UCS X-Wing 2023 - Mods

[rde]

On 7/6/2023 at 8:23 AM, Aeroeza said:

Gotta say I love this X-Wing… Having built the first two versions, I was happy to see TLG address many of the inaccuracies of the past & at the same time engineer something very different. Kudos to Henrik! But, ideally, there's a few changes I'd like to make to this UCS beyond a small MOD here & there, the S-Foil system being one of them - those wings ideally shouldn't droop when closed & that gap between them is problematic. It would be great to display this set without those features being so apparent & McPhatty's new stand, incorporating the landing gear, goes a long way to solving this problem. An inspired solution! And, once you've seen those renders with that top plate tilted slightly downward toward the nose tip, well, you can't un-see it. This set needs a new nose section!

ChemicalWorld & JabbaTheHatt have collected together some great tweaks to the set but the nose section is a bit of a rebuild. So, in the spirit of giving it a crack myself & putting a few ideas out there, here's my tinkering in Studio thus far...

Version 1

1. Uses two vertical 1 x 4, thin Technic Liftarm to mount the tilted top nose panel at an angle of 3.4 degrees. This still incorporates the Technic Pins with Tow Balls to continue providing some lateral support to the side panels.

2. Given the loss of the original upper technic beam structure, a series of horizontal liftarms, connected both forward & rear of the two vertical liftarm mounts are integrated with the lower technic beams. Two layers of plates complete the reinforcement & still provide plenty of room for however you may want to build support for the tilted nose plate. It’s probably overengineering but this solution fits snugly & still allows for the light grey ingot bars to add their worth to the job of the red tow balls.

3. The lower side panel has had the transparent 12L bar shifted half a stud back via the use of a 1 x 2 jumper plate, allowing for the nose cone/tip to fit just that little bit closer on its two red 4L axles.

4. The upper side panel has been divided into two sections. The lower section here still uses the tan wedge to slot into the nose cone. It also provides a channel for the topmost side panel to slide into. Hinge plates & a 1 x 3 double jumper plate have been used to lift & align this topmost side panel with the tilted top nose panel, closing the gap between them almost perfectly into an overall hexagonal form.

5. The only way I could get the top nose panel to fit so snugly to the side panels & still provide all the room required for the internal structure to fit was to use both 1 x 2 - 1 x 2 inverted & 1 x 2 - 1 x 4 brackets. These provide a bed of studs for the tiles rather than using studs provided by a layer of plates. Even a single layer of plates is simply too thick to use here. It’s worth noting that I’ve also been very careful to make sure Studio hasn’t tricked me with any hidden collisions or strange connections.

What I don’t like about the result is that the top nose panel is raised almost one plate above the base of the canopy piece. It’s a small complaint but ideally this component should be in line with the canopy for a nice, clean profile. Also, the use of brackets, although critical to the success of the MOD, are awkward to connect with a good amount of clutch power to all the supporting plates, hinge & technic bricks which form the rest of the component. I’ve yet to test it, but I suspect you would need to handle the top nose panel with care. At least it does tilt nicely with closely fitted parallel side panels to match. In addition, the whole nose section, with all that liftarm support, shouldn’t sag over time or separate from the rear of the model when moved about.

Version 2

1. Retains a similar technic support structure but uses two 1 x 3, thin Technic Liftarms to mount the top nose panel instead. This lowers it to be in line with the base of the canopy for that clean side profile I prefer.

2. As an alternative approach, the tan wedges can instead be incorporated into the upper side panel. This should better hold this panel in place than the design used in Version 1. So long as the clutch power of the hinge plates is enough, then the channel which the upper side panel slots into should also lock the other side panels in place as the tan wedges slide into the nose tip to form the X Wing’s hexagonal front profile.

3. Unfortunately the upper side panel must also be lowered as the thickness of the top nose panel is now too great, even with the use of brackets. The jumper plate is removed & a straightforward connection to the hinge is made. Only tiles one stud in width are required here rather than the two studs in width used for Version 1. The upper side panel is lowered by half a stud, remaining nicely parallel to the top nose panel but more of a gap is revealed by the side tiles at the corner of the hexagon where the two panels meet. It is still most certainly an improvement over the original build but doesn’t look quite as elegant as Version 1.

4. More gap means fewer brackets required. The top nose panel can now provide more clutch power & greater stability all-round via the use of larger plates. Only a single hinge brick has been used, an approach worth exploring for Version 1 too.

I'd also like to give a shout out to Hypodorious on r/Lego Reddit whose MODs for this set are really next level. Go check their work out folks!

Wow! That is fantastic work! I love it! Looks very very clean and neat! Would you mind sharing stud.io? Thanks 🎈

[Aeroeza]

Done! And built in the real world!! Version 3.

It is over engineered but the aim was for strength & stability. Technic Liftarms attach the nose plate at four points. The brackets aren't a stable base for the nose tiles & needed vertical support from opposing jumper plates, an underpinning 2 x 16 plate & below this & also 3 1 x 2 slopes. The combination of these supports resolves the brackets stability issues & allows for significant stresses to be applied to the overall structure. The side panels sloping toward the nose tip pretty much worked as per my original Studio play.

 

 

Edited August 9, 2023 by Aeroeza

[rde]

3 hours ago, Aeroeza said:

Done! And built in the real world!! Version 3.

It is over engineered but the aim was for strength & stability. Technic Liftarms attach the nose plate at four points. The brackets aren't a stable base for the nose tiles & needed vertical support from opposing jumper plates, an underpinning 2 x 16 plate & below this & also 3 1 x 2 slopes. The combination of these supports resolves the brackets stability issues & allows for significant stresses to be applied to the overall structure. The side panels sloping toward the nose tip pretty much worked as per my original Studio play.

 

 

Fantastic work, that is beautiful! I will MOD mine tonight when the kid is sleeping. :)

[rde]

As a photographer with too much gear and scanners, here are some stickers for future renders! Enjoy..



Stud.io file can be downloaded here.

Edited August 9, 2023 by rde

[Aeroeza]

16 hours ago, rde said:

"...Stud.io file can be downloaded here."

 

Cool! This floats my perfectionist boat!! 

Edited August 10, 2023 by Aeroeza

[mcphatty]

@Aeroeza Your nose mod is excellent! The angled panel you added to the original side panels is a great piece of building, really great job sealing all the gaps up. Looking forward to seeing the finished product, have you built it for real yet?

My nose mods, landing gear stand and R2 are all done, I don’t think I’m going to do anything else to this set. Free instructions are on Rebrickable, see the zip file for the nose and R2 stuff.

[Aeroeza]

On 8/12/2023 at 6:03 AM, mcphatty said:

"Looking forward to seeing the finished product, have you built it for real yet?"

 

@mcphatty Yep! Here ya go...

Thanks for the thumbs up! The design worked as hoped. The gaps are closed & the MOD is solid. It holds together without concerns that it will fall apart if held firmly. I've also removed the 4 x 6 plate from the nose tip/cone to better fit the the new angle...

 

I'll certainly be building your stand. It's a fabulous solution. You've also taken some gorgeous shots of your MODs there. I've only my phone camera , renders from Studio & a tiny touch-up in Nuke to work with so you've certainly put me to shame!! Not to mention your excellent instructions. Your efforts are a real boon to the Lego community in general. Thank you!! 

As for me, I've not yet finished with this UCS. Alongside @rde, I've also been tackling Hypodorious' S-Foil MOD. More to follow soon methinks!! He's on the case like a howling gale at the proverbial gates of Lego stardom!! (I'm the slow one).

 

Edited August 14, 2023 by Aeroeza

[rde]

Fantastic MODs @mcphatty , looks really good! 🤘

Me and @Aeroeza kind of stumbled into each other, apparently we were both working on the same s-foil MOD (which was originally found on reddit, made by a very cool and helpful guy named San), who In turn helped me a lot with his s-foil MOD as he only posted like 15 photos of it.. lots of emails back and forth, phew!

Meanwhile @Aeroeza just like a wizard drew it all up in studio with nothing but photos to look at which in itself is most impressive!

Here is a quick render of my version. Will test build it today if all parts arrive.

And @Aeroeza has been awesome sending me his studio files as well (need to build his epic v3 today, parts should arrive, finally!). Here is a quick print screen with some various mods he has done. I just added some panels which I am not happy with at the moment, had no time to make changes as kid was going to bed and wife wasnt too happy. 😆

Going to be great in the end! 🤘

 

[rde]

Ok, right.. so here is a working S-FOIL MOD (v5), it's was a bit fiddly, BUT i am happy to say it WORKS.

That's about it for now. I will go back into my cave and build V3.4 of @Aeroeza MOD.

edit: there is a tiny error, four 1x1 bricks needs to be swapped out to 1x1 technic bricks with holes.. and correct pins needs to be added.. this will go fast.., v6 on it's way..

Edited August 17, 2023 by rde

[rde]

Alright, S-FOIL mod v6: Fixed some errors in the build, added correct bricks/pins, also removed those nasty grills.. blah... switched to tiles instead! Looks cleaner.. I am happy with this version.. hmm..

 

Edited August 17, 2023 by rde

[Krazeh]

Looks really good. Do you have a studio file for the mod which you wouldn't mind sharing?

[rde]

1 hour ago, Krazeh said:

Looks really good. Do you have a studio file for the mod which you wouldn't mind sharing?

S-foil? Sure, when its done! Need to attach wings, modify panels etc. And.. then attach it all.. @Aeroeza is probably on it and doing some magic! 

[rde]

Long time since any updates! Here we go!

We are working very hard on that S-FOIL MOD which has gone thru a lot of changes at this point.. it's getting there (looks great), @Aeroeza has done some fantastic MOD's on those wings as well! Just beautiful! I am sure he has done like 10-15 versions at this point, crazy! (Wish I could post some renders but I wont, I'll let him do that himself.. ).

It's like ping pong over here between me and @Aeroeza which is super fun! Always something new to do (phew).. so with that said let's hope we are done before Christmas.. .

Anyways, here is a small tease for you all.. :)
(please note, stock vanilla s-foil is in all of these renders but I promise the finished result will be beautiful! Stay tuned!).

Updated tip, looks good!


Some greebling, v1.2, this might change quite a bit as we all have various ideas. :)




Swooooosh!






That's about it, hope to have more updates real soon!

Edited September 16, 2023 by rde

[KK3D]

Glad I came upon this forum.  I've only recently gotten into UCS sets and modifying them.  I wanted to post to show my changes to the UCS Xwing.  I don't have a lot of sets to work with so there is a lot of kitbashing from what I had laying around to get to something I thought worth showing off. 

Special thanks to @Aeroeza for putting together a slopping front.  I built on top of the setup by elevating the cockpit/seating/window by one stud.  Having the roof plate behind the cockpit lining up with the rest of the body made it to be more accurate to an actual X-Wing.  I was happy to get all the studs off the sides of the body too, not sure why they even did that, except for structure.  Everything was for personal preference or cosmetic.  Raising the cockpit higher does cause an issue with the sides of the body.  The glass doesn't fit perfectly without getting pushed up.  There is a happy accident with the cockpit and the 2x1 pieces under the grey tile where it locks it in place with a little bit of pressure.

I'm happy with how the area behind the cockpit looks.  Exposing a little bit of the sand blue helped marry that section to the body better.  And I was lucky the Tallneck had those 2x2 half-flat pieces in the same blue that I could steal to drop under the hinges.

-Engines-

1. Moved engines in be 1 stud
2. Moved thrusters in by 1 stud, stole techinic bricks from the nose cone and switched them.
3. Changed engine center
4.  Reordered engine parts

(For those moving in the engines by 1 stud and can't get the pins under the wing to go in all the way, know you don't need all of the 2x2 half-flat pieces to keep the engines in place)

-Cockpit-

1. Moved the seat forward by 1 stud
2. Fille in the space inside with grey pieces for the rest of the interior
 

-Cannons-

1. Reverse rear cannon section.  (If you turn around the part that's holding up the back section of the cannon you can reorder all the barrel pieces so studs are facing the other direction.)

Removing the 1x1 red wall tiles and replacing them with 1x1 pieces on their side helped keep the body from moving around and locked them in place.

 

I rebuilt the stand so I could display it on its side with my UCS A wing.  I reinforced the stand so it wasn't so wobbly.

[JFfy0218]

I can't wait for someone to fix these wings so I can fix them.

[rde]

On 10/2/2023 at 6:13 AM, JFfy0218 said:

I can't wait for someone to fix these wings so I can fix them.

Oh, its coming..😁🥳

[Guyinaplaguemask]

When? Not to be a bother, but it's been several months.

[rde]

On 12/24/2023 at 10:33 PM, Guyinaplaguemask said:

When? Not to be a bother, but it's been several months.

Hi, yes, good things seem to take time. About five months now. 

We are basically done, just some minor stuff that needs our attention.

The good news is a testbuild is being built right now, and it is looking fantasic!

Stay tuned! 🤘

Edited January 6 by rde

[Guyinaplaguemask]

Awesome, and thanks for all the work you're putting into it!

[rde]

1 hour ago, Guyinaplaguemask said:

Awesome, and thanks for all the work you're putting into it!

I am sure you'll like it once done.

We are 3 people involved in this epic project! Me, @Aeroeza and @Rilted 🤘. Its been an amazing journey so far! We are having a blast!

[dmount]

I found this thread and absolutely love the mods that have been created. Are there plans to share these mods still? @rde @Aeroeza@Rilted

I was considering buying this UCS set, but the flat nose drives me nuts. It'd be a no brainer to get the set if these mods become available.

I'd be willing to purchase instructions.

Edited March 21 by dmount

[Aeroeza]

On 3/22/2024 at 4:20 AM, dmount said:

I found this thread and absolutely love the mods that have been created. Are there plans to share these mods still? @rde @Aeroeza@Rilted

I was considering buying this UCS set, but the flat nose drives me nuts. It'd be a no brainer to get the set if these mods become available.

I'd be willing to purchase instructions.

Final touches to the prototype build being addressed. Optimization of parts list in terms of expense & comparison with the original build being finalized. Sticker sheet additions complete. Instructions have begun. 

The nose cone? Well, it ain't terribly flat! 3 rather than 4 studs wide, smooth & fully integrated with the rest of the nose section. No gaps!  😁

Edited March 25 by Aeroeza

[dmount]

5 hours ago, Aeroeza said:

Final touches to the prototype build being addressed. Optimization of parts list in terms of expense & comparison with the original build being finalized. Sticker sheet additions complete. Instructions have begun. 

The nose cone? Well, it ain't terribly flat! 3 rather than 4 studs wide, smooth & fully integrated with the rest of the nose section. No gaps!  😁

Amazing news, thank you for the update! Can't wait to see the final product 

[KK3D]

Hi

I wanted to post some updates to my X-Wing that I posted last year,  I was inspired by Giamax74's YOUTUBE video and how he was able to integrate the wings into the body.  I followed as much of his breakdown as I could and rehauled my wings to incorporate a lot of his build.  I'm still using most of the original internals to open the wings so they still sag, but I can live with that now that there aren't any of the internals exposed.   Thanks to his video, I think my build is much more accurate.  Everyone who's posted on this thread has made this so much more fun, thank you all.  Hopefully, I can inspire a bit as well.

 

1. I was able to replace the fuselage with all flat panels, no studs (minus the nose)

2. Updated turrets, flat circle in the rear

3. I filled in the cockpit with more computers and tighter seating.

4. Expanded the wings a stud, and added inner wing engines, and inner wing panels.

5. Updated the back of the wings so the "S-Foils" section actually locks in.

6. Covered and closed the gap in the fuselage under the wings.

Plus tons of panel work across the fuselage and body. I really wanted up the panels by having some intention to their placement around the cockpit and the front sloping areas. The more I could break up the paneling the better in my opinion.

 

 

[Sucram]

Looks really damn good