See the model in the Google 3D Warehouse here and the gallery below:

As far as I know there are no biometric iPod safes in existence. When you place your iPod in the dock it is then lowered down and concealed within the stereo where it will charge and allow it to be operated by the stereo. Once the iPod is safely stowed it can only be removed once the owner scans their thumb print (or fingerprint, toe print, paw print, flipper print and sometimes tentacle print, etc.) on the included scanner atop the unit. Sure, someone can just steal the whole thing but as an additional precaution there is a Kensington security slot located on the back that is compatible with their tethered laptop locks (sorry, modeled separately).

In addition to iPod compatibility the stereo can accept a variety of inputs. The built in BluRay player is capable of playing BluRay discs, DVDs, CDs and all recordable variants. You can also access and play images, music or videos through the front USB port and SD card reader. If that is not enough there are also 3 HDMI/composite inputs on the back of the unit allowing for connection to a video game system, cable/satellite box or additional BluRay/DVD players. Video can be output to any TV with an available HDMI input. Connecting all components to the stereo allows everything to connect to the TV with a single HDMI cable.

See the model in the Google 3D Warehouse here and the gallery below:

My parody version is called SketchUpenstein 3D and is modeled entirely in 2D components including the walls. The original enemy guards have been replaced with the “Unmodelers” who are bent on erasing all 3D models armed with giant SketchUp erasers. In this erase or be erased world you must guide the hero, Bryce, through the game killing, er, I mean, erasing the unmodelers before all is lost. Along the way you can recover some models taken from the 3D Warehouse including the coveted Google SketchUp 3D Challenge trophy.  When ‘”playing” SketchUpenstein 3D be sure to use your imagination. Some laughable instructions are listed at the top of the screen to help you along.

See the model in the Google 3D Warehouse here and the gallery below:

Usually I post something on my blog about the challenge right after I finish my model but this time I am posting after the winner was determined. I am happy to say that I am the winner of the challenge making it my 8th win.

For this challenge I decided on making an electric bus. My inspiration came from a few concept buses I found online but in the end I came up something unique. My entry is entitled “Solocraft Electric Bus”. Just in case you are wondering, “Solocraft” is the fictional brand name I use for any vehicle I create for the challenges. The name comes from Han Solo from Star Wars.

It is designed to be small and maneuverable for tight city streets. Instead of relying on overhead wires this one gets its power from the Lithium ion batteries contained in the front and back drive module units which would save on infrastructure costs. It would be very lightweight to provide for a decent amount of battery range.

The most unique feature of the bus is the way in which it steers. There is a 4 wheel drive module at both the front and back of the bus. Each module rotates on its own 360 degree axis. This allows the bus to not only make very tight turns and the ability to turn on a dime but it also enables it to rotate the drive modules 90 degrees and pull up to the curb laterally.

The floor is at the same level as a standard city curb height in the middle for easy no climb access to the lower level seats. The floor height also accommodates wheelchair users like me without trouble at the specifically designed bus stops the bus would use. When the bus parks at regular bus stops or on flat pavement a ramp concealed in the floor also provides for wheelchair access.

I had planned to push this model further by creating an attachment that would turn it into an airplane for short distance air travel but I had to abandon that idea as I ran towards the deadline. Sometimes my ideas are just too ambitious to complete within the allotted time. You can see what happens when I don’t have a deadline for a project if read about my Starship Project on this blog. I plan on implementing the airplane idea as well as a few other ideas that would extend it’s versatility after I finish the starship.

See the model in the Google 3D Warehouse here and the gallery below:

For the rear facing weapons I started by modifying a quad laser cannon. I just took a half of the quad laser cannon, removed the disc and created a hinged mount for it that restricts horizontal movement (5 degrees inward and 15 degrees outward to avoid shooting the sub light engines or bumping the side of the ship). The mount housing pokes through the wall of the cargo section and has a round door accessible for maintenance inside the cargo section. There are 2 of these dual laser cannons on each side of the cargo hull.

For the kitchen equipment the first thing I modeled was an electric range. This may seem funny putting something like this on a spaceship that isn’t even from Earth but if you watch Star Wars – Episode II: Attack of the Clones you will see something similar in the scene in Dex’s Diner. It hangs on the wall in place of a wall panel and has a smooth glass top. I also created a matching range hood for each of the 2 ranges.

Continuing in the kitchen I created modular cabinets that match the style of the electric range that also hang on the wall. One of the cabinets was then further modified to become a sink. As you can see in the pictures the sink is again similar to a kitchen sink found on Earth but why reinvent the “repulsorlift”. What is different is the faucet which is operated by buttons that set the temperature and the flow rate right on the spigot.

And finally every kitchen needs a trash can so again I created one in the style of the electric range and again it hangs on the wall. I placed 2 more of these trash cans on either side of the Mess Hall entrance.

The final thing I did this time was add 2 additional landing struts in the back of the ship because I felt just two in the back were inadequate.

Along the way I also replaced all 2 3/4 and 2 1/4 panel walls with 2 1/2 panel walls to reduce the amount of components. This doesn’t reduce the file size by much but I’m trying to optimize the model as much as I can. As it currently stands the model is 17 megabytes.  I plan to upload the completed starship to the Google 3D Warehouse once done. The 3D Warehouse only lets people upload models up to 10 megabytes  so I’ll have to break it up into pieces and people will have to reassemble it.

What’s next now? The head (bathrooms), the brig, the infirmary with a small morgue and possibly some ceiling lighting. Update 16 will likely be the final update where I will declare the project finished! One problem though, it still doesn’t have a name…

See the gallery below or here to see what was added this update:

The first thing I did was to fix the table design in the mess hall so the ridge would no longer be in the way people sitting at the ends of the table.

Next I made the controls for the main elevator on the bridge. They are all based on the design of the pocket door controls I designed earlier. I then added the controls for the “Jeffrie’s tubes” which are identical to the bulkhead door controls. Once I was done with the control pads I added detail to the outside of the pocket doors so they match all the other doors on the ship.

Most of the shortcomings I mentioned in the last update were taken care of this time in the form of the new engineering section. The first thing I needed to do was to move the cargo section back by 22 feet to make room for the engineering section. That required me to lengthen the hull plating to cover up the new gaping hole I created. I copied the cargo section and pasted it above the ship so I could turn the copy into the engineering section. I shortened the newly created section and cut out a hole for the bulkhead doors. Then I had to make the front wail of the cargo section flat again. I then reconfigured the wall panels to cover the walls. I also removed everything from the cargo section that would now be located in engineering. I didn’t make any snapshots until I finished creating the empty engineering section because it was just boring busy work. I then moved the engineering section in place in front of the cargo section.

Continuing the work on the engineering section I extended the crown lighting under the upper floor and added columns to support it. Once that was done I moved on to modeling the hyperdrive equipment. I decided to place the hyperdrive generator on the lower floor of the engineering section on the front wall. It’s design is based on the hyperdrive I saw in the cross section drawing of the Millennium Falcon I mentioned in the last update. I found only one other example of a hyperdrive generator online but it was just a monolith with a lot of detail that I didn’t want to add. I made the generator upright as opposed to flat so it would fit against the wall. I added some tubing at the bottom of the generator to connect to the wall. These manifolds connect the hyperdrive generator to the four power generators and to the hyperdrive motivators that will later be added to the outer hull.

Since I added manifolds to the hyperdrive I decided the power generators needed exhaust manifolds. I created these in the same way as the small ones. The pipes wind upward, then converge into one then the pipe widens and connects with the ceiling. Above the exhaust pipes I created a round vent on top of the ship to expel heat and gaseous vapors.

The next job was to design the computer core for the ship. I decided on placing the computer core on the lower level back wall of the engineering section. To make it fit I extended the floor above to create enough depth underneath so the computer core wouldn’t extend past it. For the core I decided to make it a network of several (10) computer racks containing 6 modules each. The computer core would work much like modern distributed computing systems. Each CPU works autonomously with the others and share the load creating a powerful and redundantly safe computer core. In the middle of banks of computer racks I created a network cabinet that contains a central hub where all the computers in the core and the rest of the ship connect to each other (most likely with fiber optic cables).

And finally I decided to create some display screens that show a schematic of the ship from several views that would highlight problem areas going on in the ship. This was inspired by the the ones seen on Star Trek The Next Generation in the main engineering room on the Enterprise that have the same function. To do this I simply created a style making all faces black and edges orange and set the camera to parallel projection. I then took snapshots of 4 different views and combined them into a single image. The resulting image was then used as a material. I placed one of these screens on either side of the computer core. I also decided to put them on the main level of the bridge. In addition I create 4 blank screens for the bridge to be used for tactical or communication applications.

The ship is now about 95% complete now. What’s next? Hyperdrive motivators, relocation of the entrance (Likely to have two: one entrance in each airlock), the kitchen equipment and rear facing weapons.

See the gallery below or here to see what was added this update:

The first step in designing the Escape Pods was deciding where to put them and how big to make them. I decided to put them underneath the main corridor because there is over 6 feet of clearance between the bottom of the corridor and inside of the outer hull plating. The maximum length of the escape pod was determined by the width between the hull plating section bracing at 16’8. The width of the escape pods was determined by the the width of the protruding strip of blue hull plating underneath the ship at 11’. The typical size and shape of escape pods used in the Star Wars universe would not fit within this space. They are typically barrel shaped and exceed the maximum length I need. The design I came up with is closer to the design of a small shuttle craft.

I created a panel for the bottom of the hull plating that will be blown off when a pod is launched. The panels are held on by exploding bolts that explode when an electrical current is passed through their pyrotechnic charges. I am not going to bore you (or me for that matter) by going through all the details of the build up of the pods but I will instead just outline their features. They are accessed through the top hatch of the pod through an access tube accessed through the floor of the starship’s corridor. When marooned, I mean when landed, on the surface of a planet The window in the front is used as the escape hatch. The pod can act as shelter while you wait for rescue or hide from Krayt dragons. They each have the capacity for 8 crew members with enough fuel, air, water, rations and supplies for for 4 standard days. The outside of the pods feature 4 small ion drive thrusters for forward propulsion and 8 pairs of maneuvering thrusters. The escape pods are attached to the ship with 4 exploding bolts on brackets attach to the outer tube or the main corridor. To get in to a pod you pull a red lever on the floor of main corridor and the floor cover raises up and the access tube and pod hatches slide open. The 8 passengers side down into the pod, They then quickly argue about who gets to be pilot and the aggressive Senator from Alderman takes matters into her own hands and orders the kid, the Wookiee, the professor, the smuggler and the gambler to sit down as she takes the wheel.

The design of the bunks I created for the crew quarters was inspired by the ones in a cross section drawing of the Millennium Falcon found on Wookieepedia. Each room has 4 beds and there are 8 rooms total. These beds, while small, really beat the heck out of the ones in modern nuclear submarines. The width of the “cubby holes” are wide enough for storage to sit along side the upholstered mattresses with a shelf for personal items. It is important for the bunks to be comfortable for lengthy deep space missions unless it’s an imperial starship. In that case comfort is thrown out the viewport. What’s the point of padding when you’re forced into wearing useless plastic and fiberglass storm trooper armor? If there is even a hint of blaster fire you won’t even have time to discover your bunk assignments before playing humanoid shield.

For the mess hall chairs I simply removed the armrests from the standard chairs. For the benches I took the chair and made it 2 and a half times wider with two pedestal bases. For the tables I created a rectangular top with rounded corners and created a ridge down the middle as a way to divide the sides of the table. I then created a pedestal base with a larger circumference than the chairs. I just realized that with chairs at the long ends of this table, the ridge in the way of whoever sits there. That won’t work; I’ll fix that once I publish this. Next I created a surround for the kitchen pass-through with a counter to rest food trays on. I am debating whether there should be an actual kitchen or to just use automatic food dispensers. Obviously there isn’t room for kitchen staff on a small blockade runner so if it’s going to be a kitchen then I will have to create rude cafeteria droids to insist that no droids are allowed in line.

For officer quarters I adapted the crew bunk by turning it into a single bed. That was easy. I then created a desk by modifying the ready room desk design to be linear so it would sit against the wall. I then decided the room was rather empty and I decided to create a sitting area. I accomplished this by first looking for inspiration on the web. I found a cool modern couch design that I liked so I created my own version. It has rounded hollow arm rests that the seat cushion flows through and it has an adjustable back than can fold down if necessary. After I was done with the couch I created a “brewed beverage” table using a couch armrest tipped on it’s side with a multi-tiered table top. The room still seemed empty so I placed a second couch facing the other. I moved the desk and seating around until it all looked right. I was going to also model the interior of the bathroom but after I researched that idea I decided to instead forego that and make the door closed for now. Besides, when do you actually see the bathroom on the Millennium Falcon? You know there is one somewhere but do you really need to see it?

The last thing I did was to create the door control pads. I made the one for the pocket doors first. There is nothing much to them: Just some buttons and small status screen on a rounded corner rectangular plate. For all of the other doors I made a version with more buttons and a small speaker and microphone intercom. The 2 types of bulkhead doors needed the control pads to be mounted differently so I made housings for each type to fit on the door frames. I will make additional control pads for the access tube hatches, lighting and elevators and lifts soon.

I decided to clean up the names of components for better organization. While doing so I found a bunch of mistakes in the model that I needed to fix. The problems were just minor stuff like misalignments and and some inconsistencies. There is still a lot of cleaning up to do with the names of components which I will continue to work on.

As I mentioned early I have discovered some shortcomings that the ship has. The main entrance is on the bridge which could cause a security risk while landed on a planet or in an airlock. There is no computer core or a place for it. No hyperdrive! I wasn’t aware that the big engines on a Star Wars type ship are only for sub light speed. Hyperdrive uses equipment on the inside of the vessel. To house the hyperdrive and other systems there should be a dedicated engineering room. There are no rear facing weapons. That was the major problem with the most well known blockade runner, the Tantive IV. I will address each of these issues in future updates.

See the gallery below or here to see what was added this update:

The first thing I modeled during this update was the Quad Laser Cannons. I decided on having 12 of them to go along with the 12 weapon stations on the bridge. This is an excessive amount of Quadlasers and would never be allowed in the era of the Empire but nonetheless I have made sure the ship is heavily fortified. The Tantive IV had just 2 dual laser cannons and 4 single laser cannons and if you’ve seen Star Wars then you know that didn’t go over so well. The design of the quadlasers my ship uses were based on the quad turbolaser cannons seen on the Trade Federation’s Lucrehulk class droid control ships. Since these guns are remotely controlled weapons there is a holocamera mounted between the the symmetrical gun halves. If the camera is knocked out somehow the gun could be set to automatically match it’s trajectory with a neighboring gun. A hole was punched through the hull plating panels to allow the guns to connect to the Jeffrie’s tubes below the surface. For panels without guns have a plug that closes up the holes. The plugs were initially round but I changed them to square ones with some detailing on them that didn’t look so boring.

Next I moved on to the Helm/detachable landing craft weapons. It’s weapons are 4 single stationary laser cannons (2 on either side) similar to the ones seen on your standard X-wing starfighter.  These cannons are controlled by the pilot or copilot of the vessel.

The final weapons I created are a pair of torpedo launchers. They are positioned below the main viewport on either side of the ship. On the lower floor of the bridge there are two rooms one either side of the ready room that allow access to the launchers for loading ammunition and maintenance. These are not based on any known Star Wars technology but are capable of launching various types of munitions including probes.

After some brainstorming on how to integrate the design of the cargo section with the rest of the ship to make it not look so much like an afterthought I came up with the idea to curve the outer hull around the edge of the cargo section. Along with that idea I realized that the docking ports need to extend past the width of the cargo section to allow the ship to dock with large ships without the cargo section being in the way. To accomplish these changes I started working on extending the docking ports. I took the profile of the outer hull and curved it 90 degrees with a an inner radius of 5 feet on the front side of the docking ports.  I then mirrored that onto the other side of the docking ports.  I moved the docking ports outward and created end panels to surround the ports.  After that I moved on to the cargo section. I curved the hull plating similar to the docking ports but just for the front of the cargo section. In doing so I erased the old hull plating. I also had to lower the profile of the cargo section’s chamber so it would fit inside the hull. I basically modified the chamber used for the bridge section by turning it 90 degrees and making the new back wall flat. I then had to modify the engines to fit the new shape of the cargo section.

Because of the change to the rear outer hull I had to reconfigure the front of the cargo section’s inner walls to match the new profile. Also, I made the following changes and additions to the cargo section:

• Added alcoves to the cargo chamber to reconnect the cargo section to the Jeffries’s tubes.
• Replaced front ladders with platform elevators.
• Removed catwalk from front to back to open up the middle of the cargo bay.
• Replaced lower catwalks with floors similar to the ones on the bridge and extended them around the perimeter. I added guard rails.
• Added computer consoles without joysticks to serve as engineering stations.
• Designed and added 4 power generators on the level above the engineering stations.

I then modeled the main communications antenna in the form of a dish. For the base I reused components from the quad laser cannons except scaled up and modified for the dish. I will add to the sensor array later.

The last stuff I worked on was finishing the propulsion systems. I added maneuvering thrusters around the docking ports and around the outer cargo section walls. Finally I added forward maneuvering thrusters to the back of the ship. I reused the engines from the detachable helm and made a new heat sink for them that fit against the rear hull. That reminds me; the detachable helm needs maneuvering thrusters too.

What’s next? Escape pods. Believe it or not the hull has enough room inside the lower part. At least I hope.

See the gallery below or here to see what was added this update: