[WIP] MG Nu Ver. Ka X LED WIP 4

Next up would be the main body.

Good thing the kit is designed in a way that lets me remove and install the armor pieces without disassembling the inner frame. That way I can finish wiring this kit first, then paint the armor parts.

I forgot to mention that I've actually already painted the inner frame before doing the LED mods. I used a custom mix of Zurc gunmetal for this. I say custom mix since it's just regular Zurc gunmetal mixed with either pearl white or metallic black to get the shade I wanted.

Since I'm almost already done with the LED mods, I've started on painting the armor parts.

I'm using Zurc paints here. The white is pearl white, the blue is Zurc's "Exia Blue", I actually wanted a darker shade simillar to the original color but I really like the finish so I'm going along with it.

The two-tone whites were done by first spraying a layer of primer gray on the desired parts then spraying pearl white all over the piece. 

I'm still undecided on modding the fin funnels. I want them lit up if I'm going to do some dynamic posing but if they're just going to be placed at the back then I don't see any reason to light them up.

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[WIP] MG Nu Ver. Ka X LED WIP 3

Continuing where I left, I started working on the lower body.

The feet was one of the simplest parts to do. but since the clear part goes around the feet. I had to put 2 LEDs on each side for it to be lit properly.

The legs would be the hardest part since it's built with lots of layered and interlocking parts. Not to mention there are moving pieces for the psycho-frame gimmick. 

I wouldn't try explaining it here in detail because that will be really hard. But hopefully you get some idea with the pics here.

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[WIP] MG Nu Ver. Ka X LED WIP 2

On to the harder parts of the project.

One thing about this kit is the complicated joint mechanism on the elbows. 

For the elbow joint, the best that I could think of was to go around it instead of embedding the wires within the joint. 

For the shoulders, I had to use 3 LEDs just to spread the light evenly across the clear part. The 0603 SMD LEDs' size really help in embedding the LEDs into the parts. The downsize would be that it only illuminates a smaller area. 

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[WIP] MG Nu Ver. Ka X LED WIP 1

So I scrapped my previous MG Nu ver.Ka project and started a new one.

My last MG Nu ver.Ka was ages ago and I've learned quite a lot since then. My WIP posts from that time are still here so we can compare what's changed and new with this one.

One notable difference would be the 0603 SMD LEDs and the 30AWG magnet wires I'll be using for this project.

Since the head is actually designed to be lit, everything in this part makes my work a bit easier. In the end, I decided to put the LED onto the neck piece so I can maximize the space originally designed for the LED module. plus this way, the head can still be removed for whatever reason necessary.

Next up would be the backpack. I think this would be one of the simplest parts of this project to work on. Wiring was pretty straightforward since there was plenty of space on the backpack part.

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[WIP] MG Star Build Strike X LED WIP 3

I'm already on the final stretch with this project. Since I've already rewired both plavsky wings so that they have the same light intensity, I've also done the same with some parts like the universe booster.

I've also finished wiring the connections at the back. What I did was to separate the connections for the main body, universe booster, and the plavsky wings so that I can still disassemble them for easier storage and transportation.

Now that all mods are done, it's time to put them all together and test them out.

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[WIP] MG Star Build Strike X LED WIP 2

It took quite some time to update this project. Last time, I was working on the plavsky wings. The reason it took this long was that lighting those wings took a lot of work and LEDs.

Anyway, since I've already finished wiring the main body, it's time to assemble them.

To make the wiring easier, I didn't bother hide most of the wiring inside the body. I concentrated on passing all the wires towards the back area near where the backpack connects to the body. There I will use a connector so that the backpack is still removable.

Now that the main body is done, it's time to get back on the back pack. Last time I worked on this, I've only finished wiring about half of the backpack.

After finishing wiring the backpack, I noticed that the newly wired parts look brighter than the old ones. Maybe because they're from a different batch of LEDs. Just when I thought I was done, I had to rewire most of the backpack.

Going back to the plavsky wings, I've finally finished wiring both of them. unfortunately they have the same issue with the backpack.

The newly wired wing looks brighter than the older one. I'll have to rewire the other wing. It took 32 LEDs to wire each wing.

Here's a pic of the 0603 LED used.

This looks much better.

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