Making Louvers

[Plastheniker]

Hi,

 

I have just started a tutorial about making louvers inside my topic

Scratch Built 1958 Mercedes-Benz LP 333 Twin Steer Truck aka "Tausendfüssler"

in the MCM sub-forum Model Trucks / Big Rigs: Under Glass.

 

The louver technique should be useful for car modelers as well.

 

If you are interested in the tutorial, and for possible questions or comments please use this link:

http://www.modelcarsmag.com/forums/topic/107735-scratch-built-1958-mercedes-benz-lp-333-twin-steer-truck-aka-tausendfüssler-plus-tutorial-making-louvers/

 

Thanks!

[afx]

Replicating louvers is always a problem. Louvers have a cross section like this:

Unfortunately no manufacturer of styrene strips as Plastruct or Evergreen supplies something similar.

Two apparently obvious solutions fail in most cases regarding scales 1/25 and larger:

• 3D transfer louvers are made for modelrailroads, thus they are usually too small.

• Transplanting kit louvers mostly fails because it is not very likely to find exactly the size and the number of louvers you need; moreover cannibalizing a kit is costly.

 

I am going to describe two slightly different techniques of making louvers.

Making louvers

 

I. What do you need?

 

• For the samples shown here I used Plastruct quarter round rod 1.5mm/0.060". Your projects may require smaller or larger sizes.

• Indispensable is a drill stand with accurate height adjustment. As shown here I use an inexpensive Proxxon Minimot equipment. I simply added a modified clamp from Proxxon's Universal Holder and fixed it with the horizontal grey wing screw to the column. By turning the vertical chromed wing screw I can adjust the height of the rotary tool by fractions of a millimeter. Probably you remember this device from my wire wheel tutorial.

 

• As shown you need a large-diameter, non-flexible, thin saw blade. Mine is Micro Mark's #14137 with 2" dia. It works perfect.

 

 

II. Making medium and large louvers

 

From the quarter round rod cut equal sections of exactly the length of the desired louvers.

 

 

Assemble four of these sections to form a four-piece round rod and hold them together with a piece of tube. Fix them additionally with a small strip of tape in order to prevent any slipping.

 

 

Insert this asembly into your rotary tool and sand the protruding end to make a nice hemisphere. Do the same at the other end.

 

 

Remove the four parts from the tube. Now they look like this.

 

 

Superglue them onto a piece of styrene sheet. Adjust the height of the saw blade and "decapitate" them as shown here.

 

 

Dispose the red part on the drawing. The green part is the louver. Deburr the louvers if necessary. The final result looks like this.

 

________________________

To be continued - any questions and comments welcome

---

Greetings from Germany

 

Jürgen

Edited January 25, 2016 by afx

[afx]

Jurgen, I copied your post and brought it over to this thread.