MOONBASE CENTRAL: Building Excitement

We've seen some amazing models built by Frank May recently, for the 1/12 scale Major Matt Mason figure range and I for one am fascinated as to how he did it. Here, Frank explains how he actually brought these (sometimes huge) creations together.

1) Mobile HQ

The body is made from 6" acrylic tubing, with 6" domes, one a half-round, the other an elliptical. at each end. Technically, scaled up directly from the GA Mobile HQ, it would be HUGE, but I try to keep the size 'playable' as well as suitable for MMM. It's about 30" long as it is. The front 'radar' is a 3" or 4" dome. The rocket pack, at the rear, is from a GI Joe Mercury Capsule. Anyway, the rollers are actually 3" or 3 1/2" V-belt pulleys, not cart wheels as you mentioned. I was going to use wooden discs, then one day it occurred to me that a pulley had just the right look to it, so I bought 8 of 'em. The tracks are adapted from a GI Joe Iron Knight Tank, simply shortened to fit. They even roll with a bit of persuasion. The fenders are simple aluminum angle. The chassis is made from scrap wood. The big top mounted radar dish is another plastic concave dome. The driver compartment is a 3" dome, tined blue, with a piece of 3" tubing installed to hold MMM or whomever in place while 'driving'. I painted it to match the original GA one, as the colors were suitable.

2) Lunar Prospector (mev)

Another GA fav. The bulk of this is made from 1/16" plywood & 2 x 4, 2 x 6 & 4 x 4 scrap lumber. The black accordion 'coupling' is a section of flexible sink pipe drain, painted black, slipped over a wooden dowel for support. While it doesn't turn, the front & rear will at least rotate freely to negotiate obstacles. The arm is taken from an old Tonka firetruck. Its not as articulated as the little GA vehicle's arm, but it just works too cool! As you stated, I fitted the Space Power Suit claw to the end clamp; plumbed it with clear tubing & connected it to the claw to make it functional. I attached a white plastic drawer pull handle to help maneuver it. I had pondered making the wheels, then considered tricycle wheels, just for the spoke effect, then decided to use some 8" plastic utility cart wheels until I found something better. Then, while visiting my insurance agent's office, one of the girls had this nifty desktop fan & I noticed its grill was perfect! I borrowed her ruler & lo & behold, it was 8" diameter! She was duly impressed as to my interest. Quite cute as well I might add! Anyway, she had bought it locally & it so happened, it was the end of summer & they were on sale, so I bought 4. I cut off the rounded edge of it where it attached to the fan & while that not only gave it the flatten area, it left a slight tread pattern as well. Technically, the wheels might could be as large as 12" diameter, but I think what I found & used are just fine. They at least convey the look! When it came time to paint, there was no way MMM & crew were going to cruise around in a bright green & yellow vehicle! I had seen an artist's sketch of this real vehicle in a '60s space book, & it was white with red trim & silver or grey wheels & those are what I call 'basic MMM colors', so, that's how it got painted. As mentioned, the radar antenna is from a Firebolt. The driver compartment is again a 3" plastic dome tinted blue, along with a 3" tube to hold the driver in place.

3) Orbital Space Station

I see most of this is covered already, so I'll just add some details. The furnishings are all from eBay. The dollhouse section. Each compartment serves a purpose. One is Navigation & Observation. One is Lunar Base Control. One is Recreation & one is Command & Control. Had I been able to leave all 8 compartments open, I'd have had a Lab, Kitchen, Bunk Room & Storage.The counters are made of wood. The silver shelves are plastic drawers from small hardware storage cabinets with their dividers.

I currently am making refrigerator sized computers to put in the 3 'business end compartments'. The maps, charts, graphs, etc., are printed from Google images. The consoles with the all their screens & the like were the most fun! The basic part is made from the console graphics from the GI Joe Adventure Team Mobile Support Vehicle. I used the old fashioned cut, copy & paste (scissors, X-acto knife, tape & scan again.) method to replace the GI Joe screen images with more suitable images for MMM. The majority of them are box art images from MMM packages taken from various online sources & scaled to fit the 'screens'. A couple of non-MMM images are taken from various other '60s vintage space packages. Oh, yeah, the nautical-type of navigation instruments, like the sextant & dividers, are handmade, as I couldn't find them in dollhouse stuff. For the astronauts doing spacewalks, I just made wire hangers to support them, but I had to have oxygen lines supplying them & I had a devil of a time finding tubing that was just right! Their tools are dollhouse tools, BTW.

4) Nova Rocket

OK, this is unfinished, but the various sections are air condition ducting. Thin sheet metal, so not too heavy or difficult to work with. The large (main) nose cone is a real airplane propeller spinner blank, i.e., it hasn't been cut for the propeller blades. The nose cones on the 4 boosters are radio controlled airplane propeller spinners. The exhaust nozzles, not easily seen in the pics, are small plastic bowls. One on each booster, five on the rocket. The launch tower is made of PVC pipe & the base is plywood. It's mounted on casters & my plan is to add 'tracks' to it, to simulate the tracks on the launch platform NASA uses for the Shuttle now & Saturn V back in the glory days. I also have some lights that look a bit like spot lights that I plan to mount on the base, to illuminate the rocket. Of course, I also will have to create appropriate markings for the whole thing. Again, I couldn't have MMM using a purple & orange rocket, so it will be white & silver, with other MMM like colors. I still haven't addressed putting MMM & crew inside the nose cone / capsule either.

5) Mobile Rocket Launcher

Here was another fun build for me! I used the body of an old Tiger Joe battery operated remote controlled tank from the '60s. Rather than destroy a good, intact one, I had picked this one up on eBay sans its turret for a good price. One of my fav Multiple Toy Makers / Multiple Plastics space vehicle is the 'Rocket Launcher Tank', which is typically the 'little green army men's' Rocket Launcher Tank molded in white instead of army green & sold with their astronaut sets. I always thought it'd be cool for MMM to have one. I had to do a bit of 'artistic scaling' with this, as the Tiger Joe is wider than it is long as compared to the smaller version, so I had to scale up at one ratio in width & another ratio in length & just sort of make the height look right. Since the plastic astronauts are 2" tall, I generally assumed the MMM version was enlarged a factor of 3. Anyway, the bulk of the front sloped areas is 1/8" plastic sheet. The large area on the back is scrap wooden blocks. Various textured details are done with assorted plastic sheeting. The vented (screened) areas are just that, small screen. The rocket launcher is made from 1/8" & 1/4" plastic sheet & PVC pipe section. The rocket is a wooden dowel with a model airplane nose cone & sheet plastic wings. The 2 silver ladders in back are again dollhouse accessories. The 2 crew compartments are larger plastic drawers from a small hardware storage cabinet (the same one that sacrificed the smaller drawers for OSS shelving) :) cut to fit & tinted blue. The seats (not visible) for the crew under them is just undetailed plastic sheet. The winch is made from tubing & electrical wire with a GI Joe accessory hook for detail. Another reason this tank was bought cheaply was it was missing it's controller & I had hoped its motor still worked, as I hoped to motorize it, but the motor didn't work & I wasn't going to go to the trouble to adapt one. Yes, it will roll on its tracks when pushed & no, the rocket is spring loaded or anything, so it won't launch.

6) Crater Crawler:

I always thought the Tonka Crater Crawler was kinda neat, so I made MMM one.This is made using 2 front sections of the GI Joe Adventure Team Mobile Support Vehicle. It was a fairly simple operation in that the only modification I made to the front (crew) section was to install seats from the MMM Space Bubble & I bought a large Tonka Dump Truck for the new wheels. If I'd had something suitable to tint the canopy, I would have, but the plastic it's made from doesn't tolerate paint well, it crazes badly with paint & I had no way to dye it, so it remains clear. I made a swivel to join the two sections using hardware store eyebolts, bushings & a screw, so it would be as articulated as the original.

7) VertiJet

Another of the Multiple Plastics Astronaut line, I think it was generally called a Flying Platform in that line, but I wanted one for MMM. Again, this was fairly simple. I basically scaled the smaller version up by a factor of 3 & made the basic body from various sizes of PVC pipe & plastic tubing, the primary pipe size being 3". The side detail is made from 1/8" half round plastic rod & the legs are cut from 1/8" plastic sheet. The pads on the bottom were originally going to be plastic discs, but I stumbled upon some cheap flashlights at my local Wal Mart, for only $1 & they came with 2 AA batteries, so, considering I'd get batteries & a bulb out of the purchase, I bought them for the cheap clear lens, which had just a bit of detail & were the right size & installed them. The rest went in my cabinet for later use! I started to had some sort of controls to it, like the console from a CatTrac, but wanted to keep it fairly close to the original. I suppose, like the original, it is probably 'mind controlled'. :) I thought 'Flying Platform' sounded too simple, so I finally settled on calling it the 'VertiJet'.