Lower Access Pits

Part one in what will be a short saga of access pits!  The lower access pits are part of my model that wasn't part of the original Falcon as it appeared in 1977.  Before they added the forward landing gear boxes for The Empire Strikes Back the lower access pits occupied a more central location on the lower saucer as seen in this image:

This original design was reflected in the full sized set pictured below, but if you look carefully behind the hoses you'll see a metal support.  

The weight of the mandibles (as well as the cockpit in the case of this set) required more support than the single forward landing gear could provide so when constructing the set for The Empire Strikes back, two additional forward landing gear boxes were added to the design and ultimately the 5 foot filming miniature.

This change in design changed the look of the lower access pits which were moved outward and thinned out a bit.

Here are some renders of my lower access pits:

And here is the part ID map:

I had a hard time finding clear reference for the port side lower access pits so a lot of the parts in there were eyeballed to the best of my ability.  As I uncover more about these parts I will continue to update.  Also you'll notice some of the McLaren parts are mirrored from one side to the other.  This was a tactic I used to fill space in areas I was unsure about or had poor reference for.

As always here's an image of our progress so far:

Thank you for reading!  I also want to mention that with the help of Lee Malone of Rogue Studio Productions I will be updating some part ID maps.  Tonight I've updated the Dish Greebles.

Next time: Upper access pits

Jaws Part III: Upper Jaw

The Falcon's upper jaw is one of the more detailed parts of the miniature, with many kitbashed model parts as well as a lot of brass tubing bent into an array of pipes.  In my opinion it's one of the more memorable and iconic parts of the ship.  Here are some renders of my Falcon's upper jaw:

 

 

The beauty  renders above contain a mistake on the upper jaw that I corrected for the part map below.  If you can spot it, let me know in the comments below!  I don't have a prize to offer but you would get extra credit toward your final grade!

As you can see, there were a lot of kits used in this area.  Most of the larger pieces are from various tanks but there is a good amount of parts from the Ferrari 312B kit sprinkled throughout.  I think my favorite pieces to model were the two missile tubes from the M36 Jackson kit.

Here's a render of our progress:

Thanks for reading! 

Next time: Forward Lower Access Pits!

Jaws Part II: Lower Jaw

With the inside of the jaws finished let's move on to the lower jaw greebles, the Millennium Falcon's goatee if you will.  Here's a render of the Falcon's lower jaw:

The lower jaw has a big landing gear box in the middle of it which splits the greebles into two groups one toward the front and another toward the back.

I had to take some artistic license with my build because my landing gear box layout favors the set blueprint from The Empire Strikes Back so there is actually a missing greeble on my model that I wasn't able to fit.  It's a part from the Tamiya 1:35 Kampfwagen Ausf. F/G.  A couple of other greebles in this area also come from that kit.  You can see it in this image:

Here is the part map for the lower jaw:

And as always here's a render of our progress so far:

The front is starting to take shape down here!  Thanks for reading!  I'll be covering the upper jaw very soon!