AMT Star Wars STAP with Battle Droid
Kit#30124
(www.ertl.com)

Instructions and Reference Pictures are available

This model is what I always thought I would pick up when it was cheap. I found it for about 8 bucks and could not pass it up. While I am not a big battle droid fan, my kids love them, so I figure this one will get some loving attention before any of my other models even though I really want start my Bird of Prey. My oldest son has already told me about how to do the battle damage and where to put the weathering. So I think this one will be fun to work on with him.

Open Box Review
My son really wants him damaged, in like missing arms and legs, but I am not going to go that far. For the Battle Droid I will prime with white and the spot paint a few places metallic and use salt to create the chip places. Then base coat with Tan or sand color, and shade and brownish color and do the panel lines in the same color. For the STAP I will do the paint chips as well and base with a dark brown or rust color. Then panel line it with black.

Spure Shots

Planning
This will be a pretty straight forward build. Nothing special on the construction itself. The Droid will be painted a sandy light color and I will do some dark washes with dirt/rust brown to fill in some of the panel lines and give the droid a worn look. The Stap I plan on doing in a dark brow and with chipping. This will pretty much be an out of the box build.

Things I have learned from this kit so far.
I really need to pay attention to

Work In progress Shots
11-14-08 I did not have much time to work last night. I just assembled the head and backpack. I am trying Mr Surfacer 500 to help hide the seams. I have not sanded down the seams yet

11-16-08 Not much. Just had had a hour or two, so I just started building. All the Droid parts are assembled. The “abdomen” part did not fit well at all. I had used some squadron green putty to fill in the gap. I hope I did not do anything wrong. I plan on using some Mr. Surfacer 1000 to file some of the seams. I do see what some of the reviews mean when they say the Knees and Elbows are week. They will have to be glue in order for the Droid to able to sand on the STAP.

11-21-08 I have sanded the Mr. Surfacer down smooth on the battle droid. I assembled the STAP and used Mr Surfacer on few seams that needed it. I would have liked to have painted this in sub assemblies but the way the STAP assemblies to allow for movement I could not do it. The interesting thing is how to paint the moving parts so that A) They are all painted and B) They don’t stick together. I see a decision being made soon on if I should glue the parts in place now or deal with it later. For some reason the STAP assembly confused me on how the part should connect to allow for movement. I took a picture so if some else is confused it my help them. The droid seems fragile and will not stand on the STAP plus he is like a wet noodle and flops all over the place. Right now I am thinking that I will glue the STAP in a fixed position so I don’t have to worry about the model flopping around as I paint it. On the Droid I will have to do something. His legs do not fit on the STAP. I am thinking about using some styrene sheets to “angle” the foot pedals and I may be able to glue the feet down and then snap them on to the droid torso once everything is painted. Or cut out a bit more on the ball socket so the legs are able to spread more. The droid will have to glue in place with the shoulders, elbows, knees and hips all locked. Yes I did glue the neck in place backwards. I removed the head to make the torso assemble easier, and I put it in backwards. To correct it, I had to cut down the head connector so the head would fit. Then cut down the “neck bar” to allow the head to lean forward. I will have to glue it all in place once it is mounted. On a side note the seam on the front of the STAP is the best one I have done to date. The Tamiya Extra Then Cement made the difference. It is “hotter” and when I squeezed parts together the melted plastic oozed out. I let it harden and scarped it off with a hobby knife. Testors glue was just not hot enough to do this.
Top: The best seem I have done to date. Right: Yeap the neck is backwards. There goes my attentio to detail.

12-22-2008 The base coats went on quite well. I really like the Model Master Sand color as the base for the Battle Droid. The STAP I am not as happy about. I under coated the STAP with Model Master Steel and then slat chipped the model, and then did the base coat with Model Master Rust. The rust is a bit to dark but I can lighten the color some. Some of the salt chips look good others do not. I may paint over the bad spots. Also on some of the salt chip it has a “halo” effect where it is lighter around the chip. It doesn’t look real at all. Also most of the chips turn out “round” a few did like I wanted but not a lot. I am giving it some more thought.

Contact me at josborn@happinessismandatory.com