... Final Day.
Late this afternoon into the evening, while I waited for a friend of mine to come over, I worked on the crew decks. He was running late (as he looked at a new apartment), so I proceeded to the bridge.
After he left, I continued where I'd left off. I almost gave up. Almost said "this can wait til tomorrow". That's when I realized precisely how few pieces remained in the boxes spread across the table. That was when I knew I wasn't going to sleep til it was finished.
Suffice to say, now I can go to sleep.
Mysteries resolved: The crew decks just "sit on" the main hull. Nothing but gravity keeps them in place. The bridge just sits on top of the crew decks (and the rear of the hull). This is (as I moved it around) quite obviously so that you can remove the top two pieces, and reach into the center to grab the keel to move it around. The one time I tried to move it with the "cradle" method, I had to rip a bunch of stuff apart and fix the internal damage I caused. Interestingly, so long as you are gentle, it is quite easy to get at the innards. The hull plates affix with three hinges at the outer edge, and magnets on the inside. Pull the magnets apart (gently) and so long as you obey the axis of the hinge, the hull plate will happily tilt right up to let you work under it like the hood of a car.
Tomorrow I get to disassemble/reassemble it one more time after I clear off the space for it on the top of the stereo gear, way up far out of the way of the cats.
Click below for pictures...
Nice 3/4 shot of the entire set:
Front Shot:
Shot of the bridge portion:
Rear view, including the drive section and the back of the bridge tower:
From the "ingenuity in use of standard pieces", it's a rotating pair of laser cannons -- take two small dishes, connect them with a small bar, sandwich in between them the large end of a pair of Lego binoculars and the eyepieces of said binoculars become a swiveling turret that looks 'custom' but isn't.
Attach those binoculars to the end of the "usual standard two-bar pieces that get uses as guns on most Lego things", and you have very mean looking four-barrel blaster arrays:
In case you ever need to know the crew-complement of an Imperial Star Destroyer (a little washed by flash, sorry):
It seems a bit .. dwarfed .. by the other ship, doncha think? (PS - Kasia - THIS is how big the Blockade Runner is supposed to be, not that monstosity your boss fooled you with grin)
Sweet. But did you notice the crack down the middle? :)