SIM Tech Report #2 - Mir

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This is the second in a series of short versions of the Space In Miniature series called “Tech Reports”.  I have been fascinated by the Soviet Union’s space program since the Space Race of the 1960s. Prior to glasnost and the fall of the old Soviet Union, it was very difficult to get good information on their spacecraft designs, yet folks like myself wanted to build models. In fact, one of my early scratchbuild projects was a 1/96th scale Apollo-Soyuz with a scratchbuilt Soyuz. Now you can get almost any Russian manned spacecraft in very nice resin (or even injection molded) kits of various scales. Mir is one of those kits. Vista Replicas and RealSpace Models issued rather simple resin kits of Mir, but in 1998 Revell- Monogram released a snap-together kit of Mir. It’s actually a decent kit, and when Tom Kladiva of NewWare came out with a six sheet photo-etch detail set, it was a project I had to do. This Tech Report is a 34-page chronicle of my effort to build that model, using the Revell-Monogram kit, some parts from RealSpace, and the NewWare photo-etch set. Even if readers don’t intend to repeat this elaborate project, I hope the contents offer some tips on scratchbuilding and detailing historical spacecraft models. The download price is $8.00. These Tech Reports will only be available via electronic download and payment via Paypal.  It allows the use of color illustrations, and simplifies my life by eliminating the need to fill orders, store boxes of books, run to the post office, etc. The reports can also be updated as needed.  In most cases, Paypal will take you to the download site when you place your order, otherwise I will send you an e-mail with a link to the pdf file.  It is about 174MB file and contains over 100 photos of the model build in-progress. If you have obtained a copy of this via any other means than the Space In Miniature website you have an unauthorized copy.  I would request that you visit my website and make an appropriate payment and also inform me of your source of this publication. To order just the Mir book, click the Buy Now button below: or use the main order page to order the Skylab book plus any other SIM publication.  This volume was released in September 2013. In November 2013 version 2.1 was issued. It corrects some typos, cleans up some info in the table on page 5 and clarifies the solar array discussion on page 9.