Orbital's Minotaur Launch Vehicle
This is my first model that I designed and textured myself. I saw the small Minotaur rocket that Orbital made, and thought that it would be a nice model to have, but nobody had designed one yet. So after looking into it for a little bit I decided that I would make it myself.
I designed the model in Metasequoia and designed the textures in Paint Shop Pro 8. (I'm a little behind on versions, but it works just fine for my purposes.) After I had all the parts where I wanted them, I unfolded it in Peparkua. Version 2 of Pepakura had just been released, and version 2.4 of Metasequoia had also just come out, and those changes made my job much easier.
After I had the layout finished, I printed it to a PDF and then edited it in MS Word. (I have a program that converts pdf files to MS Word files.) Not the most elegant solution, but it worked rather well. I was really pleased with the final result too.
Pictures and Download
Here are some comparison pictures for you to see just how well my first project turned out.
And to show you the finished length and on display:
Download the Minotaur model here.
Revision 1 was released 2 Sept 07.
Instructions and building notes are included with the model. I recommend that you print this on regular white paper, around 20-24 lb. For those of you who missed out:
This stand fits both Minotaur models, so you only need to download one copy.