7K-LOK finished

Well, it's about time, right? (-:
Slowly but steadily, I have been working off and on at the 7K-LOK moon Soyuz. There were loads of things interfering with the continuity but nevertheless, here it is. A nice, 7K-LOK in 1/96.
Resuming, I used Alfonso Moreno (AXM)'s Soyuz as a starting point to convert it into this bigger predecessor. Here and there I admit I have taken some poetic license and even some liberties in how things ended up looking, but I tried to stay as close to the truth as possible.
Two things cost me a lot of time: the docking section and the protective collar over the fuel tanks in the aft skirt. Here's the result, the story continues below.

First, let's start with a shot of the two Soviet lunar expedition vehicles. As I told earlier, the 7K-LOK was manned by two cosmonauts and just one of them had to enter the LK moon lander to get to the moon's surface. The two couldn't really dock, so the moonwalker had to make a small space walk to the LK, which was floating free behind the LOK at the time of the transfer.

Below, there's a closer look at the LOK and its size.  I used several different kinds of paper for the structures on the hull and the rod you see is brass. The twoo smaller railings to the upper hatch are made of thin iron wire. The RCS thrusters around the middle of the hull were beads and I put a strip of aluminium tape around them to make it more of a unit. 
Note I haven't glued all the metallic paper strips around the hull here.

The 'collar' over the (fuel?)cells at the aft skirt was a little hard to figure out. It had to be in a more or less straight angle with the vertical axis of the spacecraft but it also was sitting on a slope. Trial and error eventually gave me the right result and shape. Even harder was the framework inside of it. It has been made from 16 small rods of iron wire.

Time for some beauty shots. Here the LOK and the LK meet up in space again after the LK's return from the lunar surface. The docking probe on the LOK just prodded into one of the holes in the mesh on top of the LK. When it was secured, the lunar cosmonaut opened the hatch, transferred the lunar goodie bags and then followed himself across the railings, to the hatch of the LOK.

Here's a look at the docking section of the LOK.

The engine section and the return capsule were joined differently as the regular Soyuz. There was no latticework but a ring with extra control thrusters.(in a modern Soyuz, you cannot see the latticework because of the insulation blankets covering the spacecraft.) The thrusters were made from tiny beads, a thin strip of aluminium tape around it to make it look better.

The docking section is made from paper, three parts, the balls are ball bearings and the vents on top are reversed pinheads.

The porthole window is made from a tiny piece of gel filter used for theatre lighting. It is a dark blue colour and it has a nice shine. I put a ring of aluminium coloured paper over it. Also, the umbilical here is totally different from that of the Soyuz.

So now, the actual rocket and its payload are complete, the only thing left is the outer fairing.  All in all the stack now is about 97 cm tall.

Thanks for stopping by and having a look.

--PK