About Us
Hello, Elon Musk fanboys and rocket fans 😉
So, who are we?
First of all, I want to note that the store does not belong to SpaceX, I am just a regular Elon Musk fan, so I made the design of StarbaseX similar to the design of the SpaceX website, which I was inspired by.
My name is Valeriy, I am originally from Ukraine, but 9 years ago my family and I moved to Japan. When I was about 4-5 years old, my grandfather instilled in me a love of space by telling me about the stars in the night sky. When I got the Internet, I loved watching videos of rocket launches on YouTube, and one day in 2014 I saw a Falcon 9 launch, and that's when I first learned about SpaceX and Elon Musk, and since then I've been a fan of Elon and most of the companies he founded. But, of course, SpaceX is my favorite.
After entering the university, I got a hobby, 3D modeling of my favorite rockets, and later I bought my first 3D printer and started printing the first models to decorate my room. But I wasn't satisfied with the quality of the PLA plastic prints, the layers were too thick, and they were conspicuous and tactile. A few months later, I bought my first photopolymer printer, unlike the previous one, it printed with resin, and the quality of its printing satisfied me very much, I was in a state of euphoria, and I showed my work to my friends, they were also delighted and recommended that I try selling models on Etsy. As a result, the first sale was made on July 17, 2021. Since then, I have received more than 400 sales and more than 100 satisfied reviews that you can read on Etsy.
Let me tell you a little more about the technologies and the difference between them.
🥴PLA - Regular printers heat the plastic to a molten state, hot plastic is fed to the printer nozzle, squeezed out of it in a thin strip, and the print head moves in three directions to print the layer by layer the model.
😍UV - Photopolymer technology allows for much higher quality models. In photopolymer printing, the resin hardens in very thin layers, about 4 times thinner than human hair, during printing the model is attached to a plate, which moves only upward as the layers harden, rising higher and higher with each layer. In turn, the resin hardens thanks to ultraviolet LEDs (the principle is the same as when a dentist places a filling on your tooth or when your girlfriend dries her nail polish).
Thanks to the extremely thin layers and additional grinding of the models after printing, the models look extremely cool, they look like a small copy of a metal rocket due to the glossy surface after grinding and painting, and the repetition of most of the small details. You can read more about the technology here.
As my hobby has started to turn into a small business, I continue to improve my modeling skills, so as my skills and tools improve, new generations of my models appear. Let me tell you more about the generations and the assortment of the store.
Gen 1 - The first generation of rockets, on my first photopolymer printer, I printed the models myself, but when I started receiving the first orders, I got a little too excited and went to a factory in China, sent them the model files, and agreed on production. As a result, I was not very satisfied with the quality of printing missile logos and mission patches, I ordered too many and haven't sold them yet 🤡. In addition, due to the lack of understanding of legal nuances, the factory started selling models to third parties without my knowledge, as I have seen models in other online stores several times…
Gen 2 - The second generation I make together with my two friends-assistants, this allows me to control the quality, provides a fairly fast production rate, and most importantly, prevents the distribution and use of my models by third parties.
Gen 3 - Currently the newest generation. I do all the manufacturing and printing myself. This generation has the best detailing due to sanding before painting and takes into account all the minor flaws and corrections of previous customers.
In addition to the rocket models that I make myself, I decided to add some other products to the store that are most likely to interest customers. Because besides my passion for Elon, I am also a fan of the movie Back to the Future, Star Trek, Star Trek games, and Kerbal Space Programs. So I thought I'm not the only one with such a range of interests, and many of my customers will have the same tastes as me, so it will be convenient to buy several models in one place🤓.
In addition to me and my two friends, there is a fourth employee, Caroline, who manages the delivery of orders.
That's all, now we've met 🤗