"All your base are belong to us..."

I'm in the painting phase of Lindberg's 1:200th space shuttle (with boosters), and I'd like to create a new display base for it in place of the simple black circle included with the kit.

The new display base will look like the NASA 'meatball' logo: http://adc.gsfc.nasa.gov/adc/images/nasa-logo.gif

So far, I've marked out some templates onto sheet styrene so I can figure out how to paint this thing and put iit together. There's just one thing I'm having trouble with:

How do I attach the model to it? I'd like to display the shuttle in an upright launch position... but I know that a few thin layers of thin styrene won't support the moel. Do I need to exopy my plastic NASA logo to a finished piece of wood and then run a brass rod up through it to support the model? Suggestions are appreciated!

Just a 'wing nut' thought, they make acrylic picture frames that 'stand' up. Potentially you could find one of those that you could modify to stand next to or integrate with your NASA base and then mound the shuttle to the frame.

Outside of that you'll have to get some 'meat' and weight into the base somehow. Tis-the-season for decorative 'tins' of holiday goodies. Maybe a lid from one of those?

One idea is to use MDF and cut the base in the same shape as the logo and paint the edge black.

Just some thoughts. I'd love to see the end result.

What's MDF?

I'd thought about just using the mini-router attachment on my dremel tool and carving the logo into a nice piece of wood, but since this is my first attempt at a custom base I wanted to keep it simple...

I got the "N" of NASA cut out this moring without too much difficulty, and I think it'll really look nice if I can get all the parts of the logo to fit together cleanly.

MDF is the 'fake' plywood. It's a very dense easy to work with wood product. It comes in a couple of thicknesses. It's a nice material because it can be cut, routed, painted, sanded. It's fairly inexpensive and you can get it at any DIY store (Lowes HomeDepot).