so how strong would wood glue be to atach teh mdf
and how much does it runn for about. i on ly got 50 bucks so just wondering if i need to save a crap loada money
If you glue the material properly (clamp as well as fasten with a brad or screw) the joint will be stronger than the material itself. This is true of wood and most wood derivative products. If a panel has been glued properly it will split at a weak spot in the material vs. at the seam.
Wood glue is fairly inexpensive. Less than $10 for the bottle you'll need. A little goes a long way, and applying to both surfaces and smoothing the bead of glue with your finger or a piece of cardboard will create a better bond. 100% coverage isn't a must, but you'll get a stronger connection if you have a thin film on both surfaces. Don't put so much on that you'll get a glue line seeping out when you put it together, and keep a damp rag handy to wipe excess – a scraper (piece of metal with a burnished edge) can clean the line after the glue has dried.
Regarding the nail gun, Kevin is right. I used a compressor driven brad nailer. However, MDF is a material they will gladly cut down for you. It’s mostly the crazy treated woods that resist insects and plastics that release all kinds of badness they don’t like to cut down.
I'm not really sure how to say this without sounding like a wet blanket, so I'm just going to put it out there. Safety really needs to be considered when you're working with tools like these - especially the table saw. Smaller table saws with smaller motors aren't necessarily safer. The engine can bind more easily on material a larger saw would blow through and create a kick-back or other unfortunate reaction. The guide fence is less accurate and easy to find out of alignment, also causing the saw to bind when sheet material is forced through the machine. The miter guide that comes with most saws is unsatisfactory for consistent cross cuts. I made my own cross cut sled to fit the table saw at the shop I used so I could work more accurately, faster and safer. A really good blade like the Freud I recommended above will help with that somewhat. The high speed steel that comes with lower end saws dull quickly and that can really compromise safety. Home Depot, Lowes and some wood working stores in your area should be able to provide some training, basic safety about where to stand, how to cut and where to keep your hands to avoid loosing fingers. These machines do more damage than an exacto slip.
Here's some basic safety tips for working with table saws....And here's the alternative.When I was building my project, I thought a lot about how fortunate I was to have access to the tools I did and to have experience with them. I had a grandfather that let me pound nails as a kid, a lot of theatrical set building in high school and early college, and experience working in a furniture wood shop at the Rhode Island School of Design. It's a skill I easily take for granted and don't often put to use in my job or life, so it was a fun diversion to pick it up again. Mostly, I thought about how I wanted my three children to have the knowledge to do the same someday, and how would they get there? I thought a lot about how I had come to where I was with pulling off my project.
That said, I really encourage you to jump into this. It's a different set of tools that I believe you'll have an aptitude toward if you've been working with foam core and other customizing. I believe you'll get better results in quality and longevity out of these materials, just be safe and smart about it.
As for the Geonosis spires, it would be interesting to investigate a dripped wax technique over a rough armature form. Then a cast could be made of the result and you could crank out a number of objects to slightly modify so they would be more unique from each other.
Best of luck.