I have solid molded pieces, clear pieces, and photo etch (PE) for these vents. The clear pieces are meant to be used when lighting the engines, which I am not doing. The unlighted alternative is intended to be the solid parts painted in silver, with or without the PE.
Instead, I attached the clear parts to the internal side and painted their fronts, which now became the insides. Thus the clear part is silver on the other side of the clear. I installed the PE grills, painted silver on the outside, over this. This was a delicate task since there is nothing directly under the PE grill to support it.
I was hoping to get a depth effect visible through the grills. This didn't really happen as the grills pretty much cover it all, and the silver pant on the clear plastic, viewed through the clear, is rather metallic grey looking and does not reflect light much. I think I would have been better off using the clear parts on the outside with the PE over them. Oh well, never let it be said that I wouldn't go to extra efforts given the slightest opportunity.
I think I've got eight different colors on the warp nacelles so far. As far as I can tell, this is pretty authentic. As is always the case with these things though, it is known that the studio model changed in small ways all through the production of the original series. There's the restored model at the Smithsonian of course, but even it represents certain choices. Looking at still from the series we see all sorts of variation.
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