Ok so I might be figuring this out. Followed the steps on importing a obj file and got this so far.
I dumped all those tga files, I guess those are textures, into the texture folder but looking at other mods texture folders they are all png files. I wonder if I should convert these to png?
EDIT: Well I'm stumped. I converted all the tga files to png and edited the mtl file replacing the tga file extensions with png, reimported the ship, and it still is invisible. Checking the log file I get a bunch of the following:
ERROR: Invalid texture coordinates index (-10179)
[00] ERROR: Invalid vertex index (-10176)
[00] ERROR: Invalid normal index (-10176)
[00] ERROR: Invalid texture coordinates index (-10176)
[00] ERROR: Invalid vertex index (-10175)
[00] ERROR: Invalid normal index (-10175)
Think I've taken this as far as I can. Any ideas anyone?
EDIT2: After researching these errors it seems likes it probably caused by whatever export process Julian used. I actually put the tga files back as in the ship creation wiki it says tga files are fine. Problem has to be somewhere in the obj file. Ah well. Looks like I have a cloaked Sulaco for now. :)
EDIT3: Going down the rabbit hole. Installed the XNLA program Julian used to export this ship and exported it myself. Still doesn't work. It's incredibly simple though with only export option of "save vertices" and none of the other options the ship creator wiki calls for. This program was created to pose images of Lara Croft apparently. Wtf who would write a program to do this?