Evening everyone in plastic land,
Allen nice updates and the
rigging. Prop looks great and everything is blending very nice build.
Thanks so much Lee! I do think it is finally all coming together barring anymore hiccups. It's great to see you keeping me on my toes, my friend!!!...
So, it has been a while since I posted an update, so today is your lucky day people...I have not been sitting on my butt and this post will be pretty long with lots of pics (to bore you) too.......
I finally got the arms CA'd on the figs in the right positions and removed the limp stick grenade from the loader. I still have to fill the joints with putty, do the cleanup on them, breath deep, break out the wet palette and do the paint nasty thang,
While building up the courage to do all this with the figs and then the hairy stick work, I drove on with the Esso gas station. Looking at what I had for the resin wheels, I thought they were a bit thin and needed to be fattened up a bit. Broke out the
Olga from the Volga Olfa cutter and made some rings from 0.20mm sheet plastic,
I also made the cart handle too (more on that later on). The rings were very close to fitting, but the inside diameter needed to be made larger. Sanding and/or trimming with a knife wasn't the answer, so I broke out a very important tool in the modeling arsenal to do it,
It worked and I still have all the skin on my fingers. Hit the wheels with some CA and set them aside. I had made 2mm strips of wine foil for the support bands and CA'd them on the bottom half of the barrel,
Next up was making the axles for the wheels to mount on the barrel frame. I carefully shaved off the bolts on the wheels and put them aside. They will be needed later on in the build. I then started with various tubing and with a whole lot of slicing and dicing, came up with this mess,
Ok, now they look like 1917 wagon wheels! I sanded, scraped and trimmed the outside diameter of the plastic rings to get an even surface between the resin and plastic. I cut 2 strips of 0.10mm sheet @ 2.3mm wide to represent the metal ring around the rim,
It was time to add the frame to the barrel being very careful to make sure it sat straight. I also had a brain fart to use a piece of brass tubing for strength in the axles. It is the same as the inside diameter of the plastic tubing. I gently drilled through the barrel with a 1.4mm drill bit and in the end, we had this,
After this, it was gluing the strip around the face of the wheels. I had a choice of using CA or TET for the job. I decided to use CA, knowing I had to work quickly before it set and it would hold better on both resin and plastic. After it dried, I did a test fit with the wheels and the handle,
Another shot.
Yea, the joints on the frame corners need some work and a dab of putty...No biggie. That damn handle kept bugging me to no end...It was way too thick and looked terrible. What to do??? Just make a new one,
Don't worry, the bends are flexible and it will fit ok. It was finally time to add the top straps to the barrel and the strap holders on the frame. I made some caps for the holders. On these, I will add 4 of the shaved small bolts later, one on each cap,
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I made 5 just in case I screwed one up while adding them. As to the other leftover bolts, they were used here,
4 used on the cart handle and the larger 2 were CA'd on the rod pieces to slide into the axle ends. The other pieces are for the kick-stand to support the cart. I let the whole nonsense dry for a while and in the end..........Before you all start snoring loudly!!!...Progress,
The kick-stand legs are flexible and move outwards to their correct positions on the foot (to be made). It looks like they are too long and may have to be trimmed up a bit, as the cart has to sit forwards and not backwards.
Still have to drill 4 holes in the framing for the support wires for the pump and build the pump assembly itself. I'm lovin' it and I haven't gone blind yet! Have a great night and thanks for looking in......Oh, and the
GGFGS* has been working better than expected. About 75% at the time and I'm happy with it......
Prost
Allen
* Gus Go Fast Guesstimation System (Gus was my nickname in The military)