Well I was supposed to make an inflated life belt, but I got distracted.
I have always intended to have a bucket kicking around (see what I did there
..) somewhere, as shown here
I have an old
Tamiya one in the spares box, but it’s a bit knackered, and not in a good way,
and if I cleaned it up it would be too pristine, so I planned to 3D print one. But, as I say, I want it to be dented but I don’t know how to make that effect in the digital model I have; and denting rarely looks that convincing doing it to resin or plastic anyway. So remembering the front bump on the bow door, and inspired by
@scottie3158 and
@Scratchbuilder I decided to make one out of metal.
I used the
Tamiya bucket to make a template from paper
I just impressed the shape with my fingernail into the paper and opened it out
Then I could cut it out with scissors
The pencil line is the join line. I then cut the shape from thin metal sheet-in this case it’s a tomato puree tube.
I put double-sided tape on the bucket to keep the metal in place while I trimmed the metal more precisely
I used my fingernail again to indent the metal into the detail of the rim and the base
Next I removed the metal by flooding it with lighter fuel to release the glue of the double-sided tape
And superglued the edges together. Using fine pliers I gradually bent the rim over in stages until it was folded flat.
For the base of the bucket I used leather punches to make a 7mm styrene disc and an 8mm metal disc, and I carefully folded the 0.5mm extra metal all round over the edge of the styrene disc.
And then ca’d it into place
Now I added the dents I want and the finally a handle from wire
It’s a shame one side of the metal is gold colour or I might leave it unpainted, but it would look a bit odd.
So sorry chaps , you’ll have to wait a bit longer for my cunning plan for the inflated life belt.
Thanks for looking in
N
