Skull Respirator: Completed

The good news is that the skull respirator is done. The bad news is that the skull faces sharply downward, so that only a small child would see it from the right angle.


Other than that one flaw I am pretty happy with it. However, that flaw looms large enough that I have decided to not pair the respirator with a fire fighter helmet (as the Death Defier) as I had planned.

I would prefer to put my time and energy into a brand new project, rather than continuing to work on a flawed one. You can see in the photo above the last parts that I added to the skull, which are aluminum tubing and steel springs, forming the cheekbone and jaw.

Skull Respirator: Concept Sketch

I've been asked for a concept sketch, which is a reasonable request. The way I work is with a kernal of an idea, and not a lot of detail. I start with something—in this case the plastic skull—and work from there. I only need to see the next step to take in order to proceed. After each addition or alteration I spend some time studying what I have so far, and develop the next idea based on that.


In this early sketch I've laid out the basics of my initial idea. This is likely to change as I go along, and I hope to end up with more of a mechanical look than is represented here. The lower right sketch shows a side view of the respirator

Here is a sketch I did today just for this blog, to show my latest thinking. I don't need or use sketches much for a project like this. The Underground Explorer started with a child's plastic astronaut helmet, and only a vague idea of what to do with it. The Defender was similarly constructed, starting with the Darth Vader helmet. I create organically and watch the project unfold, which I find much more enjoyable than someone handing me drawings and saying, "Make it look like this". And you, dear reader, get to watch it unfold with me.