So with a finished project, what problems did I encounter working on it? Well the legs are the first thing that stick out. I mounted the feet too far apart on the Libra base, so this forced the legs further apart. This creates a bit of a bow-legged appearance and hurts the final version of the model.
Showing posts with label OZ-13MS Gundam Epyon. Show all posts
Showing posts with label OZ-13MS Gundam Epyon. Show all posts
Wednesday, November 11, 2015
So with a finished project, what problems did I encounter working on it? Well the legs are the first thing that stick out. I mounted the feet too far apart on the Libra base, so this forced the legs further apart. This creates a bit of a bow-legged appearance and hurts the final version of the model.
Monday, November 09, 2015
So now we're starting to wrap up this project. Wow has it ever been a trip to get to this point, from experimenting with casting clear resins, to building new sections to replace what would otherwise be moving joints, to modifying existing parts to accept new components. Now it all begins to come together.
It was a fairly simply matter to cast a new part for the chest gem. I simply attached the original gen sticker to a segment of styrene tubing, and then made the mold based on that part. Unlike casting the saber effect, this was a far simpler affair and required only 2 attempts to get right including embedding the LED in the part.
Of course putting everything together... that was more of a chore. Here you see the majority of the final connections being made in the chest cavity.
I should have thought of this before, but alas I did now. The way the model is intended to transform, there is a slot in the back where the hip/waist assembly would fold up allowing the legs to flip over the back. Since I removed the actual transformation mechanism, this space was no longer needed and I really should have covered the slot with styrene and painted it to match the rest of the waist. Sadly this wasn't something I thought of before hand. So if you look closely you will see the wires in the finished model.
"What? you think I was going to skip arm day?"
I had to use pressure clamps to hold the body together while the glue set. This is largely it. Next time the finished project.
I had to use pressure clamps to hold the body together while the glue set. This is largely it. Next time the finished project.
Friday, November 06, 2015
So today I'm talking about fabrication. One of the major features of the Gundam Epyon is its ability to transform from mobile suit mode:
to a twin-headed dragon style mobile armor:
I used a series of styrene tubing I built up a central section that would pass up through the assembly, and then glued a section of 1/4" styrene block into the space behind it. This combination provided a solid base to firmly attach everything together and effectively remove the entire transformation mechanism.
There were 2 other sections that I chose to make non-moving, the elbow joints. See in the standard model the elbows are made by joining 2 pvc joint pieces so that it will have a 2 axis range of movement. While this is nice, it doesn't help for this project. So I went to work building replacement joints that would be glued into place.
I started with segments of 1/4" styrene blocks and drilled out holes to accommodate the mounting pegs of the fore arms. I then passed segments of tubing through the upper portion of the blocks that would match the mounting holes in the upper arm. I added some groove slats to the back side of the sections to add some visual detail. With the parts glued in place, some paint finished the fabrication.
This gimmick is carried over to the model itself and is managed by way a
splitting hip/waist assembly. As far a gimmick trick it's a nice setup,
but for my purposes it creates some issues. Specifically the risk of
the hinge joint causing the electrical connections to be broken after
assembly of the model. So I had to address this by either gluing the
hinge shut or reinforcing it. I elected to do both:
Wednesday, November 04, 2015
I knew from the start that the giant beam saber was going to be a critical component of the finished model. I wanted the entire saber effect to glow bright green and that was going to be a challenge. At first I toyed with the idea of inserting a flat LED into the base of the saber effect and running wires through the hilt and into the hip.
While there was ample space to place the LED in the base of the saber effect, there was the issue of connecting it to the power source. I felt a bit nervous about trying to solder the connections so close to the hilt. So I decided to go with resin casting with the intention of being able to embed a string of LEDs into the saber effect.
Yeah... working with translucent resins and dyes is trickier then it first seems.
It is a very solid and very nearly totally opaque red. It looks kind of cool, but it wouldn't work for my purposes. I did try putting a super-bright LED to the red resin just to see how much light did come through. In a totally dark room, with not other light sources what so ever, it just barely glowed at all. Far too dark for what I was going for. So I went back to experimentation working with differing concentrations of dye in the volume of resin. I used rock molds to avoid wearing out the saber effect mold I had made.
I finally settled on an approximate ration of resin to dye by mixing up 1 1/2 ounces of resin and adding about half a drop of dye from the very tip of a pin. Yeah when they decided to call there dye series 'So Strong' they picked the right name. With a good ratio figured out, I went to work building the LED array to embed in the cast. I settled on a series of four flat LEDs to get the proper brightness. It took some finagling, but I managed to get the LEDs roughly in the middle of the mold and the resin properly cast around them.
Monday, November 02, 2015
"Hey Zecks, Zero is saying you have no future. Is Epyon telling you different?"
So today I'm talking about the head. Since this a basically humanoid model, you know if you ignore the large wings, the devilish appearing armor and the whip arm that is, the head is a major focus point for the model. Because of this I wanted to put extra care into it's production and preparation.
The first challenge was making space for the LED in the head. I went with a flat topped LED because it's easier to orient. To help direct the light more I painted the back side with silver pant and then came back with several coats of black paint. I wanted as little light leaking out as possible. In order to accommodate the LED in the head I had to cut away the mounting ports that would normally hold the parts of the head together. The next big trick was building a new neck brace for the head.
Normally the head sits on a ball joint, but with the LED in there the joint would have have to go. So I went to work with some styrene tubing and built a new mounting brace. I took extra care to ensure the negative and positive leads on the LEDs are on the right and left respectively. This way it was going to be easier to connect everything later one.
Once the new neck was built, I went back in with some Kneadatite modeling putty and filled in the space. I do not want this LED to move at all.
Friday, November 14, 2014
Battleship Libra, that is the topic of today post. More specifically the construction of a stand that is intended to represent a piece of the battleship that will act as a base for the Epyon model and provide a location to house the majority of the electronics for the finished product. Now previously I had a flat panel with some bracing and a pair of raised sections to house the switch and the battery pack for the Libra base.
So obviously the next big step is adding the sides for the base. The sides are made up of alternating sized triangles, the wide sections on the longer sides, and the corners being covered in a thinner triangle shape. So in theory I should just be able to cut out the 4 wide triangles, and the 4 narrow triangles, glue them together and call it a day. Right?
Well, in theory yes. That is what I would need to do. See, here’s the thing: Reality isn’t theory. Here’s a prime example of this concept in action. When I cut out the shapes I used the measurements for the two-dimensional shapes, and I didn’t take into account the dimensions of the depth of the part. This isn’t necessarily a bad thing so long as I’m willing to do the work on the next stage.
The problem the lack of consideration for the depth measurement creates is one of sides not lining up the way that you would expect them to in theory. 2+2+2= 6 yes, but 1.99+1.99+1.99= 5.97 and that’s where the problem comes in. This construct has 8 sides. 4 of those sides are supposed to be the same, while the other four are different from the first four. So using the previous example of 2+2+2=6, well now it is 7.0625+1+7.0625+1+7.0625+1+7.0625+1=32.25. Again, in theory.
But lets say it becomes: 7.062+1.01+7.0725+0.92+7.0425+1+7.1625+1.09=32.3595.
A difference of 1/20th of an inch one way or the other on each piece amounts to more than a 1/10th of an inch of difference in sizes.
But remember, these are pieces that are being assembled into a three dimensional structure. Once the parts are attached to the structure, it’ll be really hard to cut the parts. So in this particular case, I’m advocating to take more off then leaving too much. Which is what brings me to this:
In building the pyramid structure I was able to mostly marry up the edges in such a way that just a little bit of sanding will be needed to hide the seam. On this last facing however, this is where all those .02 and .01 inches worth of difference finally added up to close to a quarter inch of gap. I had to slide in an extra segment of sheet styrene to fill the gap and even then there is still a sizable space between the parts. So I will need to fill the space with a putty and sand it down.
With some advice from a friend at Hobby Town I picked up a tube of Tamiya Putty white and went to work filling the spaces. The putty is really hard on the skin, and it’s best to wear gloves when working with this stuff. Beyond it being best to wear gloves, using the putty is very simple and straight forward. Apply a portion of putty to the seam and then smooth it down with your finger tip. Let it sit for 24 hours so that the putty has a chance to cure and harden properly. Once it had cured I just needed to come in sand paper and sand it down smooth. I started with 200 grit sand paper and worked my way up to 1200 grit for a smooth finish.
The next step was scribing the lines of the panels . If you look at the image of the Epyon perched atop the Libra, you can see the divisions between the parts of metal that make up the surface of the ship. These are the panel lines.
The first step in this process was to mark out the lines. This sounds like it would require a lot of measuring, and in truth there is a lot of allowance for that sort of detail. But once everything is said unlike the process of building the pyramid itself, this really had no reason to be such a detailed process. So the only measuring I did for this part was the distance from the apex of the pyramid down the sides. I marked out lines with an interval of 1.5”. So 1.5” from the top of the pyramid to the first line, 1.5” from that line to the next and finally 1.5” to the next. I used a blue fine tip marker to draw out the horizontal lines that will be etched into the surface. I then went in and basically put in random vertical lines to mark out various sized plates.
Once I had the lines marked out, I came back along with label tape and lined the tape along the horizontal lines. The label tape is that plastic sort of tape used in those label maker guns. This tape provides a hard edge with an adhesive back to it that can be stuck on the surface of plastic. With the tape applied I then went to work with my scribing tool. I went for a depth of 5 passes with the scriber. This gives a really solid panel line. Once I had the horizontal lines scribed I went to work on the vertical lines.
| The base for the Epyon Gundam. |
Well, in theory yes. That is what I would need to do. See, here’s the thing: Reality isn’t theory. Here’s a prime example of this concept in action. When I cut out the shapes I used the measurements for the two-dimensional shapes, and I didn’t take into account the dimensions of the depth of the part. This isn’t necessarily a bad thing so long as I’m willing to do the work on the next stage.
The problem the lack of consideration for the depth measurement creates is one of sides not lining up the way that you would expect them to in theory. 2+2+2= 6 yes, but 1.99+1.99+1.99= 5.97 and that’s where the problem comes in. This construct has 8 sides. 4 of those sides are supposed to be the same, while the other four are different from the first four. So using the previous example of 2+2+2=6, well now it is 7.0625+1+7.0625+1+7.0625+1+7.0625+1=32.25. Again, in theory.
But lets say it becomes: 7.062+1.01+7.0725+0.92+7.0425+1+7.1625+1.09=32.3595.
A difference of 1/20th of an inch one way or the other on each piece amounts to more than a 1/10th of an inch of difference in sizes.
But remember, these are pieces that are being assembled into a three dimensional structure. Once the parts are attached to the structure, it’ll be really hard to cut the parts. So in this particular case, I’m advocating to take more off then leaving too much. Which is what brings me to this:
| The Libra takes form. |
In building the pyramid structure I was able to mostly marry up the edges in such a way that just a little bit of sanding will be needed to hide the seam. On this last facing however, this is where all those .02 and .01 inches worth of difference finally added up to close to a quarter inch of gap. I had to slide in an extra segment of sheet styrene to fill the gap and even then there is still a sizable space between the parts. So I will need to fill the space with a putty and sand it down.
With some advice from a friend at Hobby Town I picked up a tube of Tamiya Putty white and went to work filling the spaces. The putty is really hard on the skin, and it’s best to wear gloves when working with this stuff. Beyond it being best to wear gloves, using the putty is very simple and straight forward. Apply a portion of putty to the seam and then smooth it down with your finger tip. Let it sit for 24 hours so that the putty has a chance to cure and harden properly. Once it had cured I just needed to come in sand paper and sand it down smooth. I started with 200 grit sand paper and worked my way up to 1200 grit for a smooth finish.
The next step was scribing the lines of the panels . If you look at the image of the Epyon perched atop the Libra, you can see the divisions between the parts of metal that make up the surface of the ship. These are the panel lines.
The first step in this process was to mark out the lines. This sounds like it would require a lot of measuring, and in truth there is a lot of allowance for that sort of detail. But once everything is said unlike the process of building the pyramid itself, this really had no reason to be such a detailed process. So the only measuring I did for this part was the distance from the apex of the pyramid down the sides. I marked out lines with an interval of 1.5”. So 1.5” from the top of the pyramid to the first line, 1.5” from that line to the next and finally 1.5” to the next. I used a blue fine tip marker to draw out the horizontal lines that will be etched into the surface. I then went in and basically put in random vertical lines to mark out various sized plates.
Once I had the lines marked out, I came back along with label tape and lined the tape along the horizontal lines. The label tape is that plastic sort of tape used in those label maker guns. This tape provides a hard edge with an adhesive back to it that can be stuck on the surface of plastic. With the tape applied I then went to work with my scribing tool. I went for a depth of 5 passes with the scriber. This gives a really solid panel line. Once I had the horizontal lines scribed I went to work on the vertical lines.
Monday, November 10, 2014
Creating the new beam saber. This is really the crux of this entire project. Most of the 1/100 scale GunPla models come with beam weapon effects molded in a tinted plastic, in the case of the Epyon it is molded in green plastic. But I want to be able to light up the plastic. I had previously tried to accomplish this by carving out a space for the LED inside the saber effect and mounting the LED at the base of the saber effect.
It does work… sort of. But it also brings up a lot of additional problems, the biggest being how do I solder the wires when the LED connections are practically on top of the plastic handle itself and the handle isn’t actually wide enough to survive being drilled through the length to pass the wires through. So I decided to cast the beam saber effect, and the saber hilt in tinted resin. This way I can physically imbed the LED inside the part, rather then having to cut up the part to fit the LED. I can also pre-assemble the LED, resistors and lead wires before embedding them into the resin and then just pass the wires through the cable tube that actually comes with the model.
Now, casting is a surprisingly simple process that can become incredibly demanding over very simple aspects. The Epyon’s beam saber with the saber effect when assembled is a design that emphasizes it’s lateral details while having relatively little vertical details. This is of relevance to the mold making process. The silicone rubber will fill in any space that isn’t sealed off. For instance, where the green plastic beam effect sits in the hilt, the hilt is raised away from the saber effect so if the mold is laid out width wise the rubber would encapsulate the saber hilt and fill that void between the hilt and the saber effect creating a wasted effort of a mold. It would be wasted because I would then have to cut apart the mold in order to remove the original part very likely ruining the mold in the process.
So there are 2 ways to make a mold for the Epyon sword, the first is make the mold with the hilt and saber effect mounted depth wise. This allows the lateral details to be taken very well. The second way is to mount the parts laterally and make a shallow mold. The challenge with this second approach is I have to make sure to filling any spaces that will cause the rubber to encapsulate the original parts.
I made my first effort to create the mold by mounting the saber in the rubber depth wise.
So 2 days later, I had a working 2 part mold for the Epyon beam saber that I can now cast in green tinted resin and embed an LED in it to create the light up saber for the mold. Things are looking good. So I mixed the resin, picked up a bottle of green dye, mixed in a couple drops of green dye to tint the resin green, poured the green tinted resin into the mold, put the LED in the base and then put the green tinted resin filled mold in the pressure pot, sealed up the pot, pressurized it, and left it sit for 6 days so the resin would cure. Yes, the resin I tried this with has a 6-7 day cure time.
This incredibly long cure time is actually a bit of a good thing in this case. When you mix epoxies like resin you tend to mix in air that create bubbles in the resin. With opaque resins this is a non-issue, but with transparent resin it create some visual headaches. So there’s 2 days to deal with this and in both cases it takes a little time and control of air pressure. The first option is to perform a process called “Vacuum degassing” where you put the resin into an air tight chamber and suck all of the air out of the chamber. This causes the bubbles of air in the resin to be pulled up out of the resin. The second option is literally the exact opposite, that is putting the resin in a reinforced chamber that is air tight and increasing the air pressure to between 50 and 60 PSI. The increased pressure crushes the bubbles out of the resin. So both approaches have the same effect, to force the bubbles out of the resin.
So, a week later I depressurize the pressure chamber, pop the top, pull out the mold, separate the two parts, pull out the part that was cast from green tinted resin and find… that it’s blue.
And has you can see it’s not even like a blue-green or a sea-green sort of dark green… no it’s blue. So… yeah. What the heck?
| I cut out a hole in the beam saber blade for a square LED. |
Now, casting is a surprisingly simple process that can become incredibly demanding over very simple aspects. The Epyon’s beam saber with the saber effect when assembled is a design that emphasizes it’s lateral details while having relatively little vertical details. This is of relevance to the mold making process. The silicone rubber will fill in any space that isn’t sealed off. For instance, where the green plastic beam effect sits in the hilt, the hilt is raised away from the saber effect so if the mold is laid out width wise the rubber would encapsulate the saber hilt and fill that void between the hilt and the saber effect creating a wasted effort of a mold. It would be wasted because I would then have to cut apart the mold in order to remove the original part very likely ruining the mold in the process.
So there are 2 ways to make a mold for the Epyon sword, the first is make the mold with the hilt and saber effect mounted depth wise. This allows the lateral details to be taken very well. The second way is to mount the parts laterally and make a shallow mold. The challenge with this second approach is I have to make sure to filling any spaces that will cause the rubber to encapsulate the original parts.
I made my first effort to create the mold by mounting the saber in the rubber depth wise.
| The first mold setup for the beam saber I made. |
Well I ran into another problem with this approach, well 2 problems actually. First, it takes more rubber to make the mold like this. And by more, I mean close to 30% more. You really can’t make a silicon rubber mold that is narrower than 1” and with as long as the Epyon beam saber part actually, it’s close to 6” long with the larger saber effect; the mold really needs to be 4” wide, if not wider, in order to keep the blade straight. So making the mold depth wise simply didn’t work out and with that I needed to create a new mold this time shallower and wider. I used some clay to fill in the spaces that would otherwise be filled by the rubber.
So 2 days later, I had a working 2 part mold for the Epyon beam saber that I can now cast in green tinted resin and embed an LED in it to create the light up saber for the mold. Things are looking good. So I mixed the resin, picked up a bottle of green dye, mixed in a couple drops of green dye to tint the resin green, poured the green tinted resin into the mold, put the LED in the base and then put the green tinted resin filled mold in the pressure pot, sealed up the pot, pressurized it, and left it sit for 6 days so the resin would cure. Yes, the resin I tried this with has a 6-7 day cure time.
This incredibly long cure time is actually a bit of a good thing in this case. When you mix epoxies like resin you tend to mix in air that create bubbles in the resin. With opaque resins this is a non-issue, but with transparent resin it create some visual headaches. So there’s 2 days to deal with this and in both cases it takes a little time and control of air pressure. The first option is to perform a process called “Vacuum degassing” where you put the resin into an air tight chamber and suck all of the air out of the chamber. This causes the bubbles of air in the resin to be pulled up out of the resin. The second option is literally the exact opposite, that is putting the resin in a reinforced chamber that is air tight and increasing the air pressure to between 50 and 60 PSI. The increased pressure crushes the bubbles out of the resin. So both approaches have the same effect, to force the bubbles out of the resin.
So, a week later I depressurize the pressure chamber, pop the top, pull out the mold, separate the two parts, pull out the part that was cast from green tinted resin and find… that it’s blue.
| So... how does it come out blue? |
Friday, October 31, 2014
The Gundam Epyon: the demon to the Wing Zero's angel, Trieze's ideal of chivalry. The Gundam Epyon was first hinted at only a couple episodes after the introduction of the Wing Zero but its’ true ability would not be revealed until much later in the series. A suit designed for dueling and engaging the enemy face to face, the Epyon was originally armed with an over charged beam saber and a segmented whip that could be heated and used to cut through even heavy armor. Like the Heavy Arms Custom Kai, I built this model years ago, and like that I'm looking back at my work then and thinking "Wow... I didn't have a clue what I was doing back then."
This project is going to involve several things and major phases. The first major phase will be the "scratch building" phase. If you look at the image at the head of this post, you can see the pose I’m going for with this model. Epyon, standing at the apex point of the Libra Battle station, with its beam saber powered on, its search eye activated and its eyes glowing. Since I’m going to build LEDs into the model I will need a power source. When I do lighting projects I like to have the battery pack accessible so that I can replace batteries as I need to. So, the battery pack will be placed on the underside of the base along with the control switch. To keep with the image, I’m going to be fashioning a base to resemble the Libra battle ship to house the majority of the electronic components.
The third phase will be about modifying the model to become a mono-pose setup. This is going to involve replacing the poly-vinyl joint caps with styrene pieces that will be glued into place locking joints into the configuration. The other part of this will be modifying parts of the model to accept the wires and LEDs. For instance, the head would normally use a poly-vinyl cup that would sit on the ball joint of the neck. That will be modified to be styrene, and thus not pose-able, so that I can pass the wires from the LED through the neck.
The last major phase of the project will be the assembling and detailing phase. In this phase I will be using pigment powders and paints to add details such as shadowing and panel lines. I’m going to use a sheet of decals from the master grade Epyon to add some additional detail to this model.
This project is really turning into the prototype effort for my Wing Zero project. I originally settled on this project with the intention of just lighting up the beam saber, then that turned into lighting up the eyes, which turned into lighting up the chest gem. The building of the Libra base was more a choice of doing something aesthetically pleasing, more than just building a box for the model to stand on.
So the first thing I went to work on was designing the base that will house the electronics and the batteries. For that I turned to a friend of mine who is an architect (helpful hint for modelers who scratch build: If you don’t know architectural design, become friends with someone who does). I explained to her that I wanted to design a base that was effectively an eight sided pyramid with the even sides being small and narrow and the odd sides being wide. We exchanged a couple more notes and she came back to me with this:
Next time I’ll be talking about creating the molds for casting the new parts.
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