Foam Air Assault and Sword Builds for Me and My Girlfriend (Comic-Con 2012/2013)
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Great work man this is some seriously awesome foam work and the energy sword is an instant plus with me. One question I couldn't find what kind of plastic you used for the swords and how durable is it ( could you have a sword fight with them ) I am planing to vac form my own and am building up a idea of the proses any help would be appreciated thank you.
Thanks guys! Work in the armor's been slow as I've been working two jobs lately hopefully, when the load will lighten soon and I'll have time to get back to this
The plastic is PETG, the exact thickness I've kinda forgotten at the moment, but it's relatively thing. As to the durability of the swords, I consider them fragile more in the way I don't want to scuff them up or jiggle around all the lights inside (So no sword fighting). A particular design flaw I've had with the swords is how the blades attach to the handles, they don't stay attached that well, so I'll be thinking up some better way to secure it.
Oh yeah! When I moved from pep to foam, I never looked back, it's just so much less time consuming and I find much more comfortable to wear than a traditional fiberglass set
Hi everyone! It's great to see the 405th back up and running properly, and I think it's time for giant update for all the stuff I've doing over the forum hiatus.
As a recap, I've already mostly built two foam suits, one for me and one for my girlfriend. We started wearing them at last year's comic-con but in my never ending tinkering I still don't consider them complete. With about a month left till comic-con 2013, we've been changes and additions and I think we're on the final stretch and pretty soon I can call them complete. Also, I've started building yet another set of armor for my sister we've been chugging away at it, but with so little time left I've explored some other ways of getting this stuff done (more on that later).
To start things off, I finally made a decent neck seal! I googled up the blue realms PDF pattern and was able to sew neck seals for the three of us. Here's mine:
It certainly lends a completeness to the armor that it's lacked over the last year and it certainly shows when we went off to wondercon:
Definately have to thank Trooper0621 for taking such great pics
As a recap, I've already mostly built two foam suits, one for me and one for my girlfriend. We started wearing them at last year's comic-con but in my never ending tinkering I still don't consider them complete. With about a month left till comic-con 2013, we've been changes and additions and I think we're on the final stretch and pretty soon I can call them complete. Also, I've started building yet another set of armor for my sister we've been chugging away at it, but with so little time left I've explored some other ways of getting this stuff done (more on that later).
To start things off, I finally made a decent neck seal! I googled up the blue realms PDF pattern and was able to sew neck seals for the three of us. Here's mine:
It certainly lends a completeness to the armor that it's lacked over the last year and it certainly shows when we went off to wondercon:
Definately have to thank Trooper0621 for taking such great pics
Next, through my constant tinkering, I ended up starting the next great update to the armor:
FOAM HELMETS!
This is how I started, drawing all those super intricate pieces on some foam:
For reference, here's all the pieces to the top of a helmet laid out next to a completed one:
I wanted to illustrate how I use my hot knife to burn those canals which allow the pieces to bend:
One issue I needed to address from the previous helmets was the fact that my girlfriend had a lot of trouble getting her head into the helmet when her hair was in a pony tail. Remembering the behind the scenes video for the live action Reach commericals, I decided to make the back of the helmet detachable like the one that legacy built:
Now, foam isn't too strong and when I tested putting a visor in there, it started deforming the helmet, so I made the decision to reinforce it with fiberglass and cheesecloth. Amazingly, I think the layered cheesecloth is much harder than fiberglass mat after it's been soaked in resin
interesting side effect: The cheesecloth when soaked with fiberglass generates a lot of heat, and I mean A LOT. It's the most heat I've felt in comparison to Bondo, plain old resin, and fiberglass mat. You can hold your hand near the cheesecloth and just feel the heat rising from it. Unfortunely, when you have a helmet made of a material that warps easily in heat and is held together with hot glue, you can get some potential distortion:
The top was no longer even, and with the cheesecloth set, it was nearly stuck in that shape. I ended up blasting the top of the helmet with a heat gun to the point that I slightly chared it, but I was able to push and bend the surface of the helmet into a more even shape:
Well, that's it for now. Next post I'll update with the progress I've been making on my sister's armor (with a laser cutter!) and the brand new swords I'm making to replace the current set.
P.S.
I think I have an Air Assault problem:
FOAM HELMETS!
This is how I started, drawing all those super intricate pieces on some foam:
For reference, here's all the pieces to the top of a helmet laid out next to a completed one:
I wanted to illustrate how I use my hot knife to burn those canals which allow the pieces to bend:
One issue I needed to address from the previous helmets was the fact that my girlfriend had a lot of trouble getting her head into the helmet when her hair was in a pony tail. Remembering the behind the scenes video for the live action Reach commericals, I decided to make the back of the helmet detachable like the one that legacy built:
Now, foam isn't too strong and when I tested putting a visor in there, it started deforming the helmet, so I made the decision to reinforce it with fiberglass and cheesecloth. Amazingly, I think the layered cheesecloth is much harder than fiberglass mat after it's been soaked in resin
interesting side effect: The cheesecloth when soaked with fiberglass generates a lot of heat, and I mean A LOT. It's the most heat I've felt in comparison to Bondo, plain old resin, and fiberglass mat. You can hold your hand near the cheesecloth and just feel the heat rising from it. Unfortunely, when you have a helmet made of a material that warps easily in heat and is held together with hot glue, you can get some potential distortion:
The top was no longer even, and with the cheesecloth set, it was nearly stuck in that shape. I ended up blasting the top of the helmet with a heat gun to the point that I slightly chared it, but I was able to push and bend the surface of the helmet into a more even shape:
Well, that's it for now. Next post I'll update with the progress I've been making on my sister's armor (with a laser cutter!) and the brand new swords I'm making to replace the current set.
P.S.
I think I have an Air Assault problem:
Jason 078
Well-Known Member
For hardening, have you ever thought about using white glue and Smooth Cast 65D? It seems to work really well for the Iron Man builders (I have a couple near me and they look amazing).
Here's a link that explains it in more detail.
http://xrobots.co.uk/coating/
Otherwise, those look amazing. I also like your idea for the removable piece on the back. I plan to use a hinge at the top and a couple of magnets at the bottom for easier entry and exit.
Here's a link that explains it in more detail.
http://xrobots.co.uk/coating/
Otherwise, those look amazing. I also like your idea for the removable piece on the back. I plan to use a hinge at the top and a couple of magnets at the bottom for easier entry and exit.
royalpain88
Jr Member
What is that foam? It'll look great on the inside of my project.
CrazedOne1988
Active Member
- Member DIN
- S088
Very nice! I might have to ask you for tips when I get to my own Air Assault Helmet!
Mstruvmgc
Sr Member
I wanted to illustrate how I use my hot knife to burn those canals which allow the pieces to bend:
So how did you decide where to burn out the canals so the pieces could bend? It is a great idea and i might use it when i try my foam helmet.
I think yours turned out great
averysmallhorse
New Member
I love those pictures, they are amazing, great work on the armor, I'm going to try a foam helmet sometime, any tips?
Thanks! That's certainly an interesting technique, I might have to look into it for these helmets or the next ones. At this point, the cheesecloth and resin seems pretty solid, and I'm trying to keep the weight down. Otherwise, why bother with foam?
My girlfriend very much enjoys assassinating me in Halo and real life
It's EVA foam floor mats, specifically from harbor freight
Thanks! My girlfriend was always having trouble with her hair, so I wanted to make her a new one. That, and I keep dropping and cracking our helmets. Figured this time around I'd do something a little lighter and resistant to dropping.
Ask anytime!
So how did you decide where to burn out the canals so the pieces could bend? It is a great idea and i might use it when i try my foam helmet.
I think yours turned out great
Essentially, when I'm putting the pieces together, I just try to fit and bend by hand. When I find a piece is too difficult to keep the bent shape, I use either a heat gun for large curves or the hot knife canal for sharper angles. It's pretty much just a trial and error thing. As to location, because it's still from the pep files, I can see the points where the folds and faces would be, I usually just line them up with a ruler and run my knife barrel over them
Try other pieces first, the helmet had some of the smaller and more intricate pieces of all the foam I've done. Helps to have practice with the other pieces before diving into the helmet
Ok, so time for part 2 of the "What I've been doing while the 405th was down" update
SWORDS! Yup, I'm making more (lots more). For now, I'm going to be building enough for us at comic-con but I think I'll be building a few extras in a few months to sell.
So I've learned a few lessons from making the first swords, first, I had a lot of issues with alignment and glueing the pieces together when I made each blade and handle separate. To fix that, I've brought in a little machine precision and decided to do the sword as two big pieces. Should help with alignment in the final assembly and get rid of that pesky problem with the old set where my blades keep breaking loose from the handle. So first thing's first I laser cut a cross-section of the sword, this way it guarantees the thing is symmetrical:
Here is the new cross-section with my current sword:
next was building the new cardstock sword on top of the base:
At this point, I've resined the sword and am currently sanding and gathering plastic in preparation for the upcoming vacuforming. Going to play around with a new heat source as I don't want to blow another fuse with the IR heaters like I did last time.
Interesting side effect: Because resin shrinks when it cures, the tips of the swords are now bending upwards. I'll be resolving it by just supergluing the sword to a plank again, but I thought it was worth mentioning since my goal is to keep this new one as symmetrical and precise to the cross-section for cutting.
Next time: Part 3 - Laser cutting and assembling my sister's new armor
SWORDS! Yup, I'm making more (lots more). For now, I'm going to be building enough for us at comic-con but I think I'll be building a few extras in a few months to sell.
So I've learned a few lessons from making the first swords, first, I had a lot of issues with alignment and glueing the pieces together when I made each blade and handle separate. To fix that, I've brought in a little machine precision and decided to do the sword as two big pieces. Should help with alignment in the final assembly and get rid of that pesky problem with the old set where my blades keep breaking loose from the handle. So first thing's first I laser cut a cross-section of the sword, this way it guarantees the thing is symmetrical:
Here is the new cross-section with my current sword:
next was building the new cardstock sword on top of the base:
At this point, I've resined the sword and am currently sanding and gathering plastic in preparation for the upcoming vacuforming. Going to play around with a new heat source as I don't want to blow another fuse with the IR heaters like I did last time.
Interesting side effect: Because resin shrinks when it cures, the tips of the swords are now bending upwards. I'll be resolving it by just supergluing the sword to a plank again, but I thought it was worth mentioning since my goal is to keep this new one as symmetrical and precise to the cross-section for cutting.
Next time: Part 3 - Laser cutting and assembling my sister's new armor
If you like that, you'll probably love part 3: Laser cutting!
I've been traveling to the LA Makerspace and using their laser cutter:
These are your basic pep patterns but unfolded to be more foam friendly, to get them to work with the laser cutter, I pretty much just had to export the files to .dxf and import them to illustrator. I have to say, using a laser cutter is a definite time saver, and makes for much more precise cuts than I've been able to manage with my hot knife:
We actually managed to get the laser cutter to have just enough power to cut mostly through the foam but leave it hanging by a few threads. So I can take the full sheet out of the lab and home and just punch out the pieces from the sheets like a plastic model.
The fact that the laser essentially sears each edge makes for an interesting look to:
But the speed at which I can finally assemble armor is astounding! I managed to put these together in one night:
And here's the sum total of all the foam I've cut to build the upcoming armor:
And in the span of this one week, I've done two shoulders, four thighs, and one shin!
There's some downsides to the laser cutter though. There's this pesky tendency for the foam to sometimes catch fire in the cutter (Have to be super attentive with that, but also just fine tune the power settings). And because the heat from the laser is much stronger than a hot knife, small detail pieces tend to get distorted by the cutter, necessitating a replacement built by hand. Overall, it's only a few pieces, so I don't mind. Also, since the cutter is burning away the foam, it kinda leaves a gap about 2 mm all around, resulting in slightly smaller pieces and a less than perfect fit in some areas.
Spartan214
Member
Hah, tendency to catch fire... no biggie, right? I will say though, the laser makes for some really neat looking edges. Makes it look like the armor was manufactured. Looks great so far!
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