Halo Legends: Spartan Daisy-023

[SI3RRA 117]

I wouldn't say I have it down to a science,

I think I’m going to have to disagree!! Spreadsheet = Science!!

 

[Harri51]

SO how is the weight going on the armor? Because I am really curious. I am looking at saving for a printer and maybe figuring on a whole suit one day? and I am just curious.

 

[TurboCharizard]

So, this thread can come active again because now there's interesting advancements other than endless hours of sanding.

There was also slight delays to this due to con-crunch related to

• Building full scale resin cast CCS Clear Card Arc Dream Wand
• SPARTAN-III upgrades including:
  • New TacPad with better audio triggers
  • 8Ga HIPPO shells
  • C-12 Shaped Charge
  • Tactical Hardcase
  • Wiring and sewing repairs
• Fancy electronic panel cover handle for the Energy Sword
• Winter Soldier and Captain America commission pieces

If any of those sound like fun build thread posts I can do them up while I wait for paint to cure on Daisy. BECAUSE I CAN FINALLY PAINT DAISY. Eighty hours of sanding, filling, sanding, slushing, brushing, sanding, filling and so on I'm at a point where I'm happy to progress.

Previously I mentioned the TurboCharizard Slush'n'Brush Method™ with very little explanation as to what that actually entailed. This is an entirely experimental process that I'm trying out, much like the rest of the suit, it's just to see if it produces something that is durable, looks good and is easily repaired by replacement if I'm terribly clumsy. Experts with various other materials are free to call me out on this at any point, my ultimate goal here was to keep everything relatively cheap and accessible if others wished to follow a similar procedure later on.

For the slush I used a urethane casting resin with a quick cure time that is semi-rigid in hopes that it will remain slightly flexible and add strength against impact damage such as dropping armour cases, parts collisions or careless convention attendees bumping into me. The resin of choice was Smooth-Cast 65D which has a short pot life (great for slush casting) and a complete cure within fifteen minutes. Mix small amounts at a time (20mL will cover most parts if slushed well) and pour into a low spot of the armour piece so that it can pool safely without pouring everywhere while you get ready to manipulate the part. Doing this with a friend would definitely make things easier but hey, not everyone has friends that want to join in on several hour sessions of playing with poison. Rotate the armour piece to get an even coating of resin across the inner surface, some high spots will be difficult to cover but multiple slushes will help. Most of my armour pieces have two to three coats of 65D, parts like the boots have more for the sake of durability.


The brush is for the outer coating of a self leveling epoxy resin to strengthen the surface and provide some scratch and dent resistance. For this I chose Smooth-On XTC-3D for it's relatively quick cure time and excellent finish. Sponge brushes and quick hands are important here. The sponge brushes are for leaving less brush strokes or fibers in your finished product. The quick hands are to reduce the chance of the resin exotherming and melting/burning it's mixing container.


Once everything was nice and glossy, we could stop there or be like me and spend another sixty hours sanding and smoothing everything


XTC-3D is self-leveling but because of that it likes to seek out low spots, recesses and panel lines. You can minimize this cleanup process by chasing down drips and flow with a brush when applying the resin but with 29 armour parts to coat and power sanders it's easier just to fix it in post. With careful sanding through 80/120/220 and 320 grit we get to something that looks less glossy but overall is smoother to the touch.


Thanks to being neurotic about things and learning a cool new trick at the Cheesecake Factory (don't ask) I thought to go the extra step to guarantee a nice finish on several parts that are focal points of the costume. One and a half cans of primer later and we're up to today.


Daisy-023 will be worn in ten days time.

 

[Dire]

This looks great dragon guy! Very, very nice sanding! Now paint it!

 

[master_colt_117]

Very nice work man!! Sanding is the most important thing, even on a foam build. I've been sanding my heart away on my stuff as well but not nearly like you have with this build!

 

[TurboCharizard]

This looks great dragon guy! Very, very nice sanding! Now paint it!

Dragon guy, that's a new one.

Primer coat internal and external is down, primary colour coat today, secondary colour tomorrow, clear coat Sunday and airbrushing highlights/lowlights on Monday.

Very nice work man!! Sanding is the most important thing, even on a foam build. I've been sanding my heart away on my stuff as well but not nearly like you have with this build!

Sanding on foam is fun and accidental scuffs with a sander make battle damage. On a 3D print sanding is a necessity and sanding in one spot for too long can ruin your finish or warp the piece with too much heat generated from friction. Decidedly not super fun.

I have the lacquers for the visor coming in the mail Monday as well as some extra parachute clips for rigging the suit. Excitement is building!

 

[TurboCharizard]

Trigger warning: depression

Colour coats went on well with two primer coats, one main colour coat done in two passes ten minutes apart and then secondary colour coat masked and applied after a day of full cure of the primary. For gasket material I used Leak Seal for a texture and rubber tactile feel of the part.


Demasking is always the best part, one quick pull to remove the plastic and tape to reveal all your hard work.


The gloss finish of the red was a bit too much for me so I applied a matte clear coat to knock down the sheen a little. This is where disaster started rearing it's head. Of the 29 armour pieces about a third had localized spider webbing.


Now, because it was only on several armour pieces and only in small patches this helps us rule out a lot of possible causes since it wasn't everywhere.

• Ambient air temperature/moisture content (painted indoors within suggested ranges)
• Paint mismatch (all three paints were Rustoleum Painter's Touch 2X line)
• Base material off-gas (spiderweb locations inconsistent with seams where Bondo was used, bondo and XTC-3D had minimum of a week cure time)
• Base material contamination (sanding dust was removed with a clean rag prior to painting, only one colour was sprayed at a time, parts are lined up in a hallway external to painting area to not catch any accelerant/solvent from spray of other parts)
• Base surface too glossy (the whole suit was sanded to 320 and a primer for plastics was used so there should have been enough bite into the material)
• Recoat times (the primer was applied in two coats 10 minutes apart, sat for 24 hours, the red was applied in two thin coats 5 minutes apart and sat for 48 hours)
• Adhesives or solvents reacting with cure (only two of the effected parts had any masking applied and only one instance of webbing appeared at an area where masking tape was applied)

The only source of this I can come up with was that layers were applied too thick in the spots and because of this didn't cure and bond properly. When the clear coat (faster cure) was applied to any spot where there wasn't a fully cured colour coat it would heat, cure and then pucker the layer below it if not fully bonded to the surface of the plastic.


When scraping off the areas with spider webs with a knife it was apparent that the paints bonded together to make a film but didn't properly adhere to the surface of the plastic. To fix the effected areas I spent another several hours scraping down with a blade, sanding and blending as best I could with 220 and 320 grit sandpaper. To make this wearable this coming weekend I have to forego proper priming and primer coats because of cure times so I just am throwing caution to the wind and using only the red, waiting two days and then clear coating. If it does the same again, well, I guess I;m hooped but this is the best option to get to where I need to be for the weekend. After the weekend I will likely sand the entire trouble pieces down to bare plastic and recoat entirely because at this point the surface finish of some pieces is ruined in my eyes and you will be able to see where paint layers were removed.

It's not how I wanted to reveal Daisy to the world but it's all I can really hope for at this time. We'll call it a wear test and with some airbrush weathering and washes it might not turn out horrible.

Sometimes science just doesn't go your way.

 

[xXDashIVXx]

Demasking is always the best part, one quick pull to remove the plastic and tape to reveal all your hard work.

Except when your tape pulls up all your paint, plastidip, AND foam... D;

This is looking so beutiful! We need to get this man a raise!

Ha... hahahah... a raise... heh

 

[TurboCharizard]

Except when your tape pulls up all your paint, plastidip, AND foam... D;

This is looking so beutiful! We need to get this man a raise!

Ha... hahahah... a raise... heh

Yellow Frog Tape or Yellow Tamiya Masking Tape for the delicate surfaces. It's a bit spendy but if you use it wisely and plastic coat everything else it'll go a long way.

Also the tape and paint types determine when and how to remove the tape. Rubberized coatings like PlastiDip that create a surface, pull that tape while it's still wet. Airbrush paints and brush on acrylics, just go to town and pull that up whenever.

No raise for me though, I borked this paint up somehow, demerits are in order.

 

[PerniciousDuke]

For the spider webbing and reading through your procedures my only flag was the two thin red coats with 5 minutes inbetween. That sounds fine for primer, but paint I usually do at 20-30 minutes in between coats.. So I think you are correct with not having enough time to cure before applying the clear.

In any case it's going to be fine! Paint cracks, just part of weathering. Sanding, scraping repainting, all part of weathering too!

Edit: My "weathering" is the most often complimented part of my suit and it's only like that because I didn't know how to black wash properly.

 

[TurboCharizard]

For the spider webbing and reading through your procedures my only flag was the two thin red coats with 5 minutes inbetween. That sounds fine for primer, but paint I usually do at 20-30 minutes in between coats.. So I think you are correct with not having enough time to cure before applying the clear.

In any case it's going to be fine! Paint cracks, just part of weathering. Sanding, scraping repainting, all part of weathering too!

Edit: My "weathering" is the most often complimented part of my suit and it's only like that because I didn't know how to black wash properly.

Unfortunately for the gloss finish Rustoleum the instructions are "multiple thin coats, several minutes apart" and if it was an issue it should be more widespread. Ah well, like you said it'll just add character for this weekend. It's just another push towards me doing the right thing for the environment and moving away from rattle cans towards airbrush and spray gun exclusively.

 

[master_colt_117]

Unfortunately for the gloss finish Rustoleum the instructions are "multiple thin coats, several minutes apart" and if it was an issue it should be more widespread. Ah well, like you said it'll just add character for this weekend. It's just another push towards me doing the right thing for the environment and moving away from rattle cans towards airbrush and spray gun exclusively.

Yeah I love airbrush!! I'm a big fan, I have the Grex XSi you can run different nozzles for larger sprays and smaller pinpoint, also it does gravity feed and syphon feed. Easy to clean and take apart. As far ands your paint job, I love rustoleum products but I've learned my lesson with them to over the years. Being that they are mostly oil based, I give days between various coats or treatments.. Days... it literally is watching paint dry. It sounds like your color coat wasn't cured quite enough due to your timeline unfortunately. Are you going to eventally sand it down and start over?

 

[TurboCharizard]

Yeah I love airbrush!! I'm a big fan, I have the Grex XSi you can run different nozzles for larger sprays and smaller pinpoint, also it does gravity feed and syphon feed. Easy to clean and take apart. As far ands your paint job, I love rustoleum products but I've learned my lesson with them to over the years. Being that they are mostly oil based, I give days between various coats or treatments.. Days... it literally is watching paint dry. It sounds like your color coat wasn't cured quite enough due to your timeline unfortunately. Are you going to eventally sand it down and start over?

I've got the el cheapo Canadian Tire Mastercraft compressor and brush combo and then a newer pair of Iwata Neo gravity fed brushes to swap onto an Iwata Ninja Jet compressor (adjustable and good for lacquers).

I've used Rustoleum products fairly heavily in the past and this is the first time that I've ever had an issue with curing even when waiting the recommended full cure time so there's probably some other unknown at play here that I didn't account for to have it occur in the seemingly random locations that the webbing occured.

In the earlier post today I mentioned that I'll be sanding down to bare plastic later on. For this weekend though I've done a patch job and am making the best of a sub-par situation.

 

[master_colt_117]

I've got the el cheapo Canadian Tire Mastercraft compressor and brush combo and then a newer pair of Iwata Neo gravity fed brushes to swap onto an Iwata Ninja Jet compressor (adjustable and good for lacquers).

I've used Rustoleum products fairly heavily in the past and this is the first time that I've ever had an issue with curing even when waiting the recommended full cure time so there's probably some other unknown at play here that I didn't account for to have it occur in the seemingly random locations that the webbing occured.

In the earlier post today I mentioned that I'll be sanding down to bare plastic later on. For this weekend though I've done a patch job and am making the best of a sub-par situation.

Awesome man can't wait to see the final final product! You'll get it I know you will! Paint can do unexplainable things sometimes, can be super frustrating. Haha the armor looks amazing!

 

[TurboCharizard]

Just a small but important update today since this one is rather well contained to one topic. Once I finish the body suit I'll do a big post with all the reference photos included and possibly sewing patterns. This is a post about making fancy custom visors! Since I've done a long form post about this before, this will be a little more of a tl;dr version but it'll still have the goods for people interested in getting their feet wet.

Daisy's visor is definitely on the unique side of things. It's a weird curve, it has raised panels, it's an inconsistently reflective. Two of those features I can deal with easily, the third though, that's a bit more difficult.

To make the visors I follow along with my normal guide for vacuum forming and dying and yes, I do sometimes write out these long posts so that I can come back and reference them later because I forget specific temperatures for materials. Since this visor is a smaller size than my maximum area for forming, I blocked off several rows of holes in the forming box to improve pull in the areas required. Load some PETG into the frame, set the toaster oven to 400°F to get heating and then back it down a little once the sheeting is inside. Once the plastic starts drooping dangerously close to the heater element, turn on the vacuum, pull the frame in one smooth motion out of the oven and onto the buck and former box. Do this three times and everything is awesome.


With these three shiny new lenses we then need to apply a base colouring to match the shade that we need, for Daisy we need a yellow with hints of orange. To colour the visor I use Jacquard's iDye Poly and the biggest pot of water that I can manage. Because there's such a large volume of water I used two dye packets, one of yellow and one of orange. Bring it up to a boil to properly dissolve the dye packets and then let it cool to 145°F before submerging the visors, any warmer and you risk deforming the plastic and losing the hard work you did with the vacuum former, any cooler and it'll take much longer to dye or won't dye at all.


Dunk the visors in increments of several minutes making sure not to have the plastic touch the bottom of your dye pot (undissolved dye particulate may accumulate or if the temperature is still to hot you may get a flat surface pressed into your visor). Dunk the visors into an ice bath to and check the colour, if the colour isn't vivid enough keep on dunking. Once you're happy with the colour intensity let the visor sit in an ice bath to close pores of the plastic and trap the colour in while rinsing excess dye from the surface.


I made three for a reason. One to be left as transparent and the other two will have Alclad II Chrome Lacquer in two different layer counts to give different amounts of reflective appearance. I created a test sheet of PETG to show the effect of multiples of two layers applied with an airbrush at 16PSI so that I can use it at conventions and panels to pass around to people and show different processes.

Today is sewing day so I hope you all enjoy my fumbling around with sewing machine posts!

 

[master_colt_117]

Just a small but important update today since this one is rather well contained to one topic. Once I finish the body suit I'll do a big post with all the reference photos included and possibly sewing patterns. This is a post about making fancy custom visors! Since I've done a long form post about this before, this will be a little more of a tl;dr version but it'll still have the goods for people interested in getting their feet wet.

Daisy's visor is definitely on the unique side of things. It's a weird curve, it has raised panels, it's an inconsistently reflective. Two of those features I can deal with easily, the third though, that's a bit more difficult.
View attachment 268548

To make the visors I follow along with my normal guide for vacuum forming and dying and yes, I do sometimes write out these long posts so that I can come back and reference them later because I forget specific temperatures for materials. Since this visor is a smaller size than my maximum area for forming, I blocked off several rows of holes in the forming box to improve pull in the areas required. Load some PETG into the frame, set the toaster oven to 400°F to get heating and then back it down a little once the sheeting is inside. Once the plastic starts drooping dangerously close to the heater element, turn on the vacuum, pull the frame in one smooth motion out of the oven and onto the buck and former box. Do this three times and everything is awesome.
View attachment 268536View attachment 268537View attachment 268538

With these three shiny new lenses we then need to apply a base colouring to match the shade that we need, for Daisy we need a yellow with hints of orange. To colour the visor I use Jacquard's iDye Poly and the biggest pot of water that I can manage. Because there's such a large volume of water I used two dye packets, one of yellow and one of orange. Bring it up to a boil to properly dissolve the dye packets and then let it cool to 145°F before submerging the visors, any warmer and you risk deforming the plastic and losing the hard work you did with the vacuum former, any cooler and it'll take much longer to dye or won't dye at all.
View attachment 268539View attachment 268540View attachment 268541View attachment 268546

Dunk the visors in increments of several minutes making sure not to have the plastic touch the bottom of your dye pot (undissolved dye particulate may accumulate or if the temperature is still to hot you may get a flat surface pressed into your visor). Dunk the visors into an ice bath to and check the colour, if the colour isn't vivid enough keep on dunking. Once you're happy with the colour intensity let the visor sit in an ice bath to close pores of the plastic and trap the colour in while rinsing excess dye from the surface.
View attachment 268542View attachment 268543View attachment 268545View attachment 268544

I made three for a reason. One to be left as transparent and the other two will have Alclad II Chrome Lacquer in two different layer counts to give different amounts of reflective appearance. I created a test sheet of PETG to show the effect of multiples of two layers applied with an airbrush at 16PSI so that I can use it at conventions and panels to pass around to people and show different processes.
View attachment 268547

Today is sewing day so I hope you all enjoy my fumbling around with sewing machine posts!

That's awesome man, you've got me wanting to give visor making a shot now. How do you make your forms for the visor? 3d printing, sculpting, or some other method? (Apologies if I missed how you make them)

 

[TurboCharizard]

That's awesome man, you've got me wanting to give visor making a shot now. How do you make your forms for the visor? 3d printing, sculpting, or some other method? (Apologies if I missed how you make them)

This one is a 3D print slightly oversized for the opening of the printed helmet, it's then smoothed and coated with XTC-3D. Honetly you can make a buck out of anything semi-rigid though. I know PerniciousDuke makes clay bucks, others use their Pepakura cutouts from their helmet peps. If you were feeling adventurous I'm sure you could even do one out of a well supported EVA foam shape as long as it's enclosed and has a flat bottom.

 

[master_colt_117]

This one is a 3D print slightly oversized for the opening of the printed helmet, it's then smoothed and coated with XTC-3D. Honetly you can make a buck out of anything semi-rigid though. I know PerniciousDuke makes clay bucks, others use their Pepakura cutouts from their helmet peps. If you were feeling adventurous I'm sure you could even do one out of a well supported EVA foam shape as long as it's enclosed and has a flat bottom.

Awesome idea, I wasn't sure how much vacuum force is applied to the heated petg but I can't image it's much... hmm mm I'm might have to give this a whirl for fun!

 

[PerniciousDuke]

This one is a 3D print slightly oversized for the opening of the printed helmet, it's then smoothed and coated with XTC-3D. Honetly you can make a buck out of anything semi-rigid though. I know PerniciousDuke makes clay bucks, others use their Pepakura cutouts from their helmet peps. If you were feeling adventurous I'm sure you could even do one out of a well supported EVA foam shape as long as it's enclosed and has a flat bottom.

My clay buck was awful. I do not recommend that ExCeLLuR8 unless you are familiar with using clays. I tried Air Dry clay and it just crumbled apart on me during the form and it was very hard to get a smooth enough surface to look through. Maybe an oven bake clay would have worked better.

My first attempt was much better. I used the pepakura cut out from pepping my helmet and used bondo to smooth it like normal. I did use Air Dry clay to provide the support underneath that during forming. That's probably what Turbo was thinking of.

 

[master_colt_117]

My clay buck was awful. I do not recommend that ExCeLLuR8 unless you are familiar with using clays. I tried Air Dry clay and it just crumbled apart on me during the form and it was very hard to get a smooth enough surface to look through.

My first attempt was much better. I used the pepakura cut out from pepping my helmet and used bondo to smooth it like normal.

Awesome suggestion I will certainly keep this in mind!