Tusken Raider Respirator

I've been putting off and putting off starting work on the Tusken Raider Respirator, as i've been kind of dreading it.
Seems the thing to do is (A) buy two cans of WD40, (B) empty them, (C) pierce then cut them in half, (D) glue the two upper halves together.
Its done that way so that each end will have the raised area all aerosol cans have. But i'm not very keen on piercing empty pressurised cans, even if i'm certain they're empty.
So, i've cheated a used a standard can of beans, which is proving quite difficult now to find one's without a ring-pull top. Of course i had to cut the can along the side to remove the conents and i can do that as sloppy as i like as the can with be covered by fake leather when done.
Along with that in the first pic you've got the other components - two WD40 caps, a length of solid aluminium tube and some sort of multiple junction thing that i looked the part. I went with that rather than the standard brass affairs a lot of folk use as its very light plastic and our Son's only 13 and i don't want too much weighing him down.
Second pic is when i've cut two of the plastic things off that junction, and drilled holes in the caps and can.
Third pic is how things are today, when i've bent the tube into shape. Think it'll be a tad too big for our Son, but i didn't want to make a kiddie one as he's growing fast and it'll soon fit.

Nurgle Dragon - eyes finished.

I wanted a bunch of colour to oppose the grim colour scheme, and have got it:

Jawa Pistol - light at the end of the proverbial.

I've not done anything on this weapon for a long while as the brick wall i've faced is the strange shape at the front of the wooden stock that joins that to the tube that runs below the barrel.
It looks to be some kind of fork for a wheel or gear or something but, try as i might, i've not been able to find anything suitable.
Fed up with waiting, and really wanting to crack on, i've gone and made my own from Plasticard.
Before that though, i added a wooden pole to the front of the stock to take the weight of the barrel that'll be going on later.
With that pole and my new shape built, i could then cover up the pole with a plastic tube (a cut down section of the reusable rockets from the Airfix Space Shuttle kit) and attached a cog at the very front.
Again, i've not been able to find a match for that and this one is much bigger than it should be. But, its in keeping with the original and helps balance the back-heavy assembly so far of having a solid wood section at the rear.

Gaffi Stick - almost done

Something i've been beavering away at while i've been off-air are the Star wars weapons for our Childrens outfits.
The Tusken Raider Gaffi Stick is coming along nicely now:
I've attached the resin end to a 90 degree plumbing part,
then attached it to a length of pipe,
then painted it all to look like wood,
then used gardening twine for the hand grips.
The next step is to add the smaller diameter pipe at the front that the spike and fins will be attached to. Initially i was going to go with more plumbing pipe, but that club end is SO heavy and the pipe SO light, that i think my Son would have a problem balancing and holding it over long periods of time.
So what i'm going to use is a wooden pole to add weight and have it go all the way down inside the existing tube to the club end to rry and balance things a bit.

Nurgle Dragon - nearly done

Okay, here he is with skin done, horns done, mouth done, and i've made a start on the eyes.
I was going with a white, dead fish eyes look but now decided to go much more colourful and bright to make them stand out.

Terminator HK Flying Machine

Okay, looks like i'm back - at least for a while. Don't know whats going on, but it seems to be a browser issue - switched to Google Chrome and now i can post pics.
Anyway, should get you back up to speed on what i've been doing, and this is the first.
I always wanted the old Horizon version since I built one as a commission waaay back when it first came out, but was always put off by it being vinyl and so chuffin’ big. That last one is even more important now, with barely any shelf space left.
But this is IP plastic and much smaller. In fact, the smallness seems to be a source of moaning online, with folk reckoning it’s far too tiny to be 1/35th. Er... Ummm.... nowhere on the box nor the instruction does it state that it’s meant to be 1/35th, so don’t know what they’re on about.
Watching the battle at the start of T2, the HK’s look to me to be about a bit bigger than an Apache Helicopter, so down I come with two different scale figures to gauge things – you can see them at the bottom of the photo here. Yup, 1/35th is way too big, the other fella is 1/48th and reckon is just about right – 1/72nd would make the craft too darn big.
There's a couple of choices to make - have the ship lovely and shiny as in T2 (in which case I could use Alclad finally) or the beaten up, grimy look of Terminator Salvation? And do I base it now, or wait for the upcoming HK Tank and make a diorama (if my shelves allow it)?
The paint scheme was decided for me when i realised that Alclad is only possible with an airbrush, which i don't have. So, here's where i am at the moment - finished "Audi Aluminium" which came out far far better than i thought it would.
So i'm not now going to heavily weather it a la "Terminator Salvation", but have it more like "T2".
Just need to put some light pastelling on for a wee bit of weather and finish the base.

Apologies

Sorry there's no new posts at the moment, but for some reason this site isn't allowing me to put up pictures. I can load them up all ready but when time comes to insert them into the text, it just sits there and sits there and sits there.
And that's both trying to load from my computer and linking from Photobucket.
Don't know quite what's going on, but there'll be nothing from me in the meantime, seeing as a visual Blog is no good without pictures.
But, can i suggest a trip to my Mr E Models Facebbok page, where i put up all my original builds:

https://www.facebook.com/MrEModels

Gaffi Stick

With only just over a month now to the Demoncon 7 convention, and with all three Sprogs wanting to join the Galactic Acadamy so they can troop with me, i've really got to pull my proverbial out.
Next up is the Gaffi Stick for our Son's Tusken Raider outfit.
The bit of it that's put me off the most has been the club end, being as the originals used in ANH were sourced from actual weapons from the Fiji Islands and are pretty complicated carvings. But i found a bloke in the States who was doing resin versions and it arrived over Christmas.
Its a lovely bit of work cast in a browny clearish resin - so nice in fact that my Wife has been trying to talk me out of it so she can have it as an ornament.
Being solid resin its HEAVY, so my first thought is a worry as to how i'll be able to secure it to the rest without it falling off.
The seller had very thoughtfully inserted a plumbing joint into the base of it and a trip to the local DIY store got me a 90 degree angle that was a nice tight fit.
Squishing ABS/PVC solvent into the joint should make for a nice secure join, but i'll be smearing some P38 around the outside join just to be sure.

Nurgle Dragon - wings

Quick update here of the Nurgle Dragon wings.
I've used air-drying clay over the wire armature then super glued toilet paper onto the paper clip fingers as the membranes of the wings.
Once the super glue was dry (which is great as it sets super hard on the tissue paper), i've covered everything with watered down PVA glue, which seals and toughens the paper surprisingly well.