The Energon Pub

[KnightStrike]

Those feet are looking pretty cool. I will be curious to see some shots of them on Hoist and Trailbreaker. I really love the Generations line, but the current trend of eliminating ball jointed articulation points is disappointing. Fortunately GlauG is here to fix with the solution

[G_Works]

Expecting Trailbreaker/Hoist feet next week sometime...

I managed to break my Generations Skids by mistake while trying to measure him for custom parts, so I am probably giving up on the shoulder extensions I had been toying with making. In pursuit of more G1 customs, I was inspired by a Digibash I saw to try and make some parts to turn Energon Downshift into a passable CHUG Siren (and/or maybe Nightbeat)... Of course, since the Energon toys are a lot chunkier than I remembered, that means some major mods. Currently, the plan is new, ball-jointed hips and ankles, new lower arms which are a bit less stubby and have rotating wrists, and a pair of new heads. Pics once I finish building something worth showing.

[G_Works]

Well, my huge order of parts has been shipped, so expect photos in the next few days. Burning question which has come up while I've been working on these;




If custom parts required you to cut or modify an existing toy, would you find them less interesting, generally? I've thought of a few ways of giving better arms to the Energon Downshift mould, but the ones with the best results involve cutting the original elbow peg off, so I'm interested to hear what you guys think.

[Fuhzimota]

My Dremel knows no fear...lead on, GlauG, lead on!

[G_Works]

I unexpectedly ended up being off work, sick, so I was home for when my Shapeways order was delivered on Friday. Good news and bad news!



Thunderclash's parts look to have printed okay.



He's kinda crazy posable now, thanks to the very stiff ankle joints. No support used here.




He stands a little taller than the original due to the ankle joints. I'm working on a revised version where that isn't the case though.



Unfortunately the white is a bit washed out, so you can't see the truck mode too clearly, but it's an okay fit. I'm a little unhappy about how the joints are slightly wonky, but I think I know what to do about that for the production version.



His G1-style, gun-toting truck mode.



And just in case anyone was interested, a comparison between the replacement hands and the original.

Besides smaller ankle joints, my only disappointment with Thunderclash was his head. I wasn't super happy with it, and as a few people have suggested, it's a little flat in the face. Also, I've realised it's slightly too big for the transformation, AND the eyes snapped off on insertion, so I need to make some changes there. Also, the gun parts need some small mods for fit, but that's a far more minor issue.

On to the bad news...



While my Arcee hands are looking much better overall, they do have one glaring issue; the balls on the right hands didn't print! They are identical to the ones the left hands, only flipped, but I discovered there was a small bit of internal geometry on both which was probably causing the issue. Annoying. Same goes for the Trailbreaker foot.




Weirdly enough? The black feet printed just fine, despite being the exact same model. Not complaining, means I can do a proper test.



A bit smaller than they were in my mind's eye when designing them. They work okay, but they really need to be longer at the very least for balance, and...



They look kinda dumb in truck mode. So toe tailgates are on the cards there, as well as some general mods. ALSO, I managed to break my Tailgate slightly trying to remove the pin from the original joint. Fnargh.



Looks pretty good compared to Hoist though.



I'm sure this is the main thing some people are interested in this thread for, so have a pic of Magnus, with the Shapeways prints of the knee joints having replaced the prototypes I had. The main post needed a little thickening up with clear nail polish, but I think the possibility of it printing too thick due to the way White Solid Flexible shrinks (especially if you get it polished) is too great for me to want to try and make the peg slightly larger on the model. Overall, very happy!




So the Dreadwing Gatling came out great! Even if the photo didn't. As soon as I make a small modification to the connector piece, that will go live on my SW store.

[triKlops]

Some really nice work in here Glaug.
That Dreadwing Gatling looks great!

[Fuhzimota]

Wow... The Thunderclash set is really coming along... can't wait for the finished product... looks like a definite must-have for me! Also, I got a gift recently that looks suspiciously like the bot under that gatling gun... so I'll need one of those as well... lol. As always, great work, GlauG! ...I'm gonna be spending a lot of money on Shapeways this year...

[G_Works]

Thanks guys!

I just want to make a last-minute amendment to the Dreadwing Gatling gun parts before they go on sale, as well as test-painting my sample one I had printed. However, I've put up the Thunderclash/Classics Prime/Magnus hand and feet parts for sale on my Shapeways store, should anybody be interested in a set of those as upgrades.

[G_Works]

Very minor update, but I finally got round to mixing some paint to match the Generations Dreadwing figure and painting up the gatling launcher.

[gothsaurus]

You'll have to let the rest of us know what colors you mixed to make this color of paint

[G_Works]

I add a little bit of EC brand "UV glow blue" paint, but you can match the colour with about a 1/1 mix of Games Workshop/Citadel Hawk Turquoise and Skull White. One just has to keep in mind that it dries slightly lighter than it looks wet, I think.

The other downside is that GW Hawk Turquoise has been discontinued. >_> But there are companies that make colour-matched paints.

[Fuhzimota]

Thanks for the update, as well as the paint info. Will be hitting Shapeways as soon as the old bank account allows...

[G_Works]

Just slightly updated the gatling model based on my test print and made it live on the store.

I've been trying to work on a hinged replacement for the FoC Vortex mould's rotors, as the toy's main weakness is the way it can't get that damned rotor out of the way in robot mode. Unfortunately, while I eventually managed to get the rotor off of the peg, I can't get the mount off of the arm to measure! I'm not sure how much of a market there is for add-on parts that need you to destroy the original part during removal...

[G_Works]

I think this might be the longest I've left this thread without an update! I've been a bit too busy to get much design work done, but I've been really, really happy to see people buying the Generations G2 Dreadwing cannon and FoC Prime/Magnus knees in particular, if any of you guys are on the forums I would love to hear back from you about how you have found them.



So, while I've been working on a few things in the scant spare time outside of my new additional job, I've found a little time to knock out a prototype Thunderclash! I have had a lot of ups and downs with him, worst being one of the clear plastic parts cracking on reassembly, but overall it's gone well. I need to wait until I can afford to order the revised head and cannons before I can call him "done", but I thought this was a nice way of seeing how everything would come together.

[G_Works]

In case anyone needed proof that I design parts for myself first and for sale second, I just spent an hour or so quickly knocking out a design for Whirl-style hands to fit the HftD Tomahawk mould, because a friend showed me what a good IDW-style Whirl he makes with a customised '07 Swindle/Jolt head... I don't expect to sell any of these, but it's just for my own fun.

[G_Works]

Just a reeeeally quick update. I got my M-F-B and Trashtalk/Cogwheel set on Tuesday morning, and it annoys me that MT went for 4mm pegs/hands where they could have used the same 5mm peg and kept the totally-not-My-First-Blaster compatible with the Generations Legends Swerve. Here's my solution.



Not exactly mindblowing, it's a bunch of pegs, but it's an easy solution for people who want to use the M-F-B kit with their Generations or other figures with 5mm holes. I haven't tested it and probably won't anytime soon, so anyone who wants to try it, no point waiting for me. The only thing is that it requires cutting off part of the original handle and then gluing, as a part which would just plug around the existing handle without mods would be too thin and fragile to print.

[G_Works]

Not had a chance to make another SW order recently, but I am on the way to one with all the stuff I need to prototype recently...




I recently got a Henkei Red Alert, which made me mess around with my "Heroic Duo" set again, and one thing it made me realise is that I reeeallly don't like the "shoulderpads" that set uses for its cannon mounts. So that's just something small and useful for anyone else who feels the same way, it means the cannons can mount directly into the shoulder socket now.



This is a set of handles for [url="http://www.hlj.com/product/KBYMW-20/Sci"]the fantastic Kotobukiya gatling gun[/url] which I know plenty of TF customisers have made use of already. It's designed so that you can give it to either Generations Springer or Beast Hunters Optimus in particular, but anyone with a 5mm hole hand can use it. The small piece clips on to the "handle" on the front of the weapon, for a stablising handle.

[G_Works]

A very self-indulgent model, this is a replacement 5mm handle for the HfTD Ratchet toy which has that weird oblong one with the gears on it. I have a pair of them left over from customs so figured I should do something with them...

I have some other things in the works, I've decided to finish off a few more designs before getting more test prints done for what should hopefully be the final version of Thunderclash. I also really want to finish off those Hoist/Trailbreaker feet.




Oh, and I finally transformed Thunderclash.

[KnightStrike]

That Thunderclash looks fantastic! The color choices are perfect.

[G_Works]

Thanks KnightStrike. Can't wait til I can test the ver 2.0 parts and then finish him.

Since I'm a little short on funds for now, I'm not able to do any test prints... Annoying, as WuLongti told me about another site I want to try! Me being me, that hasn't stopped me working on another project:




Hopefully this is obvious as Ultra Magnus parts... Specifically, MtMtE style Ultra Magnus. I know a lot of people use the Beast Hunters Magnus as a stand-in for him, so I figured, why not go a step further?

This was originally meant to just be a set of thighs, shoulders and a head, but then I realised that I'd really like to remodel the arms, and then I realised I'd really like to remodel the torso... then I realised I'd like to remodel the chest...

Long story short, I'll be making a few different versions of this available depending on how confident you feel disassembling the original BH Magnus (not as hard as I thought, actually). I think a set of leg + head (and maybe shoulder) parts should be enough for most people, with the "full set" available for crazy people like me.

As well as some valuable advice about making ball-joint-sockets, I also realised that colouring this stuff makes it a LOT easier to work with... So thanks to WuLongti for both there.

[G_Works]

Ran into some problems with Magnus, I'm not sure if I want to have waist articulation or not... It requires replacing the "spine" that the chest mounts onto, which means yet more parts (and therefore cost) to an already expensive kit. Suggestionsand thoughts on the matter welcome.

Caught up with some requests in the meantime.



This was for a chum on Twitter, who wanted a 4-bladed rotor for the Energon Bruticus helicopter, for a more G1-looking Vortex.

https://www.shapeways.com/model/1768036 ... lades.html

I do NOT recommend it in Detail plastics, but said friend insisted on the smoothest finish. I can't be sure it's not too brittle.




This may not look very interesting out of context, but someone on Shapeways asked me if I could make some more parts for Generations Dreadwing, so that the gun parts could be mounted to the back like the wings of the original toy while the shoulder cannon I designed is used instead. I have yet to test it, but it probably does what he asked.

https://www.shapeways.com/model/1775343 ... ounts.html



This last one's for me, as I have always thought PCC Heavytread would make an excellent CHUG Brawl. I have a half-customised one which is an okay Bruticus leg in a pinch, but with these parts replacing his butt and front minicon port he should be far more stable than my old custom. Some more parts (new head, elevating tank turret gun) and I figure he'll make a good little Brawl.

[G_Works]

Today, I got my hands on Arms Micron Magnus. In retrospect, I wish I'd had one of these before I started, because while he'd involve just as much work and material, I think he might make a better MtMtE Magnus base... His truck mode is more similar (even if it only resembles it loosely), his parts layout means that he might actually be easier to design new parts for and still function normally, too. Only downside is that I'm not sure how I can get the shoulders to go how I want, at least at the moment, and I don't really want to replace them, given how they are attached.

So what should I do now? Design both, and see which I like the look of most? Give up on the BH Magnus and start on PRiD, or finish BH Magnus first and see how I like it? I'm open to any thoughts, comments or suggestions guys.


That aside... Been working on Heavytread/Brawl parts:



That's an Energon Combiner port for his butt, new turret parts so that the barrel can elevate (for G1-style positioning in leg mode), a replacement for his minicon port, a new neck, and a mount for the two Crossfire guns to peg behind the turret like his G1 tank toy.

Just not sure if I want to design him a new head, or if the original is close enough.

[KnightStrike]

I'd say finish BH Magnus and see what you think of it, but I may be biased just because I want to see what all you do with it after seeing how great your Thunderclash looks

[G_Works]

Thanks Knightstrike! I plan on doing both I guess, but I think I might have to abandon my plans for a waist swivel for BH Magnus. To be honest, his torso is close enough in general detail to the MtMtE design that I might just make a new clip-on crotch or something.

Also, now I feel silly... I was having a conversation with C16 and realised I'd totally forgotten to post this one up online:



Inspired by a Japanese custom headswap I saw, this turns BH Bulkhead into a MtMtE-inspired Brawn. I'm just going to sort out light piping for the head and then he'll be good to go!

[Forgotten]

Unpainted

I love this thing. I hardly ever post on the boards anymore, but I had to share this. It is quite durable. No worries whatsoever about it breaking under normal use(including me dropping Bruticus about five feet earlier). The black detail has quite a good amount of flex to it. It's almost the same consistency as a tire patch. Thanks again, Glaug!