The Energon Pub

So, those of you who have seen me post photos of my Cybertron Optimus Prime might have noticed he's a bit shabby looking. About a decade ago I tried to do a big touchup job on him, but I was an incompetent boob at the time. Krylon silver sprayed on too thick too fast, enamels applied sloppily and too thick, unwisely using paint markers for parts of it.. Also an idiotic attempt to extend the rifle barrel and the muzzle of the other side's cannon (since reversed), filled in one of the leg cannons with Mighty Putty and covered the other's gaps somewhat roughly with cardstock... Ugh. I've on-off chipped away at some of the excess paint over the years since, but now I'm finally making a concentrated effort to scrape and strip it away, and re-do the job better.




There are unfortunately some scratches from the removal that I couldn't quite smooth out with sanding... hopefully clear-coat will finish the smoothing well enough to be getting on with.

Finished repainting that batch of parts and got them clear-coated and reassembled:

Currently working on the torso and head:

This has mainly been all-new enhancement work rather than stripping and re-doing the old botched efforts, although there was some of that to deal with.

Time for a biiig update!







The torso repaint and reassembly completed.




And the right arm and leg, and the Matrix of Leadership. So that just leaves the backpack and the leg add-ons.


I recently read up on a better way to strip the botched paint: Soaking the parts in Pine-Sol. In preparation, I've removed the electronics by carefully de-soldering the wires from the battery terminals.


The parts gathered up in a bag to keep them from getting lost...


And now having a good long soak.

Painting in progress. Having do it in subgroups because of how many parts there are and how much coverage some of them need.

Looks great so far!

Any more updates on this guy? I love what you did with the matrix chamber detailing

Thanks! And yes, I do have another update:

I'm almost done. Only two parts remain unpainted, the rest are either done or just need cleanup.

Finally got the paint done, the parts clearcoated, and Optimus fully reassembled.

The first step was to solder the electronics back onto the battery terminals. Did so successfully, tested them with batteries.

[img]https://images-wixmp-ed30a86b8c4ca887773594c2.wixmp.com/f/c32b4c02-5aaf-4b9d-86d0-856d6c09651d/de1hvcr-98d229bc-a97e-44eb-8c8f-91b137708db5.jpg/v1/fill/w_800,h_450,q_75,strp/cybertron_optimus_touchup_overhaul_23_by_zeldatheswordsman_de1hvcr-fullview.jpg?token=eyJ0eXAiOiJKV1QiLCJhbGciOiJIUzI1NiJ9.eyJzdWIiOiJ1cm46YXBwOiIsImlzcyI6InVybjphcHA6Iiwib2JqIjpbW3siaGVpZ2h0IjoiPD00NTAiLCJwYXRoIjoiXC9mXC9jMzJiNGMwMi01YWFmLTRiOWQtODZkMC04NTZkNmMwOTY1MWRcL2RlMWh2Y3ItOThkMjI5YmMtYTk3ZS00NGViLThjOGYtOTFiMTM3NzA4ZGI1LmpwZyIsIndpZHRoIjoiPD04MDAifV1dLCJhdWQiOlsidXJuOnNlcnZpY2U6aW1hZ2Uub3BlcmF0aW9ucyJdfQ.Rtr5vuvvCV-FouBSsa_XC70ExniSl1N5JsqkGBun2TI[img]



With that taken care of, I got everything reassembled. There was a misadventure involving tracking down a stray spring from the missiles cannon, but I ultimately found it and got everything together.





Vehicle mode shots, including the glorious flight mode.

[img]https://images-wixmp-ed30a86b8c4ca887773594c2.wixmp.com/f/c32b4c02-5aaf-4b9d-86d0-856d6c09651d/de1hxf5-fb6f58c9-fcd8-4d7d-a29e-91c1c279db1b.jpg/v1/fill/w_800,h_450,q_75,strp/cybertron_optimus_touchup_overhaul_31_by_zeldatheswordsman_de1hxf5-fullview.jpg?token=eyJ0eXAiOiJKV1QiLCJhbGciOiJIUzI1NiJ9.eyJzdWIiOiJ1cm46YXBwOiIsImlzcyI6InVybjphcHA6Iiwib2JqIjpbW3siaGVpZ2h0IjoiPD00NTAiLCJwYXRoIjoiXC9mXC9jMzJiNGMwMi01YWFmLTRiOWQtODZkMC04NTZkNmMwOTY1MWRcL2RlMWh4ZjUtZmI2ZjU4YzktZmNkOC00ZDdkLWEyOWUtOTFjMWMyNzlkYjFiLmpwZyIsIndpZHRoIjoiPD04MDAifV1dLCJhdWQiOlsidXJuOnNlcnZpY2U6aW1hZ2Uub3BlcmF0aW9ucyJdfQ.bZaYpxKGLHPzvcmZjuKXqKomeD5Hgl526SJ4QZ8uGDY[img]
Battle station




"Optimus Prime, Super Mode!" This shows off a lot of the painted detail, I find.



"Cyber Key Power!" Had to show off these details too.