The Energon Pub

I decided to just make a new topic for this, since it went a tad beyond just painting his eyes clear blue.

First, alt-mode!

I really didn't care for the metallic-white paint they put on him, so that's gone, and I added black accents. I also painted the headlight wells silver.









Yet again, Hasbro molds pieces in clear plastic, then paints them; in this case, BB's tail lights. They're the same clear plastic as the windows, but for whatever reason, they were painted opaque red. I cleaned that paint off, painted the wells silver and the lights clear red.






Behold, teh shiny new side mirrors!





I'm gonna print up a license plate for him later; I'm thinking something like "BMBL B".

Next post: bot-mode!

And here's bot-mode!


I've given him a proper Autobot symbol on his chest, and relocated the rub-sign to the inside of his roof.






And here, again, Hasbro molded his eyes in clear plastic, but didn't do anything with that. I've painted them clear blue and installed my own light-pipe into the back of his head. (I'll add a couple pics of the inside later.)





As a bonus, here are a couple pics of my modded Waverunner! I sanded the sides of the top-half's nose narrow, and the point below the nubs that lock it into the bottom-half, so it's hinged and can swing up. I'm trying to come up with a simple way to turn the water-ski into a weapon that he can hold now.






And there you have it.

This light-piping project has given me ideas for adding piping to both my Super Starscream project and my Classics Starscream (though the latter is gonna be a little tougher, since the head is a single piece)!

Definately well done. The only thing I don]t like is moving of the rub-sign. The whole point of those is to hide the true nature of the bot/con in alt mode so keeping the rub sign where it was is pretty essential.

Great Mods! Everything looks real nice. hope you can make a decent weapon out of the jetski, it will be interesting to see what you come up with. Alas for once I agree with Tramp the whole rubsign issue. You could just eliminate the rubsign altogether since it is bumblebee after all. No decepticon would ever look weak like him.

Oh yeah, a tape cassette looks really frightening:)

Nice. I like what you did with the insignia. I might just move the rub sign there on mine, too. Classics is really making me hate rub signs.

Actually, I'm developing a new-found love for the things myself. Personally, I'm trying to find ways to hide them 'in plain sight', as it were, in vehicle form (so they can sort of reveal their allegiance at will), and giving them proper, easy-to-find insignias in robot mode. I've only got Prime so far, and his rubsign has moved to the handily-sized space in the middle of his bumper - With a tiny bit of trimming it fits perfectly, and doesn't look obtrusive at all.

Nice job, DLP! I'm liking the Bumblebee mould more and more - can't wait to get two or three myself! As with Starscream, brilliant job on the light-piping. That's one of the gimmicks that really adds to a fig, and the fact that the've done transparent eyes but solid backs was just daft.
Getting rid of the white paint-apps was a brilliant decision, as is modding the waverunner to open up.

Nice idea, turning the jetski into a hand weapon. I can see that working - if you turn it upside down, it does kind of remind me of one the disruptors from Star Trek. If you can attach a Minicon-style peg to the back of the jetski (sort of at the back area of the seat), and rig a 'headlight' on it, that could make quite a nice pistol.

Ramrider wrote:Getting rid of the white paint-apps was a brilliant decision, as is modding the waverunner to open up.

Nice idea, turning the jetski into a hand weapon. I can see that working - if you turn it upside down, it does kind of remind me of one the disruptors from Star Trek. If you can attach a Minicon-style peg to the back of the jetski (sort of at the back area of the seat), and rig a 'headlight' on it, that could make quite a nice pistol.

Actually, I'm trying to turn the entire thing (Waverunner and its trailer) into a BFG for him.

I'm looking at adding either a pair of floatation devices (like the lifeguards on Baywatch carry) or two sets of scuba tanks to the front of the trailer on swivels, so the two halves of the trailer flip forward and the tanks spin around to become blaster barrels.

Then, with the Waverunner upside down, on the bottom, the top of it flips down to provide access to a handle peg in the seat (which is more-or-less blocked from view when the Waverunner is "closed").

The only problem is, where do I get a couple sets of scuba tanks that'll fit the trailer well? I'm gonna be checking out the toys I usually ignore at Big Lots and such. I know I've seen playsets with mini diving gear there before...

I love checking out the toy aisles at the quid shops. Sometimes you find happy knock-offs (like the oversized Minicons I've got, which also provided nice big assault rifles), and sometimes you just hit upon the most random gem (like the jetski I got for 50p which I want to turn into a Transformer).

Did you think of filling in the spaces left by removing the wing so everything is uniform in terms of it not looking like it's missing something?

I left the Rub symbol where it was and added a Autobot symbol to the right foot like in the G-1 animation pics i have

Did you strip the white off the front and back there, or jsut paint over it? Trying to find a way to strip it off without damaging it my self.

tentagil wrote:Did you strip the white off the front and back there, or jsut paint over it? Trying to find a way to strip it off without damaging it my self.

I tried taking the stripes off with Testors Brush Cleaner (it's worked well before), but they didn't want to come off, so I ended up just painting over them.

John Dillinga wrote:Did you think of filling in the spaces left by removing the wing so everything is uniform in terms of it not looking like it's missing something?

Huh?

He's talking about the indents on the back where the spoiler plugs in. In several pics you have the spoiler removed. Personally I like him better that way. But looks like you painted it and put it back on.

tentagil wrote:He's talking about the indents on the back where the spoiler plugs in. In several pics you have the spoiler removed. Personally I like him better that way. But looks like you painted it and put it back on.

Ah. Yeah, the spoiler was actually done the whole time, but I completely forgot about it till the first pics were taken and I was busy cropping them.


I made one more change--now, he has a 'Bot symbol on his hood.





I'm sorry; I said I was gonna post pics of the inside of his head, but I forgot and it's glued together now (no more screw hole, 'cause the light-pipe went down directly in the way).

But, here's a shot of the back of his head, showing where the pipe went in, and the total lack of screw hole.

Phase one of turning the Wave Runner into BB's gun is finished (installed a handle)!






I'll be mounting barrels on the front-bottom of the trailer, which will be able to rotate, so the muzzles will be hidden in alt-mode. I've also got two configurations worked out; I'm thinking the straight-ahead mode will have a regular blaster function, and the forked mode will be some sort of harmonic-resonance generator mode.






Phase 2: adding the barrels, patching gaps with epoxy putty, cleaning it up and repainting.

Nice. Heh. I kinda like the way we're taking the same idea and taking slightly different routes with it. I like your idea with the dual-config gun; can't wait to see how you work out the barrels (actually, I can't wait to see how I work them out, either )...

Nice, love the paint job and Wave Runner is coming along niceley, can it still function as a jet pack/glider? (not that does anything to improve the toy, I leave mine off anyways)