The Energon Pub

(NOTE: new pics below)
I finally rounded up another Universe Insecticon, and I've gotten a good start on my Shrapnel revamp.
The LEGO mandibles are temporary only. I'm still deciding whether I'm going to build on top of them or just use the hinges.


Pointy butt.



Here are a few pics of the inner-structure of the head. I'm kind of jazzed that I'm making something that has an "inner-structure"!

More to come...

that looks great. can't wait to see it done. I am a fan of your previous bashes.

I'm inclined to build on the lego bits.

The mandibles are huge, and no doubt someone would say they're too big, but for some reason the fact that they're too big seems to make them work!

Cut pices of the lego of (make them slimmer and then build on top of them) cos they look realy badass.

I finally made some more progress on Shrapnel. I got the inspiration that I needed by rounding up an original Shrapnel at the flea market this weekend. Here are a few new pics.




His left mandible is misaligned because it isn't glued together yet. That's been fixed.

And the bot mode!
I still have a lot of work to do on his face, and he will get the guns on the ends of his mandibles.

I'd been dragging my feet on this one, but I finally got the guns onto his madibles. They even swing forward like they did on the cartoon.


To keep the gun in, I cut a mushroom-shaped hole and melted and mashed the peg. The bits keeping them in are thin strips of styrene that I originally bought to redetail Astromechs.



Only slightly crooked.

As with the rest of your stuff, thats BLOODY GREAT!!!

How do you do it? Like, how do you take lego and make it look like it does now? And how do you get that scratched, dirtied battle scarred look to your paint job?

Oh yeah, i wanna see more of your bashes if possible?

So far, so good. I look forward to seeing the finished product.

Serious scratchbuilding going on with some tiny features there.

Impressive.

Most Impressive.

First off, thanks all for the kind words.
As for your questions:

Sonray wrote:How do you do it? Like, how do you take lego and make it look like it does now? And how do you get that scratched, dirtied battle scarred look to your paint job?

Well, it looks scratched and battle-scarred because it is. That's all ground down plastic and epoxy you're seeing here. It has an appeal, I'll admit, but it will get a nice smooth paint job in the end.
As for the Lego, the only remaining fragments of everyone's favorite building set are the hinges and what were the short end bits in the original pictures. I hollowed the short bits out and made them into sockets, scratch-built the new jaws and slid them in. 'Gotta love that styrene rack at PEARL. Why sculpt a right angle when you can buy one?

what materials do you use to build this sorta stuff from scratch?

This is really taking shape. It's looking great. This kitbash forum slowed down for a week or so I was getting worried the gas prices where getting the best of us too.

So, you mentioned PEARL which I'm in about once a month. Is that where you get your molding stuff. I want to start scratch building but I don't know where to even begin with the materials. Any suggestions would be greatly welcome.

thanks
keep it going

Wheel_Jack wrote:This is really taking shape. It's looking great. This kitbash forum slowed down for a week or so I was getting worried the gas prices where getting the best of us too.

So, you mentioned PEARL which I'm in about once a month. Is that where you get your molding stuff. I want to start scratch building but I don't know where to even begin with the materials. Any suggestions would be greatly welcome.

thanks
keep it going

I wanna know what to use for molding and sculpting your own parts and heads etc.

Aside from the Lego hinges, the plastic parts in the jaws are all PLASTRUCT brand styrene parts that I bought at PEARL art supply. The head and knuckle claws/ bug butt are FAST STEEL brand two-part epoxy putty. I get that at HOME DEPOT in the plumbing isle.
I couldn't get anything done without the Plastruct company. The guns on Shrapnel's jaws are made from two gages of tube with a thin rod inserted to make the hinge. The jaws are hollow tubes with a rectangular cross-section. I bent them by cutting notches out of them, folding them and then filling them with hot glue to reinforce it. I then cut slots along one side with a dremmel and laid flat, thick strips in and cut their ends to the propper angles. Eventually I'm going to smooth them out with epoxy puttty. For that I will proably use the wood repair epoxy, appropriatly (and amusingly) called Quick Wood, because it has a longer work time.
The teeth half-way up the jaws are sticking out through holes. I melted the ends of the teeth to give them a mushroom shape that holds them in.
When it comes to heads, I try to avoid making them totaly from scratch, so I try to build on what's already there. That's where the epoxy putty comes in. If you figure out what you can use, you just need to shave off what you can't and build up what you need. Sometimes the new bits pop off, but you can just glue them back on. For gluing, I reccomend Krazy Glue in the Brush-On bottle. I love that little brush.

heheheeheh, "quick wood", heheheheheehehehehe


Ahem...anyway, thanks for the info dude!

Tom_Servo wrote:...I love that little brush.

and I love that you gave such complete info.
thank you very much

This beautifulness equals Classics Shrapnel. It's sooooooo good. I wish I was good at Kitbashing, but alas, I am not. Oh well. Keep up the good work!