DLP's Custom Projects

[deceptikhan]

Pretty cool Dark Prime. I like the GameBoy toy as well. But reffering to your Grimlock, how does this effect robot mode?

[Dark_Lord_Prime]

Pretty cool Dark Prime. I like the GameBoy toy as well. But reffering to your Grimlock, how does this effect robot mode?

 

It doesn't. I'm looking at ways to fold the chest piece away, but doing it as a single piece is proving to be problematic, so I'm making two more plates so I can cut them in half and try making them fold into both halves of the dinosaur torso.

 

I'm making two copies 'cause when I cut with my rotary tool, I lose about 1/8" of plastic from the edge(s), so with two duplicate plates, I can cut them both at slightly more than the halfway point to compensate for lost plastic, so the finished halves will fit together, rather than having a gap down the middle of his T-Rex chest between the panels.

 

I'm not sure how I'm gonna handle the hinging yet; I'm probably gonna order some styrene tubes and make the hinges from scratch, though.

[Guest Primal-Convoy]

I agree with you about the forums. I wish we could still post regular posts, as then we can just see the pics of the kitbashes on the thread page without having to go to a album. Its nice to have the album feature though, but I dont look at this forumas much as I used to...sigh.

[Dark_Lord_Prime]

I ripped out the lame "gravity spin" transforming thing and made the entire transformation manual. I also fixed his damned loose waist.

 

Behold:

 

 

Also, he has friggin' AWESOME light-piping!

 

 

This is the auto-transform bit inside his crotch:

 

 

I think that spring used to flip his legs down or something; I forget. Regardless, it's not needed now, so it's gone.

 

 

This is the gear assembly that sticks out the back. I removed the large gear and put the rest back onto the pin.

 

 

This is what the inside looks like now. The large gear I removed went in the middle and meshed with the gear from the waist piece. The back gear rolled along a row of teeth when the waist was swung back, rotating the legs around. I kept the back gear thing so the whole thing moves smoothly when I swing his legs back. The waist piece is now firmly glued into place, so the blue hip piece rotates around it.

 

 

This spring has to stay in place so the release lever works.

 

 

Now, when his legs are swung back and rotated for truck mode, the clip still locks into the hole in the front of his pelvis until the lever is pushed.

[Nakashima Taiki]

Nice grimlock mod. think you could maybe make a guide on how to do that? I also have an Idea on what the colors should be:

for Grimlock’s gray I had to use Gunship Gray mixed with some Bear Brown to get that shade. His red needed Dragon Red lightened slightly with some white, or Rust mixed with some Bloode Red.

just thought that might help. :D

 

I plan on doing that too, but I'm also going to cover the hole by his thighs (excuse the :ghey ness)

(BTW, did you take my advice on your prof or were you planing that beforehand?)

 

As for Prime, I heard there's something wrong with his knee articulation, but have no idea what it is. Are you going to tackle that too?

[Dark_Lord_Prime]

Nice grimlock mod. think you could maybe make a guide on how to do that?

The cardboard insert, the plastic insert, or the split plastic chest plate that folds into the halves of the dino torso?

 

I also have an Idea on what the colors should be:

for Grimlock’s gray I had to use Gunship Gray mixed with some Bear Brown to get that shade. His red needed Dragon Red lightened slightly with some white, or Rust mixed with some Bloode Red.

just thought that might help. :D

 

Thanks! It will! :)

 

(BTW, did you take my advice on your prof or were you planing that beforehand?)

 

My King Grimlock avatar? Yeah, thanks for the suggestion! :) The crown doesn't quite fit him as well as it does Classics Grimmy (that one, it fits exactly like it was molded for him!), but it works. :thumb

 

As for Prime, I heard there's something wrong with his knee articulation, but have no idea what it is. Are you going to tackle that too?

 

I dunno, but it may be that the front of his thigh stops the knee hinge, so the calf stops just short of a 90-degree bend.

 

I'm not sure if that bothers me enough to do anything about it, though.

 

I was considering ways to give his neck a ball-joint, but the way it's molded/built will likely make anything I do look like a hack-job. :tfmad

[Nakashima Taiki]

I mean which ever is the best. So the fold-out, I guess. As for the ball joint, jin has a guide for that :How to make a Tranformers Ball-jointed neck! not sure If it'll be what ya need, but Jin knows what he's doin.

[Dark_Lord_Prime]

The new chest armor is coming along nicely. :)

 

I decided to make it split in half and fold into the halves of his dinosaur torso, as I couldn't figure out how to fold the single-piece plate out of the way.

 

The new hinges used to be the legs of an Armada Minicon, but I don't remember which one; I think it was a member of the Requiem Blaster team, but I'm not sure.

 

I cut the ball posts apart and trimmed them to fit, then glued them inside Grimmy's "wings", then trimmed the leg pieces and glued them to the undersides of the chest plate halves. (and it was a PITA getting the damned things lined up right, despite measuring and re-measuring! :tfmad)

 

I'll be trimming the bottom edges of the panels so they're even with the bottom of the torso, and bulking them up slightly with pieces from a CD case, so it's more flush with the original contours. I've also got an extension made, to make his "collar" go all the way across.

 

I still need to trim the hinge piece on his right side to match the left, so it fits down over the robot-mode collar, too.

 

 

 

 

[Primus-feather]

Awesome, now make them hinge in the middle..

anyway I had a very similar idea to that, just didn't know how to implement it. THANX

[Dark_Lord_Prime]

Awesome, now make them hinge in the middle..

Eh? You mean, make the two panels fold on themselves to hide better inside the dino halves?

I probably could slap some tiny hinges in there, but I think that would compromise the stability a bit.

 

Anyway, the bottoms of the panels are gonna be cut down to be level with the bottom edge of the dino torso, and once they're painted, they'll blend in with the existing wings.

 

 

anyway I had a very similar idea to that, just didn't know how to implement it. THANX

Glad I could help. :)

 

I only had a vague idea when I started. I mostly made it up as I went along (much like most of my other projects :P) and did a lot of trial-and-error.

 

The ball-joint I originally tried to use came from Armada Blurr's Minicon's right arm, but it failed miserably: it would not stay glued to the chest panel at all, and I only had one of him anyway.

 

Luckily, I found this other set when I went through my Minicon parts again, and they worked perfectly. :)