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OVERHAULIN' ...Cylon Edition
Okey Dokey. This happened tonight. I had two things dangerous for me laying about: Abundant Caffeine and a determination for positive outcome. Let's begin...
Things You Will Need:
Seriously... had I not had this I would be in the hospital with third degree burns. The arm cuffs are super-glued together, but the really insidious thing is that the lower half to two thirds of the forearms appear dipped in superglue and the sleeves and interior of the cuffs are one massive gluecicle.
This is what it looks like if you boil them out:
As you can tell, damage to the cuff chrome and paint WILL occur. Additionally, the pleather of the legs would be toast if boiled.
Is it possible to separate the halves of the cuffs and just pop them off that way?
Well - you'd think. But there was so much glue on mine that that proved impossible. You may have to choose the method I did.
What you have to do first is pull the fabric through the bicep bracers (you can't remove them yet because they're locked in place by the cuffs on the end of both sleeves) and get the back opening end of the jumper through to the opposite side of the bracer, so that you can turn the sleeve inside out around the cuff. This wraps the back, elbow end of the cuff in fabric, with the elbow of the arm exposed in order to grip with pliers.
You want to then pull the fabric back through the bracer, so you can shove the bicep bracer up the sleeve and away from what will be dipped in the boiling hot water (no sense damaging the surface of parts if we don't have to).
Then you boil it repeatedly until the plastic is soft enough to grip with the pliers and twist/pry/pull away from the glue lining the cuffs. I opened one sleeve seam doing it, and destroyed the elbow joint points of both arms. You'll also note that the surfaces are covered in glue deformation, and the ends of the sleeves are literally stiff and deformed with dried glue.
I'll be putting it back onto a vintage black body for propriety's sake, and you can see what the sleeve action looks like here:
By the way, the pant legs don't finish in a sewn toe - just like some other BBP! outfits (thinking Flash here) but instead have an elastic stirrup which comes twisted into a moebius strip figure eight around the foot - I've done that again here...
The thing about that is you'll notice it actually makes the pant leg bulkier and harder to fit a boot over than a footie pajama legging. For a long time I scratched my head as to why this might keep happening (I mean, MEGO only did it that way for how long?) but doing this tonight I realized that it may actually be very advantageous. If you've got factories with apparel issues, doing it this way allows some flexibility and you're less likely to be saddled with an entire production shipment of figures suffering from fitted crotches somewhere around their knees. I don't know if that was the planning though... In reality the body suit is otherwise very well fitted. If it were solo I'd say "Best Choice on the market for a Black Panther"
Anyway the hardest part is behind us.
I notched out an old chips hand instead of modifying the rifle for now - because I'm pretty sure I'm going to try and rework part of the rifle so that standard colonials can hold one, but also make and cast myself new hand sets for cylons.
Freeing up the cuff, even before I cut it down, allows more range of motion in the arm, though until the cuff is cut down it's still trading elbow flexibility for wrist movement and so forth...
Now one thing i didn't mention before is I actually love the boots solution. I really do. It's chunky, and chromed, and spray painted on the base and just kind of fun. I adore them, because they and the pleather leggings really seem like they want to kick some colonials in the Frakkware.
So - here he is reassembled into Paul Blart, Mall Cylon - with a little loop for the sword.
I know I want him a little slimmer and meaner though. I can't remake an entire pelvis shell tonight, and I may even do it with pleather and an elastic belt with chromed elements as buckles... I don't know. In any event I knew the diaper was a goner... And anyway, I could always buy more - you know?
Here's what he looks like chopped down:
Now at this stage, I'm thinking the thing to do is modify the positions of both the shoulder pauldrons and the front chest plate. Bring that angle in a little and rework the whole kit. This wouldn't even be a bad slush mold to make, recast and have chromed as a single piece. Putting the head back into the body through the opening without a clamshell design would be a serious issue though.
I should also point out that the torso clam, like the other glued parts, is pretty easily separated. Everything is chromed, but the glue sticks better to the chrome than the chrome to the plastic, so they pop apart fairly easily without broken joinery.
This is Imperfect Temporary Solution back shot (using a freebie broken knight belt I got in in three pieces from "Fabulous Outfit Maker T" which I was luckily able to repair back together):
And the front, showing that at least the sheath holds the cylon sword well enough that I think the CTVT version of this would hold it too (though those snap when you sneeze on them):
...And there you have it. I'll update this as I get time to make changes. As for tonight - I just wanted a Cylon I could make ride a batcycle. Mission Accomplished.
Things You Will Need:
Seriously... had I not had this I would be in the hospital with third degree burns. The arm cuffs are super-glued together, but the really insidious thing is that the lower half to two thirds of the forearms appear dipped in superglue and the sleeves and interior of the cuffs are one massive gluecicle.
This is what it looks like if you boil them out:
As you can tell, damage to the cuff chrome and paint WILL occur. Additionally, the pleather of the legs would be toast if boiled.
Is it possible to separate the halves of the cuffs and just pop them off that way?
Well - you'd think. But there was so much glue on mine that that proved impossible. You may have to choose the method I did.
What you have to do first is pull the fabric through the bicep bracers (you can't remove them yet because they're locked in place by the cuffs on the end of both sleeves) and get the back opening end of the jumper through to the opposite side of the bracer, so that you can turn the sleeve inside out around the cuff. This wraps the back, elbow end of the cuff in fabric, with the elbow of the arm exposed in order to grip with pliers.
You want to then pull the fabric back through the bracer, so you can shove the bicep bracer up the sleeve and away from what will be dipped in the boiling hot water (no sense damaging the surface of parts if we don't have to).
Then you boil it repeatedly until the plastic is soft enough to grip with the pliers and twist/pry/pull away from the glue lining the cuffs. I opened one sleeve seam doing it, and destroyed the elbow joint points of both arms. You'll also note that the surfaces are covered in glue deformation, and the ends of the sleeves are literally stiff and deformed with dried glue.
I'll be putting it back onto a vintage black body for propriety's sake, and you can see what the sleeve action looks like here:
By the way, the pant legs don't finish in a sewn toe - just like some other BBP! outfits (thinking Flash here) but instead have an elastic stirrup which comes twisted into a moebius strip figure eight around the foot - I've done that again here...
The thing about that is you'll notice it actually makes the pant leg bulkier and harder to fit a boot over than a footie pajama legging. For a long time I scratched my head as to why this might keep happening (I mean, MEGO only did it that way for how long?) but doing this tonight I realized that it may actually be very advantageous. If you've got factories with apparel issues, doing it this way allows some flexibility and you're less likely to be saddled with an entire production shipment of figures suffering from fitted crotches somewhere around their knees. I don't know if that was the planning though... In reality the body suit is otherwise very well fitted. If it were solo I'd say "Best Choice on the market for a Black Panther"
Anyway the hardest part is behind us.
I notched out an old chips hand instead of modifying the rifle for now - because I'm pretty sure I'm going to try and rework part of the rifle so that standard colonials can hold one, but also make and cast myself new hand sets for cylons.
Freeing up the cuff, even before I cut it down, allows more range of motion in the arm, though until the cuff is cut down it's still trading elbow flexibility for wrist movement and so forth...
Now one thing i didn't mention before is I actually love the boots solution. I really do. It's chunky, and chromed, and spray painted on the base and just kind of fun. I adore them, because they and the pleather leggings really seem like they want to kick some colonials in the Frakkware.
So - here he is reassembled into Paul Blart, Mall Cylon - with a little loop for the sword.
I know I want him a little slimmer and meaner though. I can't remake an entire pelvis shell tonight, and I may even do it with pleather and an elastic belt with chromed elements as buckles... I don't know. In any event I knew the diaper was a goner... And anyway, I could always buy more - you know?
Here's what he looks like chopped down:
Now at this stage, I'm thinking the thing to do is modify the positions of both the shoulder pauldrons and the front chest plate. Bring that angle in a little and rework the whole kit. This wouldn't even be a bad slush mold to make, recast and have chromed as a single piece. Putting the head back into the body through the opening without a clamshell design would be a serious issue though.
I should also point out that the torso clam, like the other glued parts, is pretty easily separated. Everything is chromed, but the glue sticks better to the chrome than the chrome to the plastic, so they pop apart fairly easily without broken joinery.
This is Imperfect Temporary Solution back shot (using a freebie broken knight belt I got in in three pieces from "Fabulous Outfit Maker T" which I was luckily able to repair back together):
And the front, showing that at least the sheath holds the cylon sword well enough that I think the CTVT version of this would hold it too (though those snap when you sneeze on them):
...And there you have it. I'll update this as I get time to make changes. As for tonight - I just wanted a Cylon I could make ride a batcycle. Mission Accomplished.
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