"Help!" for: Molding

[lurchwizwoz]

Body filler question

Hey 405th users
I'm fairley new here
I have made my pep suit and it's has been stiffened using resin and fibreglass, but here's the question... Do I need to use bondo or body filler or whatever you want to call it, if so how do I keep the intricate bits looking good? do I 'HAVE' to use body filler is the question realy?
Thank you

 

[lurchwizwoz]

You would want to mold it with a brush on mold liquid like Rebound-25 for instance and after you have a few good coats on the pistol use a exacto knife to seperate the mold into two halves down the middle, after that you can put a fiberglass jacket over the mold, so it keeps the rubber rigid during molding.

Another option would be to get a sheet of styrofoam (loft insulation foam) and carve out using a sharp knife & sand paper dafrontlinetrooper (Andrew cook) gives great tutorials on YouTube
Good luck

 

[Katsu]

You don't HAVE to use bondo. It is meant to hide the "polygon" look a pepakura piece will have when it's finished.

It's the difference between this:

And this:

If you don't use bondo, your helmet will look like the first picture. If that's okay with you, then you can skip bondo! But generally people want a degree of game accuracy and asthetical happiness, which requires smoothing it out. (I realize in-game there are polygons, but they hide them with high res textures!)

 

[miggitymike82]

so i completed my first suit of armor about 2 years ago. Now i'm looking to make helmets for my nephews, problem is i don't want to sit there and keep making individual helmets considering they all want helmets now. i just figured it might be easier to pep one, resin, and bondo it and making molds out of that... question is... is that even possible? and if it is possible what do i use to make the mold? i know i can find tutorials on how to mold but what's the best "material" to use?

 

[Xtremenoob]

so i completed my first suit of armor about 2 years ago. Now i'm looking to make helmets for my nephews, problem is i don't want to sit there and keep making individual helmets considering they all want helmets now. i just figured it might be easier to pep one, resin, and bondo it and making molds out of that... question is... is that even possible? and if it is possible what do i use to make the mold? i know i can find tutorials on how to mold but what's the best "material" to use?

Once you finished peping bondo and sanding and have it ready for molding to make more copies, you can go over it with oil based clay to fix up all the little bits like indents or even adding details because silicone doesn't stick to oil based clay. For all the products and tutorial you can get from smooth-on.com but there other retailers like Raynoldsam.com witch you can find all around this site. My favourite is this guy http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=CcW1BYeaGU8he shows you step by step molding of an ODST Dutch helmet in real time and also how to build a jacket mold ( mother mold ) a special way but fibreglass is the most common because it's cheap lightweight and durable. I'm still a noob but progressing in the mold making industry. Personally I use dragon skin 20 is my favourite for molding as it is really flexible and don't have to split the mold into 2 but the cure time is 4hrs and a total of 5 layers it will take all day to finish molding it but well worth it. The most common molding products are dragon skin rebound 25. For the casting I've been using smoothcast 320 as it it very sturdy, but have seen people using smooth cast 300 or roto (65D depending on some stores). I hope this helps as I've said before I'm still a noob with experience. Ask the people in the elite threads most of them have the best experience in molding helmets and could save you from disaster. Good luck,
Daniel

 

[D008ie360]

Thanks for the advice

Very informative thanks just about to start this process fingers crossed all goes well

 

[drack]

Just to add my little bit in here as I have just done my first mould. It's very simple although scary the first time. If you follow Ben Streepers videos that Xtremenoob linked then you can't go wrong. I have not used it but I would go for dragon skin too as making a 2 part mould looks tricky. I was fortunate with my mould as the iron man helmet has no big bits jutting out like the Halo helmets do so could simply slide the cast out with ease. If you haven't started yet in Cerealkillers video here click the smooth on dragon skin glove mould link. He talks about using a thinner for the first coat of silicone to make sure the details are captured perfectly.

 

[HappySalesman]

I'm certain this question has been asked quite a few times, but unfortunately, I was unable to really discern the answer I'm looking for.

So my situation is this, I've made myself the Sniper Rifle from Halo 1. I want to create a mold of it so I can cast it in resin (and hopefully cut down a bit of the weight) but, I can't really afford a $150 8lb set of Silicon RTV, but a friend of mine recommended Plaster of Paris. Has anyone used this and made viable molds? I'm not really looking for making several molds out of one, if I need to make another I figure if plaster is a viable resource, it's cheap enough to where I can make another.

So has anyone used this with any success? Or is either Silicon RTV or Rebound25 my only option?

 

[Rubber Slug]

A quick question - is there any risk of damaging a helmet or its paint job by making a mold after it's pretty much already finished? Most people seem to only make molds with a coat of primer on, or from clay sculptures.

 

[Hive]

Hey guys, quick question that im sure is something i should already know as ive been doing some research and im a little confused, after having worn a full suit for a couple of conventions now ive found that moving around in fibreglassed pep pieces sucks, be it having to go down stairs or just trying to avoid destroying parts. As such ive wanted to make molds and thus casts so that if anything does get broken i can easily replace any part that gets damaged, have stronger parts as a result and ( and here is where i start to get confused) I've seen passing mentions and brief video clips of people making soft leg, crotch and foot parts out of what i assume is some kind of casting foam? silicone? i imagine these parts would be far more durable and comfortable, thus fitting exactly what i wanted out of the process.

So my question after all of that..would be what are these (Foam? silicone?) products, and how do i cast parts in them?

 

[Katsu]

Once you build a good mold, you can cast your new pieces in whatever kind of plastic you want.

Generally there are three or four types of plastics used for different purposes. There is a "hero" resin that picks up details and small pieces very accurately, but is incredibly brittle and heavy, it is commonly used for making weapons that are in close-up shots in movies. There is "stunt" resin which picks up details decently but is very flexible and strong, Thorssoli demonstrated by throwing an assault rifle around cast in the material. You can also use types of softer plastics, like silicone and the like, it's not like there is a single one material for any of these, so picking the right one can be a bit difficult.

Smooth-On has a sample ring that I think you can buy for around 80~100$, (mold making is very expensive, as a side note), and in general has a pretty large selection of plastics to choose from, but they are USA based, though they have a british dealer. You really do need to track down a good plastics store nearby that will have a keyring with different casts of plastics so you can figure out the one that most matches your needs. It may also be prudent to look through smooth-on or smiliar distributer's site, as they have some detailed information about the different plastics.

 

[Hive]

Sadly, i dont think i will be able to physically go into a shop and fondle samples as there is nothing nearby xD , so i will have to order a ring for myself to test out, as for a supplier, while its not smooth-on, i have found a UK supplier of polytek, and all sorts of other supplies it seems http://www.mbfg.co.uk

 

[Ghost Bear 027]

Doing it on the cheap - Or at least saving a few bucks.

One lesson I learned in The Army Northern Warfare School was that "Ounces equal pounds, and pounds kill" when it comes to having to carry equipment through the mountains. Same applies to spending as far as I'm concerned and a good tip to make the molding process more accurate and reliable involves the use of "Keys." These are obvious additions to the silicone mold prior to the hard shell addition and ensure that the silicone fits within the hard shell outer mold with uniformity for cast after cast and the original shape is maintained as best as possible. You don't want that silicone mold folding or bending in some weird shape when you pour a polyurethane cast and end up with some helmet or whatever that looks like a Gravity Hammer had a go at it at some point. Probably anyways.

Some guys use shot glasses filled with rebound 25 or ice cube trays, but the use of raw Rebound gets EXPENSIVE QUICK. I'm cheap (and married,therefore terrified of actually telling my wife how much this hobby costs) so one thing I do is save the excess rebound that has dried in the mixing cup or dripped off my master mold for use as filler in these keys.

The little chucks have to be rather finely cut up, no long strips that can trap air or anything inside the ice cube tray or shot glass, but going with a 50/50 mix of rebound and recycled silicone chunks seems to work really well when pouring keys (mix well to make sure all the air gets out properly) AND saves me a few dollars. This 1) Makes me feel better about myself like I've somehow helped saved the Earth and 2) Means I don't have to lie to my wife about keeping costs down. The second is really priceless (not that the first one isn't, but it's more of a NOW priceless instead of an EVENTUAL priceless ) and that can't be discounted.

Hope this helps. Saved me a bundle of grief to date.

 

[Vandoore]

I think vaccum forming falls under the molding process so I'll post my question here.

Is it possible to vacuum form a concave surface? looking at MC's Halo 4 helm the visor has details on the outside, would It be possible to replicate the details by vacuforming a concave surface?

 

[Omnicidal]

Where can the mold be found and bought at?

 

[Splash]

I have a few questions. I would like to make a Bionicle mask via pep, but I do not want to be wearing the original. That being said, how do I go about making a mold? I've seen a video where a gentleman carved an ornamental wax piece, coated it with something, then melted the wax out of that casting, and poured molten bronze inside. I'd like to do something similar, but with aluminum. I just don't have any idea how to go about it. Once I have the finished resined/glassed/bondoed pep model, how do I cast that so that I could pour something like molten wax in there? That's all I really need to know, would dragon skin be able to hold up? Thanks in advance for any help!

 

[computergeekman]

why does the database only have the left arm, thigh, shin, gauntlet, and handplate? where can i get the models for the other side? or is there a way to like mirror the model to make it the right side? sorry i'm new to the forum but any help would be appreciated. thanks!

 

[Katsu]

Even though this is posted in Help for Molding, I am assuming it's a question about Help for Pepakura, that's fine!

In pepakura Designer, there is an option under Others -> Mirror Invertion. This will flip the model and the parts layout so you can get the right side of things!

 

[computergeekman]

thank you so much i've been looking for this setting for quite some time now. i cant believe it was so simple and yet i still couldn't find it.

 

[gin tekidan]

Ive done a few peps and now I've got the hang of rondo work and all the time consuming detail filing(the fun part!) and Im wondering if you can use model magic clay once its cured as a mold base, Im not so much concerned about details, I plan to use the clay to get the basic shape of someones face and pour in a medium to cast out a canvas so all future builds for them will fit the same. I've seen videos of people doing molding with it for safer chemicals on youtube, but I wanna know if model magic could handle silicones, flex it foam, rigid plastics and if using the proper release agent maybe even bondo? This is one of those experiments you have to be bold and try out but Im curious if anyone has input. Thanks!