Announcing The Spartan Ghost Red Bull Racer

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steigd1

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Announcing The Spartan Ghost Red Bull Racer

I wanted to let you know that some friends and I have recently been accepted to race in the Philadelphia Red Bull Soapbox race Sept 5th! We'll be racing a full sized Halo Ghost that we just started building two weekends ago. We've begun welding the stainless steel frame (from scrap metal) and hope to begin testing by the end of the month. We'll be doing fiberglass body work and paint in August.

Check out my blog on this site (http://405th.com/forums/index.php?automodule=blog&blogid=277&) to see photos, track our progress and maybe even help out!
 
So far we've built the base frame of the ghost, attached the wheels, added the seat and begun welding on the aesthetic frame. Check out the photos from us working two weeks ago.


I bought a ton of fiberglass/resin/hardener/sanding gear/paintbrushes/face masks yesterday for $130, plus two go-cart disk brakes for $40. Today I started taking detailed measurements off of a model ghost I bought, and converting them to full scale measurements. Next I started work on a plaster casting mold for the dual plasma cannons.

This weekend we want to finish the aesthetic frame by adding the wings and hood, setting up the steering and maybe attaching the brakes if we get them in the mail.

I'll try to keep you all up to date at work progresses, but make sure to check out my blog (http://405th.com/forums/index.php?automodule=blog&blogid=277&) for more photos and more info.
 
I can just tell this is gonna be a very busy thread, so I suggest you post your blog entrees on here as you write them up. Some of us are too lazy to go to blogs (not me though lol)

This is gonna be sick! And if im not mistaken... its the first at full (or near full) scale.
 
So as I was doing my conversions from model to "full scale" and began to realize that our design won't be 100% to scale, but rather around 50% to "Full-scale". If the Ghost was full-scale it would be about 5 ft tall, 12.5 ft wide and 14.5 ft long! The reason it doesn't look that huge in the game is because the master chief is supposedly over seven feet tall.

So you may ask, "so what if it's built proportionally to an average male's height?". I calculated that as well and found that it still comes out about 12.5 feet long and about 11 feet wide.

The major reason we've got to cut back on scale is that Red Bull rules state that our Soapbox racer can not be wider than 6 feet. With that limitation the ghost's length would be about 7 feet long.

So when we began building we were doing everything "by-eye" off of a model we bought on e-bay. We decided to go with an 8 foot chassis because it just looked right... and I swear it still does... but the math doesn't lie... Oh well, nothing we can change now since we already welded a ton of stuff into place. I hate to disappoint the purists so early in the build, but I'm sure they'll get over it. I promise the ghost will still look awesome.

Some other planned adjustments are that we're going to lower the hood a little bit so I can see over the top of the racer while I'm driving. That whole flying blind bit doesn't appeal to me. Also, instead of having my legs totally exposed and at risk for injury my feet will under the hood instead of dangling down on a T-bar. To be honest I don't think anyone would notice these changes, or the actual scale issue unless they'd be holding a model in their hand and studying it at the same time as I'm doing right now. But I promise, it'll still look awesome!

Oh yeah, if you're interested in checking out the other team's ideas or details about the race check out the Red Bull website: http://www.redbullsoapboxusa.com/Philadelp...08/default.aspx
 
MisterSwiss said:
Thanks for the PDO file! It won't work on my MAC, but I'll have one of my buddies take a look on his PC.
dont worry i have the same problem when people send me pep files
 
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This is gonna be cool, can't wait to see this all finished up! How are you going to do the paintwork? I know it's purple but the paints a bit wierd, I have a hard time imagining how to recreate it. Good luck and I hope this turns out awesome!
 
Hi everyone,

We did a bit more work on the Ghost today and got the frame of the hood section mounted. It doesn't look like a lot of work, but was a lot more work since we didn't have the proper tools to bend the metal with. Sometimes it seems like we're working with tools from the stone-age... Anyway, I can't be too critical since we're getting to use all this stuff for free, so I guess the extra work is just part of the territory. Despite not having a proper bender, I hatched a plan to make our bends quick and easy. I still think it was a good plan... but it still failed miserably. Oh well, no-one's perfect. Despite the loss of a few hours work, we still managed to get a little work done, and with luck we may get even more done tomorrow.

Check out my blog's album for more photos/comments/details and to see what else we got done today. Hopefully we'll post more tomorrow. Blog = http://405th.com/forums/index.php?automodu...blogid=277&

Have a great night!
 
Thats kick a....
Well, bottom.

:p Looks great. Seems you got the frame work right. When are we going to see the wings on it? Isee you have the guns planned, very nice!
 
The ghost is looking good, I really can't wait to see this finished and watch it in the race. Sucks that I have to work the day of the race, I would travel to "The Wall" just to watch this.
 
Well done. I believe this is the first serious attempt at creating a vehicle from Halo, and you seem to be doing wonderful with it. Can't wait to see the finished thing.
 
Macattack64 said:
what day and what channel is the race on?

The race is on September 6th and one of the ESPN's usually covers it, but I'm not sure.
 
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