Props M6G Set to Stun!

I decided to put my pistol into its own thread!

DISCLAIMER! I did not make the pistol, I am just assembling and painting it. All credit for the making molding and casting goes to the fantastic Tactonyx.

+++
Final Draft
+++



+++
From this point on is the original post, I am editing in final pics because... Apparently some people do that? It is nifty so when I direct people to this thread, they can see the final draft, and then leaf through the brief worklog if they so desire.
+++

Here it is after receiving it, as well as my working stuff!


The first time priming it:


So there was a problem where the paint on some spots on the pieces were not curing at all, after several days. There is a problem with this plastic where sometimes oils get into the plastic I guess. I found this out after sanding, priming, and painting it a second time. I have to bake the gun to extrude the oils, which requires I strip the paint off. Here it is after I sanded it a third time (I lightly sanded it the first time also). I realize I missed the detail areas in the slide and the silencer, there were some problem areas that refused to take paint before, I made sure I heavily sanded all of them before baking the piece. The detail areas in the slide and the silencer were taking paint, so I didn't bother digging in to sand the paint off them before the bake. The worst offenders were the handguard, the rear sight, all of the smartscope, the little block part of the pistol (that rectangular piece that's on its own) and the sides of the scope.


The oven! Bake time.


After baking them for four hours at 170F, I let them sit in corn starch for an hour to suck the oils off them.


Sadly, the pistol bubbled in the bake process. I don't know if it will affect the strength of the piece or not.


The final results? The baking worked VERY well, almost all of the problem areas were fixed, though as you can see, it was at the cost of the grip of the pistol. I didn't look too hard for more bubble spots. The smart scope and the silencer still have some un-curing spots still, but they're substantially smaller than before, small enough I could probably pass them off as battle damage areas by carving them a bit.

I'm not sure if Ben uses a release agent or not when casting. If he does, many times the release agent will cause paint to behave in this way. In the future, you may want to wash the parts when you get them, dawn works great, or you can just toss them in the dishwasher (don't use the high heat drying cycle I you do...). Hope that helps in the future.

I've had this happen with a few of my castings too and you've done the right thing. Even after washing, sometimes there are parts of the resin that aren't properly cured (usually a mixing problem when the casting is poured) and the best option is to bake them. The worst of my castings took eight hours at 180F before I could get paint to stick to it.

The only other option is to set it somewhere very warm and dry and wait for everything to leech out of the resin. I don't recommend this. It could take months.

Brandon McClain said:

I'm not sure if Ben uses a release agent or not when casting. If he does, many times the release agent will cause paint to behave in this way. In the future, you may want to wash the parts when you get them, dawn works great, or you can just toss them in the dishwasher (don't use the high heat drying cycle I you do...). Hope that helps in the future.

Click to expand...

Sorry, that is not the case. All parts were thoroughly sanded and washed with dish soap before any painting was done. It's good information for people not too experienced with painting plastics to know, though, so thanks for making sure. However, this is not my first painting project, I learned about this a few years ago already when I first got my airbrush.

It was, as has been mentioned, because of oils that had seeped into the plastic during the curing process. The problem is exactly as Tactonyx and Thorssoli have mentioned. It happens on only a few castings, and I guess I unlucked out on this one.

Well, I'm glad the oven cured the resin a little bit more. Though I was worried that bubbling and /or warping would happen. I think the reason why those happened was because those areas are open, and you had hot air beneath and above the model, making it hotter than it could handle. Hopefully sanding the bumps down will be the last of your problems.
When doing my molds, I use release agents on some parts of my mold, areas that are detailed heavy or have a special function that requires a lot of friction when demolding. This was a measuring error on my part.
Anyways, your gun looks like it's on the mend and I hope everything turns out.

You just got me totally paranoid. I didn't even think to test the fit of the pieces because I was so focused on the paint, so I put them together and it looks like the outlook is grim:



The big gap in the front of the slide is because I guess the back of the gun bowed from how it was laying on the bake pan. I wonder if it would have caved in if I'd laid it on its side instead. Either way, it impedes the motion of the slide, and looks pretty ugly too... Not sure what will happen from here, but I'm pretty bummed. I'll have to keep this in mind next time I heat treat a plastic piece.

Wow mate... that sucks, it really does. Does inserting the chamber make it look any better?

Not by much, there's a gap between it and the slide because of how the slide leans away.

well considering heat did that, you could always try to use heat to fix it again, either with a heat gun, hair dryer, or the oven again, see what other peices seem warped, heat them for a bit, and then assamble the pieces with tin foil or wax paper between them so you dont run the risk of sticking, and wrap em together with tape or rubber bands. that could work to make em form to each other again

hey did you have any luck fixing th pistol?

The gun was warped, bubbling, and possibly collapsing on the inside. Heat repairing the pistol would take more time and effort than the piece warrants, and some parts were beyond repair, like the rails on the slide.

Tactonyx has been beyond helpful in helping me on this. He's going to aid me in fixing it up, so it's sent back to him for further assessment.

smart move. you did moast of the right things, so don't feel bad. This is why I tend to stay away from casts involving mulitple attaching peices and detailed paint, such as Adam's AR which came in jet black XD

No I get that, but before I went and blew the thing up, it was freaking AWESOME! I did a dry run of the parts before I painted anything, and they were pretty cool to have that slide working and stuff. Even if I glued down the slide, that seam would make it look less like a toy than single solid piece pistols look. Nothing against those, but the parts sort of add another layer of reality to the gun. Tactonyx's work is incredible!

well I'm glad things are getting worked out, hurray for customer service, haha. but seriously, it always sucks to buy something, and then accidently mess it up somehow and have someone go, oh well, so glad to hear he's helping you out.

Speaking of pistols, I've been meaning to post this guy. It's going to get a hack job to make it match the Reach design.

Tactonyx took good care of me. We sorted out the problems, and here is a whole new deal-i-o.


Don't hate the player, hate the low quality camera.

I love it so far. It takes paint like a dream except for the rear iron-sight. Obviously I haven't installed the takedown components in the back, nor clear-coted it, but it's almost there. I am pondering how I want to mount it on armor, if I want to drill in magnets or hook-pins...

Also, happy birthday to our neighborhood friendly loans bots:
personal_loans_011 (54), fast_loans_007 (51), online_loans_032 (47),

Those are some pretty old bots...

Looks great

Finished!



Tactonyx took good care of me. I love this thing, it looks awesome and is pretty strong. Next is to break it so I can add mounting hardware! The smoke looking thing in the second picture is a smudge on the mirror by the by...