Re: RobotChicken's Halo 3 Mk VI Master Chief, Ultra Detail, First Build WIP (many pic
Update: Resin!
With nothing more to pep until the helmet model is finished and the weather finally quite nice, I opened up my Smooth-On boxes and put the first coat of resin on the parts. I'm using EpoxAmite 103 because the biggest problem I had using polyester resin was it setting up too quickly and having too much unused resin. The 103 product has a 55 minute pot life so I didn't need to rush the application process racing against time. I was also able to leisurely go back to the drying parts and blot up any resin pooling (of which there was very little). Although this resin has no odor (another great benefit) I did follow their recommendation of using a chemical vapor respirator - just because you can't smell it doesn't mean it isn't harmful to your lungs. I bought their pump add-on package to make dispensing portion amounts much simpler (no measuring needed, and no messy spills).
One squirt, the smallest batch you can mix without manual measuring, was enough to do the top side of both hand plates, top side of both shoulder pads, all the antecubital detail parts, 1/3 of each forearm, and 1/3 of each upper-arm with a small amount of resin left over. (I did only 1/3 of the larger parts deliberately so there was plenty of dry cardstock to hold the shape and lay the parts down for drying without resin touching anything.) The first coat was applied very thin just to harden the paper but not at all intended for final hardening. After this thin coat is applied all around I'll then slush a heavier coat with a thickener filler on the inside to start building up the strength. (I'll probably still glass the insides of these with the same resin.) This stuff has a very nice viscosity and I had virtually no pooling at all (mostly due to how thin I was spreading the resin). The little bit that did pool was easily wicked up with the resin brush having no resin on it. It dries clear and looks just like cardstock after drying, so I'm going to be getting some of their resin dye to make it easier to keep track of where resin has been applied. Now for some pics...
Here are the hand plates (the resin is still a little wet in the photos). As you can see, all the corners are clean:
Here are the shoulder pads:
I didn't snap photos of the arm pieces, but they turned out just as well with no loss of detail from the resin. Ultra-High Detail parts can't be resined? Bah! Yes they can, if you do it properly. (And no detail will be lost under Bondo, either.) More pics will be posted later when I get more resin on the parts.
