"Help!" for: Molding

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i have a bit of a question with rebound-25. .. is it safe to make molds that you can later make like icecubes or candy with. cause i was thinking of making sets of game weapon molds to make chocolate out of but the sites failing me for info on food safe or not. also if its not any suggestions on what silicon mold stuff i could use
 
Materials for suits.

Hello, im a big noob to this. I got some parakura (or something named like that) but what should i use? just print it on paper? But paper cant hold to so much so how do i make it hard enough, so i doesn't get destroyed so easily.
 
i have a bit of a question with rebound-25. .. is it safe to make molds that you can later make like icecubes or candy with. cause i was thinking of making sets of game weapon molds to make chocolate out of but the sites failing me for info on food safe or not. also if its not any suggestions on what silicon mold stuff i could use

Hello !

Rebound 25 is toxic . Make sure you use Smooth-Sil 940 food safe silicone (make sure it says that on the listing . You can find it at http://www.smooth-on.com

Hope that helped!

Hello, im a big noob to this. I got some parakura (or something named like that) but what should i use? just print it on paper? But paper cant hold to so much so how do i make it hard enough, so i doesn't get destroyed so easily.

Hello ,

Please view this thread -

http://www.405th.com/showthread.php/26848-quot-Help!-quot-for-Papercraft-or-Pepakura

Pepakura is printed on cardstock , from which you cut out the pieces and glue it together to get your model . After that you use Resin and Fiberglass to harden it so it won't get destroyed . You can see a full video series by BenStreeper here-

http://www.405th.com/showthread.php/22923-How-To-Make-A-Helmet-From-Pep-To-Finish

If you need anymore help , just reply to the thread!

-Jacob
 
My friend and I plan to use dragonskin for molding and casting some anime helmets to sell at artist alley at a convention and we are in the research planning stage and were wondering how many helmets can 1 gallon of Dragon Skin or any general mold making material will cover, including making the mold to keep the shape. I know it largely depends on the helmet size but answer in your experience what you generally see. We also want our mold to last as long as possible so we would like to know how many helmets can a mold make before we can't use it anymore.
 
I'm making a Perfectly-as-humanly-possible M6 Magnum from Halo: Reach out of plexiglass sheeting. It's just about finished and it is by far the best prop I have ever made.

As soon as it is finished I wanted to make a mold from it and pop them out like crazy.

So far as I can tell the best mold making rubber would be : http://www.smooth-on.com/Silicone-Ru...tml?catdepth=1
OOMOO 25 - Trial Size
Medium softness easy to use tin cure silicone rubber - Shore 25A hardness.
1:1 mix ratio by volume - no scale or vacuum required.
75 minute cure time.
Net Weight : 2.8 Lbs.
$25.47

This is my first time doing this sort of thing. Whenever anyone tries to do something new, they dont want to make any mistakes. Since I dont have a ton of money, I make it a point not to make any mistakes. I've done tons of research and have read and watched just about everything possible to learn. The last thing to do, is to actually do it.

However, I got an idea about making the mold "cheaper." I dont know if it will work though, which brings up my question... Does anyone know if it would be possible to use:
http://www.smooth-on.com/Rigid-and-F...tml?catdepth=1
FlexFoam-iT! V - Trial Size
5-lb. Flexible Polyurethane Foam. 1A:1B By Volume Mix Ratio -
No Scale Required
Net Weight : 2 Lbs.
$25.96

instead of using the OOMOO. It expands into something like 20x the amount actually used. Do you see where I'm going?

Would it be possible to make a mold from FlexFoam? 1 oz would technically be 20oz (in size, not weight) It puffs up and "hardens", BUT it is flexible so I would imagine that it could be used as a mold. -And since it expands I would assume it would grab every single bit of detail there is to obtain.

I know in general, you dont want to deviate from what everyone uses and what is known, and not use something new, but if this works, it could potentially make molding "cheaper" for everyone.

Any suggestions would gladly be taken.
Thank you very much in advance!
 
Hi, i an trying to find an answer to a molding question. I am trying to find out if candy paint can be mixed into the clear plastic that I am going to use. I am going to use a molding kit from micheal's and the clear plastic kit that they offer. I will experiment with it, but I just wanted to know I any one has tried this before as I could not find my answer here. Thanks in advance. Edit: I will get the names of the products later today.
 
Usually there are special Tints you are supposed to use to color plastics. The paint may interfere with the curing process of the plastic depending what you are using. But as you mentioned, it is a field of experimentation, it may work beautifully, but that is for you to find out, and us to hear about! If it works, that'd be very cool, I wish you luck!
 
Thank you katsu, I mentioned the tints to the employee at micheal's and she just gave me a crazy look.
 
Alrighty, so i am new to this hobby entirely but i wish to start a red vs blue project build with smoothcast. i need help to figure out the mold for a helmet and the armor. and because it is a red vs blue project, i wish to make molds that will cast multiple times so my friends and i may all make suit from the same mold. so my question is that how can I make a decent mold of Mark VI armor from scratch?

also, could i use pepikura to create the mold for a smoothcast piece?
 
You are absolutely correct. The steps you mentioned are the process for making your "master". This is the primary template for your armor piece. Lots of folks go no further and use their master for wearing and showing off. Their master is the finished product. Molding has nothing to do with this process.

What molding does is allows you to make very accurate copies of your "master" piece out of urethane resin or other slush castable materials. That way you dont have to pep, resin, fiberglass, and bondo an entirely new suit just so you can have one red suit and one blue suit. You can just make a mold and cast out as many as you want. This is fine and smiled upon if you do this to the armor YOU built. This is bad and frowned upon and their will be weeping and gnashing of teeth when making molds of armor someone else built without their permission.

Hope this helps. Best of luck.

Thanks a lot. this was the answer to all my questions about molding! :)
 
Sorry if I sound like a noob, but Im confused about you saying that you will get in trouble if you copy someones work. Like in what way dose it count as copying someones work? All I can think of is if you buy it from them or trade something for there suit and then make a mold out of it. Is it copying someones work if you make the mold out of the suit you made from using blueprint off of the halo wiki. Or do you have to make your own blueprints in order to be able to make a mold of it with out getting in trouble. And also I couldnt really find anything about how expensive it is to make the mold. Is the stuff you use to make the mold farely cheap or is it more expensive to do it this way then it would to make it with fiberglass.
 
Not sure if anybody really reads this thread to answer but I'll ask anyway:

So lets say I'm making a prop, and I want to cast and mold it at some point, but not right away. I make the prop, I finish it how I like it, and I paint and seal it.

When I'm done using it, THEN, I want to cast it. Can I do this, having painted it first? Or do I need to do it the other way around?
 
Cereal KIlll3r had no trouble casting his Mk VI helmet after he had painted it, so I don't see any problem doing what you're thinking. Just make sure that before you apply the rubber molding that the helmet is clean and you've applied the proper mold release agent.
 
Sorry if I sound like a noob, but Im confused about you saying that you will get in trouble if you copy someones work. Like in what way dose it count as copying someones work? All I can think of is if you buy it from them or trade something for there suit and then make a mold out of it. Is it copying someones work if you make the mold out of the suit you made from using blueprint off of the halo wiki. Or do you have to make your own blueprints in order to be able to make a mold of it with out getting in trouble. And also I couldnt really find anything about how expensive it is to make the mold. Is the stuff you use to make the mold farely cheap or is it more expensive to do it this way then it would to make it with fiberglass.

Theoretically, it COULD be stealing if you used a halo pepakura someone else made, assuming they had made it for private use. Most pepakura makers release their files out of good will, and expect no compensation. Usually it's a good idea to ask them before molding though, regardless, as they may have released it for you to make for personal use, but not for you to profit off of, so if you intend to mold-cast for profit, you should contact the person who made the file. Mold-casting someone else's FINISHED physical armor, as in something you obtained through trade or purchase, is almost always wrong and usually illegal, unless they give you explicit permission to do so.

Price-wise, it is fairly expensive to make a mold, expect it to cost around 100-200$ for a basic mold of a helmet, upwards of 500$ if you make a really high quality boxed mold, which is a tad excessive. Then there is the additional costs of the plastics for the copies, which can run you around or over 80$ per casting. Usually the first couple copies are made to recover the costs of the mold, and a mold will only last you a certain number of castings before all the pulling and peeling start to break down the mold. It all depends on the material you use, and how good you want the copies to be.
 
Theoretically, it COULD be stealing if you used a halo pepakura someone else made, assuming they had made it for private use. Most pepakura makers release their files out of good will, and expect no compensation. Usually it's a good idea to ask them before molding though, regardless, as they may have released it for you to make for personal use, but not for you to profit off of, so if you intend to mold-cast for profit, you should contact the person who made the file. Mold-casting someone else's FINISHED physical armor, as in something you obtained through trade or purchase, is almost always wrong and usually illegal, unless they give you explicit permission to do so.

Price-wise, it is fairly expensive to make a mold, expect it to cost around 100-200$ for a basic mold of a helmet, upwards of 500$ if you make a really high quality boxed mold, which is a tad excessive. Then there is the additional costs of the plastics for the copies, which can run you around or over 80$ per casting. Usually the first couple copies are made to recover the costs of the mold, and a mold will only last you a certain number of castings before all the pulling and peeling start to break down the mold. It all depends on the material you use, and how good you want the copies to be.

alright so, that makes sense, but i do have a question... how would you suggest i make a suit model to finish and then perhaps to mold? would i need to make a pepakura helmet first or are there alternative means? i hate to approach this incorrectly but could i just simply make my own pepakura file, make the suit and then mold it so i could cast it into a more sturdy/realistic suit?
 
You only need to worry about pepakura rights if you are mold casting for profit. If it's for personal use there's no harm in mold casting.

If you are doing it for money, I strongly suggest you slow down. You're trying to sell the house when the wood hasn't even been cut down from the forest yet. You need to actually get practice making this stuff first, as from what I've seen, you haven't started yet. Build a helmet, see how it goes. If you're satisfied with the results, you can look into mold casting, but mold casting is a very difficult and complicated process, and getting TO mold casting is probably more difficult and complicated. You're making end-game plans when you're not even out of the starting gate. We can help you along the way, but you really need to take it a step at a time. If for no other reason than no one is going to want to buy your first draft set, since 99% of the time it won't be anywhere near as good as your second or third draft. But the main reason is that you have to progress along and get to that stage when you get to it.

To ACTUALLY answer your question, most of the files are either abandoned by their creators, or owned by very very nice creators. Just try asking, it can't hurt. If you don't get a response, or see in their profile they haven't logged on in a year, I am under the impression you're fine... worst comes to worst they find out, tell you to stop, and you stop. Alternatively, you CAN make your own file, but that requires getting ahold of the 3d model from other sources, importing it, and unfolding it yourself. Foam is cheap and easy as an alternative, but I don't think it would handle mold casting anywhere near as nicely as fiberglassed pepakura can. Pep is your best option for getting quality accurate pieces for mold casting. If accuracy and quality aren't big issues, you could just freeball the piece, drawing out and cutting your own pieces of cardboard and gluing them together or whatnot.

Also, if you are only interested in a strong suit for yourself only, you don't even need to mold cast. Once the piece has been fiberglassed well enough, it will be stronger than a mold casted piece, since fiberglass is made for boat hulls, and is stronger than plastic when you layer it enough. Mold casting just gives much lighter pieces that are almost as strong as the original piece. Very few people actually mold their pieces, partly because of low demand, and partly because most people just want their own cool armor, and once they finish glassing and smoothing it, realize there's no need to mold it.
 
Cereal KIlll3r had no trouble casting his Mk VI helmet after he had painted it, so I don't see any problem doing what you're thinking. Just make sure that before you apply the rubber molding that the helmet is clean and you've applied the proper mold release agent.

Thanks for chiming in. I've been spending a lot of time on smooth-on's website learning more and I'm starting to get the basics of it all. Looks like I'm going to have to be careful with what kind of mold I do and then the material I use to cast it if I want to actually paint them lol.

Meanwhile, my wallet weeps....
 
Hey im new.....and i was wondering if anyone can tell me what to use to mold a skyrim priest mask, and how......i would really appreciate it..............TY
 
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