Props Spartan Laser Metal & Fiberglass Airsoft Prop (Fully Functioning Electronic Replica)

Inside Grip

Here's a part I've pondered over for some time. Removable or not? Welded or bonded? Stacked plates or bent bar stock? In the end I decided to cut square channel in half and score this channel with my band saw to bend it into shape. I then went back to fill the voids with welds to strengthen it. Finally, under the belief that any crappy weld can be made beautiful with a sufficient amount of grinding, I attacked it with the tabletop belt sander.





With the Alumiweld system, the rod melts at a much lower temperature than the aluminum. The problem then is that the previous welds can remelt while you are heating up the part for subsequent welds, often destroying the weld and causing the alumiweld to run and pool. Here it is early in the build, just trying to get it to stay together. Later, the section Where the metal is pooled just melted and fell away while I was trying to clean it up. I had to recut and redo that whole section.





I added two small loops to the underside to support wire ties. The wire ties will organize the harness running inside the handle and keep the wire from fouling the rumble motors that will be mounted in the handle.





Shaping the inside with the belt sander. The second problem with Alumiweld is that it is actually harder than some grades of steel, making it very hard to shape, especially given how soft the aluminum is.





Ready for final clean up. I used the belt sander to smooth this surface to maximize the room inside the handle for wires and electronics. The open notch at the back will actually be filled by the mech box cage when it is bolted into position--that's how tight my tolerances are inside this thing. There is no spare space.





Here it is, temporarily in position. During final assembly, this will be bonded using JB Weld. As there is still welding to be done, I can't bond it just yet since the adhesive can't take the extreme temperatures.

My next project is the lift for the front shroud.

Redshirt

Red, beautiful work from a skilled craftsman can't wait ta see it finished.

Sent from my SGH-T989 using Tapatalk 2

Scissor Lift

Let me start this out by thanking Zarnel for sharing his design for the front shroud lifting mechanism from his own Splaser. He also patiently answered my questions that helped me develop the math needed to accurately figure slot lengths, pivot points, and arm lengths. If you haven't checked out Zarnel's Splaser, please do so. It's the nicest complete pep-based Spartan Laser. I took Zarnel's design and branched out from there to meet the needs of my application.

Zarnel's scissor worked by pulling on the metal loop that projects from the front and used an axle that cut through the mid section. I couldn't have an axle as it would interfere with the barrels and other mechanisms. Likewise, I needed mine to operate electrically, indirectly actuated by the movement of the front grip. I stood on the shoulders of giants and this is what I came up with . . . .



Once again, I bonded two sheets of aluminum together and cut the two halves together to ensure symmetry. The job of cutting the slots was too small to to through the trouble of setting up the router, so I drilled a hole at each end, cut the basic slots with the air saw, then tidied them up with the air file.




Slots complete, This was as good as things ever looked.





It quickly became clear that this was going to be a proof of concept and not the final pieces used in actual construction. Once I put everything together, I found that I'd need to move the cosmetic slots slightly, stack the scissor arms in a different order, build the arms with a slight crank to them, and move the entire scissor system forward to clear the BB nozzles and feeds. Other than that, it worked perfectly. It slid easily without wobble and kept the upper frame parallel with the lower frame throughout the lift process.






Along with the scissors, I realized that some portions of the shroud and the upper receiver needed to be reprofiled in order to fit better and clear the scissor lift.





The cut lines on the upper receiver. I still have to figure out how to mount the scissor mechanism to the lower receiver along with the side stabilizers (the black metal sliders that run on the outside between the shroud and receiver).

Redshirt

That is righteous indeed man
Are you going to post a vid of it moving at all by the way??

Holy poop on a stick, this is going to be so so awesome

Setbacks and Workarounds

Mstruvmgc said:

That is righteous indeed man
Are you going to post a vid of it moving at all by the way??

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Absolutely, when I have more stuff that moves under it's own power, I'll post vids. Until then, you'll just have to re-watch the electronics demo vid--sorry.

Camaro91 said:

Holy poop on a stick, this is going to be so so awesome

Click to expand...

Thank you!

OK, I'd hoped to be further along on the lift system for the front shroud, but I've realized I'm not ready to do that. In addition to discovering that I would need to remake the lift mechanism last week, I also found that I can never adjust it right to open and close cleanly with the state of my fiberglass. The lift mechanism will attach directly to the lower receiver, but the shroud will mate against the fiberglass upper receiver. Until the mounting of the upper receiver to the lower receiver was stabilized, I was nowhere. When I set out to mate up the two receivers, I found two problems: The front end of the upper receiver was bent up, making the long (horizontal) lines of the fiberglass receiver not parallel with each other or the lower receiver. I also discovered that the left and right sides of the upper receiver turned out to be not even close to symmetrical.

Bottom line: I had to stop cutting metal and go back to work on the fiberglass.




Here's the upper receiver as well-positioned as I can get it. See what I mean by not being parallel? Before I can revisit the upper shroud mount, I'll have to not only get things square, but work out all of the attachment points between the upper and lower receivers.





So I sawed the front end almost all the way off and reglued it in the correct position. I followed up with more fiberglass on the inside.

Unfortunately, that doesn't even begin to deal with the asymmetry between the left and right sides. That's going to be a much longer job, but it will be less work to put it right now than to try and match up unequal parts later.





But wait, there's even more that's jacked up. As I was trying to figure out how much room I had beside the BB hop-up chambers for the shroud lift, I found that I'd gotten the mech boxes so close to each other that they interfered with each other. Not sure how I'm going to fix that!

Anyway, in some respects, this isn't too big of a setback because I knew I'd have to get back into the fiberglass at the end of the project, anticipating that I'd clean everything up and figure out the mounting points at the end after the mechanics were done. Instead, I see that now is the best time to mount up and clean up all of the fiberglass parts rather than later. Looks like I'll be back in the model building business, rather than engineering for the next few updates.

Redshirt

and sooner or later this is going to be in a live action film it will be epic.

This is absolutely amazing! I am pretty jealous - lol.

Love updates on this beast!

HALOween Update

Thanks all! Yes, I will put together a few videos of the working beast when it's done.

Long ago, I'd hoped to be done by Halloween, then I hoped to be done by Halo 4 . . . . not so much. I am getting close though.

I had my Mk VI suit on for Halloween. It's still holding up well for being cardboard-based. Anyway, I decided to bolt together the Spartan Laser and snap a few photos to show the detail and scale of it.












Yup, it's a big *$$ laser

No actual progress here, just gratuitous posing. The sharpie writing all over it is my note taking method highlighting what needs raised, cut, reinforced, etc.

Redshirt

this is beast

:OOO
I have been waiting for those pictures!!!!!!!!!

EPIC

That is all....

Ugh!!!

Bioshutt said:

this is beast

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Thanks!

Dh748 said:

:OOO
I have been waiting for those pictures!!!!!!!!!

EPIC

That is all....

Click to expand...

I'm pretty happy with how it looks with my costume. At least I was . . . .

Apparently Mstruvmgc isn't the only one with bad luck these days (lost build time due to thief breaking in and stealing his TV). My crappy garage finally struck back. I walked out to be confronted by the shelf above my workbench that had collapsed, sending the Splaser tumbling off the bench onto the ground.

















There was some pretty good damage to the front zombie smasher as well as to the rear upper receiver. In a way, it's not all bad, because it revealed the weak points. Because I'm going to airsoft this, it need to be tough enough to handle this sort of thing.

Anyway, I cleaned up and then cleaned the garage this weekend rather than make progress on the Splaser.

Redshirt

Man that sucks. Hopefully you can get back on track soon.

Redshirt said:

Thanks!




I'm pretty happy with how it looks with my costume. At least I was . . . .

Apparently Mstruvmgc isn't the only one with bad luck these days (lost build time due to thief breaking in and stealing his TV). My crappy garage finally struck back. I walked out to be confronted by the shelf above my workbench that had collapsed, sending the Splaser tumbling off the bench onto the ground.

There was some pretty good damage to the front zombie smasher as well as to the rear upper receiver. In a way, it's not all bad, because it revealed the weak points. Because I'm going to airsoft this, it need to be tough enough to handle this sort of thing.

Anyway, I cleaned up and then cleaned the garage this weekend rather than make progress on the Splaser.

Redshirt

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Red, srry ta hear that after a lot of hard work that you've put into this project o'l Murphy's got ta put his two cents in an ruin everything. But still now ya know what you've got ta work on so it's unbreakable while out on th' airsoft field a lot of awesome skill an preparation has gone into this be safe an be well brah.:eek

Sent from my SGH-T989 using Tapatalk 2

Back On The Job!

Enough hamming for the camera and moaning about mishaps. I'm back on the job. This week it's metal repairs and welding on the hard points for the upper receiver to attach to the lower.




Cool welding shot of the repairs to the zombie smasher. Tough welding because the smasher is very thick. It is hard to get that up to welding temps without liquefying the thinner piece I'm welding it to.




Reworking the front hard point. This gets dressed later to not look so crude.





Mid mounting points before cleaning them up.





Rear hard points. These are beefed up because they will serve as a main mounting point for the back piece of the upper receiver as well as the lower rear alignment point for the main portion of the upper receiver.

With the mounting points set, it's time to work the upper receiver into symmetry and proper alignment.

Redshirt

Red sorry to hear about your shelf fighting back and knocking this beauty on the ground. I am happy to see that you have gotten back to work on it, cant let lifes little mishaps stop us from building lol. (speaking of which i finished my suit enough to wear it lol. Not 100% buts its close)

I love the welding shot, its really cool looking. I looks like the welding job is going to help the splaser a lot. Keep up the great work.

Fiberglass! Ugh again.

With the metal hard points on the upper receiver all added or filled in to be re-drilled, it was time to get back into the fiberglass and Bondo world again. I have to say that I was not in the mood for this at all as I'd just finished a couple of giant fiberglass jobs for my squadron and opening a tin of Bondo was about at the bottom of my list. However, since we'd all like to see this thing finished, I got busy.



Here's the cut at the front to bring the forward portion of the receiver into alignment with the rear. I cut through all surfaces except the bottom. I heated and bent the remaining surface, then superglued the cut edges into position before fiberglassing the inside. Easy part done. Re-cutting the bevels represents several hours of work over a few days.





These bevels needed some thickening as they are supposed to cover where the largest metal side plate of the lower receiver vanishes into the upper receiver. This area had two problems, it didn't fully cover the metal plate and the angle of the bevel didn't match the angle of the metal plate. More material to fix this--plus a whole lot of sanding and grinding.





I'd cut the bottom edge too short on the right side initially. This repair needed to be structurally sound, so I ground the overlap areas down so I would get a good bond as well as a tapered seam rather than a butt joint on the new material after I ground it back to level.





Here's the extension dressed back and re-cut. By blending the new material in, I got a nice bond with no risk of the seam failing later. Notice how well it mirrors the other side now.

Getting there!

Redshirt

Man I dont know how I havent seen this before. This is a masterpiece of, well im not sure what but it is absolutly EPIC! Cant wait to see it finished and blasting grunts!

More Glass Work

Phoenix-164 said:

Man I don't know how I haven't seen this before. This is a masterpiece of, well im not sure what but it is absolutely EPIC! Cant wait to see it finished and blasting grunts!

Click to expand...

Thanks. Welcome to the epic (epically long) Spartan Laser thread!


Working on the initial fiberglass cleanup after cutting and realigning. I also filled in some details on the right side so I can recut them as exact mirrors of the left side.




Here's the clean up following the changes I made to get the upper receiver to better match the lower receiver.





I filled in the bottom portion of the vent on the forward right side as it was much lower than the vent on the left.





Same type of work at the rear. In addition to the vent, the lower edge had to be extended (see last update) to give me enough material to recut to match the left side.

There really was an amazing amount of asymmetry in the receiver. I took some time to figure out where this all went crooked. Believe it or not, the broken mold blanks show the problem goes all the way back to warped pepakura during resining and rondoing. Yes, check the early posts, this thing did begin as a pep gone wild. Anyway, if you don't already believe that it's better to start over than to try and fix a bad pep, just keep watching to see how long (and how much material) this takes to fix.

Redshirt