Alternate Methods For Making Armor Without Toxic Stuff.

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VaultDweller101

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Okay, so I personally created this thread so I could brainstorm and hear other peoples ways of going about making helmet without the use of Bondo or resin, or fiberglass, or Rondo, anything that involves toxic stuffz.:cool Please only post thigns that are helpful for other people like: tuts, guides that sort of thing.
 
After you finish the pepakura do a Papermache coating on the inside, maybe 2 coats. Shave/sand off any high points on the outside of the helmet then use a light weight joint compound instead of bondo. It will sand like butter so be carfull. You can also use "rock hard" as an outer coating. But like the name, it's hard to sand but very strong. There are lots of water based sandable primers that you can use before paint, home depot or lowes. Then use latex or acrylic paints.

Just remember, most of the nontoxic materials are not as strong and most likely will not last.
 
Why not use 2 part REAL epoxy. its a TON safer cure fume wise then resin poly stuff.

Just dont eat it . wear some gloves ect.
 
I think you can use wood glue it will still harden the piece you'll just have to bee a little careful with it and i wouldn't use it for any parts that get damaged easily (EG) boots
 
Well the first thing that comes to mind for me when you want to work with less toxins is foam. The only issue is that it is easier to warp a foam helmet if the internal structure is inadequate, plus it is in general a less rigid material so it is easier to deform. However if you want to do a pepakura helmet specifically, you could always look into acrylic resin, it is pretty much non toxic but it is far more expensive and sometimes much harder to find.
If you did find some acrylic resin you could mix some sort of fibre or sandable powder into the resin to mimic Bondo or Rondo.
 
A good alternative to resin for hardening a helmet it liquid plastic. I have played around with it and I have found it get pretty hard but you have to work in small batches and have lots of cr*p brushes for it will ruin what ever you use for when it hardens its hard.
 
Due to the weather resin and fiber glass just weren't an option for me so I needed an alternative.

For my Halo build I gave the finished pep about three coats of wood glue (start with 50/50 ratio glue/water then up to about 90/10), and then a cover of paper mache. I then used plain ready mixed poly-filler instead of bondo.

I'm doing an iron man build now and for this I am using a cotton fiber method. It is the same process as fiber glassing but instead you cut up a cotton t-shirt into strips and cover the inside. It sets rock solid (if you've ever got glue on your clothes you'll know how hard it goes).

I then coat the piece inside and out with more wood glue.

Rock solid pieces with no toxins.
 
Great tip on cotton fiber method......at first I thought you were going to say you used strips of cotton gauze or cotton balls or something like that..........and yes I have gotten glue on my clothes. Easy to get off if you don't let it harden but yeah, it would get nice and solid.
 
Why? Are you planning on any head on collisions in the near future? No but seriously, no one method is better than any other so doing a comparison.......not necessary. If you were looking for certain criteria in your own build, that's different.

I would say that w/o dropping it from a significant height, either would hold up nicely. In a crush test, I would say the fiberglass would hold up better. Weight, depending on your preference, the cotton fiber would be the lighter of the 2.
 
You won't notice the strength difference unless you like to throw all your armor in a heap, and throw boxes on top of em. If it's all you can use without poisoning your living space, then absolutely go for it.
 
I realize this is an old thread, but I recently did a Skyrim dragon head pepakura build out of paper for art class. I hardened it with yellow wood glue, diluted 1:1 with about 3-4 coats. Mind you this was paper, but it soaked into the build and did not harden it much; it was still very floppy and did not hold its shape well (Again, paper not foam). Afterwards, I used an epoxy resin, the stuff they use to coat bar tops and make jewelry pendants. It hardened and gave a nice shiny finish, but it pooled something awful. There were dried pools of it all over and anywhere it had dripped off of the dragon it hardened (and stuck to my platform :( I tried hand sanding the extra resin areas and it did not work, not sure if an electric sander would be more effective. Of the resin that dripped on my work station, it was surprisingly flexible and didn't crack, just wrinkled a bit when folded in on itself. If you use a very thin layer of epoxy resin so that is won't pool or drip, it was make a good alternative.
 
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