Has Anybody Used Steel?

[F4RL BR34D]

I'm not a complete noob to mold making. I've worked as an apprentice under a bronze artist and i currently work making molds for gypsum and concrete products.

I've never used something like pepakura before though. I'd play with it now but i'm at work, lol. I've read a lot of the forum stuff on it already, but didn't get a chance to mess with it last night thanks to Red Dead Redemption.



So here's the thought process:

Pepakura file -> print TO FILE (.eps) -> convert .eps to .dxf (autocad et al) -> cnc table



The less pretty way would be:

Pep -> screen shot -> trace lines with vector or cad program -> scale properly -> cnc table



If i/you/we could get a clean CAD file without the glueing tabs on there, it would be...only sort of hard to weld all the seams up.

Once you figure out how to get everything assembled, it's just a matter of making it possible to put on/not torture to wear.



It seems possible to me.

Edit: The horrible part would be trying to fold the steel, but you don't need a press brake to bend 20ga or even 16ga steel.

I'd like to start with the face masks from Army of Two, but a paper version of the Monitor before that.

 

[Akademee]

Thats very ambitious of you! I believe I saw... a long time ago... someone attempting to make armor out of cast and welded aluminum. But why steel? That gets heavy really fast doesn't it? I'm glad to see that you have experience with CNC and AutoCAD, holy crap that will save you a lot of work

 

[old school dude]

well steels expensive and hard to work with, thats probably why.

 

[drgon47]

Heavy. Hot. Good luck though. Id like to see someone try it.

 

[carlino]

I know someone made a suit out of metal before.. there was a person that made a Halo suit and another guy made an Ironman suit. Both were made of metal, Im not sure if it was steel, but it was metal. Do a quick search to find the Halo suit here and the Ironman suit is made by Andrew Lee? (not 100% sure thats his name, he posts youtube videos of him and the suit)

 

[matheuszs]

With steel, WOW, It should be really heavy man!

Anyway Hope you make it!

Good luck with your project !



Cheers From Brazil!!

 

[drgon47]

Honestly, If I were to go with metal, Id suggest Aluminum. Easier to work with (sans the welding. thats hard) but its lighter and cheaper.

 

[F4RL BR34D]

Yeah steel probably would be hot to wear and heavy, but cool! lol.

Aluminum is about double the price of steel in general. The difference is less if you compare cold-roll steel vs bargain bin aluminum though.

 

[Brandon McClain]

The problem with going from the PDO/OBJs from pepakura is that it is low poly based in order to make models easier to pep, so instead of having a smooth curve, it is multiple straight curves. If you have experience casting things like bronze, I would recommend building a regular suit and then casting in metal. If you can use a cnc, it would be easier to clean up a PDO and then cut it in something like MDF, mold it and then cast the parts in metal. Just my 2 cents...

 

[killjoy95]

Its deffinatly worth a go but from personal experiance working with mettal your much better off trying to shape sheet metal plus its a lot cleaner finish.

 

[F4RL BR34D]

The problem with going from the PDO/OBJs from pepakura is that it is low poly based in order to make models easier to pep, so instead of having a smooth curve, it is multiple straight curves. If you have experience casting things like bronze, I would recommend building a regular suit and then casting in metal. If you can use a cnc, it would be easier to clean up a PDO and then cut it in something like MDF, mold it and then cast the parts in metal. Just my 2 cents...

I agree that casting would get the best surface as far as curvature smoothness and shape. Casting metal always leaves some bits of imperfections unless you have $texas to spend.

I know casting isn't the way i want to go because: a) i don't have [free]access to a foundry :coolthe parts would be WTF heavy.

With the metal casting i've done (sand casting and lost-wax) the parts where a minumum of .25" wall thickness.

Compared to stitching together sheet metal, at .0625" (1/16") or even .125" thats a massive weight difference.

Also, and it would take expirementing, i think the weld seams and segmentation could be hidden with a combo of grinding and air hammers, and probably skim coating with bondo. I'd like to avoid bondo obviosly.



What should i try first to get a model and unfolded set up of an Army of Two mask?



(uh..knowing that i could conceivably make bronze molds and have them poured, i wonder how much or if anybody would buy a bronze bust of a mastercheif or ironman? )

 

[Brandon McClain]

An army of two mask would be a great place to start, its fairly simple and would give you a good idea of what it would take. Plus it is an open back model, so you can use the air hammer to smooth the lines, where a lot of the halo models are tight and closed making the air hammer much more difficult to use. Best of luck! If you can pull it off it will be sick!!

 

[Akademee]

As an attempt, I tried to make a simple, low def piece of Master Chief's forearm out of aluminum flashing (Shiny, very thin, aluminum that comes in a 10-25ft roll, found in most hardware stores) and I found it extremely difficult. Granted, I am no expert metal worker, but one of the major disadvantages that I found almost immediately is that it is very possible to severely damage the piece while working with it.



In order to compensate for the weight, you need to go very thin, and with that, even with a good weld, it becomes very weak. Since you are trying a "Metal Pepakura" style build, I found that metal is not flexible enough to work along the fold lines. I was almost required to bend the metal to the exact assembly angle BEFORE I had to weld it since once it is welded, you can't bend it.



I did not come close to completing my endeavor



Not to be a downer, but good pepakura and finishing techniques yield clean results that can be easily passed off as metal, but good luck with your mask!

 

[Nintendude]

Good luck with this I know it's possible because we have a member on here Scott is his username that made his MC suit out of metal, carbon fiber, kevlar and some other materials so you might try getting in touch with him.