Because I remembered my camera...
Finished the cowl today. The bumper needs a little more work ( the bumper shop did me no good, I ended up leading it, since its getting painted; BTW, lead sucks. its fun, but it still sucks. hot lead down your shoes is not as entertaining as it sounds).
40 Merc convertible I've rebuilt both doorjambs on. Car is on hold till customer comes in with more money.
The ubiquitous shop truck. I haven't had a chance to work on this thing in forever, and I probably wont, since Matt (one of the guys I work with) hosed it. Never, NEVER, EVER, EVER MIG weld on sheet metal. Or I will kill you. Till you are dead from it.
Which brings me here.
There is some warping here, but a majority of this is caused by camera angle. what little warping there is I'll show how to fix later, when I get a chance to redo my tut on bondo, or, keep reading, since I've already typed about all you need to know, if you're an experimental type.
This is still in 36 grit, I've made a few changes in the half hour I've had to work on it, but I'm still having problems finding good shots of the in-game helmet. The spot above where the ear is is giving me a headache. Also, after staring at the starry night helmet for an hour or so, I ended up filling in the lower 'notch' at the base of the jaw.
I picked up a NIB, unopened LE set (helmet and games) for 50 bucks off of Ebay. Ebay is my god.
The LE helm pretty much confirmed what I was thinking about the lower notch, but the detail on the LE helm sucks monkey scrotum, so I was hoping someone could give me some input on it.
No, I haven't done anything with the back, front, or other side. I'm not going to bother till I get one side set correctly. And I know, the top fins are off. I've got warpage in the front of the helm, but I can get it out once I find the damned heat gun.
Consequentially, for those of you with warping issues:
Buy an industrial heat gun. If you heat up an area roughly twice the size of your warp, you can move the offending part around, and hold it in place till it cools. You can't get massive warp out, but some of the minor issues I've seen can be done this way.
For example, the little inset next to the visor, above where the lights go, was warped severely on one side, and not so much on the other. If you look at the pics above, the one thats now covered in mud (bondo, if you wanna be anal about it) i moved close to 3/4 of an inch. I also took most of the warp out of the underside of the visor.
Now, you can't correct major defects, but you can get alot of annoying little areas fixed without too much hassle. The best way to gauge when the temp is right is by smell. When the resin is starting to get pliable, it'll smell like its curing. another nice side effect of doing this is that it'll drive most of the resin smell out of the helmet.
Areas that aren't tied down are going to move around alot more than parts that are locked - for example, the underside of the visor is easy to fix, as is getting one side of the entire visor to move, but getting the top to move around is going to require alot more heat, and alot more force.
Also, keep in mind that bondo can fix alot of problems. Its around for a reason. if you've got a few spots that have puckered, leave em be if you're going to mud the whole thing. If you're trying to be as accurate as possible, or if you're damned anal retentive like I am, fix them as you go. Only experience will tell you what needs to be fixed, and you're not gonna find that out till you get to the filler work.
any q's, leave em here, and I'll answer when I get back from the movies.
also, can I get this thread moved? Tired of wading through 300 some odd posts with polls about color choices to find my own. I suppose I ought to bookmark the damned thing.
edit: good god, I can't type.