Vacuum Formed Armor *update : Mk Vi Handplates*

[Spartan137]

New update for you!

I've been working in co-operation with Michael Vroegop (AKA Vrogy), who has built a rather splendid CNC mill, and I'm in the process of vacuum forming CNC'd armor parts. Vrogy sent me the first of the CNC'd parts a while back, which was the MK VI handplate (based upon Robogenisis' model), formed out of MDF wood (to VERY nice quality, even if it did look like a cookie to me). The piece was to serve as my prototype piece for determining the ease and reliability of Vac-forming.

Results where pleasing!

Pics:

Finished gloves! Painted in my Red Alert 1741 colors!

And the first run of Handplates (still need to be trimmed), destined to be shipped to Vrogy:

Thanks goes to my dad for helping me with the table, and to Michael, for helping me create such fantastic pieces.

Constructive criticism only, please.

A run of handplates are currently being considered for the 405th community! Please PM me if you are interested so I can get a reference of how many are wanted!​

 

[rvb18]

Ok, so I've been working on some stuff recently that I havn't really publicily announced, but a few people know about.... yadda yadda yadda.

So I've been building SKG and Crew's Weta ODST armor, which are superb, guys. And I decided that I want some more substantial armor than our usual medium of paper and fiberglass. I also didn't want to spend gobs of money on some rubber molds and poured plastic. It's good for high detail stuff, but most ODST plates have less detail then a sheet of ironed rice paper.

I went a different route, one only attempted by a very small number of people, namely Rube and Vos. I decided to vacuum form.

At this point in time, I've fully bondo'd the left main chest piece and the center main chest piece, and fiberglassed the right main chest piece and the two shoulder blade plates. I hope to finish bondo'ing those pieces sometime within the week, depending on my plans. I also have the shin in the works.

I've almost completed my vacuum table/box as well. All I have left is the frame for the plastic, the pegboard for multiple pieces, and some cleaning to do on the box. After that, I'm ready to go! Roughly ten sheets of High Impact Polystyrene are sitting in my room, waiting for the forming work to begin.

Potential Pros of Vac Forming:
Ease of reproducing parts
Cheap cost
Tough pieces

Potential Cons of Vac Forming:
Low detail vs rubber molding
Can only cast parts under a certain size (16"x20" ATM)
Have to cut up the molds for certain parts

Picture time:

A rather old photo of the ODST pieces, they are currently MUCH smoother then what's shown here.

The top of my Vacuum Forming box, with both holes shown. I'm creating interchangable tops so I can get different results, ie mesh screens, pegboard, etc.

The bottom of my Vacuum Forming box, showing the pipe which the air is going to be channeled through by my shop vac.

Other misc. pictures of the box.

I hope to have finished and formed the five pieces sometime within the next week or two. More pictures and updates to follow.

Constructive criticism only, please.

looks good, finish up the table and get to it!

 

[rvb4life]

depending on how thick the plastic you are using is, you can get more detail out of thinner pieces. just make sure they aren't too high traffic areas, or you could be breaking stuff you dont wanna break.

 

[Spartan137]

looks good, finish up the table and get to it!

I'm working on it!

depending on how thick the plastic you are using is, you can get more detail out of thinner pieces. just make sure they aren't too high traffic areas, or you could be breaking stuff you dont wanna break.

I agree. I've got both .040 and .060 inch plastic, which is still pretty thick, but at least smaller nontheless. One thing I considered was using vac-forming to create reverse molds, something that Vos did with his CQB helmet. From there, I can pretty much do whatever I want to do.

 

[pvt waffles]

looking good i can wait to see the finished product of this

p.s. do i spy crocs?

 

[Crucible]

ABRIDGED VERSION

God's sake, don't quote an image-heavy post only to add 'looks good, keep it up, can't wait etc!'. Not all of us have some futuristic super-computer that can handle that sort of a load, and most of us don't want to have to scroll through that much stuff - be considerate when posting please.

As for your system itself: it looks really good. Basic, but hopefully very efficient. And hopefully strong and resistant to damage too - I made one of those once and it set on fire.

 

[Spartan137]

looking good i can wait to see the finished product of this

p.s. do i spy crocs?

I was wondering if someone would notice that... those are my sisters. I'm too lazy to put my Vans on for a couple of pictures !

But thanks! I hope I get some good results with it!

God's sake, don't quote an image-heavy post only to add 'looks good, keep it up, can't wait etc!'. Not all of us have some futuristic super-computer that can handle that sort of a load, and most of us don't want to have to scroll through that much stuff - be considerate when posting please.

As for your system itself: it looks really good. Basic, but hopefully very efficient. And hopefully strong and resistant to damage too - I made one of those once and it set on fire.

I'll need to remember to keep a fire extinguisher handy!

 

[Spartan137]

UPDATE:

Check the first post!

 

[rvb4life]

how strong was the vacuum? Usually if you crank the suction up on it, you can get more detail out of it. Looks good, but the plastic doesn't really look like its completely sealed to me.

 

[Spartan137]

how strong was the vacuum? Usually if you crank the suction up on it, you can get more detail out of it. Looks good, but the plastic doesn't really look like its completely sealed to me.

Yeah, it seems I'm not getting the even suction all the way around the piece... which means that the screen fails.

So, I'm going to try pegboard instead, see if that helps. The detail actually came out nicely, though. All of the smaller marks on Link's Magnum where present, just a little less defined. We purchased some .040 HISS, so that should get here soon.

 

[rvb4life]

yeah, the pegboard seems like a better option, you may get some better suction out of that in an even area. Try that, or a more powerful vacuum.

 

[church 957]

looking good mate.

Quick question did you use your pep pieces for the mold?

 

[pablofiasco]

your heating the plastic in your kitchen oven?
please, for the love of god get some resperators on, the heating abs and pvc can give off some realy narly toxic fumes(one of them i think is clorine gas i think it was?)
and its always better to be safe then sorry

 

[MadManInABox]

To improve the detailed areas you could try putting small holes through the mould in these areas.

I would also recommend putting much smaller holes over the surface instead of one big one in the middle in order to increase the area and direction in which the vaccum acts.

 

[Spartan137]

yeah, the pegboard seems like a better option, you may get some better suction out of that in an even area. Try that, or a more powerful vacuum.

I'm going to build a small 12x12 pegboard panel before I start the next round of forming. So that should help.

Hopefully.

looking good mate.

Quick question did you use your pep pieces for the mold?

Yes, pep pieces with bondo. I'm probably going to put bucks on them, so that they're larger.

your heating the plastic in your kitchen oven?
please, for the love of god get some resperators on, the heating abs and pvc can give off some realy narly toxic fumes(one of them i think is clorine gas i think it was?)
and its always better to be safe then sorry

I'm using HISS (High Impact Styrene Sheet), which they use in plastic models and toys. How toxic can it be?

To improve the detailed areas you could try putting small holes through the mould in these areas.

I would also recommend putting much smaller holes over the surface instead of one big one in the middle in order to increase the area and direction in which the vaccum acts.

Yeah, both of those are being considered. We might use pegboard on top of the hole for more airflow. Hopefully that'll help. I put some air holes in my center chest piece, but they didn't help too much. So I might make them bigger. Or something. I'm still working it all out.

Thanks for all the support!

 

[pablofiasco]

I'm using HISS (High Impact Styrene Sheet), which they use in plastic models and toys. How toxic can it be?

when heated, the hips can give off: carbon dixoide, Carbon Monoxide (the silent killer), Styrene gas, and Hydrogen Cyanide.

now, under normal heat+vaccum your probably not going to release very much, but when dealing with any sort of plastic or polymer+ heat, you want to take precautions.

these are like fibreglass fumes and dust, that could take years (or decades) to have major impacts, these various fumes an d gasses are more along the lines of "i feel kinda sleepy" and then you dont wake up



http://www.westlakeplastics.com/msds/msds_hips.pdf heres a materials safety sheet on Hips, the info is in the fire section (but really, any sort of heat enough to make a material flexible like needed for forming is going to release at least small amounts of the fumes)

 

[Spartan137]

Ah, so, 'TOXIC'. Gotcha.

I'll need to remember to wear the respirator, form now on, then. But it can't be incredibly toxic, the books I have don't recommend an aired out room, or say that you can't use kitchen ovens.

Wouldn't it be somewhat safe considering many people do it with home ovens in their kitchens?

 

[pablofiasco]

Ah, so, 'TOXIC'. Gotcha.

I'll need to remember to wear the respirator, form now on, then. But it can't be incredibly toxic, the books I have don't recommend an aired out room, or say that you can't use kitchen ovens.

Wouldn't it be somewhat safe considering many people do it with home ovens in their kitchens?

yes, it can be perfectly safe given resonable precaution, just make sure you have a respirator, and fresh batterys in your carbon monoxide detector, and AFTER vaccuming, open windows, etc to air out a bit.

so long as you keep an eye on the plastic/hips/abs/etc and make sure it dosent begin to bubble, smolder, char you should be ok
under normal and oven heat (when watched) it isnt incredibly toxic, but if you let that stuff burn, then theres trouble

 

[Spartan137]

so long as you keep an eye on the plastic/hips/abs/etc and make sure it dosent begin to bubble, smolder, char you should be ok
under normal and oven heat (when watched) it isnt incredibly toxic, but if you let that stuff burn, then theres trouble

Thats what I was thinking.

Thanks for the good safety tip!

 

[ARKOokami]

your heating the plastic in your kitchen oven?
please, for the love of god get some resperators on, the heating abs and pvc can give off some realy narly toxic fumes(one of them i think is clorine gas i think it was?)
and its always better to be safe then sorry

I agree!