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Tag: finishing

RESIN KIT: Part two, the one where things go awry.

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Something to keep in mind when you choose to work with resin, and resin based kits. The material is brittle, doesn’t handle torque particularly well, and warps like a mother fucker. Nothing a bit of hot water, clamps and a flat surface can’t handle, but expect delays, and lots, and lots of additional work that you wouldn’t find with a Bandai quality plastic snap fit model.

Also, rule #2, for anybody keeping track, casting quality. Pay the premium for high quality casts from the original developer, don’t chince out and buy a recasting, as the quality will suffer, and add considerable time to your build. That’s IF you can over come the casting deficiencies you encounter. I can sculpt, but I don’t do hard edged mechanical stuff, so my best hope is that the outer armor has better casting quality that will hide much of the misshapen, or poorly defined details of the internal structure. Round holes are oblong, octagonal holes for nuts, are off centre and warped, details are lumpy masses, so… yeah. Don’t get suckered into buying the 1/3 priced stuff, as it’s going to cost you in the end anyway.

But, having said that I have managed, over the last five or six days, to build up roughly 80% of the internal structure for this massive (comparatively) model kit. I have the feet, legs, waist, lower torso, arms & shoulders built. I just need to figure out the upper torso and electronic wiring harness portion, and then I can wash (again – to remove all of the mould release agent) and begin to prime the internal bits. I’m ok if test fitting armor panels rubs off the primer, it will help me achieve a better fit. Plus painting won’t start for a while, beyond the priming stage. I may get this to a point where I can leave it for a good stretch, for a rainy day, or the cold weather again.

I started late because I was intimidated by all the resin (And Covid), and just how much fixing, and rejiggering I knew I was going to need to do. But now that I’m in it, and not in a rush, I am not too overwhelmed by it anymore. Funny how that works. Also for one thing the pour spouts on every single piece of armor need to be cut off, and sanded, which is several weeks worth of work. I can do that when I stop going outdoors due to the cold. I now, as the temperatures rise, want to work outside, or in my garage shop. I’ve made considerable headway on my Urn build, and I need to sand, test fit, pilot hole drill, and paint the Moose fence topper for my parents. Then figure out shipping across Canada to Campbell River BC.

So I promised some pictures, here they are in no particular order.

The feet, legs, groin, waist portion loosely assembled as a cohesive unit. With the arms and shoulders set on the table, elbows facing up.
A closer look at the messy details of the resin castings on the internal frame. Yikes!
A size comparison of the legs & waist to a finished MG Gundam ZZ. This thing should be between 16-18 inches tall when all is said and done. A real chonker.

I spent some time on Saturday while it was warm working through the Urn build. I used wood filler to plug the pin head nail holes. I also touched up one mitered corner on the tray, and assembled the cover that goes over the main chamber & nesting tray. I have an obscene amount of sanding to do, and then a wipe on, polish off wax finish that I hope makes it all look cohesive, and wonderful. No stain for this one, just clear coat. I am toying with the idea of using a bit of trim around the base, but we’ll see how it all turns out after sanding, and rounding over some edges with a router. Easter weekend quickly approaches. I wanted to hand it off then. So I best get cracking! Ciao Bella!

Wearing my Handy-Man pants for a brief shining moment.

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It took a while to find the part I needed but I did manage to change a brake light bulb that had burned out on my wife’s car. Took all of four minutes once I had the correct bulb in hand. I spent more time looking for a part number than I did doing much of anything else, other than driving to & from Canadian Tire. For less than $8.00 I made it street legal once more. All I needed were two different types of screw driver, and about four minutes time. Glad we can avoid any sort of traffic ticket regarding the tail lights. Go team!

I always wanted to learn more about cars, but those would be the types of vehicles from the 90’s, you know the pre-computer regulates everything, type of cars & trucks. When you had more mechanical solenoids to regulate operations in your car, and not lines of code. It’s a shame you can’t just bust out a bridgeport mill & welder to fix parts any more. Not that I can do much with either at the moment, but I can learn! Now it’s all cameras and touch screens and plastic, or polycarbonate this, that, and the other. Planned obsolescence and all that greedy bullshit. Bah! Beside changing my tires, light bulbs, and adding fluids, or an oil change there isn’t much i can do to fix any of our vehicles. Wouldn’t mind learning how to do brakes, and rotors, but if you fuck that up you crash and potentially kill people.

Oh, since the weather has managed to climb just over 0° C recently I have once again been able to pick up the Urn build for brief stints. It is going to require a fair amount of TLC, for the cold weather glue ups that left residue behind. Glad I’m just clear coating and not staining this, as it would wind up being streaky AF. I have the top tray built, glued & assembled. I went with a Royal blue felt liner. Looks tasteful. I felt the green might be too “Machinists Tool Box”, so blue it is! I have to shave down the tops a bit for a suitable flush final fit. Then I need to plug pin nail head holes, add any final trim, and build the cap/lid/cover. Then sand until I’m sick to death of doing so. Then add the high polished clear coat finish.

More glue ups with clamps.
Pieces of the top tray portion.
Tray fits, not too snug. Needs to be planed flush.

I also have the fence topping moose for my folks to complete. It needs a good sanding, test fit with pre-drilled holes, priming, and then painting, then a clear coat. Get disassembled and flat packed to be shipped across the country to my folks in Campbell River BC. That should be done by end of April if the weather gets nicer.

Rough cut moose fence topper.

Wednesday – Hump Day – Middle of the Week Day! It’s here and cold, with lots of wind on the way. I will be glad that I cleared all of the brush yesterday morning, because more will fall out of the old trees today, believe you-me. I will end up needing to sharpen my hedge trimmer, Swede saw, secateurs and long handled loppers. Going to be a busy spring with lots of damaged limbs to prune back nicely, in an attempt to not let my trees, shrubs, and bushes become diseased or die. The ice, and wet heavy snow did a real number on all of our old growth Lilacs. I have an old Maple on the front lawn that’s been dropping branches and bark for a while now. It’ll have to come down within the next 3-5 years. Possibly sooner if the stripped bark causes additional issues. I’d love to have the main lower trunk cut into slabs for furniture builds for the house. Tables, chairs, and desks for both kids. I have plans for all that wood!!!