Saturday, November 10, 2007

Kroot pistol project.

I was away for work when I did this, out of boredom. I had some spare Kroot bits, and just wanted to make a convincing kroot pistol. After looking through all the assorted bits, here is how it went: I planned on a left handed aimed pistol shot, cannibalizing parts from these ones showed on left









These are the cuts. At top I wanted the pistol grip from the actual pistol. At middle I wanted the left hand, thats holding the rifle stock in juust the right way (kind of hard to see, sry). At bottom, I wanted the stock of the rifle, with the cocking handleand all included. Yeah, believe it or not, these parts all fit together nicely.








First, I had to empty that left hand. At the moment, its holding the rifle barrel in a normal firing pose.. but if I empty it out and flip it over, oddly enough its also a left handed pistol grip pose. Do it yourself: hold out your left hand like your supporting a rifle... your thumb is at 9 oclock and your fingers wrap around counterclockwise. most likely your index finger is a little foreward of the rest. now, spin your wrist keeping that grip intul your thumb is at 3 oclock, and imagine instead a pistol there. Weird, huh?



It was a little risky, digging out chunks of plastic this tiny, but a new and ver very sharp exacto knife helps. Eventually I got it emptied out. You can see how it looks like its aiming a pistol already, yea?













With a little shaving and fitting, I eventually got the grip on the grip just right. Thank gawd for the pro-weld style of plastic glue; where it melts the plastic parts together. That helped fill in some gaps. I just gouped it up, and squeezed them together.. presto!! 1 solid piece of plastic.












Now for the amazing bit: this is how the two parts are going to go together, to form a pistol. Whats amazing is how the weld glue makes this rough looking join asolutely perfect.. with very little effort. I just did a rough fit test, then slobbered the goup over the stock-bit, waited for it to get nice and squishy, then pushed it into place, letting the melted plastic bead and buldge out (hence the weld analogy), waited for it to dry and harden up, then filed/scraped the extra weld beads away... and presto!



The end result! Solid as a rock, because it is now indeed on solid piece of plastic.
(point of note: use the expensive weld-on glues... you do get what you pay for!)









Maybe its just me, but I find that amazing.
Adding the barrel to the gun was as simple as cutting one off of one of the rifles, then chopping it off at the appropriate length. Now, for the size comparison: My little baby is the middle one, and the other two are 'bits' showing a piston in its holster (to hang from the belt) You can see its pretty true to the spirit of the 'official' pistols, if a little too big and blocky. I say "so WHAT?!? its still freakin awesome!"




Fitting the arm was simple. There is an arm pose where the kroot is holding the rifle out in front of him like a Bat'leth (your a geek for knowing the ref.), making his left arm naturally in the right pose. So, a spin of the wrist, eyeball what looks about right, and presto! All done!


Next was to find a good pose for the rest of the kroot, and came up with a very "sheriff in town" cowboy sort of pose that I really liked. tell me what you think:














I think it looks just about perfect. But sadly, This poor piece of crafting artwork has remain unchanged, un painted, and in a storage bin ever since completing it.
Shame on me!
Well, this is still a historical review. This all happened when I was away for work in Virginia... and while there (making an insane amount of $$$, thank you per diem!), I got into RC airplanes. Heavilly. They became cheaper than I ever expected over the years, and before I knew it, I had extras and spare parts for this hobby as well... when it hit me; why not combine the two?
Next will be the Servoed Razorback!

2 comments:

Anonymous said...

nice pistol design.

I have been reading through the blog with some interest after finding it from searching for lighting help for miniatures. (well to get some ideas anyway)

Will be dropping back every now and again to see what you are up to.

Nice work with the lighting by the way.

Anonymous said...

This is beyond a shaddow of a doubt the most leetzor conversion site I have ever seen. I am very impressed and inspired. You need to get this linked to other site so more people can see it.