XRobots - Iron Man Hulkbuster (inspired) suit.

I had planned to build a real life suiting up robot gantry for my Iron Man MKVI build. However since the suit and it's strapping system have progressed the idea has become less practical. Also, as the Iron Man/Avengers series of films has progressed, Tony Stark has moved away from a special room full of robot arms to do the suit-up, towards suits that put themselves on.

Therefore the plans for my next suit will be as follows:

-A suit that is free standing/self supporting which you can get into and then move around.
-Heavily mechanised with lots of electronics and 3D printed mechanical parts.
-Inspired my Iron Man, but mostly my own design.
-To have high visual impact / high detail.
-Must disassemble for transport.

Building a suit that actually opens up and allows you to climb in will require quite a complicated mechanical assembly. Fortunately though it is rumoured that Avengers 2 will feature a Hulkbuster suit, so following this trend should allow plenty of space for the extra mechanics.

There outline concept for the frame of the suit is pictured below. Note that these are concept sketches, I won't use these CAD drawings to make the final physical assembly. Key points are:

-All of the joints lock in place so it will free-stand, once you climb in from the back you can unlock them.
-The suit will only make the wearer around 30cm/1' taller, so it's not too problematic to walk.
-The 'toe' of the suit will be hinged and sprung so that walking without flat feet can occur.
-The arms are suspended from the overhead gantry and also tethered to other points on the torso so they hang naturally.
-The frame is covered with body panels which hinge open and closed to surround the wearer.
-Note that the hip hinges need three degrees of freedom to allow full motion, the final assembly here will probably look somewhat different.

I've already build most of the frame, just the arms to go, there's more info at: http://xrobots.co.uk/hulkbuster/

A concept picture:



Here's the latest part of the video with a demo so far:


Whole YouTube playlist (5 parts currently): https://www.youtube.com/playlist?list=PLpwJoq86vov8gC5fYZu6zq3JpQ0VOPQmV

Simply fantastic. The engineering aspect alone is phenomenal. Can't wait to see the finished product!

Looking great dude, the toes really do make all the difference for posing!

I think the thigh and shins need to be a little thinner and more streamline. It would give it a more natural look. I just saw your mock up on Youtube and like it, but the legs still have a frankenstien type look. The arms look great though and I can't wait to see it come together

Mrdopey said:

I think the thigh and shins need to be a little thinner and more streamline. It would give it a more natural look. I just saw your mock up on Youtube and like it, but the legs still have a frankenstien type look. The arms look great though and I can't wait to see it come together

Click to expand...

Yes I haven't worked on the shell for the lower legs yet though?

Here's the latest video

Looks pretty good so far, however you may want to try doing some sketching of the overall shapes of the outer Armour plating/shell before mocking them up, this will mean you can throw a few ideas around and get a feel for what the thing's silhouette will look like and how the panels will flow into one another.

I can't wait to see where this goes.

This is going to be an exciting journey...GM

This week I have been mostly 3D printing for hours and hours, to make something that looks like a pair of hands:

This looks awesome... I have been following your channel for a while.

I admit that watching your videos makes me feel better about my own obsessive shield building. You are spending a lot more time and money than I am -- so I must not be the crazy one.

I've started to build out the forearms in a combination of 3D printed parts, wood, and Foam PVC board. More pictures at:

http://xrobots.co.uk/hulkbuster/index_arm.html

There are a couple more videos for this one, showing the opening arm/weapon pod and the upper arm frames:

Got the arms and their motors on:

Just watched them all mate. Outstanding. Really very good. Some nice basic engineering principles applied with common sense. If you dont mind me asking, do you make money day to day via your prop building, or do you also have another source of income ie. a dayjob? I'm an engineer myself, and I can't fathom how I could find the time to do this sort of thing! No worries if you dont want to answer that by the way.

I'm inspired!

Fantastic work as always, one question I'd have is do you think weight could become an issue? From previous updates I can see the torso/arms will be supported on your shoulders, if that's the case I'd imagine with all the added weight of electronics/armour plates etc. this could potentially become a problem?

Fawbish said:

Just watched them all mate. Outstanding. Really very good. Some nice basic engineering principles applied with common sense. If you dont mind me asking, do you make money day to day via your prop building, or do you also have another source of income ie. a dayjob? I'm an engineer myself, and I can't fathom how I could find the time to do this sort of thing! No worries if you dont want to answer that by the way.

I'm inspired!

Click to expand...

Thanks, I still have a day job but I'd like to build XRobots into a content production company. I'm using Patreon for funding as well as the YouTube Partnership program: http://www.patreon.com/xrobots

RowBoatCop said:

Fantastic work as always, one question I'd have is do you think weight could become an issue? From previous updates I can see the torso/arms will be supported on your shoulders, if that's the case I'd imagine with all the added weight of electronics/armour plates etc. this could potentially become a problem?

Click to expand...

Yes it will if I'm not careful, I'm just making the video which includes wearing the pieces so far so we'll see how that goes (it feels ok). Most of the shells will be various foam products, so not too much more weight gets added.

Brilliant!

Can't wait to c suit

Thanks guys, here's the next part: