Harry Potter Quidditch Broom (Hardware Build)

Wolfie had such a great idea to use an axe handle as the base for HER broom and my 5 year old has been begging for one for such a long time, that I just couldn't resist a little friday afternoon project with him.

Materials:
36" Hickory axe handle - Home Depot - $13.00
Decorative curtain hooks for the foot pads - Home Depot - $14.00
Adjustable curtain rod brackets from the same section - Home Depot - $5.00
a 2" plumbing pipe connector -$3.00
One bundle of Bear Grass - Hobby Lobby - ($10.00 at %50 off)- $5.00
5" styrofoam ball - Hobby Lobby - $4.00 (to hold the form inside the bristles)
3" styrofoam cone - Hobby Lobby - $3.00 (same)
Total cost $47.00 (compared to $35.00 for the cheap plastic one you get at a costume shop)
Look on my son's face...priceless.











I still need to add some more stain, and do some detailing and touch up, but I'm pretty happy with it considering it was a 3 hour project and was so cheap, all things considered!

PHArchivist said:

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Brilliant! Do you have progress shots?

I only took a couple of shots before I put the foot pegs on. It was such a quick project that there really wasn't much to take shots of.
I can give you a quick play by play though:

I gave the axe handle a quick sand and rubbed some wood stain on it (going to redo that later)

I put the bundle of grass in the bathtub for a bit, to soften the grass and keep it from breaking when I shape it.

I took the 5" styro foam ball and the 3" styrofoam cone and bored the thick part of the cone down so the ball would fit in it just like an Ice cream cone, and I glued those together using hot glue.

I loosened up the 2" bracket as big as it would go and slid it over the end of the axe handle. I then started taking plugs of wet grass and sticking them into the bracket. I made sure to go further in than I needed to that I could tap the ends back out and even up the ends.

once I couldn't get any more grass in, i worked it around inside the bracket to make it evenly spaced around the handle. I then adjusted the grass and bracket until it was where I wanted it and then tightened it down as tight as it would go.

Then, standing it on it's end, bristles up, i spread the grass out evenly and pushed the foam ice cream cone down into the center of it, ball first, spreading the grass out into a fan.

I then sprayed the inside of the grass and the foam form with spray adhesive and slowly formed the grass around the foam.

Once I had it even, I tied it off at the end with a string to temporarily hold it while I wrapped it with some wire I had laying around. 16 gauge galvanized wire I believe.

I then chopped off the extra grass after the wrapping and used a kitchen knife to clean up the other end next to the bracket, just to even everything up.

To clean up the few extra straggle hairs that were sticking out, I lightly coated the entire bristle section with spray adhesive and then used the spray can lid to roll the bristles out and get them to lay down. This works a lot better than trying to stick them down with your fingers.

Anybody have a high-rez shot of the Nimbus logo? My son decided to call it the "Nimbus 2011" . I was hoping to find a good straight on shot, print it out, and cut out the letters using an exacto knife to make a stencil.