Re: Vacformed Warhammer 40k Space Marine Armor
I haven't posted many updates on this project lately because it was somewhat pushed aside while I was going through some Halloween insanity. The other day I decided it was time to bite the bullet and start cutting the chest armor into something that could be used as forming bucks for the vac table.
I used a laser level to describe the slicing plane I would use. First, I picked where I would cut the top off of the chest:
I had the chest armor sitting on top of a couple of buckets so I could rotate it around and keep the laser at the same level as I marked the line with a Sharpie. Then I set it on its back and marked a line where the front and back would be split:
Since there was no good angle to get both sides of the chest at the same time from the outside, I decided to just go ahead and scribe the line on the inside. It's not like there's a shortage of room to work in there:
With the lines all marked out, I passed it off to my friend Matt so I'd have someone other than myself to yell at if something went wrong. He made the cuts with my shiny new jigsaw:
The finished result was three smaller pieces that sit nice and level on the forming table. Unfortunately, I can only fit two at a time:
Now I just need to add about a 1/2" standoff at the bottom edge of each piece so everything will form correctly all the way out to the edges. That done, I'll need to close up the ends of the front and back, reinforce the whole arrangement with one or two more layers of glass, and then it'll be time to make some chest armor.
By the way, I decided it was important to start with cutting this out instead of one of the many easier parts so that I'll be able to get started sculpting the trim pieces for the chest.
Stay tuned...