Thanks!
So with the former finished off we got it into my workshop, prepped and ready for moulding. Just for a comparison here's the former next to a TPE helmet.
Next up we got the helmet mounted on a stand and I made some ridiculously oversized mould walls:
Black tooling gel was used first of all, then a smear of fibral was run over areas where air voids may occur and areas that possibly needed extra strength. This was smoothed out with a light brush of acetone:
Once laminated with a couple of layers of matting we took a couple of pulls from the mould.
For the backplate we've adapted an Earthshock version to match the smaller ones used on the originals.
What became apparent whilst we were researching was that the Invasion helmets were cast as solid pieces and the backplates cut out- if you look at how each helmet varies it really stands out! I did think of including this detail into these, but eventually decided against it and we added a strip of plasticard in to mould a retaining lip.
So far there's been 5 casts from the mould and in all honestly it won't last much longer. Because we'd rebuilt up the deeper grooves that Imagineering sanded down prior to re-moulding for Earthshock we soon began to realise why the Invasion helmets looked so battered- they stick in the mould! If you look at the original Invasion helmets they look absolutely battered- we'd always assumed they took a right drubbing whilst out on location- but what became apparent with each pull was that the helmets are pulling chunks out of the moulds- the grooves in the helmets are actually pinching the corresponding raised sections in the mould. Some of the mould actually stuck to the grooves on the ear muffs- which bizzarely appears to have happened on some of the originals and they have just been painted over!
So the plan now is to try and get another 3 or 4 pulls before the mould completely breaks down, then make a new mould in RTV!
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