Airsoft Destiny Hand Cannon

[drjag]

Hello all! It's been over a year since I have started a new thread for a new project but now I finally have the time to share some of the work I've been doing over the past couple months. As the title says, this thread is to show the process of making an actual functioning airsoft Hand Cannon from the video game Destiny! I've been planning this one for a long time to work out how to approach this ambitious project and with some research and tinkering of my own, I figured the best way to approach this was to build on top of an existing gun; this saves building a working mechanism from scratch.

Because of the way I'm building this, it isn't going to be "100%" accurate because I have to work around the mechanisms of the revolver, instead, I'm trying to make it look as close to the Hand Cannon as possible based around the model.

Before I even start with how I approached making this, I gathered two vital references: The official Hand Canon references released by Bungie, prior to Destiny's release and Bill Doran's FREE Hand Cannon template that's based off the official references. The official reference gave very good up close views of the gun and the template let me scale it to my choice of airsoft gun. (Link to Bill Doran's Free template) http://punishedprops.com/shop/destiny-hand-cannon-blueprint/



The gun I have chosen to base the Hand Cannon off is a HFC HG-133 gas airsoft revolver, as I had the opportunity to buy a semi working one for really cheap so I didn't mind messing around with it, since it already needed tinkering with in the first place. For those wondering why it is orange instead of black, silver or whatever, that's because I live in the UK and if you're just a regular citizen who's over 18, you can only own "2 tone" or clear guns, unless you're a member of an airsoft site which allows you to own and use black airsoft guns.



With my airsoft gun chosen, I needed to work on the free template to scale and work out how long pieces were and how I would fabricate them (if possible); I had to scale it down to 11 inches to fit the model profile.



Lastly, before I could start fabricating pieces, I needed to break down the gun to its core components to separate the functioning pieces from the body and learn how each piece fits together; I used this handy schematic guide to help with the disassembly process.




That's all for now, next post will show a lot of the fabrication of pieces as I don't want to post too much on the opening post.

Until then...

 

[gunnerk19]

Re: Functional Airsoft Destiny Hand Cannon

Interesting. Had you considered trying to use an airsoft Mateba revolver as the base? Being underbarrelled already, it lends itself much better to the mechanical and firing aspect of the project.

It's a good thing you're going to need to heavily mod that anyway so the orange won't be too off-putting. I do feel sorry for you guys across the pond and your UKARA laws.

 

[drjag]

Re: Functional Airsoft Destiny Hand Cannon

Interesting. Had you considered trying to use an airsoft Mateba revolver as the base? Being underbarrelled already, it lends itself much better to the mechanical and firing aspect of the project.

It's a good thing you're going to need to heavily mod that anyway so the orange won't be too off-putting. I do feel sorry for you guys across the pond and your UKARA laws.

I did actually consider using a similar model just because of the under barrel but to actually acquire one in the first place would be a challenge in itself, plus I dread to think how much it would cost to get one so I decided not to go down that route.

Unfortunately, the underbarrel for this mod will be purely cosmetic but that's one of the few exceptions I've had to make to still make it work.

 

[Grey]

Re: Functional Airsoft Destiny Hand Cannon

There's only one Mateba airsoft and it's made by Marushin, the price on those is upwards of 200$ as it's a collectors item in and of itself.

What you want to do is certainly possible and has actaully been done before, Poseidon had a model kit that required a Tanaka M29 revolver to build up and it had instructions for modifying the gun to fire from the bottom cylinder. I definitely want to see this build happen.

 

[Noeland]

Re: Functional Airsoft Destiny Hand Cannon

You're going to have to replace the entire barrel action anyway. I'm sure you can install an angled tube inside the barrel housing to at least vent the gas. You won't be able to fire anything out of the gun but it will still function fine otherwise.

 

[drjag]

Re: Functional Airsoft Destiny Hand Cannon

@Grey @Noeland I appreciate the input that has been suggested, but as much as I would of liked to make the underbarrel function as the primary barrel, it's simply not possible with the model of gun I have chosen, plus I stuck with this gun because I was able to get it for £10 as this project is on a budget. I've also done a lot of progress on the barrel before I opened this thread so there's no going back.

With that said, it's time to start! This post will focus on the top barrel alone as there is a lot more to it than the rest of the gun.. Because the barrel is entirely separate to the gun body and it comes out with just a single pin, I am able to make the top/bottom barrel as visually accurate as possible with very few restrictions. I used a 15mm OD X 12mm ID PVC tube that was cut to the length of the barrel measured out on my template; the 15mm diameter means it slots into the gun body and the 12mm inner diameter can house the inner barrel and the spring that is needed for the gun to cycle properly.

The PVC pipe also acts as the base to build onto. I used 1mm styrene sheets to build up a box around the pipe, totalling in a 17mm X 17mm frame which is exactly the thickness I needed to build details on. A notch was then cut out the end of the PVC that will be inserted into the gun and a PVC sheet block was cemented over the notch so it slots into the gun flush.


Joshua Guess, on Flickr


Joshua Guess, on Flickr

Now that I knew the barrel would fit into the gun, I could focus on the shape and look of the barrel. The box built around the barrel wasn't perfect so I corrected the surfaces with body filler and I made a jig that I could squish the body filler against, ensuring it cured flat and at a perfect 90 degree angle so only minimal sanding was required.


Joshua Guess, on Flickr


Joshua Guess, on Flickr

With the barrel squared, I adhered some thin strips of styrene to make a boarder around the sides of the barrel to build up on later; the edges were also bevelled with a flat file to make the barrel octangular.


Joshua Guess, on Flickr

I then turned my attention to the opening of the barrel. The Hand Cannon has this little muzzle-like piece so to make it, I made a frame around the opening with 1mm PVC sheet and glued around the opening; the gaps were filled with Milliput.


Joshua Guess, on Flickr


Joshua Guess, on Flickr


Joshua Guess, on Flickr

Up to this stage, the barrel has been going smoothly but one area I had to compromise was the rounded rectangular areas that run through the sides of the barrel.



I didn't want to cut this area out as the inner barrel and the spring would be exposed and ruin the look of the gun so to accommodate for this, I made rounded tabs that I glued on top to at least show the pattern; I'm not overall pleased with this solution, but it's far better than letting the inner parts be seen.


Joshua Guess, on Flickr


Joshua Guess, on Flickr

The last thing I did was add a front sight to the barrel, using 2mm PVC sheet.


Joshua Guess, on Flickr


Joshua Guess, on Flickr

At this stage, the top barrel is mostly complete and my next post will be on the bottom barrel.

Until then...

 

[drjag]

Now it's time to post the other of the barrel, the dummy underbarrel.

The main material I used to build up the underbarrel is 5mm PVC sheet; it's light, durable and when superglued to another piece of PVC sheet, the bond is unbelievably strong.

Because I'm lazy and I hate cutting out thick PVC sheet with a utility knife, I used my scroll saw to plough though it; you'll see some little pieces sticking out of the back of the PVC, I thought I would need these when I was planning it out but I later discovered they are not needed at all.


Joshua Guess, on Flickr


Joshua Guess, on Flickr

The top and bottom lengths were just strips of more PVC sheet and glued in-between the side pieces and all of the edges were rounded slightly with a file.


Joshua Guess, on Flickr

Somehow, after all of the measuring I did, the back of the underbarrel was short by 4.5mm so I sawed off the little pieces and glued on a 5mm PVC sheet puck, then I sanded it down to 4.5mm and filed the edges to blend with the rest.


Joshua Guess, on Flickr

Moving on to details, I focused on the front end of the underbarrel. It has a raised area that protrudes from the rest of the barrel.



To tackle this, I made a template on the underbarrel by wrapping a layer of masking tape on the barrel, roughly sketching the shape, removing the masking tape as one piece, straightening out my lines and transferred to 1mm styrene, this means I know it will fit on, but I added a little extra material to the sides because when the styrene wraps around, it'll lose a bit of length; this was formed with my hands, no heat needed for bending the styrene.


Joshua Guess, on Flickr


Joshua Guess, on Flickr


Joshua Guess, on Flickr

Once the piece was wrapped around the whole barrel, (except the top) I etched in the lines that run along the raised area; I used a simple round needle file and carefully worked into the styrene. I also added a front piece and a 15mm acrylic rod to close in the barrel.


Joshua Guess, on Flickr


Joshua Guess, on Flickr


Joshua Guess, on Flickr

Lastly, I added some more raised detail on the sides; these are supposed to be cut out but if the areas were cut out, it would go through the acrylic rod and you would see the empty space inside, so I opted for small styrene pieces instead.


Joshua Guess, on Flickr

There's still a couple more details to add but the majority is done and it's only little things left to do on it.

Next post will focus on the rest of the gun and how I worked around the guns functions and visual accuracy.

Until then...

 

[drjag]

It's time to show how the grip was made.



Compared to the design of the Hand Cannon grip, the original grip on the airsoft revolver looks nothing like it so I've done quite a lot of modifying to get it to look as good as I can, while trying not to interfere with how it joins back on the gun.

First thing I had to do was cut off a piece on the right side of the grip to match the left side.


Joshua Guess, on Flickr

The next thing I did was remove the finger grooves that gripped around your hands. I used a dremel and various files and sandpaper to smooth it out; I also sanded off the bumpy texture off the surfaces. I had to fill in the gaps made from removing the finger grooves by using Milliput, this also aloud me to shape it how I wanted.


Joshua Guess, on Flickr


Joshua Guess, on Flickr

The next stage was the grooves that run along the top of the grip.

Milliput is perfect for this kind of application so I jumped straight into making it. I did two passes of Milliput: first pass was just the edge and the second pass was to thicken and shape the groove as best as I can. As soon as the Milliput set, I filed and sanded it to shape, doing my best to keep it symmetrical.


Joshua Guess, on Flickr


Joshua Guess, on Flickr

The last thing to do was to make the strange bottom piece that is part of the grip.

I didn't really take pictures at this stage because I was more or less experimenting how to make this piece. I chose to use PVC sheet to make up most of the shape and the strip that runs up the back, and I "bondo squished" the piece to the grips to fill the gaps and form around the bottom of the grip. A hole was also drilled because the gas is inserted through the grip.


Joshua Guess, on Flickr


Joshua Guess, on Flickr

Because the grip is two separate pieces that screw separately into the gun, the bottom piece had to be cut in half; I used the thinnest scroll saw blade I had and ran it through.


Joshua Guess, on Flickr

The last thing to do was to adhere the cut pieces to the grip halves. I used 2 part epoxy glue to adhere them together because epoxy glue bonds extremely well and because of its viscosity, it fills in the minor gaps around the grip and leaves a nice seal around the edge.


Joshua Guess, on Flickr


Joshua Guess, on Flickr

At the time of writing, I'm still trying to figure out the small emblem things on both halves of the grip but because the screws that hold the grip in place are positioned there, I can't just glue it on top; it might have to be an exception for visual accuracy but for the most part, the grip looks very close to the Hand Cannon design so I'm not too worried about the emblem.

The rest now is the body and the pieces that are part of it.

Until then...

 

[drjag]

The last stage of fabricating... The body.

The first thing I decided to do was to rise up the body to match the profile of the Hand Cannon. I used 5mm PVC sheet and a torx head machine screw to secure the PVC in place; this screw will be used later for when I do the back sight.


Joshua Guess, on Flickr


Joshua Guess, on Flickr

With that piece out of the way, I moved onto fabricating the selector switch. In this case, the selector switch is actually the recoil shield but will move back and forth to select the safety and fire. I had to hack off the original hemisphere so the piece can slide right up to the end of the gun; this was made with built up layers of PVC sheet.


Joshua Guess, on Flickr


Joshua Guess, on Flickr

On the other side of the gun, I couldn't hack off the whole hemisphere because it helps guide the cylinder to rotate, so I cut off the back of it and built around it; this piece is static.


Joshua Guess, on Flickr

The last thing to do was build up and patch areas on the body. Milliput was my best friend for this part.


Joshua Guess, on Flickr

Milliput was used to bring out the body and the swingarm (I think it's called a crane) to be flat against the barrels.


Joshua Guess, on Flickr


Joshua Guess, on Flickr


Joshua Guess, on Flickr

At this point, 99% of everything was built up so I threw on an initial layer of primer and dry fitted the gun together... I'm liking the look of it.


Joshua Guess, on Flickr

I've still gotta make the back sight but other than that, everything is ready for paint.

Until then...

P.S. This is worth pointing out as it's already been mentioned. This gun was orange for a reason but now I have primed it and I will be painting it a gun metal colour. This means I'm technically not aloud to own this or use it anywhere (especially in public, not that you should EVER brandish a gun, even if it's a toy) as it will be a realistic looking firearm that anyone can mistake as a real gun to a passer-by. I'm only making this as a display piece and to test whether I could cosmetically modify an airsoft gun this much, so if any of you are in the UK and are planning on painting a 2 tone gun to a realistic colour, I advise against it; I'm aware of the laws and I'm aware of the consequences.

 

[Militicus]

Looks great!

Sent from my SM-G920V using Tapatalk

 

[drjag]

@Rabex Thank you! Much appreciated.

Update: I kinda had a set back with the revolver that meant I had to do something quite drastic. I had planned on cutting off the ejector rod right up to the cylinder but that would mean the cylinder would be at risk of simply sliding out along with the rest of its internal parts, so I decided to hunk out a channel between the barrels so the ejector rod could sit in.

I had to split the barrels apart that I had already epoxied (this was painful to do, and to watch) and I used a rotary tool on the bottom barrel and removed a bunch of material. The top barrel had a little channel chiselled out as the ejector rod sits just a bit higher than the bottom barrel; All gaps were re-filled and re-epoxied.


Joshua Guess, on Flickr

In the process, I also wet sanded off the paint I was experimenting with.


Joshua Guess, on Flickr

The fix works but I hate the fact I have to have it there but sometimes, you just have to go with it; set backs like this makes me wanna design and rebuild a new Hand Cannon altogether... someday.

Next is paint, if there are no more set backs or anymore paint mishaps.

Until then...