Captain America’s Shield ver. 1.0

[Jhym]

After reading through Valor's forum posts on making Cap's Shield, I figured I'd give it a go and try to write up all my thoughts, successes, failures, and insights into what it takes to make this shield. Luckily if it doesn't turn out perfect this round, I have three boys who are already lobbying for it to hang in their room.

My progress has been slow mainly because I'm trying to reconstruct Valor's information into a linear sequence as well as writing up my process notes and steps for posting here.

First if you are using this build your own, I have to make an assumption that you have procured all the parts / components listed in the following posts.

If not please feel free to use the following list to get what you need.

Captain America's Shield

• Steel Saucer Sled
• 1.5 in x 84 in Leather Strap
• 150 Grit Sandpaper
• 3M Industrial Strength Adhesive Foam Tape
• Acetone
• Aluminum Rod for Hand Drill
• Aluminum Sign Blanks (10 in x10 in. larger)
• Brad hole T-Nuts, 1/4 in x 5/16 in x 3/4 in
• Buckles for Leather Strap
• Dry Erase / Grease Marker, Pen Style
• Duplicolor Acrylic Clearcoat
• Duplicolor Anodized Blue Metalcast Paint
• Duplicolor Anodized Red Metalcast Paint
• Exacto Knife, Basic Knife Set
• Fine-toothed Metal Blade for jigsaw, 36 TPI
• Graphite Pencils
• Hand Drill
• Hand Files, Needle File Set
• Heavy Duty Stripping Pads
• JB Weld
• Jigsaw
• Meguiar’s Cleaner Liquid Wax
• Metal Drill Bit
• Metal Ruler / Straight Edge 18+ in
• Paint Stripper / Citri-strip
• Painters Tape
• Rectangle Metal Rings
• Rivets

I will breakdown this build into the following posts:

1. Preparing the shield
2. Painting the shield
3. Creating the shield's star and cross bracing
4. Assembling the shield

You will also need the following templates that Valor was kind enough to share with the world.

• Star
• Cross Braces
• Strap Brackets

 

[BDBear]

Working on one myself, I'll be following this build with great interest

 

[Jhym]

Preparing The Shield

After getting the sled (from here on out I will call it a shield) and inspecting it for any damage that may have occurred with my cross-county move, I cut the rope handles off and proceeded to measure for the center by using string to make an “X” on the shield. I measured three to four times before I made my mark for drilling a hole. Feeling confident that I had done well by measuring twice before cutting (or drilling in this case), I proceeded to drill a small hole into the shield.


This was great. I was making progress. Not bad for starting on my first prop. I was feeling good…. That is until I set the shield up on its side and took a step back and realized that my measuring with string sucks. I was off center or to use the ancient Greek for archery, I had sinned. First mistake out of the gate.
So I looked at it a bit, got my flexible measuring tape (FMT) and determined that the hole would be covered by the star. This caused an “AHA!” moment when I realized that I could use the FMT to determine where center would be with more precision than string. So measuring from the upper-left hole to the lower-right hole I marked center distance. Then going from the lower-left hold to the upper-right hole, I found the middle mark again and made a new “X.” I did this a few more times making sure the middle hadn’t moved. I drilled my second center hole and verified that it was in the center. It was and I was starting to feel a bit more confident about this.


Next up I measured two inches up from the rolled lip of the shield and marked my lines I would use to cut the lip off. Why two inches? I can’t say I take the credit in finding out the math to determine why two inches, it was something Valor had worked out prior so I figured that was as good a place to start. Once I had made my marking lines, I used a string and a dry erase marker to make the cutting guide. This again didn’t turn out well and the circle was less of a circle and more of circular meandering over the shield.

After frowning at my failed attempt at drawing a circle, I grabbed my engineering compass that I got when I was in art school, put a dry erase marker in the pen holder and drew a nice circle all around. Once again I set the shield up on its edge to visually make sure all was well. It looked well, so I began the taping process to help prevent scuffs when using the jigsaw to cut the lip off.

Using the jigsaw I started my first cut at a slight angle into the shield, working my way to the circle guide, and following it around to cut the lip off. It was shortly after getting about a quarter of the way around the shield that I realized I was having problems with the shield vibrating something fierce and my inability to hold either the shield or the jigsaw straight with either hand. I figured (and still do) that it was inexperience on my part of cutting metal for the first time with a jigsaw.

I set the shield on its edge and realized that it was mostly round. I thought perhaps I could fix it with sanding bits and my rotary tool. The inexperience of youthful exuberance came to mind when remembering my attempts to sand the shield smooth and circular. I learned that when sanding a metal edge it’s best to have your rotary tool parallel to the edge instead of perpendicular. It was until I literally scored my sanding bit in two that I realized my next mistake / learning opportunity.



The shield looked like Howard Stark was on a drunken binge when cutting it round. So grabbing my compass again, I redrew my circle line and then grabbed my rotary tool and metal cutting wheels. This was an extremely slow process, involved a lot of smoke, and the replacement of a couple of cutting wheels. The end result was the shield looked nice an round.

Next up was paint stripping. I hadn’t stripped paint in years and had forgotten how messy it can be even when you are trying to minimize the mess. I used Citri-Strip paint remover twice, starting with inside (concave) portion of the shield. The first coat I waited about an hour before scrapping about 80% of it off. Because it was cool when I put it on, I had figured it would take closer to 24-hours before it was ready to come off. When I checked to see the paint looking quite bubbly, I test scraped a small section and the entire section of paint literally lifted off. So I scrapped the majority off and applied the second coat for the stubborn areas and waited about another hour before the remainder came off.


I flipped the shield over and proceeded to repeat the process for the convex side. It was about this time that I realized that maybe I shouldn’t have used a metal paint scrapper by the number of scratches that were appearing on the shield’s metal surface. I shrugged and naively thought that I could hide / remove them with the spun metal look that I would be doing.

After thoroughly cleaning the shield with both paint stripper wash and acetone, the shield was ready to get it’s spun effect. Cutting off a couple of strips of 150 grit sandpaper, a small nail and a metal ruler, I taped the sandpaper to the ruler, put the nail through the ruler’s hole, and into the center hole on the shield. I then started spinning the ruler around the shield to get the spun metal effect. Whilst I was was doing this, I had to change the sandpaper a couple of times as it kept getting fouled with the residual paint on the shield that stripping didn’t get.


Then it was onto the green, heavy duty, scouring pad. This took all the remaining paint off and really polished / brightened the shield. I was pleased with the overall progress I had made in a couple of days and couldn’t wait to get the paint on it.

Things I Learned
1. Use a flexible tape measure instead of string when needing to make precise markings.
2. A beam compass would have been better for measuring and drawing circles on a convex shape than the engineering compass.
3. In stead of using a jigsaw, a bandsaw would likely answer better as I could use both of my hands to help hold the shield steady during cutting.
4. I now understand why Valor used a bench sander / grinding disc to smooth the edges of the shield after cutting the lip off.
5. When using a rotary tool’s sanding bits on a metal edge, use the sanding bit in a parallel fashion rather than perpendicular to help prevent scoring the bit into two pieces.
6. When removing paint from a metal object, do not use a metal paint scrapper unless you really like the scratched metal look. Plastic may do better or just move straight to using an abrasive pad. Also, it’s important to use the abrasive pad first before sandpaper. Using the sandpaper first allowed what little paint remain to foul the sandpaper, thus making a person work harder to obtain the same effect as if using the sandpaper after the abrasive pad.

 

[Jhym]

Thanks, BDBear. Hopefully it will be of some assistance on what went right and what has gone wrong. I'm mostly finished with it at this time. I made a push to see if I could finish it for Halloween. I didn't make it.

Look forward to seeing how yours came out.

 

[BDBear]

Unfortunately I got as far as filling in the holes with jb. But real life interfered, and it's all at a stand still. I did get a sheet of plexiglass for my photon shield.

 

[Jhym]

"Life.... Don't get me started about life. Brain the size of planet...." - Marvin the Robot

BD, I completely understand about having to put things on hold. I'm just now able to start delving into fixing, building, and tinkering. I've had the components to build this shield for over a year, but have only recently started it. I sincerely hope things reach a state of calm for you.

 

[BDBear]

"Where's the kaboom? There was supposed to be an earth-shattering kaboom!" - Marvin the Martian.

I was totally going to use the string idea to find my steel sleds center.