Foam Iron man helmet faceplate problem

[Kurtis876]

Hey guys! first of all, I am new to the rpf, so a big thanks to all of the pepakura template makers and everyone else making the iron man builds much easier. I have a question regarding the foam Iron man build...I have tried three different pep files for the helmet now, and I am still having trouble with the faceplate.

Is anyone else having trouble right in the middle of the brow where it meets the "nose?" For some reason, I'm having trouble bringing the middle of the brow out to meet the nose area... it's almost as if the span from cheek to cheek is too wide, and the middle of the brow doesn't reach the nose without distorting the upper cheeks too much. any suggestions? thanks again

 

[IronWarrior777]

If you followed the pepakura exactly, glued right, when it comes together it should distort it to look like the actual one. It worked for me.

 

[Moth]

Kurtis, you're not alone, man. I've done 2 different helmet files in cardstock (to avoid messing up a lot of foam), and each time I've had the problem you're talking about.

Bumping this, because I, too, would like to know how to avoid this. :confused

 

[Vinom11]

I think the problem is that you are not thinking in three dimensional terms. The brow and the lower faceplate are both compound curves. They need to be curved both horizonally and vertically. This will bring the brow in line with the lower face. This should be fairly easy to do in foam with some heat applied.

 

[bignatedegg56]

i'm not an expert (never used foam) but if you trim the upper cheek bits surely the brow would come forward?

personally, I'd make the rest of the helmet and see if that lines it all up.

 

[Hammer]

heat it up and bend it be4 you glue it bud, look at the pictures of the helmets, its ment to be "rounded" ^^

 

[Dancin_Fool]

The trick is in using a heat gun to make the compound curves like was stated earlier. The other thing is that there's a gap that you're missing between the upper and lower pieces, you can see it here in my build.

 

[Freaklord]

so glad this came up. i have the same problem. i noticed some of it went away with adding the detail "channel" dancing fool mentioned. i built three before i caught that little nugget of wisdom. i made an internal support from scratch.

will try the multifaceted complex curve in addition to see if that helps. thanks!

 

[Grave]

looks like something went wrong on the brow. may 3 so far and mine met up. cut out the brow again and see if its the same size.

 

[Moth]

Cool, thank you guys very much! Now I just have to get a heat gun :lol
I wonder if a hairdryer would suffice...

 

[Hammer]

Depends how bug the hairdryer is

 

[Dont Panic]

Any update on this? I'm about to start gluing, and I'm thinking I'm going to be in the same boat as you with the faceplate not lining up.

 

[Kurtis876]

wow thanks everyone, i took a few days away and I have a lot of response. I do understand the 3d aspect of it, and on a different build I used the heat gun, and molded both to come back in the same direction, and always keep pepakura open as I do it. yet I just could not get the two to line up without distorting the cheeks.

Glad to know I'm not the only one having the problem... I bet there are a ton of little things like this that go around with no one saying anything about it.

What I'm going to do is build it in card stock first, with more polygonal facets, then probably create the bends in foam with a heat gun ala Xrobots style. Thanks for all of the input guys I very much appreciate it!

 

[Kurtis876]

The trick is in using a heat gun to make the compound curves like was stated earlier. The other thing is that there's a gap that you're missing between the upper and lower pieces, you can see it here in my build.

I was wondering about the gap thank you! on that note, how did you go about creating the gap? In fact, there are what looks to be many similar gaps in some of the pepakura files I've seen, so at times I don't know which to omit, if any.

Having a blast so far though! :thumbsup

 

[Kurtis876]

so glad this came up. i have the same problem. i noticed some of it went away with adding the detail "channel" dancing fool mentioned. i built three before i caught that little nugget of wisdom. i made an internal support from scratch.

will try the multifaceted complex curve in addition to see if that helps. thanks!

very cool. Familyman also recommends using floral wire to support any curves that might come "undone." This is done by hot gluing the wire to the inside of the piece you're working on, then hot gluing another piece of foam to reinforce it, so you're sort of "sandwiching" the wire after you reinforce your curve

 

[Kurtis876]

Kurtis, you're not alone, man. I've done 2 different helmet files in cardstock (to avoid messing up a lot of foam), and each time I've had the problem you're talking about.

Bumping this, because I, too, would like to know how to avoid this. :confused

yup yup. kind of weird, You shouldn't have to do too much "modification" to the foam, I think its a matter of using the heat gun to form the shape first, then gluing the two together. Rock on

 

[Kurtis876]

i'm not an expert (never used foam) but if you trim the upper cheek bits surely the brow would come forward?

personally, I'd make the rest of the helmet and see if that lines it all up.

that's exactly what I'm going to do thanks man

 

[Kurtis876]

Cool, thank you guys very much! Now I just have to get a heat gun :lol
I wonder if a hairdryer would suffice...

hairdryer seems to work for me, you generally need to heat both sides fairly thoroughly, then form your curve before it cools completely

 

[Kurtis876]

If you followed the pepakura exactly, glued right, when it comes together it should distort it to look like the actual one. It worked for me.

cool, I'm going to keep at it. The pictured faceplate is actually the first one I didn't use heat on, as I thought at the time I needed to try something else. I suppose I wasn't making the curves curve enough. I'll get back at it this weekend thanks man

 

[blackwader]

i think the problem with your faceplate is that you need to cut the sides that connect to the eye. by the way nice helmet.