Han Solo’s Hoth DL-44 Blaster from TESB..

[chubsANDdoggers]

Finished up my another FDM printed DL-44 Blaster and again wanted to show it off. This one is the Hoth blaster from TESB.

The goal as always is to recreate it as accurately as possible to the film prop itself. I also wanted it to be "functional" so just like a real MGC the trigger releases the hammer, the bolt can be pulled back, the safety works and will lock the hammer in place, mag plate comes off and the sight will slide. It can also be field stripped and fully disassembled as well.

First these are the some of the specific pics I payed attention to for this recreation. For the MGC I reused the base CAD design that was already created for the Endor blaster..

These specific posts and findings I found to be extremely helpful as well in bringing this prop to life..
•DL-44 ESB Blaster Discussion - Greeblies POST 573
•DL-44 ESB Blaster Discussion - Greeblies POST 613
•DL-44 ESB Blaster Discussion - Greeblies POST 670

It was first drawn up in Solidworks and assembled to make sure everything fits as it should..

And then it was physically brought to life with a Bambu Lab P1S. The blaster was printed up in different colored PLA filaments taking advantage of BL’s AMS system. The screws, springs and glass lens are pretty much the only things not printed. I used both a 4mm nozzle (.12mm height) and a .2mm nozzle (.06mm height) depending on the part itself and the details desired to be captured. This is probably my favorite OT DL-44..

1:1 Han Solo's Hoth DL-44 Blaster from "The Empire Strikes Back”..

Once I got everything printed up and assembled I then added the lines to the flash hider by using a sharpie (similar to film prop obviously) as well as adding some white acrylic paint to help make the letters/numbers pop on the m19 scope replica..

Now this is obviously subjective as there isn’t any real pictures that show the Mystery Knob that covers the Mystery Disk on this blaster but I still wanted to add something that might be in ball park to how it looked while filming..

 

[Rexermus]

Absolutely gorgeous, probably my 2nd or 3rd favourite DL-44 (Either tied with or just below the classic ANH Hero). Any plans to do a Luke Bespin in the future? Because that is definitely my favourite DL-44 prop and would love to see your replica of it

 

[chubsANDdoggers]

Absolutely gorgeous, probably my 2nd or 3rd favourite DL-44 (Either tied with or just below the classic ANH Hero). Any plans to do a Luke Bespin in the future? Because that is definitely my favourite DL-44 prop and would love to see your replica of it

Thanks my man! I’ve already designed it up actually long ago. Same time I did Solo’s Bespin but simply haven’t printed it just yet for what ever reason. I’m still goin back and forth on how to do the FH.. all black? Half silver, half black or simply all silver.. and then paint it. That shouldn’t be holding me back as much as it is as silly as it sounds..

 

[Rexermus]

The flash hider (at least to me) looks like it's base is silver with significant black weathering/paint, so my vote would be all silver then painted. The weathering looks too complex to be able to rely on filament swapping for an accurate print

 

[chubsANDdoggers]

The flash hider (at least to me) looks like it's base is silver with significant black weathering/paint, so my vote would be all silver then painted. The weathering looks too complex to be able to rely on filament swapping for an accurate print

It’s definitely possible to do the weathering within the print but it would use so much filament as it switches back-and-forth That and it would take forever and a day to print one flashlight because of how it’s orientated on the print bed. I’ve been thinking about doing half silver/half black for anyone who might not want to paint it. But all silver definitely makes more practical sense as well.

 

[Rexermus]

It’s definitely possible to do the weathering within the print but it would use so much filament as it switches back-and-forth That and it would take forever and a day to print one flashlight because of how it’s orientated on the print bed.

Yeah that's what i meant by too complex, you'd most likely have to rely on the 0.2mm nozzle to get all the little details of the specks which would add-on to the long print time that the filament swaps already cause. But if we really wanted to get nitpicky the minuscule raise of the paint on the flashhider wouldn't be present on the filament swap

 

[chubsANDdoggers]

Rexermus oh man not sure about using a .2 nozzle as it would probably take 15 plus hours to print that one single flash hider Probably just leave it silver as you mentioned honestly. That should be my next build/assembly after the GK for practical sense so let’s see what happens. I really want to add in the black though so I’m sure I’ll do some experimenting along the way.

 

[Rexermus]

chubsANDdoggers You could use black filament for the larger sections of weathering and then go in with your preferred method of black weathering to do the finer specks. If you have enough filament and patience/free time you could print 2 flash hiders doing both options.
Looking forward to the Greedo Killer, and not just because Luke's Bespin is after, it's a really unique build that's severely underrated/ignored. The squared mag-well fins and skinny full-length barrel with the M3 flash hider are dope

 

[chubsANDdoggers]

Rexermus obviously I’m biased as I’m creating it but the GK is coming out real nice. Have to agree with you on all accounts as well. It’s also uniquely HUGE.