ConvergencePro
Master Member
Hey all, I'm pretty sure I've probably lost my mind, so I figure I'll start to document it here. 
Being that Jaws is side by side Empire Strikes Back as my favorite film of all time, I've always wanted at least 3 of the yellow barrels in my collection.
A few years ago I was lucky enough to take a ride out to Marthas Vineyard and meet with Lynn & Susan Murphy to purchase a original production used DOT 34-30 "BORN FREE" JAWS barrel as well as talk with them about their experiences working on the film. The barrels Lynn & Susan had were used to help float various barges, act as flotation on the shark arm gantry, and are the same ones that were painted yellow and used in the film. The barrels were seemingly only made in December of 73 before being changed over to a different design, so relativity few were made (though they do actually appear in the dog kennel scene in John Carpenters: The THING as well) . It was fantastic sitting and talking with them both and I'd always intended to go back out to the island and visit them again if I could gather the spare funds for another couple barrels.
Here's the one I have along with some production photos showing them
Sadly, due to real life, that plan just sorta never happened.. Lynn has since passed away in 2017, and last I heard Susan had recently sold the remaining few barrels she had. So getting a hold of any more original barrels now and in the future looks to be much more difficult prospect.
I always still wanted to paint and do the rope on the one barrel I still have but there's always been once small thing that stopped me from doing so...
The barrel I have actually seems to have some residual over-spray of the original Yellow paint on it from when they painted the other barrels for use on the ORCA. I've always liked this a really cool little feature and never wanted to risk damaging it by painting over it or anything, so now I'm pretty much left with one real option if I want actual yellow painted barrels, making copies of this one
My thoughts are to make a giant 2-3 part rotocast mold and do copies in Smooth-on's ONYX EpoxAcast BLACK to make hollow copies. I gotta hit up the local supplier to see what material they think would be best suited and most durable with something this big. Worse case scenario I may have to foam fill them if the resin is too fragile on its own. Then cast the caps separate and do them in a mix of blue and red colored resin like the originals. I think I have a pretty good plan laid out in my head for it, but this will still be By Far the biggest mold I've ever had to make hahaha.
More soon!
Being that Jaws is side by side Empire Strikes Back as my favorite film of all time, I've always wanted at least 3 of the yellow barrels in my collection.
A few years ago I was lucky enough to take a ride out to Marthas Vineyard and meet with Lynn & Susan Murphy to purchase a original production used DOT 34-30 "BORN FREE" JAWS barrel as well as talk with them about their experiences working on the film. The barrels Lynn & Susan had were used to help float various barges, act as flotation on the shark arm gantry, and are the same ones that were painted yellow and used in the film. The barrels were seemingly only made in December of 73 before being changed over to a different design, so relativity few were made (though they do actually appear in the dog kennel scene in John Carpenters: The THING as well) . It was fantastic sitting and talking with them both and I'd always intended to go back out to the island and visit them again if I could gather the spare funds for another couple barrels.
Here's the one I have along with some production photos showing them
Sadly, due to real life, that plan just sorta never happened.. Lynn has since passed away in 2017, and last I heard Susan had recently sold the remaining few barrels she had. So getting a hold of any more original barrels now and in the future looks to be much more difficult prospect.
I always still wanted to paint and do the rope on the one barrel I still have but there's always been once small thing that stopped me from doing so...
The barrel I have actually seems to have some residual over-spray of the original Yellow paint on it from when they painted the other barrels for use on the ORCA. I've always liked this a really cool little feature and never wanted to risk damaging it by painting over it or anything, so now I'm pretty much left with one real option if I want actual yellow painted barrels, making copies of this one
My thoughts are to make a giant 2-3 part rotocast mold and do copies in Smooth-on's ONYX EpoxAcast BLACK to make hollow copies. I gotta hit up the local supplier to see what material they think would be best suited and most durable with something this big. Worse case scenario I may have to foam fill them if the resin is too fragile on its own. Then cast the caps separate and do them in a mix of blue and red colored resin like the originals. I think I have a pretty good plan laid out in my head for it, but this will still be By Far the biggest mold I've ever had to make hahaha.
More soon!
