My Star Wars weapon collection (added: Aluminium Replica EE-3)
- Thread starter BradWright
- Start date
BradWright
Active Member
Finished up a darkenergycreations droid caller. And gathered stuff to start on a solo holster rig.
BradWright
Active Member
Took Good Friday to do a one day build of the Trooper Trent training remote kit. Had so much working on this. Very pleased with the outcome, bar some light leak issues
BradWright
Active Member
Holy grail for me has always been Boba's EE-3 from ESB. Got a hold of FieldMarshalls Aluminium kit. I have nothing against people who painted or anodised theirs, but for me it wasn't going to sit right with me. I want it to look real steel. With a lot of experimenting, I think I managed a chemical based method for treating Aluminium.
Everything is FieldMarshall, bar Romans MPP flash, and some cast Unimax greebles (and the leather strap of course)
This is the finished result, i will show some in progress stuff after, explaining what I did, for anyone wanting to give it a go.
The scope below was given a coat of etching primer, then gloss black. I made a little stencil to paint a small white H. masked off the scratch with masking fluid and painted flat black.
The flash tube below doesnt slide in more than 5mm, and as i havent access to a lathe, i had no choice but to cut the MPP flash down .As it will only insert 5mm into the barrel, i wanted extra support, so had some scrap copper pipe, that fit the internals of tube, and with some gaffer tape and a lot of epoxy, the tube now has plenty of structural support without compromising look. I also drilled out the 2 holes at the from bottom of the tube, you can just about see below. The scope clamps tolerances are exact, so a wooden dowl and hammer was used to persuade it onto the tube.
Making the damage to the stock was daunting, as wood tends to break how it chooses. I drew the shape of the chunk, then using a centre punch, I went over that drawn line to make a dotted line. This encouraged the wood to split where I wanted and gave a more exact result.
Using a blowtorch, and some darker stains in the areas I figured hands would leave grease residue on the stock, then a couple coats of Tru oil. Yellow car tyre marker pen for the "67".
I had some scrap tubing and washers(below), so made some Ammo. This one(above) in particular is just Rubber Bullet Casing. Growing up in Northern Ireland, there was plenty going round.
The chemical process left some nice rust in the hard to reach spots, at least im calling it rust, as i have no idea why aluminium did that.
Even though we never see Boba reload, after watching the Mandolarian, i wanted a selection of baster and disintegration ammo.
I drilled out the 2 tiny holes in the molex connectors and dyed them black, before a coat of flat back spraypaint. Which i then scratched gently to reveal the difference in lustre of the black below.
Below is a bit more about the treatment process of the aluminium.
Ill say before I start, I tested on scraps first before ruining 1000bucks of replica! and all the scraps behaved slightly differently, so please trial and error cheaply.
Firstly sanding and filing is needing to shift those machine marks and kill the sharp edges. I gave all the parts a soak over night in a sink with heavily bleached water. This mottled the surface colour. some dark, some dusty, some still shiny spots.
Now the key to this finish is Ferric Chloride. So please use plastic containers and eye protection and the vapour and heat given off is quite extreme.
First pass of Ferric is in a very weak solution, roughly 1 part acid to 20 parts water, and left to soak for around 3 hours. This doesnt do masses to the colour, but what it does do it give those micro pittings. like steel would accumulate over many years.
Next is a dunk in pure ferric. This will seemingly do nothing, but be warned it turns very fast, and the metal gets very hot, so have a dunking bath of fresh water near by. Full barrel was only dunked maybe for 20/30 seconds, rinsed off, then redunked again. Make sure you screw the barrel to the breach, as you don't want to damage any threadings.
Below is immediately after a ferric bath and rinsed in water
Next step was to take a small file and scratch up the surface. Then using aluminium black, i washed over it to darken down those scratches and add further variety to the colour of the surface.
Below you can see the micro scratches and abrasions as well as the randomness of the aluminium black on the surface. Created the effect of worn gun bluing over decades.
Final step for the metal, was to heat gentle with a blow torch and rub pure beeswax over it, heat again to fully melt the wax. When cooled, i buffed. Then a last coat of boiled linseed oil, that i blasted again with the blow torch to bake it in. This deepens the colours of the surface and warms it up to match the screen blaster colour nicely, as well giving a pleasant satin finish. You can see that in the finished photos at the top.
Please feel to ask anything I might of missed that you may be curious about.
Everything is FieldMarshall, bar Romans MPP flash, and some cast Unimax greebles (and the leather strap of course)
This is the finished result, i will show some in progress stuff after, explaining what I did, for anyone wanting to give it a go.
The scope below was given a coat of etching primer, then gloss black. I made a little stencil to paint a small white H. masked off the scratch with masking fluid and painted flat black.
The flash tube below doesnt slide in more than 5mm, and as i havent access to a lathe, i had no choice but to cut the MPP flash down .As it will only insert 5mm into the barrel, i wanted extra support, so had some scrap copper pipe, that fit the internals of tube, and with some gaffer tape and a lot of epoxy, the tube now has plenty of structural support without compromising look. I also drilled out the 2 holes at the from bottom of the tube, you can just about see below. The scope clamps tolerances are exact, so a wooden dowl and hammer was used to persuade it onto the tube.
Making the damage to the stock was daunting, as wood tends to break how it chooses. I drew the shape of the chunk, then using a centre punch, I went over that drawn line to make a dotted line. This encouraged the wood to split where I wanted and gave a more exact result.
Using a blowtorch, and some darker stains in the areas I figured hands would leave grease residue on the stock, then a couple coats of Tru oil. Yellow car tyre marker pen for the "67".
I had some scrap tubing and washers(below), so made some Ammo. This one(above) in particular is just Rubber Bullet Casing. Growing up in Northern Ireland, there was plenty going round.
The chemical process left some nice rust in the hard to reach spots, at least im calling it rust, as i have no idea why aluminium did that.
Even though we never see Boba reload, after watching the Mandolarian, i wanted a selection of baster and disintegration ammo.
I drilled out the 2 tiny holes in the molex connectors and dyed them black, before a coat of flat back spraypaint. Which i then scratched gently to reveal the difference in lustre of the black below.
Below is a bit more about the treatment process of the aluminium.
Ill say before I start, I tested on scraps first before ruining 1000bucks of replica! and all the scraps behaved slightly differently, so please trial and error cheaply.
Firstly sanding and filing is needing to shift those machine marks and kill the sharp edges. I gave all the parts a soak over night in a sink with heavily bleached water. This mottled the surface colour. some dark, some dusty, some still shiny spots.
Now the key to this finish is Ferric Chloride. So please use plastic containers and eye protection and the vapour and heat given off is quite extreme.
First pass of Ferric is in a very weak solution, roughly 1 part acid to 20 parts water, and left to soak for around 3 hours. This doesnt do masses to the colour, but what it does do it give those micro pittings. like steel would accumulate over many years.
Next is a dunk in pure ferric. This will seemingly do nothing, but be warned it turns very fast, and the metal gets very hot, so have a dunking bath of fresh water near by. Full barrel was only dunked maybe for 20/30 seconds, rinsed off, then redunked again. Make sure you screw the barrel to the breach, as you don't want to damage any threadings.
Below is immediately after a ferric bath and rinsed in water
Next step was to take a small file and scratch up the surface. Then using aluminium black, i washed over it to darken down those scratches and add further variety to the colour of the surface.
Below you can see the micro scratches and abrasions as well as the randomness of the aluminium black on the surface. Created the effect of worn gun bluing over decades.
Final step for the metal, was to heat gentle with a blow torch and rub pure beeswax over it, heat again to fully melt the wax. When cooled, i buffed. Then a last coat of boiled linseed oil, that i blasted again with the blow torch to bake it in. This deepens the colours of the surface and warms it up to match the screen blaster colour nicely, as well giving a pleasant satin finish. You can see that in the finished photos at the top.
Please feel to ask anything I might of missed that you may be curious about.
BradWright
Active Member
Thanks Eethan, than means a lot!that is seriously AMAZING! one of the very bests EE3 that I have even seen and this one is based on replica parts. you really made a magnificent job finishing that kit, I'm seriously impressed! congrats once again
russellsch
Master Member
Amazing!
& oh so gorgeous!!
& oh so gorgeous!!
Sonuva... I knew if I stopped visiting the junkyard I would miss something like this! Oh well. Yours looks great!
