Re: A DL-44 build for ME: LUKE ESB ADDED scottjua blaster catchall thread
Well... here's the brief story/build of my my E11.
It all started with a friendly tip from a fellow RPF'er about a demilled sterling E11 that got posted to ebay. He was international and there was no way it was going abroad legally, so he tipped me off.
I contacted the seller, and got it for a super bargain price.
However, when it came, it was in so-so condition. Sure it was real and worn, but the first thing was the scope rail came right off in my hands out of the box... it just flopped off. It was not even really fastened in, and was more or less jammed or wedged into the rear sight and apparently, with tension alone.
There was rust in almost every crevice, and you could easily see where this was a torch cut sterling that had been re-welded. The welds however, were cracking and had huge chunks of metal missing all together.
Teh T tracks, were some odd abomination super glued to the main barrel...
I asked the seller some of the details, and he said he got it for his 501st trooping, acquiring it from another trooper who purposely added/painted on the rust since he was a sandtrooper.
Well, it looked awful, and while I want a worn/weathered blaster, I don't want a rusty holy piece of crap.
So I stripped it down, which was a MAJOR Pain in the booty. After getting down to the metal I could see where the welds had been filled with some bondo type of substance, but not very well.
The red is my blood… I put my blood into this build
I also pulled on the bolt... that was supposed to be welded closed, and the thing gave and ****** back a couple of inches. Now since the thing was cobbled back together, it was NOT smooth, or even really working. However, I decided to try to strip it completely for refinishing...
I took a rubber mallet and removed the entire bolt and spring set eventually with a LOT of work, and then went about re-filling the holes and cracks with JB weld.
After getting it all back together I cleaned and degreased all in the springs and bolt and put it back in.
Primed, and painted.
Unfortunately with paint and primer some of the lettering details were lost on the mag well, and my jb weld blending kind of sucked. So I tested the bolt to see if my JB weld fix worked, and it came loose… and CRACKED the welds and JB weld again…
Soooo… I stripped the sucker AGAIN… but this time had a friend WELD the thing back together! The penetration sealed the bolt CLOSED for good… It WILL NOT cock or move without extreme force breaking the welds.
This and another two spots were welded, but I wanted a small tack here so I could clean it easier.
So after filing and cleaning the slag, I re-smoothed all of the surfaces with JB as best I could… and instead of priming… did LIGHT coats of paint… and it looks great!
Baked to cure
Not PERFECT… but very hard to notice unless with contrasty light and this angle
Then Since the scope rail sucked I had to make a new one. New one in progress next to old one with Resin scope.
I liked the shape of the old one so I replicated it.
Bought some raw aluminum bar from the hardware store and got to SLOWLY bending it to shape. Cutting, painting and fitting.
I also got a small L bracket for the hengstler I picked up from Marv and fabricated that.
Drilled into the metal cage, and an added 4-40 set screw to keep it level.
REAL Scope replacing the resin one
Fake and real next to each other
Hengstler mounted
I decided the best was to secure it was to bolt it to the frame through the rear sight.
finally I used Marv's T track for the front grips and used the boiled water method. AfterI bothced two of them by trimming them, I got the rest down nicely. So I need to replace two of them…
Now all I need is some cylinders. ^_^