This is what I've been working on for almost two weeks this friday. I have this mostly finished, but I'll post this here as I usually do with periodic updates, as I have to get back to the X full time while I work on other peoples' projects in tandem.
I'm only doing this as a sideline project for myself. This is my way of marking the end of a historic build, even though it's for someone else. This is for me, and no one else as my tribute to a job well done the first time. Before anyone asks, I'M NOT MAKING ANYMORE OF THESE EVER!!! This one was hard enough to do with my experience, let alone making these all the time. I couldn't ask for a reasonable price for it anyway!
This is made from styrene, steel, nickel and aluminum.
This is the dividing plate for the elbow.
This is the beginning of the wristplate, and the top plate of the elbow joint.
This is the first attempt at the mounting plate for the pistons. The holes were bigger than I wanted as I realised that the main piston body was longer with a smaller tube inside extended into a smaller hole for stability.
This is the final version of the Central Processing Unit.
Nothing like the look of stainless steel.
This is the elbow joint. This is nice, and shiny. These are comprised of three parts. The outer tube with an inner styrene core with an aluminum bearing tube that I glued the inner axle pin to.
Twisted piston rods that I ended up replacing, as they were too big around. I made the main piston bodies from these, but with smaller rods to match the diameter of the real endo arm.
More to come, stay tuned.
I'm going to make the final installments of this build today. I had a lot of acrylic to cut, but I still haven't got all of it cut yesterday, and now it's raining. I need to straighten the lines of the parts I've already cut so that I can fit them together. I need 60 grit sandpaper to do this, but I ran out. I need to get more.
I always wanted an endo arm when I first saw these on ebay, but the price was a lot more than I wanted to pay for one. Now you can get illegal recasts for almost nothing! I decided to make one of these in 1/6th scale since I don't have the money, or the space for the big version.
The thought came to me of how I could do this without losing my sanity. I've been thinking about this since I first painted the Arnold figure until I saw that his arms were covered with the leather jacket. I went on to build the figure, and the rest of the weapons - I forgot about making an endo arm until I saw a seven inch figure on ebay with a poorly made endo arm that was meant to be interchangeable. I thought " I could do better than that"! That's all there was to it, the rest is history.
I'm going to try not to post many descriptions to keep from detracting from your thoughts, and to help in keeping viewing times short. Either way, I hope you'll enjoy this.
~ Cobra Chris
Scribed by hand - all these lines were cut into the metal with an Exacto saw blade. I didn't have a steady enough turning surface with the hand drill to make these lines evenly, so I cut them very slowly by hand. This took me twenty minutes to cut all the scribe lines.
I didn't add the bottom two scribes on the elbow guard, as I didn't want to, and it looks better this way in my opinion. The small indentation was supposed to be a screw that holds the bottom mounting plate for the pistons.
The first attempt at a CPU chip. These were all cut into even squares, then glued to a piece of styrene.
This is the first acrylic tube that I made as a cover for the arm. It was too short, but as I progressed - I left the parts inside it to keep them safe from being lost. The circle on the left is the pattern I used for the base that this is mounted on.
A better look at the dust case. Note the piston rod failure beside it.
Wrist plate. This one was a failure. It was too big.
Zipper teeth. Joints for the fingers.
More teeth. This little fuzzy part in the middle with the styrene, and metal is supposed to be a hinge that I'll never use - it was completely wrong in its' design.
This is 0.18" in diameter. This is a nickel wound G string for electric guitar.
Stainless, but not painless. It took forever to drill these holes. 0.50", 0.20", and 0.18" in diameter.
Baby teeth. These need to be sanded down before being assembled. I had to recut some of them. These were the recut versions, as the first batch was too tall. The first digit to be made was the thumb.
I replaced the styrene to make this look more professional, and realistic with the same materials.
I was going to use this vaccum tube as a dust cover, but when I cut it - the damn thing broke along the bottom edge unevenly. It doesn't matter, it was too short. I pulled this from an old Sylvania T.V. back in 1993.
The grenade head the left stuck to the aluminum cutting board. I don't know how, or why, but it won't come off. I left it there as it isn't hurting anything. I also have a couple pieces of tape stuck on there from when I painted the M-79 barrel.
I made this while waiting for glue to dry. This is a non working personal fan. We used to make junk like this around the shop to see if someone would actually try to use it. It's a personal joke.
Trading spaces.
My one finger salute to the rpf.
Note the spilled alcohol on the cutting panel. I use this one for cutting with a saw, which I've been doing a lot of lately.
Need a hand?
This is the broken half of my smallest 0.20" diameter machinists' bit. I decided that since it will never cut anything again that it should be for a good cause. I removed the chemical tool dye that was on here to match the lifesize version.
This is something that I made from a tea light candle, and a colour processing chip from a digital camera. I saw the tea light at my cousins' house this last weekend, and thought that I could use this for kitbashing. I'm going to put a blue LED under it for a neat effect. I'll pair this with the Terminator endo arm in a diorama. The chip itself turns all the colours of the rainbow like a hologram in the light.
This is the top of the base. I was going to use a different circular part for the release button for the arm, but accuracy wins out on this one. The little circle is supposed to be the release mechanism for the endo arm. I made an earlier version with a styrene rod inserted into a hole in the center of the button, but I later found out that this was wrong. I remade it by drilling with an 0.18" machists' drill bit in a three point pattern with shallow indents into its' surface. I beveled the edge of the hole this button goes into with a 1/4" drill bit to match the appearance of the 1/1 version of the base.
This is the final version. I posted the original version of this button later in this post - this was out of order for some reason. The reliefs in the face were engraved by hand with the flat tip of a 1/8th inch wide precision screwdriver.
Turning the base parts.
The button in this is the original version, but it's wrong. I don't know why I thought it was this design, but I just figured it was like this until I supersized the photo. It's supposed to be three little dots indented in a triangular pattern - that's the pattern I decided to use.
This is the arm in mostly complete form, except the small piston end on the bottom front. The little piece laying to the left of this (arrow) that you can barely see is that part. At this point, I still needed to make the dust cover for this.
More to come, stay tuned.