Captain America Ball Chair Project Part Three

With each section of the Captain America ball chair project it has gotten more interesting as I have progressed as well as more time consuming. In the last post I had completed the skinning of the third section of the ball.  In this post I will show you what I had to go through to construct the fourth section of the ball which has turned out to be one of the more difficult yet rewarding (so far) pieces of this big puzzle.

As in the first three sections of the ball portion of the project I started construction with a ring and the spacers needed to create the outer shape of this last section.  This section is not a ring like the other sections but rather a dome that will be the center of the back of the ball chair.

 

The ring and spacers at this point were hot glued into place just like the first three sections.  There is no additional ring that is added at this point but rather a dome shaped cap.  In this photo you can see the circular two inch disk that I cut so that the cap could be shaped in the next process.  I laid the cap on to the spacers at this point just to check the fit of the pink foam disk.

 

The dome is seventeen inches in diameter and is made using these simple templates that will help guide a hot wire when the foam is cut into shape.

 

 

I needed a simple way to hold the circular disk so I placed a one inch wooden down in the center of a eight inch square piece of 3/4 inch plywood.  This will help hold the foam and be able to rotate it when I make several cuts with a hotwire bow and the templates.

 

 

In this photo you can see that I have screwed the two templates and the center mount to a plywood board.  I then clamped this jig onto my work table so that it would not move when I wanted to make my cuts into the disk.

 

The foam disk was then placed on to the center dowel ready for the first cut.

 

In this photo you can see what is called a hotwire bow.  The black box in the upper left corner of the photo is the power supply the feeds electricity through a wire that heats up and will cut the foam when it is run over the templates for the dome I needed.

 

After the first cut I got a nicely curved surface across the foam because of the templates.

 

 

After rotating the foam disk I made three or four more passes over the templates to get a nearly perfect dome shape.  With a bit of sanding the disk will be ready for assembly onto the last section of the ball chair.

 

 

Here is the newly formed dome cap after I had carefully sanded it down as uniformly as I could by eye.  This portion of the build did not have to be absolutely perfect but I try to make it as perfect as I can get it as it makes things easier as I go along.

 

 

After dismantling the template jig I used the center mounting plate with the wooden down in it to hold the dome assembly upside down on the work table so it would not rock around when I worked on it.  This made it easier to glue the spacers of this section to the dome cap.

 

 

I used a hot glue gun and slowly aligned the curved spacers of this section so that they match as closely as I could to the dome cap.  This is very time consuming as the hot glue needs to cool a bit before I could let loose of each piece as I moved forward in the assembly. The hole in the center of this piece did not matter as it would be covered up as I progressed further.

 

Once the framework of the dome had been completed I moved on to gluing on 1/4 inch foam strips over the top of the now upright assembly.  I started with a cross pattern of three strips each direction. I thought this would work best so more marking, cutting, and hot gluing was the next step in the assembly.

From the first cross strips I then divided each empty quarter again with three more additional foam strips.  This allowed me an easier way to keep the pattern going as well as forming the correct shape for the outer skin.

 

 

Nearly done at this point after two good days of just putting the outer skin on the done section.  I did five hours worth assembly the first day and had to call it quits before my eyes and nerves would give out.  As I said it is very time consuming work.

 

Here the dome section is finally completed.  Even with this section of the ball chair only being glued up Styrofoam pieces it looks to be very strong.  I would not doubt that I could stand on it without it breaking.  Not that I would even take the chance with the hours I've put into it so far.  The first three sections of the ball took me 25 hours to complete.  This section alone took another 14 hours to assemble.  Again what slowed me down on this section was all the fitting that needed to be done to get the skin on the dome correctly.  This section alone has 120 pieces in it including the parts for the framework.  I think my efforts make this section look pretty good at this point.

I had to take this shot simply because it is a great look.  Like the other sections of the ball chair it will be a shame to have it covered up once the project is complete.

 

 

So here is the ball section of the chair as of this afternoon.  I had to get into the shot just to give you a good idea of the scale of the ball section. It's a good start to this great project and I am looking forward to getting further along with it.  The ball is 42 inches in diameter and in this photo the sections are stacked up with the opening for the chair face down on the table.  There is a lot of work that needs to be done yet with these four sections of the ball to get them ready to be assembled and prepped for paint.  But that is further down the line and is on my to do list for another day. 

 

Enjoy the photos.  I'll keep all of you up to date as I keep plugging along on this big fun project. Have a good day in your workshop as well.

 

 

Captain America Ball Chair Progress

With Christmas come and gone I have gotten back to my ball chair project that I last posted about.  It is getting more interesting by the hour as I continue with the third section of the ball construction.

 

In this photo like the other sections that I have already completed I am assembling the spacers into the third section of the ball portion of the build.  This section as you can see has a much steeper angle for each of the spacers which is interesting in itself though no different in the procedure to build it than the first two sections.

 

I cut the sixth ring for the third section but before I set this up on the hotwire ring jig I laid it on top of the newly assembled third section spacers just to double check that I had things fitting right.  This shot looked kind of interesting as it could be a body for a rather fat looking robot or a section of one anyway.  Just a thought I will have to remember if I ever want to put together something similar to it someday.

Here's the third section after I had cut the final ring for the top as you see it here. I was really pleased with the fit of this section and I am feeling more confidant that the last ring that I will need for this project will be just as easy to create with the hotwire table setup.

 

 

With this section I had to do something different with how I put the Styrofoam strips on it.  The curvature of this section is much steeper than the other two sections I had already built so I could not lay the strips horizontally as I had before and still get a nice smooth surface.  The strips now needed to be hot glued on at a diagonal as you see in the photo above.  This slowed my progress down considerably as each piece being around eight inches long now needed to be placed on the new section at an angle, then marked for cutting.  Then glued into place one by one. 

 

 

Once I had laid down a dozen or so pieces the angle reduced as I progressed.  I suspect the curvature of the assembly plus some other variables from foam strip to foam strip causes this to happen.  So when one of the last pieces in the first set of foam strips landed on a spacer and was near vertical I needed to start the process over again with a new set at an angle once again.  Here you can see the first two foam strips of the next set after they were glued onto the third section of the assembly.

 

 

It was just a simple matter of filling in the gap with additional foam strips to get this portion of the assembly set up for longer strips as I continued around this section of the ball assembly.

 

 

This process continued on for seven hours yesterday. I finally set my tools down and called it a day and this is as far as I got.  I had taken a stop watch and timed myself in putting the foam strips on this section of the ball.  I was only averaging one strip every five minutes.  Slow work to be sure with all the cutting, marking and fitting of these strips to get a nice even outer surface.  Not hard to do but very time consuming.

 

 

When I had gotten all the way around this section to my starting point I simply  had to start filling in the final gap from the slanted pieces moving toward the vertical strip where I had ended up. 

 

 

Here you can see the final layout of the foam strips for this section.  The difference in the direction of these strips really does not matter in the construction as long as I get the nice flowing curvature that I need for the each section of the ball.  Once I sand everything smooth and glass over these strips it will all work out perfectly and never be seen in the process.

 

 

With the three sections stacked up on the work table you can see the ball shape coming together nicely.  The only reason I am now using blue Styrofoam instead of the pink is because I simply ran out of pink.  I like the blue better anyway but it really does not make a difference in the construction one way or another.

 

 

I had to take this shot as I thought it was rather interesting to see all the spacers in these first three section of the project.  It's a shame that they will not be seen once the chair is completed.  Most if not all of the spacers as well as the rings will be removed from the assembly once I have these sections fiber glassed. The foam is only there to give me the shape that I want in this project.

 

 

Here is a shot of the work table with the ball chair under construction along with the hotwire table and the ring/wheel jig attached to it.  The hotwire table is tilted at the correct angle that I needed for the last ring in the third section of the project.  This is where this setup has really paid off already to make this project possible.  You can see under the table more pieces of pink foam that I saved from a previous project.  Some of this probably will be cut up for parts that will need to be made for the ball chair.  The first two sections of the ball portion of the project took me 15 hours to construct.  With the third section it has taken me another 11 hours just to complete.  This being because of the different way the foam strips needed to be added to that section. 

 

I suspect that the last section that will cap off the ball portion of this project will also take quite some time to lay the foam strip down to get it looking and working right too.  Really no problem as I don't suspect that I will be done with this project until sometime in the spring.  I'll keep you up to date with further construction as I keep plugging along and making more progress. 

Construction Has Started On The Captain America Ball Chair!

Several weeks ago I posted about the Captain America ball chair that I had planned to build.  Well over the past couple of days I finally started the construction of this great project and during the winter months hopefully will have ready for painting in the spring. 

These images I put together that I had posted about gives you a good idea of what the chair hopefully will end up looking like when the project is completed.  That's the plan anyway.

 

Since the time that these images were created the ball chair has been updated further to refine the construction and overall look of the chair. It is an ongoing process that will continue until I am happy that this project will be successful to the end.  I'm keeping my fingers crossed as I usually do when I create something new for the first time.  It's all a  learning process to be sure and a lot of fun along the way rolled all together.

 

 

To more easily explain how this chair will go together and show the first steps I have taken in it's construction I managed to put together this short video. In the video you will see some of the tools that I used to cut and shape the Styrofoam for the chair and start putting the first two sections of the chair together.  One tool that I have used a great deal while building Styrofoam fiberglass composite projects that you will see in the video is called a Hot Knife.  This tool is produced by a company named Hot Wire Foam Factory.  For more information about this tool and the company I have listed a link to their site below.  Enjoy the video.

 

Hot Wire Foam Factory

Back To Work On My Blender 3D VW Bus Project Part 8

It's been around four months since I last worked on my Blender 3D VW Bus project that has been sitting idle in my computer. I thought now was the right time to get back to it since I have been waiting for various materials for other projects that are currently in the workshop.  That and the fact that I do most of my Blender modeling during the winter months when the weather is just plain crappy to be outside anyway.

 

The exterior of the VW bus was completed when I last left it and so now the logical next step is to get the interior modeled as correctly as I can.  This is no small task as a lot of reference photos needed to be collected from the Internet in order to have any hope of getting things to look right.

The most complicated parts of the interior is of course the dash.  It has gauges, buttons, handles and of course the steering wheel just to name a few things.  A lot of detail is needed in many little things that make up the look of the dash and then to get it to correct or near correct scale is always a must.  It's like painting a picture really.  You put something in like the steering wheel which you think looks good until you add gauges or something else and find out the scale of one or both is way off.  So lots of fussing and cross referencing of photos help to keep things in check. 

To get a closer look at the dash click on any of the photos in this post and a larger view will pop up on your computer.

 

As with my other vehicles that I have modeled in Blender 3D I get a lesson in history as to what these vehicle look like and a real feeling of why people like to own them.  Each model I complete gives me that same sense of wanting the vehicle so it's a good and a  bad feeling at the same time.  Good because I'm able to create a good looking computer image and bad because I know that I will probably never own the real thing.  Nice to dream at least.

In this posting I wanted to only show the current work that I've managed to create in only around 10 hours or so.  Pretty fast if I do say so myself.  I was able to steal some of the components from my WV Bug Blender model for this dash so it did speed up work a fair bit.  The radio, speedometer, fuel gauge, and various knobs again reduced the amount of time it took to get the dash into this shape.  But saying that it was easy is totally not the case.  For me it's kind of like a puzzle.  I look at various pieces of the entire dash layout and have to figure out how to make it all work and look right.  This dash is far different than what the VW Bug has in it so it is a real challenge at times to say the least.  Good fun all at the same time.

 

  I'll post more about this project during the coming weeks/months which ever comes first.  I just thought I would bring you all up to date on my latest Blender 3D creation and let you see how it is all coming together. Total hours on the project has risen now to 110 and still counting.  

 

Merry Christmas From The Tinker's Workshp

Well another year has nearly come and gone and Christmas is rapidly approaching.  The Christmas tree is up, shopping is done, and  the presents are wrapped sitting under the tree.  It doesn't look like we will have a white Christmas here in the Midwest but that still does not diminish the feeling of joy I have during this time of the  season. A lot of this warm holiday cheer is because of people like you that have taken the time throughout the year to read my blog and keep up with all of the projects that I take on week after week.

 

   So with you in mind I wish you and your families a very Merry Christmas and a Happy New Year. May Santa show up at your house with a load of Christmas cheer, new tools for your workshop, and a list of new plans and projects that will fill your heart with joy throughout the coming year.