NegativeEleven

Marcel, I'll be doing the barrel like yours. No one replied to my offer of making bucks and trying vac-form a few of them. That slight angle on the top will make it easier to vac-form two halves if I put no vent holes in the bottom (on the bucks at least). I'm going with a round flash hider. I still say the Battlefront one has flat edges because of the nature of video games at the time. The Sideshow collectables figure's rifle has a round flash hider. For the scope mount, did you buy a single piece one, or did you build that raised rectangular piece and fit 2 rings on top of it? For me, this project is probably gonna be put on hold till after May 4th. I want to wear a new costume for my annual party and I think I can get a Mando costume wearable by then. I debuted my scout there last year (borrowing armor since mine came in the mail on May 6th). I also have a lot of orders for my holdout blaster and Cobra Viper helmets to fill in the next couple of weeks.

I just made my 3rd cummerbund. The first two were a layer of cotton on the inside and flag nylon from Hancock Fabrics on the outside. It is pretty shiny and I wouldn't recommend it. The reason I'm making a 3rd is because if you don't fold over the nylon 2-3 times and go over it a couple of times with a wide stitch, it'll start to unravel when the velcro catches it in the washer/dryer. My 2nd bund has large areas where I had to fold it back inside and restitch over to keep it from fraying. With my first two, regular padding tended to bunch up and shift after a few washes. I decided this time that I'd make a front/back out of the white cotton and stitch across the middle a few times before adding the nylon layer on the front (hiding all those stitches) to keep the insides from shifting. When I started though, I realized I didn't have enough padding and decided to experiment with some thick canvas material inside. It's not soft, but it looks padded now that it's done. It's not gonna shift and bunch like loose padding, so it'll hold its shape pretty well.

Looking good. If you've seen my thread in the trade forum, you know I ordered resin and as soon as that comes in the mail I gotta get several holdout blasters made and shipped. I don't think I'll get much done on this rifle for at least a week or two.

If you've bought one of my blasters without magnets in the pressure button (for holding it in the holster), here's my tutorial for adding them: http://forum.bikerscout.net/index.php?showtopic=11894 And hey, I just realized there's no picture of a finished blaster in this thread, so let's borrow a picture from that tutuorial:

This took around an hour to complete (and that's with stopping to take pictures for this thread). This particular blaster is going to Tim (user name Soundwave). He's also on the waiting list for one of Duku's blasters and promises to take some comparison photos of the two blasters. I think mine's about 10% too big.

Ok, so in a confusing turn of events, over 3 weeks several people contacted me asking if I had blasters for sale. I sold the only blaster I had with magnets in the handle. I was left with one without magnets and not enough resin to pour another. The best way to get magnets in the handle is to just put them in that spot in the mold when you pour the resin. Through a miscommunication, or perhaps impatience on my part, I currently have 3 people who've paid me for blasters with magnets in the handle and one blaster with no magnets. I've ordered more resin and hope to fulfill those orders in a little over a week, but to keep my reputation in tact, I am going to mail a blaster on Monday to the first person who paid. So here is my tutorial for adding magnets to a resin blaster. The pressure button on the handgrip of the Biker Scout blaster is a transistor you can find at Radio Shack for $3. http://www.radioshac...ntent=CT2032230 Rare earth magnets (neodymium magnets) can be found at art supply stores, often labeled "super strong craft magnets." You can sometimes find them at Lowe's or Home Depot on the aisle with screws, nuts and bolts, near the picture hanging stuff and velcro, but not all locations have these. A lot of them just have regular magnets, which aren't going to be strong enough. The ones I've got here are about 1/2 inch in diameter, and I'm gonna put 2 of them in the blaster (along with some smaller cracked ones that I've got lying around from another project). Alright, here we go. First you're gonna want to clamp down your blaster with the scope removed so it will sit flat (note I've got a piece of felt in the clamp so I don't mess up the blaster itself). I used my Dremel - actually it's a $26 Chicago Electric rotary tool from Harbor Freight that has lasted longer than the 2 $75 Dremels I burned out, and it uses all the same attachments as a Dremel - to cut off the top of the resin pressure button. Then I cleaned it up, sanded flat and drilled a 1/2 inch hole. The only bit I had that size was a spade, which was gonna leave a thinner hole below, so I used it to just get the basic outline then carved it out with the rotary sanding drum. The transistor has a couple of leads sticking out of the bottom that you'll have to cut off with wire cutters. You can see my 2 magnets fit neatly in the 1/2 inch hole. I put a little Loctite super glue gel between the transistor and the blaster just to hold it in place. This part gets tricky because the transistor is steel I believe and is very attracted to the magnets. Pre-drill the screw holes and put in some round-top slotted screws. Once you've got the transistor screwed down tight, clean up any scratches by wet-sanding with 400-800 grit sandpaper and throw on some flat black paint.

Well, I wasn't gonna work on this today, but silverboyd told me he was working on his, so I carved away at the trigger/trigger guard for a little while. I'll probably replace the guard with metal and use a moving plastic trigger at some point, but that's why this whole piece is removable.

That could work. I haven't used plasti-dip.

Just checked that Home Depot link, Jason. That's a good option for the bi-pod. If it's strong enough for shelves, you could probably make it functional, although as a TD, I doubt you'll be lying down to pose with it. Do they come in black though? I know with my Death Star wall panels, paint chips off of metal like that very easily. You'll want to carry black/silver paint markers when you troop for touch-ups!

Marcel, until there's a specific rifle detailed on the scouts 501st CRL or some source material besides a low res video game, I think it makes more sense to assume the scouts use a rifle that is based on something that was seen in the original trilogy. I don't mean to sound disrespectful, and I'm definitely using your build as a guide. You did a great job. I just think that some liberties were taken in the design of the video game and shouldn't be taken so seriously. Is there some reference material for the DC-15x elsewhere, perhaps used by someone other than scouts? The sideshow collectable premium scout's rifle looks very simplified, but could be the body of an MG42. Your barrel matches that one (except for the round flash hider). That one also has a slant to the bottom of the handgrip, where yours is parallel to the body of the gun like the MG42. Yeah, Jason, that's another difference I gotta deal with converting your wood-cut to what I need. Glad I told you to make the handgrip bigger to accommodate the scout gloves! I think with something like an expanded universe weapon, it should be ok to "customize" it a little. There's like 6 variants of the DL-44 and just as many of the E-11 on screen. One would assume a small detachment, like scouts, would be separated from the main armed forces for long periods of time and would naturally have some elements of customization or even improvised repair or modification on their weapons. I also agree with the discussion that cropped up in the thread about adding it to the CRL, that only one scout per troop should be carrying a sniper rifle. There's no reason for them all to have them. I plan to use this mostly with my Mandalorian (in progress) anyway, but if someone asks, I'll be calling it a DC-15x. ------------------ Also, I'd love some advice on what to do with this bi-pod. I kinda expected it to come with a mounting mechanism. I guess I could build a rail to clip it on, then remove it to set up as a bi-pod, but I'd like for it to be permanently attached and still functional.

Got these in the mail today from airsplat.com. The bipod was only $10 and I picked the cheapest scope that looks like what Marcel used. Anyone got ideas for attaching the bipod? I think I'm gonna have to drill that rivet out and attach something that swivels.

I believe I'll be building my flash hider from this funnel and the tip of an old Luke ROTJ lightsaber. The diameter of the lightsaber part is pretty consistent with the WOF template. I'll still have to make the curves fit and the lower part with the holes, but this is a great base to build on.

I believe mine were 3/4 inch planks, so 1.8cm is pretty close. I would have done the handgrip as part of the middle layer too, but last year, silverboyd dropped his T-21 when the strap slipped off. The handgrip/trigger broke off. I took it home, made a new handgrip/trigger and reattached for him. So he thought it would be a good idea to make it a separate piece in case it breaks on this one, just two screws to remove to put a new one on there.

Then what is Dengar's rifle in ESB? It's definitely based on an MG42.

I've got the 3 layers of pine glued and screwed. I started putting some wood filler between the layers. There's a good bit of difference between the shape of the middle layer and the 2 outer ones. I'm not blaming silverboyd. He was short on lumber and I brought him a piece that was a little thin, so he had to adjust the template to fit. I'm just gonna have to spend a couple of days carving it with a dremel and palm sander to make it look even. The length seems to match the WOF templates, but the width is about 1cm more than it should be. I don't think I'm going to worry about that though. It's something no one will notice unless they've built one too. I labeled my pictures because if silverboyd doesn't mind, I'll include his build in this thread. He's posted pictures for friends on facebook. I believe he's probably documenting it over on the MEPD boards because they've got the DLT-19 in their CRL as an official weapon. I know there's some parts that I still gotta trim like the round thing on the top and the one behind the handle. Those are definitely not on the MG42, but are on the MG34. You can see I traced where I'll be the top cover (I'm thinking aluminum sign for the material) will overlap the main body. I've got a lot of filling (actually cut thin slivers of wood for some parts) to do where the stock doesn't line up on the three layers. When putting it together, I thought it was more important that the front/top line up than the back/bottom.

I used a combination of Rustoleum and Krylon when I painted my old Rubies vinyl Boba Fett a few years ago. I didn't have any trouble with them reacting or not sticking on the vinyl. When I painted my KS, I used Rustoleum gloss white and Rustoleum's automotive gloss clear coat. I had a lot of problems with one specific area where it wouldn't dry properly and did that crackle thing. I had to keep sanding that spot over and over. I eventually got it by doing several very thin coats of paint, so there wasn't enough paint there to raise up in the crackles while it dried. I've learned since joining this forum that if you ever have a material that spray paint is reacting strangly on, lay down a coat of Rustoleum Filler Primer (in the automotive section of Walmart). That stuff sticks to everything, but you'll need to wet sand it because it dries kinda rough like as though a coat of dust fell on the wet paint. And every paint I've found will dry properly on top of it.

Oops, I was gonna edit and not reveal my mistake, but thought that would be sneaky. Apparently Battlefront was not based on another game engine, so everything in it was created by that studio for a Star Wars game. From the LucasArts website FAQ released before the game: "Is Star Wars Battlefront using the same engine from an existing game? No, the engine for Star Wars Battlefront is a brand new engine developed by Pandemic Studios." I still think they would have used a gun model similar to something seen on screen, and the fact that the barrel is so similar to the MG42, they probably intended that to be the basis. They just didn't expect us to obsess over it this much!

Gaunt, if you'd rather me start my own thread, I will. I think this is an interesting topic to have both builds together showing the differences. You're right that the DC-15x appeared first in a video game and therefore was not literally built on top of a physical real-world gun. I think that logically, the game designers picked a real world gun (very similar to the ones used for other large rifles in the game) and used it as their starting point in modeling though. It makes sense in the Star Wars universe that the weapons would be similar. Also, the Battlefront engine that the game used, was shared with WWII games. It's likely that previous designers had put a version of the MG42 in and when tasked with designing a sniper rifle from scratch or just sticking a scope on something that was already built in-game, the Star Wars Battlefront guys went with the easier choice. I really feel that Marcel got the flash hider wrong in his build. It's my opinion that the flash hider's flat sides (hexagonal or octagonal) are a product of shortcuts in modeling. Remember, they thought it would only be seen very tiny, for a second or two on an analog television. In a 2004 game, running on the Playstation 2 hardware (released in 2000), the computing power to make a cone shape would have been significantly higher than those flat edges. -------------------------------------------------------------- and now for my build notes and comparisons: -------------------------------------------------------------- My friend (silverboyd) started work on his DLT last weekend and he cut out mine this weekend. I didn't mean for him to do twice the work. I would have cut it all out at once instead of cutting out one, assembling and sanding it then cutting out the other. I picked it up, took it home and started to glue it together(3 layers of 3/4in pine. I went back to the plans to see where those 3 screws are in the body of the MG42 (DC15x). I planned to put some screws thru for stability and if I put them in the same spots, I wouldn't have to fill and sand them. Looking at the plan, I decided on a whim to place the MG34 plan over the MG42 and compare them more closely for the first time. I might be building a DLT-19. There's a lot of differences that I didn't notice. I've had the pic Gaunt posted saved in my costumes/props folder for 6 months, but never looked at it very closely. Here's a quick diagram I threw together. I scaled the higher resolution image (the 42) down until the handle/trigger overlapped the other, then checked the stock to see if it overlapped correctly. Since the handle and stock fit very closely, I think this is a good representation. If my friend cut out the body from the MG34 plans, it's going to be too short (height and length) to make an MG42. I might be able to add on top and hide the addition with a box placed where the shell casings would be ejected on the original. It looks like a separate piece sitting on top anyway. The handle and trigger are pretty similar. The stock is the same, although shorter on the 42. See where it connects to the square body, where on the 34 it rounds to a cylinder and goes an inch or so before connecting? I'll be working on this a little tomorrow and possibly Monday, and I'll report back. The details on the sides and much of where the barrel connects are very different. This could be more of a project than if I had just printed plans myself and cut it out. We both seem to have made more work out of what could have been a simpler project. ---------------------- In an example of me doing things the smart way and building something easy, would anyone be interested in styrene vac-formed barrels for this thing?I think that's the best way to do it: a PVC pipe barrel, with the squared barrel made of 2-3 vac formed pieces around it. I think I'd spend as much time building vac-form bucks as I would building one barrel. Why not make it something I can use to make more? Why styrene? I spoke with Jeff from SC about getting ABS and he says it's probably not economical unless I buy A LOT OF IT, but all sign shops seem to carry styrene.

Michael, the DC-15x will have a scope and the DLT won't. There's probably some other details that are significantly different that I'll find when I get started.

Looking good. If you wanna go for Lancer, the pouches should be sewn so that you don't see the stitching (the flap), but no one but other scouts know that. What do you have inside of them to keep that shape? I made a box from styrene for mine, so that they can still hold stuff, but a hollow stryene box makes an echoing noise when your keys bounce around in there! I put styrene in the flap too, to hold that shape.

I was gonna build myself a heavy blaster last year, but got behind on other projects. Last week, my TD friend said something about making himself a DLT and I said if he cut out an extra body, I'd love to build a DC-15x (very similar body, different barrel). He says he's doing that this week. I will be watching your build as I start mine!

I think that riding patch will work. You are pretty brave sliding your legs into that suit with so many pins there... I got nervous just looking at it. Your vest sleeves might be a little long. I know my application got sent back twice because my GML only wanted to see 1/2 inch of vest sleeve beyond the shoulder bell. I had someone make the vest for me, but I ended up having to take the sleeves off, push them further up in side the torso, and sew em back down 2-3 times before I found the right spot.

Oh yeah, I forget you and KS are in other countries where with different things available to you. Elevator bolts make it easier to take apart without having to pry off a cover to get to the bolt. If you cut the hole in the visor square you won't need to hold the bolt to tighten nut inside. I found my 1" (diameter of the top surface) elevator bolts at Lowe's to replace the 1.25" ones I got at the little hardware store in my neighborhood. I think this is the one I used (LINK), but I might have gotten them longer and cut off the excess where they stick inside too far. They don't tell you the size of the top part in the description, but I know the ones from Lowe's were smaller and looked more correct than the local guy. The accurate 3M bolts are flat on top, right? CB's cast ones look rounded in the picture above. I believe what KS sent me with my kit was plastic feet for furniture to protect flooring, which are also very rounded and have a black outline. EDIT: sorry, I see there are bolts originally on it in the picture and re-read CB's post about "casting bolts" not covers. So what are the rounded clear things in the picture of the accessories?

That is a good lookin' helmet. I love those ear holes. I'm still underwhelmed by the lightweight feel of the KS helmet and would someday like to jump up to fiberglass or resin. Also, on me, the KS is so small on me that when I tried a chin cup, it was constantly clicking against the bottom of the faceplate and drove me crazy. Good call swaping the bolts. Those covers wouldn't look right. I don't understand why he and KS don't just pick up elevator bolts from a hardware store to ship with their helmets. They're not expensive at all and look better because they're flat. They ship a regular bolt and a cover instead. I can't see the details on the snout greeblie. Is that correct, or is it more like the one that ships with the KS? I think it looks better with the backplate as one piece the way DVH makes em. Did you see my thread from a few months ago about the CB decals? It looks like the grey he's using is still too dark. Also, what are those two longer black decals? Is that something I'm missing? So confused.

My scout is stored in the boring blue storage container that my old Boba Fett used to be crammed into. The Fett backplate and rifle are so big, they were always tough to get in there. I now store my Boba Fett in 2 containers put together with hinges on one side and a latch on the other... It's the one on the left. Kinda sneaky cuz I leave my storage container out in full view and don't have to have a locked room to put it in! I live a couple of miles from a CycleGear store so I often find myself in there casually looking at things that would make good costume parts. That's where I got my helmet bag for $15 (link to item). It's real easy to take off the logo with a seam ripper.