Driving off into the sunset!

We got a last minute job Friday, so with the t.v show build in full swing, it was a weekend at the shop.
The last minute job was for a commercial, but that's all I know. They wanted a 13" blue cube. They were able to provide a Pantone number for the color, which happened to be the exact same color of the light blue PVC we use. As luck would have it, we had a sheet in stock!
It needed to be strong and lightweight, as they'll be writing on it and tossing it around.
I drew the file in Aspire, just 6- 13" squares. These got mitered on our mitering jig with the little Makita router.

With squares cut on our Techno cnc, and drawn in Aspire, I know that everything is dead square, making the assembly very easy. A simple tape hinge holds it all together until the glue got applied.

I reinforced all the edges with strips of 3/4" pvc, chem welded into place. For the final top piece, I used a medium bodied pvc cement, as the water thin stuff can evaporate to fast!
I never got a final image of it, but it was exactly like you could imagine.
That job delivered this morning, for shooting tomorrow.

--------------------------------------------RACECAR------------------------------------------------

Jody finished the paint job on the driver's body, and despite the rumors (Rob), it isn't actually Jody in the car :) Although.............................................................

He drove off at the end of the day. Who knows if he'll win the race, but he'll be looking sweet, whatever he does!
We should get this back in around a week, and I might brand it out with all of our amazing sponsors, for display. Maybe Jody can drive it to the market for groceries!
They added a bunch of signage for our current NDA  t.v.show build, so that should keep us busy for another week. YAY!
It's the gift that keeps on giving :)!!

8)
JO

This drivers got it!

I woke up early this morning to get ready to deliver the letters to the studio.....

But was greeted with some serious freezing rain. This was certainly not part of my plans! So instead of arriving at the studio for 11 am, we didn't leave the house until 11. By then the roads had melted and the drive was pretty easy going.
We dropped the letters off, then headed to Metals Plus to get the material for the show build. Then it was a bunch of other stops before we actually got back to the shop at 7 pm.

I picked up the finished driver sculpt from Karen as well. He looks great!

I quickly cut the steering wheel center portion on our Techno, and glued it into place.

All in all, I'm super happy with it!
I didn't get the clear on anything today, largely due to the time setback from this morning, and I have to pick up some more first thing tomorrow. I probably have enough, but I want to make sure before I start.
So tomorrow will be the clear-coat and driver painting day! If it kills me.....again!
8)
JO

It's not easy being green. It's not quick either!

I would ask: "When will these letters ever end?" But I know the answer, when they're done!

They're everywhere. They're on shelves, they're on tables, they're on the railing, the workmate, the floor. If there was one more sentence, we'd have to rent more space.
But Jody and Anna got them done by 6:30. We'll load them up in the morning and deliver them to set. The photographer Vicky, and prop stylist Christina popped in this morning to check them out, as well as do some measuring. I really like Vicky, she is always so easy going. She was the photographer on the gingerbread Christmas torture shoot we did a while back.

____________________RACE-CAR____________________

I didn't get to clear coat the spoilers for the racecar, as one of the pieces was being used on the car while Karen was sculpting the driver. But I did get the color on them. They look killer!
This whole car is completely overboard for it's purpose as a proof of concept model. They only wanted a small model, but I negotiated getting it back after, and I wanted it to be really cool. Not only to WOW them, but as a display after. It didn't ultimately add much more to the cost, but the end result is way over the top.

I machined up the helmet first thing when I got to the shop. I had to get that done before Karen could start the sculpting of the driver. It's oversized to the driver, and looks really funny! The visor will get cut from some sort of black material, and wrapped on. The helmet is quite big at 4" wide. I was able to steal it from Karen after a bit to get the primer coat applied. This will go high gloss like the car.

The car got completely taped off so epoxy covered fingers wouldn't get all over the shiny new paint job the car got the other day. The steering wheel was cut from the end of 1.5" abs pipe, and glued to the angle I wanted. The rest was up to Karen. She started with a foil armature, built around the 3" screw the helmet will fasten to. The whole sculpt will be epoxy putty. Karens a big FIMO sculptor, but baking the driver after is out of the question, as the base plate and steering wheel are all plastic.

We decided that the driver would look great if he was driving like a total "dude" cruisin' for chicks, Except in a racecar. That's funny! So he'll have one arm on the side of the car.

 He's even got a little zippered pocket to keep his racing license in I guess.

 The other hand is on the wheel, and looks great.

His little racing glove makes me laugh! Some guys get all the chicks, and this guys a chick magnet!

Karen took the car and driver home to finish tonight, and I'll pick it up tomorrow from her.
We have a busy day tomorrow, dropping off, and picking up some more material for the other jobs going on. The clear coat will be flowing tomorrow before I leave if it kills me. Once that's done, It's just final assembly left on the car.

Today was a blast at the shop! I'm not sure if it's because there were 3 stellar ladies working, or if because the day was filled with laughter and jokes, but whatever the reason, I'm glad I get to do this for a living!
8)
JWO

Painting Fairies are always handy to have!

Our letter build is well into the painting stage now. Jody and Anna made great headway, even if they are only 3 feet tall. We're doing the English and French version of the print ad, which means lots and lots of letters. I'm thinking I'll have to roll up my sleeves and pitch in tomorrow, they're coming along, but not quick enough. I would have liked to spray them, but were using a pretty heavy texture in the paint, and it doesn't like to flow through any of my paint guns!

Speaking of painting.....the rims for the toon racer got primed and painted their aluminum color. They look great. I still have to drill them out, but that'll come later.

I was bound and determined to get the spoilers done today as well! I cut all the plates out of 1/4" styrene. I thought about heat bending the airfoil on the rear of the car, but I didn't want to take the time to make any jigs to form it evenly. I opted to go for 4 ribs that would get clad in easy-bending .060" styrene. The ribs will slot into a rabbet on the sides that our Techno milled in.

The ribs will be on the underside, so it won't be a really big deal.

Here's the airdam slotted into the sides of the spoiler. This will be plenty strong once the solvent weld hardens up. I didn't get a picture of it mounted onto the car :( but it was a little intimidating drilling into the body of the car with all that super-awesome shiny it's got goin on!

The front spoiler was way more simple. I did actually heat bend the front one, as it's so big, I thought the ribs would be frustrating. I place the flat plate of 1/4" styrene over a piece of pipe, and heated it with the heat gun until it drooped over the pipe, then I quench cooled it to hold its shape. Nothing fancy with the side wings, just glued them to the ends, and put screws up through the bottom for extra strength. I shaped the angle of the mounting block by taping down some sand paper to the bent spoiler, and sanded it fairly quick. I have no idea what the angle was, so this solved the problem.

The finished piece got chem-welded and screwed with some #6 countersunk screws. You can see the clearance holes drilled for when I attach it to the car.

The final step was to add the "supports" for the fins. Just some 1/16" brass rod, bent to fit into the pre-drilled holes. A little CA glue and it was done.

I did primer spray all the parts, so tomorrow I hope to get the final paint and clear on these. I'm having my artist friend Karen Coombes come in tomorrow to sculpt the drivers upper body and arms from epoxy putty.
It's almost done, Nice!
8)
JWO

Ferrari red always looks good!

Saturday became the official shop cleanup day! I know when some people clean their shops, they get inspired to create something right away. I, however, get inspired to not create anything and enjoy the fact that everything is in its place, and the space looks huge.
That was pretty short lived, because Sunday was all about the toon racecar. I got the final color on it. They wanted it red, so I chose Ferrari red. The perfect color for a speedy little racer!
I used an acrylic lacquer for the quick dry time. This let me get the clear on about an hour later. I used an automotive 2 stage clear for it's high shine and durability.

 The color is a little pale in the photo, but in real life it almost hurts my eyes!

I also got the 4 rims machined on Sunday as well. I went with rigid pvc. It's super tough, generally machines well, and you can coat it with VC-1 and smooth it out a little. I ended up machining them with a 1/16" tapered ball nose for the detail. But I think that it actually made the cleanup a little more involved due to the bottom of the ballnose spinning so quickly it may have melted the bottom of the model. Soaking it with VC-1 helped with the cleanup. A few coats of primer will solve most of the problems!

The little styrene rings fit perfectly! They even had a little "click" sound as they snapped into place.

The tires got their final coat of black, again, an acrylic lacquer for dry time. They're gonna look pretty hot on the bright red car.

The vent opening behind the drivers head got whipped out pretty quick also. A few slabs of styrene glued together, then a clean-up. I love the fact that this will look like a separate piece when it's done.

I added a ridge out of .060" to allow for the thickness of the urethane automotive tape that will be holding it onto the car.
Today was a bit of a shop bust as we spent all day getting materials for a few upcoming jobs. Tomorrow we'll be cutting a ton of styrofoam letters for an upcoming print and television ad. We will be painting these with latex, but not installing them. They're going to handle that.
We also got final approval on the NDA prototype we dropped off for the new series we're working on. These will keep us hopping until we deliver next Thursday. I've actually cleared out 3 Home Depots getting the right hardware for it!
8)
JWO
 

Oval is the new round tire

I ran the 2 other toolpaths needed to finish the 4 sidewalls on the cartoon F1 car tires first thing this morning. I have come down with a nasty cold, so I haven't actually been putting in full days at the shop since Monday. But, I'm almost at 8 hrs today-almost!

The rest of the tire thickness will be made from 4 layers of 3/8" black pvc. I have to save my last bit of 1/2" pvc for the rear tire sidewalls. These were just profile cut. Once they were glued up, I rabbeted them on our small table saw for the tread grooves. I cut the rabbet right down the center of the joints. This will hide the seams, as well as let me have a track that I can use to do a final chem-weld in. Once the rabbets were cut, I glued the sidewall pieces on and gave them a quick sanding.

After I have done a final sanding, I will brush the whole tire with VC-1, which will smooth the semi-porous pvc. Then they'll get good coat of paint!

I glued up the car body slabs, and gave them a good sanding. After my material "miscalculation" it took longer than I would have liked, but it happens!

In the beginning, I spent a while in the computer trying to figure out the best way to handle the cockpit recess. But I finally decided it would be easier to use the drill press to "mill" out the opening. I drew a pencil line, using the body shape as a guide, to mark out the edges, then went to town with a 1/2" drill bit.

Only the sidewalls of the cockpit recess need to be clean, as I plan on placing the driver on a plate of 1/8" pvc, which will cover the bottom of the recessed opening. With the seams filled, it was off to a pile of high build primer coats.

I have had really good luck with the Rustoleum black sandable primer, so I chose that as a filler/ primer. Goes on fairly thick, and dries in a reasonable amount of time, plus it's pretty resilient to whichever finish coat we're going to be using.
Just the rest of the tires, the driver, and the spoilers, and were done. Oh, and the final paint.
8)
JO

Cartoon racecar build continues

I started machining the body parts for the racecar when I got into the shop today. The deadline is pretty good for this, so I haven't had to kill myself on the build. I also have a lot of computer work to get done at the same time, so I toolpathed the parts with a pretty small stepover. I don't need the small Techno router for anything else at the moment, so I figured it could mill away while I got my computer work done!

 I've been doing the cnc thing for a while now, most times it goes really well. However, I made the basic of basic mistakes on this! I assumed my HDU was 2" thick when I was toolpathing the model in Aspire. It actually calipered out at 1.960", which means the slices are going to need a bit of manual massaging after they're glued up. I HATE having to "tweak" something the router has worked on, especially if I had payed attention in the beginning. Stoooopid Jamie!

I also started machining the sidewalls of the front tires when the body parts were finished. I cut these from 1/2" black pvc. The tires will actually be layered flats of pvc, this will let me rabbet the edge of the layers to achieve a basic "tread"

I didn't put anything together today, but will do that in the morning. The computer stuff is the priority for the rest of this evening!
8)
JO

F1 and other stuff

I exploded the parts off the racecar in Hexagon. The reason for doing this is so I can bring them into Aspire separately for machining. Aspire fills in any undercuts on imported geometry, and this allows me to machine the tricky parts as separate units. Even though I modeled both sides of the car, I only actually need one side.

Once the body was centered in the material on all 3 axis, I just mirrored it for the other side. Sometimes in Hex, things can get tweaked on only one side of the model by mistake (operator error for sure!) Mirroring the model in Aspire keeps both sides of the car exactly the same.

Then it was just a matter of using Aspires' slicing feature to cut the model into the 2" thick slabs we'll be cutting it from.

With all the parts ready to go, I nested them in Aspire to get the best material yield I could.

I'll start cutting these tomorrow when I get to the shop.
On another note....
When we were in New York at Techno, we cut the demonstration piece to go over different toolpath options.

A fun little piece with the "Awesomeness" meter maxed out!

We painted it almost entirely with the Rustoleum Metallic Accents paint. I love this stuff! The opacity is really good for a waterbased metallic, and the dry-time/ inter-mixability is so flexible!

Well box this guy up and send it down to Dee and Roy at Techno for them to have, a thank-you of sorts, for having us down!

8)
JO