I was debating with myself on how to treat the ion arm end cap. I really like the raw metal finish, but none of the actual movie packs have it, especially not the Spengs, which is what I plan on making mine over time with swapping out some parts. So I took a little time today to finish the piece off and I’m happy with how it came out.
I used a combination of flat enamel, buffing, graphite, and more enamel to reach this finish which resembles the finish of the shell. It will change color depending on the light, which actually bow provides more interest than the raw piece.
I am copying every assembly technique you’re using for when I put mine together next year. You have knocked this thing out of the park so far!
Can’t wait to see the eventual speaker setup.
I began painting my wand parts today, I will work on the finishing tomorrow.
Meanwhile, I have decided to add some details to make this the real deal Spengs… or as close to it as possible. I will get the ion arm and booster tube welded together with the Spengler weld… this will take some time but it’s in the works. I am replacing my GBfans HGA with a custom HGA to more closely match the Spengler, again this will also take time. I am replacing the rear cylinder on the wand with the “oddball” model from Freeky Geeky to match the Spengler wand.
Here are some pictures from the reference library that show some of the details I want to replicate that are unique to the Spengler pack.
Custom rear cylinder, offset HGA holes, welds ground off the bottom of the injectors tubes, a bolt in the shell under the hole for the ribbon cable, and weld between the ion arm and booster tube.
Now I have more multiples of pieces… I guess they will be set aside for a future build. The schedule for this project continues to get pushed out, I thought I had everything covered but when I started gathering parts I did not think of trying to replicate a specific pack and I continue to learn something new every day. :sigh:
I made some progress on the finish of the wand body and various parts. I also just got billed for the trigger box from GBfans, so I’m really looking forward to getting that. Here is where things are at
I achieved this finish using a flat black enamel and using steel wool with small circles and medium pressure as recommended by Tom Morris. It is a learning curve, the first try didn’t come out very well and I repainted and tried again. Here are some shots with the pack
That is where things stand for now… back to the day job tomorrow.
Man, this pack is really coming along nicely.
I received the GBfans trigger box in the mail this week and got a chance to work on the painting and finishing yesterday and today. It is a slow iterative process, but I think I have reached a point where I am happy with it. I’ll see how I feel about it in the morning and if I still like it I’ll fish the switches in.
Been lurking this thread for a bit, amazing progress! As Burkit said above it’s cool to see another fiberglass/aluminum build since much of it has been haslab stuff as of late. This pack will definitely turn heads, and wear out your shoulders after you’ve had it on for a bit :lol:
I was able to take some time today to work on fishing the switches into the trigger box. I used some very thin jewelers wire that we already had to pull them into place. I first tried installing the intensify button, and try as I might I just could not get it into place. I took a break and moved onto the activate toggle, which I was able to get through pretty quickly.
I then realized that the hole in the trigger box was slightly too small for the momentary button. Using a step bit, I drilled the hole out to the next size and repeated the fishing expedition. Once the hole was drilled out it went in quickly. I felt pretty dumb for not checking the hole against the switch in the first place, I simply assumed it would work.
Well, if you haven’t already heard the phrase here it is: “when you assume you make an ASS of U and ME” - I certainly made an ass of myself wasting an hour… Lesson learned. Here are some shots of the result.
I got the trigger box mounted onto the rest of the wand and I’m pretty happy with how it looks.
Tomorrow is Monday, so I’ll put this aside until I have time again and return to the grind.
I received the oddball rear cylinder from Freeky Geeky this week and I am very pleased with it, I now have a spare cylinder, I guess that means I’m saving it for a future build. Here are the two side by side. The bolt pattern of the oddball is a tiny bit wider than the bolt pattern of the GBfans, I will need to file out one of the mounting holes in the wand body ever so slightly to make it fit.
Since I already started to paint my original rear cylinder I decided to practice the same finishing technique on that one before finishing the oddball, here they are again side by side.
I’ll hopefully get around to mounting the oddball into the wand body this weekend along with moving forward on the pack portion of the build. I need to remove the ion arm and booster to get them ready to receive the Spengler ugly weld. I also need to remove the injector tubes and file off the bottom welds and refinish the paint job now that I have more practice. It feels like I’m taking a step backward, but sometimes you have to undo some previous work to get to what you really want.
I was able to get a little bit of work in today after the day job. I had painted the lever retention disk and done some finishing work along with the rear cylinder. I ended up filing one hole out of the wand body slightly to accommodate the bolt pattern of the oddball cylinder. Took my time and did it carefully so as not to make the hole bigger than it has to be.
Was able to get the cylinder mounted and inserted the lever as well. I replaced the grub screw in the retention disk with a socket head bolt to match the setup of the Spengler wand.
We’ll see what additional tasks I can get around to performing this weekend. The real job is heating up and progress on this build might slow down even more :sigh:
Looks great! Love your weathering.
I was able to finally get something done today. I removed the ion arm and booster tube, created a bolt pattern and boxed them up to receive their Spengler weld. Next time I see these pieces they will be ugly welded together. At that time, I will also have a new Spengler HGA. Slowly but surely this pack is coming together.
Thrower grips arrived and I am very happy with them. These were made by Tom Morris. I had ordered one set and he was kind enough to throw in a bonus set! I guess I have no choice but to save the spares (and all my other extra parts) for a future build. I’ll have to order a pop riveter now to get these in appropriately. Now all I need is the front assembly at some point. One grip set is a bit lighter in color than the other, I will likely choose the darker set for the current build.
Thank you! I am trying to have a subtle weathering, I feel like less is more when it comes to that. Worst case just take all the paint off the thrower body and start over :boogieman:
Hi Ed,
Can I ask how you went about finding the center line for drilling the mounting holes into the booster tube? I’m currently trying to figure that out on my build. I have a few ideas, but trying to keep my options open. Thanks!
Here are some additional pictures of the process that I didn’t post for drilling the mounting holes in the booster tube. I laid the tube onto the shell and marked on the edge of the tube what looked to be the center that rests on the shell. From there I used my square to project a line down the back of the tube and placed some tape along that line, and marked the hole spots at an interval that seemed reasonable. Hope that helps!
Haha, that’s exactly how I was planning to do it too. What caused me to doubt myself was how the booster tube cap protrudes a bit from the top of the tube. It felt kind of awkward (but possible) to place the square off-center to get the center line down the tube, but it looks like that worked perfectly for you, so I’ll give that a go as well.
Thanks for the help. Your pack is looking great!
I was able to address a minor detail today, I removed the injector tubes and filed down the welds on the lower portion to be more in line with what is seen on the Spengler pack. While not perfect, the difference is noticeable as the corners are sharper than they were before.
Obtaining perfectly sharp and square corners may be beyond my capabilities at the present time, but I am happy with the difference for now. I will also work on the finishing of this piece as my finishing skills have improved since this build began, but I have to leave that for once the new paint is cured. That’s all for now…
Another quick question for you:
Looks like you’re using the same GBFans wand body and wand track that I am. Did you have any trouble affixing the track to the bottom plate for the wand body? The pre-drilled holes are in the correct locations, but the outer ones are too small to accept the hex bolts from the wand track. I was just going to widen the holes myself, but then I wondered if there was something else I was missing: https://ibb.co/Msh7XsF