Hello all! It’s so weird to me that this community is so warm and welcoming. It’s rare on the internet, but you guys are awesome! Beyond the pleasantries, a few months ago, I got to wondering: what does a proton pack cost? I was born in 85 and, as a result, loved Ghostbusters. I got the proton pack and ghost trap toys as a kid. I loved them. They were fun and cool. A few years back, I went to a wedding that had a Halloween theme. The groom was dressed up as a Ghostbuster. He had the whole 9 yards. EVERY man in that room was jealous. So to a few months ago- what would a proton pack cost? I found that many people actually build their own stuff. You can get the good stuff, but I’m not exactly the richest person on the planet, so building would be better. I have a bit of model building skills, so this would put me up to the task of scratch building stuff. So I decided: I’m going to do this. PERIOD.
I have the uniform (mostly) complete. And yes, before anyone asks, I did change the position of the hose (pee tube) connector (what was I thinking?).
The uniform, patches, belt, etc., were from the gbfans store. I found the boots at a local antique mall. They’re not 100% accurate as they don’t have the zipper sides, but they’re Carolina and they fit. I’m usually a stickler for details, but these will do for now. The only problem I have is with the pockets on the flight suit: I think that I’m going to cut them off to make them more comfortable while tucked in my boots.
I also wanted to get a shot of me with my original Stay-Puft Marshmallow Man that I’ve had since I can remember:
Beyond the suit, I wanted a proton pack! I decided that the fiberglass and aluminum parts weren’t for me as this time. I wanted to utilize stuff that I had and stuff that’s easy to work with. I decided that wood, PVC pipe, and styrene sheets were going to be the main stuff I would use (outside of resin parts and other stuff like tubing). So I got started. The power cell was my favorite part of the pack, so I wanted to start that first. Here it is in the early stages:
Box somewhat built and pipes cut to length. I didn’t compensate for the extra piece of styrene for the caps, but…
Here are the two parts all painted up and ready to go:
A few things: I utilized hot glue as a “weld joint”. I also used thin sheet styrene as a covering for the power cell to give it a cleaner look. A few problems: “Goop” glue, to my horror, actually melted the styrene, and can be seen in some of the pictures. It’s not bad, but it really did anger me. But- “nothing ventured, nothing gained”. Also, my clear blue acrylic paint peeled! It didn’t do that the first time I removed the mask, but it did the second time. For those of you familiar with airbrushing you’ll know that just re-coating it doesn’t make it go away. We’ll see after I get lights installed as to whether or not I’ll have to strip and repaint.
Moving on, I think that the people at Kinkos thought that I was messing with them. They didn’t print the motherboard and cyclotron motor blueprints very well. But this was the result of printing and cutting:
Oh, and my uncle got a good shot at the Ecto-1 (-A?) in California!
Moving on, the ion arm was next. This was two wood pieces, sandwiched with thin styrene. I got the resistors from eBay. This was for two reasons: 1. the real stuff is expensive, and 2. I would rather have the people building the really good stuff get the original stuff than me. It still needs some parts, but here it is:
Here’s my current progress:
I committed a cardinal sin here: I was trying to fit parts around a motherboard when I should have cut the motherboard around the parts. Oh well- I’ll get the stuff build and cut my motherboard around them. It will probably work out better in the long run since I’m only 5’6" and it’ll look better on me.
