E11 Display case

[welshchris77[TK]]

Started Building a new display case for my E11 sterling conversion (will show that in a separate post soon) recently. I built a similar case last year and have build glass cases before but never this big!.

The last case was made from 4mm glass which was too thin for a case this size as the top piece kept cracking a few days after assembling it, It might have been changes in temperature and expansion and contraction between the glass and the wood was causing this so this time around I'm using some 6mm glass I have recycled from an old single glaze patio door.

I found that using white electrical Tape to mask off the area's before glueing is the best tape on glass for removal and application, anything that squishes out I trimmed off with a new blade after letting it set for 24 hours.

I built a chipboard former that fits around the glass before assembling too that holds the glass in place when glueing and also wood braces for the inside.

I glued two sides first, with ordinary builders silicone by the way, and let set, then the other two sides and screw former together and let everything set. The next day removed former and cut the top piece of glass to suit, masked it off and glued it on, I didn't put any pressure or clamps on the top piece just gently pressed it down and left it. When dry I removed all the tape and did some clean up with a blade.

On previous cases I used ordinary masking tape and didn't mask both edges in relation to the edge being glued, spent hours trying to get the silicone off the area's I didn't want it on!, seems to take a long time making off all edges on all the pieces of glass inside and out but it is so worth it in the long run and gives a nice clean crisp edge.

 

The Timber base is White oak joined in 3 pieces, I always make the base second to suit the size of the glass as discrepancies in the size of the glass due to the way it splits when cutting it means the groove has to be tailor made to fit the edge(sometimes off square), if your thinking why doesn't he use perspex?, Ive gone down that road before and leaving it for now for 2 reasons;

First is its hard to join, to get the best join I used dichloromethane which I had to import from the UK as it was too expensive here in Ireland, not that it wasn't cheap anyway, have to be careful with this stuff as its quite toxic!, touching the pieces together you apply it with a syringe across the edge and it chemically cements the two surfaces together, it worked fine on smaller pieces but on large lengths it just didn't seem to want to behave, I tied all sorts of ways of clamping it but wasn't working out for me so Ive returned to using glass for now.

Second reason is glass doesn't scratch as easy as perspex, has more clarity and is easy to clean, some drawbacks though is it can break easy if not handled with care and its heavy, I mean real heavy!, with the oak base and 6mm glass it already weighs a ton, when I put my E11 conversion inside I will have to move it around in sections lol.

 

Anyway all thoughts and idea's appreciated!

 

[I'm Batman[501st]]

Looks great Chris! And when you're out trooping, you can put some fish in there!

[welshchris77[TK]]

Thanks Ian, yeah I was kinda waiting for a mention of fish tanks alright, lol!

[I'm Batman[501st]]

hehe. I'm just looking at the top shelf of my bookcase. Something like that might fit there.... Hmmmm

[welshchris77[TK]]

Printed out an imperial insignia on a Laser printer, laminated it to give it rigidity then cut out the bits to make a stencil.

Also cut out some circle templates in Hardboard using a circle cutting attachment on the dremel  and a tidy up with sand paper ready for routing.

[welshchris77[TK]]

Get out your measuring tape Ian! lol, so far the measurements are;

 

Glass case 585mm long, 294mm high and 244mm wide.

Oak base is 656mm long, 314mm wide and 39mm high: the groove is for the glass is 8mm wide and 7mm deep.

 

Making the design is basically Routing 2 circles with a guide bushing and circle templates on my Hitachi M12 E Router, stenciling in the missing lines and freehand routing the rest, takes a very steady hand so no beers the night before, lol.

I did a practice one before hand by the way on chipboard.

 

 

 

More pics of the process for the next circle.

12.7mm(1/2") tct router bit for the circles and a 6.85mm(1/4") router bit for free handing the rest.

Roughly 3mm cut depth.

 

 

 

 

[gazmosis[501st]]

Pretty darn sharp! Museum piece!!!

Man you guys have some funky looking electric outlets!

[illusionz_09[TK]]

looks great

[welshchris77[TK]]

Thanks Steve and David, I'm unsure yet as to what shape I should do the support arms or struts for the E11 and what material to make them in, maybe something chunky in matching white Oak, the ones on my old case didn't look great, I will have to think about this one  , any Ideas anyone?

I guess in matching white oak it will blend in more and not detract from the E11 too much, or maybe some thick brass rod and custom brass support cradles. I might do a decorative edge on the base too, when I first got my router I put roman o.g moulding on everything, the novelty has worn off now so might do something different, I did a roman o.g on my last Mk1 case, I can post pics of it if anyone is interested in seeing it.

Edited July 9, 2014 by welshchris77

[I'm Batman[501st]]

What about some clear glass or Perspex ones coming off from the back somehow, like shelf supports, so they're basically invisible.

[welshchris77[TK]]

Thats a good idea Ian but would have to decide then which side to display, although most seem to display the guns left side showing off the counter.

I am tempted by perspex ones though in some form.

 

I wonder how some old retired stormtrooper who has served the empire well would display his trusty old E11 in his living room on some distant planet siting in his armchair saying to his grandson "thats the E11 I used in the battle of endor you know my lad", grandson "wow, did you shoot many rebel scum that day granddad?" lol

[fuumantroop[TK]]

Looks amazing sir! I own a router but have never used it. Your build makes me want to at least give the stenciling a whirl! I always have access to scrap plywood, any pointers on the stenciling?

[fuumantroop[TK]]

And you can always do a mirrored background, that way both sides of the E11 are displayed without having to walk all the way around

[I'm Batman[501st]]

Thats a good idea Ian but would have to decide then which side to display, although most seem to display the guns left side showing off the counter.

I am tempted by perspex ones though in some form.

 

I wonder how some old retired stormtrooper who has served the empire well would display his trusty old E11 in his living room on some distant planet siting in his armchair saying to his grandson "thats the E11 I used in the battle of endor you know my lad", grandson "wow, did you shoot many rebel scum that day granddad?" lol

 

Perspex 'forks' or U shaped holders coming up from the bottom. Then you can swap it around when you feel like it, or display both sides if it's on a low table or something.

 

I remember as a kid my dad telling me he was a cowboy when he was younger, fighting the indians. Of course I believed him, so the Battle of Endor story would be cool!

[welshchris77[TK]]

Thanks Andrew, is there any particular design you wanted to route or just just play around to get a feel for your router?, routing is a whole world onto its own and there are masses of information on it online, as an artist I like to use mine for freehand routing designs and images (mostly non star wars related), freehand routing lends itself to free flowing shapes and curves but straight lines and large circles are near impossible , thats where templates comes in and guide bushings, this is the first time I've used templates as it can be quite time consuming working them out and making them, I could use templates for curves and whole designs but the amount of templates I would need for even something simple sometimes is not worth it, it would be good if you planned on making a run of the same design though.

The stencils are good for getting an idea of the scale you want your design to be, you could print a design at the size you want, laminate it, cut out the bits your going to route, tape it to your stock(wood, board etc.) and trace it out, you might have to make a number of stencils for one design where pieces are 'floating', with multiple stencils you will have to make some kind of registration mark or hole on all of them in the same place to line each one up, maybe incorporate two circles on corners opposite each other before you print it, you don't have to have a printer by the way, you can use tracing paper or sometimes I have just held a piece of paper over my laptop screen and traced it for smaller images.

For the circle I had to make it bigger than it would come out as you have to allow for the gap between the cutter and the outside of the guide bushing, for a circle I measured it and times by two then added this to diameter of the circle, its a bit of trial and error really, I only have one guide bushing at the moment but have a set of different sizes ordered which would be good for smaller and more intricate designs. 

You could also use a projector to transfer your image onto your stock, I recently did this for a large piece by clamping my stock into an easel then projecting the image onto the stock and tracing it off with a pencil, always use a pencil on wood by the way as you can see the line better than anything else if your freehand routing, I would maybe practice on some scraps of MDF or similar before using expensive hardwood too.

You might have got a guide with your router that attaches to the side, I used this for routing the groove that glass sits in, also the quality of the routing bits makes a huge difference, I use trend tct bits and the speed you drive them at is important, too slow and you get chattering which makes the cut bumpy, too fast and it will burn the stock, you can see some burn marks on my design but this was hard to avoid as the oak I'm routing is very dense.

To cut the circles templates I used my dremel with a circle cutting arm and a spiral cutting bit, I screwed the hardboard down onto a scrap of chipboard to stop it moving around, there are lots of other ways you could cut circles if you google it, hardboard is good as its thin and easy to sand after cutting, plywood would be tougher to cut and clean up but would last longer as a template, I would stick to hardboard though if I was use, its fine for the good or else very thin MDF. I would definitely mark a cross on the hardboard or plywood  first  to use as a guide for lining it up to lines on your stock.

Im probably leaving lots of things out here but hope this helps.

 

yeah perspex forks sounds good Ian, they could fit into a slotted grove on the base or maybe even a cross shaped groove with two pieces of perspex slotted together which would make it stronger, the cowboy story is cool, kids imaginations are great!

[fuumantroop[TK]]

Wowzers! Troopers helping troopers to the extreme here! Thanks! Ill have to print this out ill have more time to mess around after we move into the house. Currently at the mercy of our apartment right now. I plan on having a work area for both wood and general work. Now i can't wait to get it set up and finally use the router i bought a year ago lol

[Zarlon[TK]]

What a beautiful build! I can't wait to see the end item with the blaster in it. Nice job!

[welshchris77[TK]]

Thanks Kyle, busy today doing other wood carvings for a seafood festival in my local village Kilmore Quay so will be tied up with that for a few days, then its back to working on my display case again, shame I can't do any routing when the kids go to bed out in the shed but that thing is dam noisy!

 

Nice one Andrew, another thing I forgot to mention is build yourself some kind of platform or table for routing on, you can just about see mine in my pics, its a box with a top and bottom that have overhangs, I built mine from some scrap kitchen worktop and old laminated pine panel, gives some nice weight to it, it has some roofing felt for grip and two strips of wood screwed to the top, I place my stock against the front strip of wood and little wedges at the back to keep the stock steady, my platform height is then just above elbow level, it varies on the person but for me this height is ideal for freehand routing without giving me a a bad back or neck, the overhang of the platform on the top and bottom is also great for clamping to a work surface or your templates on the top.

 

The main thing with routing is take your time!!!, start to rush and you will make a critical error or worse have an accident, google router accidents in pictures and you will see what I mean (not for the faint hearted), they can do some savage damage to hands and fingers, at the end of the day its a super sharp piece of tungsten carbide tipped steel spinning at 24 to 33 thousand rpm.

 

Wear googles and mind your fingers!! 

Edited July 10, 2014 by welshchris77

[fuumantroop[TK]]

Noted sir! I work on a CNC Lathe and Mill so I know what ya mean! Mainly using carbide and high speed steel tooling that can be very dangerous as well. Perhaps I can have my programmer create a program or two that I can run on my off time to speed the process up, but we will see. Been working 50+ hours a week as it is so there is barely any off time at the moment :/ . Hopefully things slow down before my wedding and before my armor arrives lol.

[welshchris77[TK]]

wow Andrew you could do some really cool stuff with a cnc lathe and mill but sounds like your flat out at the moment, don't burn yourself out dude!, all in good time, congrats with getting married by the way.

I don't have armor yet by the way, still unsure what to get, want something sturdy but accurate, don't mind paying for a good kit but there are so many out there seems a bit of a mind field!

[fuumantroop[TK]]

Thanks Chris! The armor choice will come to you sir! Everyone has opinions about each of the armors, what it really matters is what you want to get out of it.

 

Im counting the days until we are able to run the machines after hours once the work load steadies.

 

On with your build though sir, when life allows it of course

[welshchris77[TK]]

ok got some more work done on and off the last week, think I'm going to go with transparent stands, I wanted to use polycarbonate as it is very strong but can't source it locally without buying a huge sheet which would cost a fortune, I have some 6mm perspex in the workshop so I'm going to use that for now.

I started off by making some templates that fit the E11 nice and snug.

Then sketched out how I want my stands to look like:-

I then made some hardboard templates from my designs and stuck them onto the perspex with small strips of double sided tape, after that I roughed out the shapes with a chop saw and half moon rasp file leaving about 2mm out from the hardboard template

If you haven't used perspex before it scratches very easy so leave the protective backing on as long as possible and use scraps of hardboard when holding it in the vice.

[welshchris77[TK]]

Next I used a copying bit (flush trim bit) on my router table to trim the edge of the piece's.

After some scrapping with a stanley blade and careful sanding I flame polished the edges transparent with a pen torch, if you haven't done this before be very careful as you can mess it up very easy, set the flame low and gently pass it over the edge until it turns transparent, practice on some scrap first, too slow and it will start to burn and go brown, too fast and it won't turn clear enough.

 

 

 

Some comparison shots of a test piece with no flame polished edge and finished piece:-

 

Finished piece's:-

 

 

Some shots of the pen torch I used, bought from harbor freight when I was in Florida but can easily be picked up cheaply from ebay and such.

Flame is slightly more intense in real life just doesn't pick up that well on cam, still quite a low flame though.

[I'm Batman[501st]]

That's going to come up great!

[welshchris77[TK]]

Routed my own design of moulding on the side of the base the other day, took a good few passes on the router table, also thought the top looked a little bland so incorporated a design that would match the grooves I put in for the perspex stands, sanded everything back a little and cleaned things up, stand is pretty much finished now, might put some kind of protective layer on it, maybe some danish oil or might just leave the natural oak colour, not sure yet.