This is my E-11 Blaster Build

[Artshot]

This is my blaster. There are many like it but this one is mine. My blaster is my best friend. It is my life. I must master it as I must master my life. Without me, my blaster is useless. Without my blaster I am useless. I must fire my blaster true. I must shoot straighter than my enemy, who is trying to kill me. I must shoot him before he shoots me.

 

Or in other words, welcome to my E-11 Blaster build.

 

Here's what came in the medium brown box.

 

 

After looking over the pieces it became apparent that some clean up was required, not a lot....I hoped, however the mold that the kits come from is looking a little tired in some places, luckily the FISD is full of people who thrive on improving what is out there, to further the quest of as screen accurate as possible.

 

So with that in mind, I ordered a few bits & pieces:-

"T-Jay" supplied a very nice selection of pieces to upgrade a lot of the Doopy blaster, power cylinder pieces, piping for a fake barrel, wire for the cocking spring, various screws to swap out molded screws, hex head screws for the barrel and grip, it really is a great selection (lots more than shown).

 

I added the chrome pipe as a replacement for the plastic that came with it as the thickness of the Doopy barrel means it looks a bit wide, the power cylinders are just to show some of the replacement parts from T-Jay.

 

 

"Gazmosis" supplied a perfect replacement for the poor magazine that comes with the Doopy kit, even comes with "Off" inscribed, which I knew was going to give me trouble if I stuck with the Doopy part.

 

 

"PlayfulWolfCub" supplied an incredibly accurate replacement for the Doopy power cylinders, they truly are a work of art, but then considering the research he has done on them, I expected nothing less.

 

 

Of course, with all those bits & pieces, a handy little box was needed, which will be repurposed once my RT-Mod armor arrives.

 

 

Okay, so on with the build.

 

Last week I attached grip with epoxy glue, I also drilled out the barrel vent holes, even though they will be under the folded stock, I am also drilling out the holes in the stock, which will have a fake piece of pipe installed to give the illusion of a real stock (part of the kit from T-Jay")

 

 

I also ground the resin hex bolts (resin blobs) out and will be fitting real hex bolts.

 

Next I applied a quick coat of grey paint as a primer to the front half of the barrel, I mainly do this on kits I build so that I can spot any flaws easier, there were a few, especially a crack going up on of the T-Tracks.

 

 

I am currently in the process of sanding and scraping away the paint, once it's gone, the little flaws, divots and resin blobs will be easy to spot and deal with.

 

Whilst I realise this stage is overkill by me, I have one of those mentalities that if I know something bugs me, I need to sort it out, even if nobody but me would ever notice.

 

I realise there's not much to show at the moment, but stick with me, I have a few ideas I want to try, especially with Hengstler counter.

 

Any and all suggestions are welcome.

 

P.s I apparently need to learn something about including photos, the next thrilling instalment will be better....honest.

[Artshot]

Okay, I give up, what's the best way to get photos into a post ?

 

I have photo bucket, never used it before though, and what's the best image size to use to stop them wandering off the side of the post ?

 

Art

 

**Never mind, sorted it*

Edited January 24, 2015 by Artshot

[gmrhodes13[Staff]]

Looking good so far

[I'm Batman[501st]]

Looking good mate. You've got some nice add ons there! Looking forward to what you come up with

[Snaps[TK]]

Looking great so far!

[T-Jay[TK]]

Nice text to start your build

 

Following 

 

Looking forward to your next update...

Edited January 25, 2015 by T-Jay

[psychotropic]

I like the box. Seems handy. Cant wait to see more. 

[Artshot]

During the clean up of the front of my blaster by removing the primer I applied and discovering a few blobs of errant resin and a couple of hairline cracks, now filled with primer, I spotted a Hengstler counter on Ebay and won it

 

Since I only wanted it for the dials as they are the same typeface as the 400 series, I do not care it is a later model, I plan on building a fake top of the box for the Doopy to deal with this (I am toying with making it removable so I can put my eventual TK numbers in there).

 

With that in mind, has anybody got the dimensions of the reset button ?, the rest of the sizes I already have in my ever growing folder of reference.

 

More photos later, when I get in from work, where I am currently stuck....don't they know I have a blaster to build!!

 

Art

Edited January 26, 2015 by Artshot

[Artshot]

Okay, here we go with Part 2, or as I like to call it "How to fit a square peg into a square hole"

 

The photo below is where I am up to at the moment.

I have scraped away most of the primer I applied, this revealed a few cracks in the resin running up a T-Track, I carefully applied a bit of super glue into the area, once dried, I will clean the area and it's ready to receive a last cleanup when I am ready to paint, I also gave the primed area a rub down with a very weak solution of brush cleaner, this helps to remove any little stray specks of primer, then I washed the area with clean water.

 

Yup, all of the above is probably overkill, but it keeps me happy.

 

So, onto the magazine.

 

As has been established in multiple threads, the Gazmosis magazine is too accurate for the overly thick sides of the Doopy magazine receiver, so they need thinning down, this is not easy if you do not have any grinding type tools, like me.

 

So I fell back on an old favourite, I marked the edges that needed thinning with a black marker, which for me makes judging widths when thinning resin a lot easier than looking at resin against a resin background, watch out for transfer of colour, should you get your fingers on the black highlight, like me.

 

I am currently thinning down the receiver by scalpel, it's time consuming but on such a delicate area, I don't want to take chances, I am doing regular fit testing as I go.

 

Whittling resin, oh what fun.

 

https://i.imgur.com/05yfFtp.jpg

[R4ZORBL4DE]

Looking good !!

 

[T-Jay[TK]]

Seems you're on the right way, slowly moving forward...

 

Will you cut off that magazine or do you plan to use it in full size? Just trying to understand, what exactly you are currently hollowing out / thinning.

[Artshot]

Hey Tino

If you look at the photo of the Doopy magazine receiver, the sides that enclose the end of the magazine are too thick, marked in black to help keep the thickness uniform, the long sides maybe by about 1mm, the short sides by less, actually one short side is a bit thicker than the other so I will thin that first to even them up.

 

I do have a cheap version of a Dremel, but its prone to cutting out, so I do not use it much, besides I prefer the better precision I can get with a scalpel.

 

If you look at the magazine from "Gazmosis" you will see a slight step in on the right side as it looks in the photo, this side will actually face front when assembled, that step is where it should hit the front edge side of the magazine receiver.

 

Looking back at the Doopy magazine receiver you can see that it's quite built up on it's inside, as far as I see it there are two choices, either continue to hollow out the magazine receiver by about an inch or so, or cut the magazine down.

 

I am probably going to cut the magazine down as it's far easier than trying to grind out the interior of the magazine receiver.

 

My plan is to cut off less than I need and just fine tune with sanding until I get a perfect fit against the step in and the catch on the other short side, that way I hope to get a snug fit against the inside area of the magazine receiver.

 

Would you believe that's a lot more clearer in my head

[T-Jay[TK]]

Okay, got you now. Thought you were planning to hollow the complete magazine housing / receiver.

 

But it seems you're doing it the same way as I did...

[Artshot]

Hey Tino

I just had one of those "Doh!" Moments, your build is in my reference folder, which I often look back through to see how you solved some of the trickier improvements, never put two and two together.....I think I may have reference blindness

 

If I can get my build to even half your standard, I will be happy.

 

Would you happen to have the measurements of the Hengstler reset button to hand ?

[T-Jay[TK]]

No problem, Art. My thread ended up with A LOT more pages, than what I had expected and it sometimes confuses me too when searching for something specific

 

But I managed to find that comment with the Hengstler cover  It doesn't show the measurements of the reset button, but of the hole in the cover. Eye-sized my reset button to that (2 x 9mm) and it worked great.

 

Be aware of the shape of that little opening in the reset button. It is not round or square but both. Looks a bit like this:  (__) 

 

Hope this helped...

[Artshot]

Still working on this thread, just got distracted by my bright and shiny Sterling, although technically it's black and grimy, with a slight smell of oil.

 

The bonus is, I can use one to help build the other.

 

More photos coming soon.

[Artshot]

In an attempt to make my blaster build as authentic as I can, I have been comparing Sterling parts to resin parts, most of the parts are pretty accurate, however I think the end cap needs some work, that's my next challenge, I already have a couple of ideas.

 

 

The end cap ring bracket or whatever it's called, needs a bit of work, the resin part has a square channel going through it, with a blocked centre, however on examining the sterling part, it's actually just a circular channel going all the way through,the ring would have been bent and welded once it was threaded through the bracket, also the circular base area that attaches to the end cap is a lot thinner than the resin part, I can understand why the resin parts are the way they are as tolerances in resin while molding can be impractical for some shapes, but while I have the chance, I am going to try for a little more accuracy.

 

I will be using a new ring supplied as part of T-Jays mod set.

 

Standby by for the next instalment, where I either got away with it or deny everything.

[gazmosis[501st]]

Oh this is so delicious!

[Artshot]

Time to make an end cap.

Since the Doopy part has a small fill across the centre of the channel for the end ring, I needed to remove it……I love my Dremel.

 

 

 

Next I prepared a small amount of “Plumbers Maitâ€, This stuff is great for things like this as it sets quickly and set’s like cement with a great ability to be sanded and carved into.

 

As I pushed the “Plumbers Mait†into the channel I made sure to leave a small amount of channel through the centre, once I had it packed in, I wet the centre of the channel very slightly, this will help to stop the ring sticking.

 

Next I pushed the ring into place, making sure to keep a couple of mm distance between the ring and the edges of the catch/hinge, once it’s in place I finished packing the rest of the channel and smoothed it down.

 

 

Now here’s the boring part, the “Plumbers Mait†has a very quick setting time and has a small amount of expansion to it, so as it starts to dry, I gently kept rotating the ring through its axis, this will stop it sticking to the “Plumbers Maitâ€, also the water that was added will help lubricate the area, this stuff sets when wet.

 

Once the “Plumbers Mait†sets the ring will still be able to rotate, it may need a couple of very careful rotations later when fully dry but hopefully it will look a little more accurate.

 

After 24 hours everything is set solid and the ring still rotates, it actually has a little resistance which I like as it will not bounce about when the blaster is in a holster.

 

To my eye the base is still a bit thick, however I will leave it until I glue it to the end cap before I thin it anymore.

 

 

 

[T-Jay[TK]]

Very well done!

 

That is an often overlooked detail. Highly recommended for future builds.

[Artshot]

Evening All, just a small update.

 

I eventually got the hex bolts (thanks Dday) fitted to the end of the barrel, I drilled out a channel in the resin and just screwed them into position, added a spot of super glue to lock them tight.

 

 

I also decided to grind out the ejector port to add my own.

 

 

 

Soon as I got the port open I decided to try and thin down the resin, mainly in the cocking handle channel, which meant the internal black pipe had to go, which was a challenge, basically as soon as the port was clear, I ground through the pipe into the interior resin to cut the pipe, I made sure to do it in an area that is supported on the exterior by the magazine housing, once it was separated I just used a long skewer to carefully work the pieces apart, from the end cap end, then it was just a case of sliding it along and out.

 

Whilst I like most of the Doopy kit, the thickness of the barrel has always bugged me the advantage I have now is that I can use an actual sterling spring.

 

While looking at the photos you might see the black edging on the port, I do that so that when I thin the resin down, I can see what I am doing easier, try it, it works.

 

Looking at the port, it looks a little too wide, so I might have to fill it slightly once I double check sizes against my sterling.

 

Incidentally while I have checked parts, the resin ejector and barrel shields need work as there too thick, I might cheat at this point and fashion new ones out of 2mm plasticard.

 

 

Just a little comparison shot

 

Hope you enjoy the photos.

[Chip]

Looking forward to see where you take this

[Sly11[Admin]]

Excellent build so far, keep up the good work.

 

 

Sent from my iPad using Tapatalk

[T-Jay[TK]]

This is going to become even more interesting.

 

Really curious on how you will do that inner bolt...

[Artshot]

After a stupid amount of real world work, I have eventually been able to get back to my Doopy build or as I am currently calling it "Beware the Dremel, it gives you stupid ideas"

 

So, when I left you last, I had opened up the ejection port in readiness for creating and inserting a sliding bolt with attached cocking handle.....well, that failed, after initially getting over confident with my Dremel and clearing the area, it became apparent that it was going to be a lot of work thinning down the area and making it work, I did try, but I am the first to admit when things are not going right, so I gave up.

 

Of course I then had to rebuild the area, which has taken more time than I can really spare, but it's nearly done, so all's well, just need to add the rest of the bolt into a newly thinned out spring area and add a few details, it won't slide but the thinned sides should look better.

 

 

Of course, being a genious, I now realise that maybe I should have added the other part of the bolt, before I sealed the hole up.......Doh!