Rubies E11 mod

[artimorty]

Hi there again.

Today I've start using milliput on the handle, to cover the mess I got there. I want this smooth, so I use water to get the putty going easier, but is taking longer than usual to dry.

So, I also started the charging handle. For that I inserted a thin stripe of sintra inside a plastic tube I have that luckily is the right size. This is to reinforce the strength and allow me to bend it without flexing, and maintaining constant diameter.

Then, using a heat gun very slightly applied heat on the marks I made where I want the tube to bend.

Double check with the template

Now added more milliput to get the rounded end and engrossing the base.

Annnnnnd... I'm not very good at waiting, so, while the milliput hardens enough to allow sanding, I've gone to mod the t track on the middle of the right side of the tube. This t track is much too long and gets up to the flash guard. So I took it off, first with a hobby saw, then modeling with the dremel, and finishing the area with sanding sticks.

Thanks for watching.

 

 

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Edited April 14, 2017 by artimorty

[artimorty]

Hi.

Some issues with the charging handled have led me to failure. Don't know why but the milliput wasn't curing right as usual. Though this stuff is pretty forgiving, I don't know if the proportions I mixed last time were erroneous or if I used too much water to smooth it while it was very fresh or whatever but It never cured properly and when I tried to sand the surface as usual, it just teared off like dry plasteline...

So I went for harder stuff and changed to tamiya modeling putty. This isn't better or worse, just different. It dries faster and is harder to sand, and gets stickier much faster so is somehow difficult to get into shape on time. Another point is that is harder to sand than the base plastic tube I used, so I had to work carefully there.

Once dried and sanded used tamiya sandind paste to fill the gaps and get a smooth finish. This is how the piece shows now. Happy with it.

Now trying to figure out if I want a spring in there or cover the whole charging slot from the inside with a piece of pipe and no spring shown. Any suggestions?

 

 

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[djmatrix09[TK]]

Spring. All the way. I used 18ga wire.

 

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[artimorty]

Spring. All the way. I used 18ga wire.

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Ok. I'll try. Honestly I was trying to skip this, but you're right. Once started, why don't try to go all the way? Now checking the e11 blaster reference to see how to get this done. Copied your 18 gauge wire suggestion. Hope to post some progress soon. Thanks.

[Cicero1981]

Man, I must commend you for a great build so far!  I know it's a lot of work taking all of these photos and posting your progress.  

I have really enjoyed watching this come together.

 

Cheers!

[artimorty]

Man, I must commend you for a great build so far! I know it's a lot of work taking all of these photos and posting your progress.

I have really enjoyed watching this come together.

 

Cheers!

Thanks Jason.

Know that there is people watching this is really an incentive to continue all the way. It's some commitment I must meet and is one I do very happily. I'm sorry if it's coming along slower than expected but the few hours I steal from every week life are very fun and the progress is somehow rewarding. Thanks for your comments.

Cheers.

[artimorty]

Well well well,... here it is what I've come up with for the back part of the bolt and the spring area. A couple of days of work plus the previous thinking period.<br>

First, and knowing somewhere along the process I had to use black paint, I took the chance and made an inner barrel from pvc pipe engrossed with electrical tape and a bigger pvc ring. This piece was hit with transparent adhesive promoter to be latter painted.

Then I stepped forward to the real deal. This are pieces I used for the back part of the bolt: a wood bar and two pieces of pvc pipe that can be place one inside another.

A rough fit test took me to think this could work, here a strange pic holding all up to get gravity aid to keep everything more or less in place.

The pieces had to be cut in halves (the wood rod only in the top rear section) to accommodate the massive hengstler counter part that goes inside the other half of the gun.

Then was time to prepare my spring... using a bit of one many pieces of wire I had laying around, I took the thickest I could work by hand and rolled it over the same wood bar I used for the bolt. About 15 loops done.

Then I covered the bolt with sanding putty and sanded it flat to get rid of the wood crevices and imperfections. Secondly, hit it with primer. After that, the charging handle, the bolt and the inner barrel were spray painted in bright black.

Once dried, the first two were chromed with metallic spray paint.

This is how the guts look in a fit test... nothing really hard core science fiction fancy.

Aaaaand here is a fit test, all held in place by simple two side tape and gravity itself, nothing glued yet, that's the reason for the strange angle in the pictures, I'm holding the thing over my head.

Hope you like it!<br><br><br>

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Edited April 27, 2017 by artimorty

[djmatrix09[TK]]

Oh man! It looks great. Good work.

 

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[artimorty]

Oh man! It looks great. Good work.

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Thank you Andrew!

You were right, wasn't as hard to do as I feared and it looks far better with the spring. Feel free to make any more suggestions and I'll try to make them. Thanks for watching...

[artimorty]

Hello again.

Some nice work started on the blaster today. Isn't finished yet but I'm anxious to share with you all. This is the one mod I've waiting to get done since the early beginning, as you can see in the initial pictures, where some pencil shadow appears at both ends of each t track. I'm drilling the main tube at both ends of each t track.

For this, I started making a circular template the size of the holes already present, done in a scratch piece of sintra, opened in one side to accommodate to the t track.

 

With it, I traced the areas I wanted to carve.

 

Then using a fine drill on the dremel, carefully took out the marked areas.

 

And this is how it looks now. I have to smooth the contours, probably with a rounded minifile and rebuild the end of the t tracks to give the appearance that they come a little inside the barrel... and some minor damage that inevitably happens using a high spinning rotary tool close to this soft plastic.

 

 

Very pleased with this mod. Feels like not too much more to be done before gluing both sides.

Edited May 11, 2017 by artimorty

[BULL65]

I am going to be getting a Rubies blaster very soon, and was going to mod it going by the video on YouTube by HappyTrooper.. Which I WILL do, but I think I am going to go your route too, if you don't mind, and try my hand at what you've done as well!

[artimorty]

I am going to be getting a Rubies blaster very soon, and was going to mod it going by the video on YouTube by HappyTrooper.. Which I WILL do, but I think I am going to go your route too, if you don't mind, and try my hand at what you've done as well!

Hi Mark.

Great idea to get a rubies! You'll see that with very little you can improve it a long way, as you can find in many examples here on the boards. HappyTrooper has also been a great inspiration to me and I follow him in YouTube and used some of his tutorials myself. He has a couple of great threads here.

If I can be of any help during your mod, you are more than welcome to ask. I'm doing this so slow that probably you would catch me up along the way! Good luck and hoping to see your build around.

Cheers.

[djmatrix09[TK]]

I am going to be getting a Rubies blaster very soon, and was going to mod it going by the video on YouTube by HappyTrooper.. Which I WILL do, but I think I am going to go your route too, if you don't mind, and try my hand at what you've done as well!

You can do a lot with a Rubies! Just takes some TLC.

 

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[BULL65]

How did you get the halves apart? You mentioned putting it in the freezer overnight, but then what?

[artimorty]

Hi mark. On this issue I walked on others footprints... followed humperdingle's advice and others. Once you remove the screws, if you try to separate both halves apart, can get to brake them. The glue is very hard. As adviced by others, I let the piece rest on the freeze overnight and this got the glue more brittle and easier to come apart. Since I had already by then redone the t tracks and removed the d ring, I could find many holes and feeble spots along the gun where I could insert a round knife or a flat screwdriver and force it open. Not easy but easier with the cold glue. Go slow and take your time, little at a time, and you will be ok.

Edited May 24, 2017 by artimorty

[artimorty]

Ok. Now finishing the t tracks.

Using the dremel with a milling head, I sculpted the ends of every t track. The goal is to get them give the impression that are bending over the edge of the holes and go somehow inside.

 

For this I had to mod both lateral sides of each end, curving them.

Here you can see the difference in the central t track, the left side is done, the right isn't yet. Marked in red is where I want to carve.

After that, all the new areas have been sanded and smoothed with sandpaper and minifiles, and also I used milliput for minor corrections on the shape both of the t track and the holes.

Here is how this came out.

 

I think they look much better now, and hopefully, using different kinds of paint in the tube (hammered?) and the t tracks (flat black?) will help to sell the trick that both are different materials.

I've also sanded the upper central t track trying to make it thinner, because it is almost twice as thick as the rest. Sorry. No pics of that yet.

 

Well, this is done. Now thinking about what to do with the scope.

Thanks for watching!

 

 

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Edited May 25, 2017 by artimorty

[djmatrix09[TK]]

Wow, looking good. I remember that top track on the blaster being a pain because it's on the seam. Also the depth of the material is really thin. I had to fill with gap filler, and seal. Total pain.

 

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[artimorty]

Wow, looking good. I remember that top track on the blaster being a pain because it's on the seam. Also the depth of the material is really thin. I had to fill with gap filler, and seal. Total pain.

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Hi Andrew. Thanks for your advice. For obvious reasons, the final mod on the t track on the top must wait until I glue both halves of the blaster together. You are right. Probably will mean a great bunch of putty. For the time being only trying to make it a little thinner. Let's see how it looks like once glued.

[discostu]

This I see an awesome thread, I'm properly enjoying the posts, looking forward to seeing the finished blaster.

[artimorty]

This I see an awesome thread, I'm properly enjoying the posts, looking forward to seeing the finished blaster.

Thank you very much Stuart (by the way, greeeat nick discostu ). I'm also looking forward to see this finished! It's taking much more than expected and it's delaying many of my much more serious sw projects, but when I try to speed this up I see another thing I can improve and inevitably all get slowed. This started only as a learning project to see what I can achieve out of a humble toy blaster, to learn something about e11s and to experiment with technics and putty and resins and glues and the lot... but like some Frankenstein's monster it's taking live on his own... thank you all for your support. Hopefully we will take this to a finish state not too long.

Cheers...

Edited May 26, 2017 by artimorty

[BULL65]

Artimorty, you've paved the road, we're just following you!
Do your ears ring? I've both praised and cursed your name working on mine, hahahaha
Impatient man I am, I went ahead on seperating my halves without waiting for a response. Nothing broke, thank GOD, but you are right, it was rough! After doing the top t-track, there was that gap, and also when I sanded flush the molded d-ring, there seemed to be a notch there, so using an exacto, and flat head screwdriver, I carefully slid it along the seam. You could hear "pops" as the glue let go. I was terrified that it was the plastic, but nope, just the glue!
I won't plague everyone with pics, as it's pretty much what you have done already! This is frustrating, but I am having a BLAST doing this! Thank you so VERY much for doing this!!
Mark

[artimorty]

Artimorty, you've paved the road, we're just following you!

Do your ears ring? I've both praised and cursed your name working on mine, hahahaha

Impatient man I am, I went ahead on seperating my halves without waiting for a response. Nothing broke, thank GOD, but you are right, it was rough! After doing the top t-track, there was that gap, and also when I sanded flush the molded d-ring, there seemed to be a notch there, so using an exacto, and flat head screwdriver, I carefully slid it along the seam. You could hear "pops" as the glue let go. I was terrified that it was the plastic, but nope, just the glue!

I won't plague everyone with pics, as it's pretty much what you have done already! This is frustrating, but I am having a BLAST doing this! Thank you so VERY much for doing this!!

Mark

Hey Mark!

Sorry I couldn't get back to you on time with my tips. Life quite often claims my sinner soul out of the fisd... but I'm glad to know you could make it on your own. Don't hesitate to post here anything you like and share the way you solve the problems ahead. Thank you for your kind words.

Cheers.

[sla73]

wow, what a very cool fun build artimorty!

 

[artimorty]

wow, what a very cool fun build artimorty!

 

 

 

Thanks Bryn! Honored by your commnet. Your doopy beast it's outstanding. I'm very impressed with the scope and the paint job... any advice will be welcomed.

Let's see what I manage to do for my scope...

[artimorty]

Greetings again.

Some progress last couple of days.

First I tried to diminish the thickness of the big t track on top. For this, I used a stone head on the dremel and pass after pass, slowly took out material until I was satisfied. Now the walls surrounding the gap on the top of the t track are much thinner and once glued and filled will make it the same width than the other t tracks. As usual, minor damage occurred on the base that will be solved later.

 

After that I went for the scope. I'm trying to give some "content" to the interior of the piece. For that, I dived in my "spare plastic treasure bin" (I bet we all have one) to look for some pieces that can do the job. I selected the two black ones on the next picture.

For the front end of the scope, I used a Vallejo putty cap, sanded to shape and placed inside.

For the rear end, I used the other black plastic piece. Sorry, but I can't recall where this came from. Same process. Sanded it until it fit properly in place.

Then I cut two discs on a transparent methacrylate sheet I have around an placed inside the new pieces as for lenses.

Quite happy with them. Now that I see the pictures, may be I could use a bigger disc on the rear part... don't know.

 

Thank you all.

 

 

 

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Edited May 31, 2017 by artimorty