new latex handguards soon! (hopefully)

[Major[501st]]

I'm interested in a set.

 

Great job.

[R2Dan[TK]]

A little update: I have pulled as many sets as my supply of latex allowed me to, 9 sets with the first one being not too good. That makes 8 sets right now - The thing is, I'm now looking for a white paint that will work with the handguards.

 

I've tried 3 different paints so far, one was flexible enough but is a pain in the backside to apply, the other two will crack when you bend them too much, which is not a good option either.

 

I will try a few more paints this week - also different brushes for the one that seems to work the best - and once I'm happy with that I will make the first sets available! Not long to go

[Krkconsult[TK]]

A little update: I have pulled as many sets as my supply of latex allowed me to, 9 sets with the first one being not too good. That makes 8 sets right now - The thing is, I'm now looking for a white paint that will work with the handguards.

 

I've tried 3 different paints so far, one was flexible enough but is a pain in the backside to apply, the other two will crack when you bend them too much, which is not a good option either.

 

I will try a few more paints this week - also different brushes for the one that seems to work the best - and once I'm happy with that I will make the first sets available! Not long to go

 

You could try mixing a bit of white latex paint or white pigment for latex paint with some of you molding latex. paint or slush it into the mold then pour the rest of the casting latex into fill the back. that way the color will be permanently bonded hand back and you shouldn't need to paint it at all. A friend of mine who does latex masks does something similar for the base color on his masks.

 

Also you could mix pigment and or latex paint with some of the casting latex and paint it on a finished casting.

 

Kris

[R2Dan[TK]]

basically that's the best option I've found so far, white latex paint. But as I said, it's hard to apply it without deep brushstroke marks, which looks really dodgy - it might be a problem with my brushes though, that's why I'll try some others.

 

I might try and cast the handguards in white latex later, but for now I wanted them to be as screen-accurate as possible... yeah I know it's nuts

[Krkconsult[TK]]

basically that's the best option I've found so far, white latex paint. But as I said, it's hard to apply it without deep brushstroke marks, which looks really dodgy - it might be a problem with my brushes though, that's why I'll try some others.

 

I might try and cast the handguards in white latex later, but for now I wanted them to be as screen-accurate as possible... yeah I know it's nuts

 

Have you tried a single action air-brush with a course tip?

 

Kris

[TK-1287]

Mix latex in with paint and airbrush it. It will allow it to flex.

[R2Dan[TK]]

I haven't tried airbrushing it, as from what I've read on different forums this is not quite a good idea. If I can't find any other solution I will try this, but I don't really want to mess up my airbrush.

 

I'm sure I'll find a way

[troopermaster]

I think you will have a hard time getting paint to stick without some cracking. Just look at the original hand plates, paint flaking off everywhere. Good luck finding a suitable paint though!

[Stormtrooper]

Hi Dan,

 

Good to hear that you've got your first few castings done

 

As for the colouring... deep breath

 

When I was going through the prototyping stage for my latex handguards I spend a tone of time and money trying to get this right, so hopefully some of this will save you the same waste of time and hassle:

 

1. Latex colouring mixed-in with the latex is a BAD idea for White latex. I bough a large bottle of it from my latex supplier, and mixed the recommended 5% in with the latex. Finished handguard came out looking like oatmeal brown colour. So I doubled the ratio to 10% white latex pigment with the natural latex.... the end result was ever so slightly lighter but nowhere near what you would call WHITE

I contacted my supplier, and he basically said "White pigment doesn't work very well with latex, because it cures to a quite deep brown colour" WTF?! Why bother selling lWhite latex pigmnt then, if it doesn't work properly! LOL

 

Kirkconsult's suggestion about mixing some as a slush casting to put into your mould, forming a skin... and then pour natural latex once the skin has cured seems like a workable idea, except when I tried it the coloured skin shrank slightly as it cured, which meant when I filled it with liquid latex for the 'body' of the handguard, it didn't really conform to the shape of the plaster mould (essentially you end up using the cured latex skin as a mould, instead of the actual plaster mould itself!

 

2. I tried mixing some white acryllic paint with watered-down latex and bought an airbursh to try spraying the finished handguards with... basically it ended-up with a lumpy surface on the handguard, and the brown still showed through, making it like a pink/oatmeal colour

 

3. I tried painting on acryllic white paint with a fine brush, and as you have noted, you get brush marks... and the paint dries hard, so when the latex is flexed the paint cracks.

 

4. Final solution (before I gave up) I tried some white colouring dye for shoes / handbags and carefully painted it onto the finished handguards. This stuff isn't designed for rubber, but after you paint a few light strokes, the dye kind of closes-over the brushstrokes without wiping out any detail of the handguards beneath.

When it dries it is semi flexible.... it will bend enough to conform to the curvature of the back of your hand, but you can't double-over the handguard without the white dye cracking - however if you do crack it by mistake, when the handguard returns to it's normal shape the tiny cracks are practically impossible to see.

You'll need 2 or 3 coats of this stuff to give a finish similar to the Stormtrooper handguards in ANH, but it looks (to me anyways) just like what they used back when they were making the originals!

 

This trial and error process cost me a LOT of messing about, and I now have latex pigment, airbrush etc. that I have no use for! LOL I'll have to put it all up on eBay

 

So try some leather shoe / handbag dye, and if you wanna shoot me an email feel free at the email address below...

 

Good luck, and make sure to post some pics of the your finished, painted handguards

 

Cheers,

John

troopergloves@yahoo.com

 

PS - Troopermaster / Paul.... it took me so long typing my message that I hadn't seen your post, mate

Yep, with standard paint, or with shoe dye and 'over-flexing' of the handguards there definitey will be some cracking, but for accuracy nuts like ourselves the screenused semi-worn look is a bonus anyways!

[airpaint]

Hi,

 

I'm a noob to the trooper thing but was briefly involved in TV props years ago. I had to airbrush, latex stuff several times and found a few ways. Details will be sketchy here as I'm writing off the top of my head having just seen this post and it's hard to remember. The make-up way was to use PAX paint - you mix acrylic paint with prosthetic adhesive like Prosaide or equivalent, I'm sure a quick web trawl for prosthetic make-up supplies will find it. Unfortunately this stuff dries sticky (it IS glue, after all) and might need powdering, can't remember if it was OK without on latex.

 

When mixing anything with acrylic paint, buy expensive liquid acrylics made for airbrushing as they have the highest pigment load.

 

My big breakthrough was sourcing some balloon inks from a local (I kid you not) novelty balloon factory. These are solvent-based screen printing inks designed for printing "Happy Birthday" or whatever on commercial balloons so they will s-t-r-e-e-e-t-c-h with no cracking at all and they bite right into the latex surface too, very tough. You'll need the matching thinners as well and then you can spray them through a heavy-duty single-action airbrush. Again, if you web search this topic looking for screen inks (no internet back when I was doing this) I'm sure you'll find the names of the ink manufacturers to track stuff down. Minimum orders are usually the problem.

 

Finally, I had a lot of success with a home-brew paint made from rubber cement (I think that's what they call it in the US). Basically solvent-based contact adhesive, thinned out massively with the corresponding thinners (bought as cleaner) to spray. Here in the UK prop-builders can experiment with Evo-Stick, and use Evo-Stick cleaners as thinner. I'm not sure but I think maybe "Cow Gum" would be a US equivalent. Can't remember what I pigmented it with, might have used airbrush acylic or maybe polyester basecoat car paint as it's solvent based. It sprays on in thick "webs" and (makes great set-dressing spider webs if you don't thin enough!) builds quickly. Lot more trial and error involved than the balloon inks though and so they were my final solution.

 

You won't get a shiny gloss from any of this, more a matte-to-satin at best.

 

Finally, latex is best cast in very thin layers, allowing drying between layers. This is time consuming and very hands on but quicker overall. Heating up the moulds helps a lot (leave them in a hot place too if not doing it layer by layer)and a hair dryer zaps a thin layer very quickly. You can add fillers like talcum powder to thicken latex, this also stiffens it and slows drying as you get thicker layers. Powder the final piece to lose the surface tackiness too. Luckily, the balloon paint won't be tacky as a final layer.

 

Big, thick pieces of cast latex can still not be fully dry in weeks but as long as the outside layers are solid they'll be good to go. The outer skin dries first and seals the moisture in the centre, it's why thin layers and hollow casts work best. Thick rubber is best done with polyurethanes which have a catalyst to cure, like Smooth-On brand rubbers. Very tough too.

 

I've no idea how the Star Wars stuff was done but if you slush-moulded the latex in several thin layers so it built up thickly on the edges of the mould you could probably get away with leaving them hollow behind. Powder-stiffened latex would be rigid enough and you could always pop in a piece of thin craft foam or something to fill the void to stiffen further. If you were being very precious you could paint 3 layers or so of latex over the foam sheet whilst in the moulds and seal it entirely inside.

 

Finally, remember that although it's unbelievably tough and ideal for props in the short-term latex doesn't last well over time, goes kind of dark and brittle (talking years here) eventually.

[VacTrooper]

if these are ever produced again in a run, i will be interested. are these used for hero hands as well? or just stunt? or BOTH?

[R2Dan[TK]]

Good news guys! It looks like I found a spraypaint that is flexible enough when dry. Flexible enough means you can bend the handguard completely and it won't crack! I have only tried it on the backside of one of my handguards so far, but I'm very pleased with the result.

 

I will try it on a good pull next, the downside is, it takes about 2-3 days to dry, but I guess it's worth the wait

 

As I said before, once I get one set finished, I will be taking orders

 

Here's a pic of me bending the spraypainted one, the paint doesn't show any signs of a crack anywhere! Cool

[R2Dan[TK]]

Here's a set, just painted with the same spraypaint:

 

 

I'll give it two days to fully dry, then I'll check if it's flexible enough. The waiting game continues... oh boy!

 

Oh, one more thing, if you're considering to order one set. Although they look nice and smooth on the pics, the surface is a little rough - it's not totally clean, but not horrible either. If you want something "flawless", you should probably stick to the vacformed handguards. These are for the "I want to look as crappy as the troopers on screen" guys

[airpaint]

Looks, good, shiny and smooth unlike my solutions. What's the brand/type of paint?

 

And are you sure you have enough R2 units?

[R2Dan[TK]]

It's Duplicolor "color spray". It's a synthetic resin paint, not acrylic. Bought it at the DIY store next door

 

You mean two full-sized droids and a whole bunch of smaller ones are enough? Phew, I thought I had to get at least two more astromechs... good, then I can start working on the protocol droid instead

[airpaint]

If it's truly a synthetic (the stuff they spray trucks, vans, buses, etc with) then it will stay softer than lacquer paints even when fully cured so might be ideal for the handguards.

 

I'm sure it comes with instructions but synthetics have some quite odd characteristics when it comes to to recoating. You can build layers (if necessary, never used it in an aerosol but it's usually pretty thick stuff) as long as you stick rigidly to the recommended re-coating times (ten minutes or whatever's recommended). Once it starts to cure, you need to leave it for a long time or it'll craze (like crazy ) when you apply another coat. This will be at least a day or two and can be up to a week if slow thinners are used (unlikely in an aerosol)! Some paints you can get away with taking liberties on recoat times but pay heed to the instructions with a synthetic - it's a really easy and forgiving paint to use in all other ways though, good find in an aerosol can.

 

Also sanding to key the surface for further paint coats can release solvents from inside and cause the wrinkling/crazing thing so best to leave a while after sanding too.

 

I'm sure none of the above will apply to the handguards but if you have this stuff lying around for future projects it might save a bit of heartache.

 

Cheers,

 

Guy

[R2Dan[TK]]

thanks for that - It's always great to learn something new

[ThayNerd[TK]]

Those look great!

[TK-1287]

Very nice paint! I hope the results turn out well. What glue would you recommend getting these to affix to the glove?

[R2Dan[TK]]

Alright! What can I say? The spraycan paint was a total success. A little more than 24 hours later, the paint is still flexible, gives a nice finish and my first handguards are DONE!

 

I just glued them on a set of rubber gloves, used basic superglue, worked like a treat, they follow each movement and don't seem to "pop off" again!

 

I just took two pics of the finished right side, I will have more of both sides tomorrow, when I'll open the order thread - Yes, I know John is doing his as well right now, but that way you can choose

 

Mine WILL NOT come with the rubber gloves, simply because I don't have them at hand... I do have 2 or 3 sets in Medium that I could spare, but I don't have a large supply...

 

A set will run 20 Euros/$25 shipped, painted up and ready to be glued on

 

Here are the two (rather dark, as it's in the middle of the night here in Krautistan) pics I took of the right side, better ones will follow in the order thread tomorrow

 

 

Hope you guys like them! I do

[R2Dan[TK]]

Ok guys, these are up for order now!!!

 

Check this thread for more details: Latex handguards

[Vaj]

the best on the market bro!

[TK8280]

the best on the market bro!

 

Marcus, please remember that expressive statements such as this can cause un-wanted friction between other fellow members of this forum, next time please take this into consideration

 

thanks Brother

[R2Dan[TK]]

Thanks Marcus

 

But to make that clear, I told John already that he was my inspiration and also a good reference, I don't really feel like I'm competing with him. After all I thought he wasn't going to do any of those for a while, that's why I picked up that project in the first place

 

His handguards look great, and I fully understand anyone who buys his. I've actually talked to him about a swap, now mine are done

[Stormtrooper]

Thanks Bernard and Dan for the comments.... I don't think Marcus meant anything bad about my handguards by his support of Dan's handguards... I certainly don't have a problem with it.

 

In fact, I'm encouraged that someone else is offering ANH latex handguards, after all these years of vac-formed plastic handguards it's great for the trooper-fan to finally have a choice of CCURATE handguard - whether it's from me or Dan

 

After all, it's like comparing an AP suit to a TE2 suit... both are a step up from an Armor FX, so it's all good!

 

Happy trooping everyone!

 

Cheers,

John