Halo Spartan Laser Metal & Fiberglass Airsoft Beast

For better or worse, I've made as many reasonable repairs as are practical. Everything else will be cleaned up in post production.

I made the repairs using Bondo and scratch filling primer. The filler primer really worked well sealing the porous surfaces left by the micro cracking. I had a nearly full can of gloss blue sitting around blighting my shelf, so I used it to get the final gloss coat on the mold surface.

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Where you see faint circles, that's where I highlighted final repairs that needed done with a Sharpie. After I made those repairs, I put on the blue coat, but the Sharpie bled through. No impact on the mold, just an unexpected result.


Next up, these will receive several layers of mold release wax--yeah, we've been down that road before. After the wax, they'll be sprayed with polyvinyl alcohol (PVA), a water-based mold release film. Following that, they'll be layed up in fiberglass mat and resin.

I'm excited to see this project back on track.

Redshirt

Looking up, my friend; I wait in anticipation again.

I glassed up the final pieces from my molds. Big sticky job, but I have a lot more confidence in the parts pull than I did for the mold making part of this project. I took my final molds and waxed and buffed them five times with Mequiar's Mold Release Wax. I would have forgone the mold release wax entirely since it failed to spectacularly on the last job, but the truth is, I needed the wax to fill in some of the remaining porosity in my molds. After the wax, I sprayed everything down with a layer of polyvinyl alcohol (PVA) mold release. I applied that with an automotive touch-up gun. The PVA is responsible for the purple tint of the molds. It dries to become like the layer of paper on the outside of an onion. Following that, I layed up the fiberglass mat using the barrel rollers to get out the air bubbles and to force the mast into the contours. This time, I had no catalyzation problems, so I expect the parts will come out just fine.


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This is my mold release wax.


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Using the roller to get out the bubbles



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The new parts cure in the sun while I try to get all the resin off of me.


Next up, removing the parts from the mold and assessing the way ahead.

V/R
Redshirt

I heard from Nokrot that you had your Al. Parts tacked together. If you are interested, I can weld them out for you.

I got the excess glass and resin trimmed from my molded parts and began to join them together into recognizable assemblies. I realized my join lines were a little spurious--didn't give a smooth or consistent line up. Rather than letting the mold lines tell me where things needed to join, I let my measurements of the original models, double-checked against the space requirements for the airsoft parts, determine how wide each assembly needed to be. In the end, I didn't have to go overscale on anything, but it was a good exercise to go out to reconsider how the end game would work out. So, I needed a jig to hold parts the correct distance apart. I made that out of plywood, basically a bottom with two parallel walls to clamp the parts to. I needed a wider one for the mid shroud. I positioned the parts in the jig and if there was any overlap, I trimmed it. Where there were gaps, I knew I'd need to fill them with fiberglass.


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Where there was good contact between parts, I created an initial bond with super thick cyanoacrylate (super) glue, then kept things moving by spraying the join with an insta-set agent (on the right).



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I then covered the whole join area with a narrow strip of fiberglass cloth and saturated that with the glue before working out the bubbles with my gloved fingers for an instant and very strong bond between parts that is almost as strong as fiberglassing.


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Here's a better look at this type of join, this time on the inside of the front shroud. You can see at the back how bid some of my gaps were.


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Here is a closeup of the joint on the back of the upper receiver. Plenty of detail work remains.


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Almost as good as a fiberglass bond is not the same as a fiberglass bond, so I followed up by fiberglassing both sides of the seams. The superglue and glass joins were made for the jig alignment process, but would be too thin for the later sanding and Bondo work.



Redshirt

With the parts joined, I needed to look forward to details that would need to be cut in as well as making robust attachment points for the fiberglass parts to join to the metal lower receiver. The green material is fiberglass reinforced Bondo. I'm also using this to build any details on the outer surface as well. This stuff is much tougher and chip resistant than regular Bondo. Naturally, it is also harder to shape, but the air file makes short work of it.

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Air file shapes the side lights. Bondo added to make sure all of the lights are the same depth.



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Getting there.



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Initial join of the front piece. This is still a weak spot.



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Here's the progress on all the parts. I've run all of the flat areas across the table sander. You can see there is still some work remaining to level the sides.



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Can you find the piece of glove that is now a permanent part of this prop?



The next job is to reinforce the parts internally.

Redshirt

I wanted to start with a thank you to everyone whose following this thread. The community support helps keep things moving through setbacks and frustrating bouts of imagineering.


And now, on with the update:

Although the parts are fairly strong, they need to be able to handle someone falling on them as well as retain their shape if they get hot. I used core mat, a polyester fiber honeycomb cloth, to add ribs throughout. I made a special effort to reinforce the openings and points where panels will fit together. This stuff gets dipped in catalyzed resin and applied to the inner surface of the part before working it with the barrel roller to get the resin soaked into the polyester fibers. Maximum strength would come from covering over this layer with a layer of fiberglass, but I didn't have room to add that layer and have it finish well since my ribbing is up against the edges of the pieces.


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Here's the front of the upper receiver including the immortalized finger tip of my glove.


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More parts, more glove bits.


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The back of the upper receiver.


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The joint between the front and rear of the upper receiver is the weakest point, I reinforced that area in two planes--in case I need to melee someone!


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Front shroud reinforcement, more glove chunks.


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Small ribs added fore and aft on the mid-shroud to help it hold it's shape.


Now that everything is properly assembled and strengthened, I can focus on the detailing of the surfaces. I will add in all of the details and get everything looking really crisp, but will not detail edges or attachment points until the lower receiver is ready to fit these parts to. Thanks again for following.

Redshirt

More work on the parts:

Joining the parts left some low and flat spots as well as curves with
the wrong radius. Traditionally, you'd fill these with Bondo, but for
this build I need as much of the material to be structural as possible.
This meant additional fiberglass--light and strong. I carefully took a
Sharpie and marked the fill areas with hash marks, then built up layers
of fiberglass mat and resin until the faults were filled.

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Here's the top edge of a seam on the mid shroud. You can see gaps and
surface blemishes as well as how flat it is on top when it should be
rounder.


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All filled in--all business. No excess resin=lightest & strongest glass job


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Leveling at the very back of the receiver


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Solving an asymmetry problem at the top rear of the receiver. This region will hold the BB hopper.

That's it for tonight.

Redshirt

This is looking very nice - Are you gonna make a matching uniform?

How are the mechanicals coming along? I mean, do you have the internal mounting points figured out yet?

Technically, I have a matching uniform, but it is not airsoft capable. It is made of reinforced cardboard and not particularly mobile--can't kneel or run. It does work to apprehend tin-pot dictators fairly well. Its sole purpose in construction was to win a Halloween costume contest.

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I might consider building a simple marine outfit later, but right now I'm just trying to get this doing. I have an engine rebuild and an M72 LAW airsoft conversion on the back burner vying for attention.

As far as the internals and mounting points go, it fairly far along with the mech box cage, folding front grip, and internal trigger mechanism fairly well sorted. If we ever get to airsoft in Wilcox again, I'll bring the project along.


Redshirt

I've been busy getting the fiberglass parts finished. One thing that I
noticed when I tried to line everything up was the overbite on the front
shroud. The Pep file I used ended up with the front shroud overhanging
the upper receiver by just over 1/2 inch. Not too bad looking in the
open position, but I'm building this to open and close. It looked goofy
closed, so I set upon it with an air saw.

I received some great news this week in the form of sponsorship to help
offset the cost of the build. Echo 1 USA, thought it was cool to see me
using their components and offered to help with some parts and spares
to ease the cost of getting this built. This week I got barrels,
chambers, and hop-ups to keep me moving forward. I've been very happy
with the quality and reliability of their guns and parts, so I'm happy
to subtly (and not so subtly) sprinkle their logo across my build pics.
Thanks Brian!



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Here you can see the extent of the overbite.



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Marked for cutting. The green material is the fiberglass reinforced
Bondo. I used it exclusively on the outside of the parts because it is
much tougher than ordinary filler. You can see the other parts coming
together in the background.


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Chop, cut, rebuild. I glued the parts together with thick superglue and then fiberglassed it from the inside.


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Finished! Also, a NASCAR-style subliminal nod to my sponsor!

If you carefully compare it to the game model or the pep/original piece,
you'll see that a lot of edges and angles are re-profiled on this
finished piece. This is because the game model is never closed. The
parts don't actually mate up as rendered. This took a lot off filler
and fiberglass to make right. The front grip is another problem. If
you look at the game model, there is no way it can rotate closed from
the depicted pivot point. That will be another day's problem.

This, and all pieces, will take more finishing at the end of the
project. My push right now is to get all the major surface details
right, but now dwell on edges or attachment points. These will get
worked when the lower receiver is done.

My next update has the fiberglass done and me ready to move on to the metal work.

Redshirt

I thought that part did have an overhang....
....searches through pics....
I guess it is an even alignment - in all the pics it does look like it has an overbite...
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Even there, it looks like an overbite.

Brynjolfr wrote:I thought that part did have an overhang....
....searches through pics....
I guess it is an even alignment - in all the pics it does look like it has an overbite...
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Even there, it looks like an overbite.

I see you have found the legendary woodwork of Lee Keegan. He has some amazing work to his credit. You are right that his model has an overbite. His replica is of the more primitive Halo Reach version (which is actually supposed to predate the Halo 3 gun). I spent a lot of hours reviewing the replay tapes (of me earning my Redshirt moniker) to make sure I really needed to take a saw to what was basically a finished part.

Redshirt

The fiberglass parts are finally finished. Sort of. I've got them all
shaped to fit well together and added all of the surface details to get
then ready to mate up with the lower receiver when it is finished. What
I haven't finished are the bottom edges where they butt against the
lower receiver or the attachment points between the parts. The final makeover will have
to wait until the lower receiver and all of the mechanical bits are
complete. So, in the meantime, here are the upper parts in all their
glory with all the tiny details cut in.

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All the edges crisp and straight! You wouldn't believe how much time with the air file, Bondo, and needle files it took to make all of those sharp stepped edges.



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Here's how everything fits together.



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Finally, just for a reminder of how big this is, I rounded up the sad remains of my Pepped lower receiver and fitted it up.

This was a long crawl from mid-April's posting of finished blanks being prepped for the disastrous mold making process.

The Pep patterns for the lower receiver will serve as the templates for
cutting aluminum to build the lower receiver. As there are few curved
or sculpted surfaces in the metal portion, I will build up the sides
from layers of aluminum, welded together.


Next up, Metal Health

Redshirt

As always, excellent work.

How are you bracing the internals to the shell, or is that what you are working on now?

This update is a huge turning point for the project as I switch gears from
resins and epoxies to metal and welding.



The plan for the lower receiver is simply the weld it from aluminum.
Unfortunately, I don't have a mill or lathe, so I will have to hand machine my
parts. Once I've welded together the sides and welded them to the components of
the spine, I'll add in mountings and the major mechanical fittings before
bonding on the exterior cosmetic details.



The key phrase in the above plan was, "Hand machine." The only way to get a
perfectly symmetrical receiver is to make perfectly symmetrical parts, no easy
feat without a mill. My method is to bond two sheets of metal with hot melt glue
and cut the parts in pairs on the band saw. The pairs remain bonded as they get
machined with the table sander, air sander, air file and router table.



That's right, I said router table. Using a router table to machine metal is
risky. You need to wear welding gloves, heavy clothing, eye/face protection, and
hearing protection. Even so, there is still risk. A mill turns at hundreds of
RPM, a router turns at thousands. If the bit grabs the metal hard, it will try
to slice the metal through your hands before throwing it at your face, stomach,
or the nice car on the other side of the garage. This technique is not for the
inexperienced. For this reason, I really don't want to get into the how-to here
in the forum. PM me if you have metalworking experience and want to discuss
it.



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A look at the pieces forming the front of the lower receiver after cutting on
the band saw and squaring with the table sander.







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All the pieces laid out together to check fit, and because they look so cool
in shiny metal. Each of these pieces is actually two pieces bonded together for
identical machining.







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Heres a step cut made using the router table









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Another view of all the parts. Note the bevel on the rear of the receiver.
The router makes a fairly rough initial cut. I'll need to dress it with the
sander before welding.







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Here are several router cuts, including the cut out for the grip. The bevel
along the rear of the main piece as well as the step cut on the bottom are
router work as well.







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This is a staged photo! I don't make router cuts without heavy welding gloves
and all the other safety gear. This show how I made the cut out for the
grip.







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Here's the setup for cutting the bevel in the grip cut out.







Well, there it is, the start of the metal work. Should be awesome when it
comes together.





Redshirt

I had not even thought kof using a router on metal - and now that I think of it, I would bet it's like shaping a mower blade while it's running Thank you, no, I'll stick to heavy plastic and very thin, very very thin, metal sheets that I can jig/scroll saw.

Still impressive, very.

I was surprised the shift to the metal work didn't generate more,
"You'll shoot your eye out responses." Anyway, the devil IS in the
details, so here are first round of metal detail parts in the making.

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OK, starting with the worst image first. These are paired-up pieces
about to undergo a second round of filing sanding and routing. You can
see on the detail parts for the zombie killer (what I call the melee
handle that sticks out of the front of the Splaser) that I haven't
finished the router cuts to hollow it out. The cutouts in the other
pieces are fully roughed out.



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Here are the other detail parts about to be heated and bonded so they can be machined as a unit for symmetry.



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The zombie killer! All machined. I was particularly happy with the
cutout results on the router. You can see that I still retain at least
five fingers!



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Zombie killer and fore grip. If you compare the fore grip to the game
model you can see the design mods I needed to make it functional.

Once the detail parts are all machined, I'll lay them out with the
fiberglass parts to get a taste of what the final configuration will be.

Redshirt

Not really actual progress here, just me playing with the completed
detail pieces for inspiration. Here is everything laid out to see how
it will go together. After this, the detail pieces will go into storage
until the very end of the project as they will be bonded with adhesive
that won't withstand the heat of welding.

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This just represents one side of the metal receiver stacked up to see
how it will look and mate up to the fiberglass upper receiver. Next I
will weld together the individual sides as I begin the assembly of the
receiver.

Redshirt

Time to bring all the metal together and start welding up the receiver.
After hand machining the pairs of parts to be exact matches to the
maximum extent possible, I split them apart, cleaned off the glue and
lined them up carefully to get the halves lined up before clamping them
in place and starting the welding. For this part of the project, each
side was made of three parts. The two main parts were bead welded
together with the third (forward) piece plug welded to the other two
parts. I'm using the Eastwood Alumiweld kit with additional rods from
Harbor Freight. This setup is more analogous to brazing as the metals
are quite different in hardness. At it's best, this system does achieve
a penetrating weld, but the welds are still more brittle than an
aluminum wire MIG weld.

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Plug welding the forward piece.



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Close up of the plug welding. I clamped together both halves during
welding to help ensure the two halves ended up as identical as possible.



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With the welding finished, it was time to sand the two halves together to eliminate any asymmetry.



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As you can see, the preparation paid off with the two halves ending up with very little variance between them.



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If the sides didn't end up symmetrical, I will end up with a warped or
twisted receiver when I try to weld them together into a complete
assembly.



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Here's the result at the end of this welding session. I'm really happy with where this is going!

Next time--joining it all together.

Redshirt

I have $20. Can you make me one?

Lovin' the work.

For this update, I've welded the two halves together using sections of
1.25 inch U-channel. During this session, I only welded in the largest
straight sections to ensure the receiver was perfectly straight from end
to end without warps or twists. I did accomplish this, eventually.

I started using two torches. I had an assistant using the polypropylene
torch to heat the massive sides while I did the welds using the
oxygen/polypropylene welder.




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Here you see that two rear sections are already in and we are welding up a section in the front.



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Oh crap! Look at the sag! We got the spacer too hot while trying to
bring up the temperature of the sides. Wee had to heat it up an knock
it out, clean up the surfaces and cut out another spacer. Grrr. I
blame my unskilled assistant.





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Using just the oxygen/polypropylene hobby welder setup, I was able to get a good result on the second try.


The whole project worked out great with the receiver ending up perfectly
straight when we were done. I now have this beautiful metal receiver I
just can't stop staring at!

I'll continue to add in the more complex spacer sections until the
entire spine is filled in. The section around and below the trigger
will be removable for maintenance and electronics access.

Redshirt

Another update with no actual progress, just taking time to see how
everything goes together. In this set of pics, I've placed all the
parts together to see how everything is going to look, as well as show
just how big this thing is.


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I've taken the other metal parts (foregrip, zombie smasher) and set them
up in position on the lower receiver and fiberglass parts. It's good
to get a glimpse of what the final product is going to look like.




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Some fit issues. The forward part of the fiberglass upper receiver is
not perfectly parallel to the back half. I'll have to cut, reshape, and
re-fiberglass the narrowest point to get the metal and fiberglass to
mate up perfectly.



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There are a couple of spots where the fiberglass angles should match the
angles in the metal, so I'll need to re-profile more of the fiberglass
in those spots. It looks like it's nearing completion, but she's just a
hollow shell with a lot of welding, machining, soldering and sanding
still to go.




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Trying to give some perspective on the size. You can see just how big
this thing is--compared to a finski. It's just short of 39 inches in
full scale.



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Here it is compared to my We-Tech SCAR-L. The
SCAR is a big heavy weapon, especially with the launcher and ACOG, yet
it is dwarfed in size and weight by the Spartan Laser. Right now, if I pick up the Spartan Laser, I know it won't shoot whereas with the troublesome WE SCAR, I NEVER know if it will shoot or not!


I've been working on the electronics package here and there. I'll cover that in my next update.

Redshirt

great job so far man

So pretty.