In Progress Â» Chompbot No.5

“A new one? What about finishing Frankenstein” you say? No worries! Frank will be finished next week when my laser-cut foliage arrives. Meanwhile, I’m working on the initial sample build of Industria Mechanika’s release of Jake Parker’s Chompbot #5.

Preorder your Chompbot and Chomp Troopers here. Order by 9.28.2012 to get a $10 discount when you order the Chompbot and Chomp Troopers together!

This kit is a lot of fun and bigger than you might think. Check the preview video below to get a good idea of size. The figures are about 2″ tall while the bot itself clocks in at around 9 inches tall. Since most of that is a sphere, it’s a rather large piece!

Clean-up was a breeze. The only part to watch for when building the chompbot is that you’ll want to insert some 1/16″ brass rod through the lower legs as they’re thin and over time could sag under the weight. Drilling those parts to insert the rod was really easy though so it’s a minimal worry. In fact I did all the clean-up, pinning, and even managed to drill out the resin eye-bulbs and replace them with 5mm LEDs/soldering wires all in about 2 hours. Check out the following video to see how simply this goes together:

httpvh://www.youtube.com/watch?v=v3YBopHjGDY

I started priming and painting yesterday. First I primed the Chompy with Duplicolor Green Self-Etching Primer, then with Duplicolor Dark Gray Sandable Primer.

When that cured I airbrushed the entire kit in German Gray Tamiya Acrylic then airbrushed on a very thin coat of Future (FFA) to seal it. When cured I masked off some of the parts I wanted to keep in the dark gray, then sprayed it all-over with a mottled coat of custom-mixed rust and dark gray Tamiya Acrylics.

Another very thin coat of FFA was applied, then I sprayed all of the parts with hair-spray. Over this I sprayed on a green blue, then Tamiya Acrylics Sky Gray. About 20 minutes later I took a wet stiff brush and started chipping away at the Sky Gray color to reveal the rusted mottled color below.