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UNBELIEVABLE! Made from nothing more than computer files and rolls of plastic rod, then cast in resin. And the brass plates photo-etched with the finer details? BRILLIANCE. I'm definitely showing your thread on the Spanish garrison to my wife to further support the purchase of a 3D printer. Have you seen TrainWreck's 3D printer work (posted recently)? The two of you may want to share files? So many questions... What printer are you using? Have you considered selling parts on Shapeways? Would you be willing to share files? Just finished up midnight shift at work - this made my day and I'll sleep happy!

DUDE! You're almost done!!! The Thunder From Down Under! Super clean work with that rail! It's deceptively difficult to get the rail and bracket just right - I've got 3 minor "mistake" rails to prove it! Good to know 1/16" aluminum is sturdy enough for a resin counter. Next up, the simple and fun task of bending t-tracks? Or paint?

Spectacular job with the Roy track. Great stuff at a fair price! Have you considered making a one-piece counter/scope rail? Those look cleaner to me. Otherwise, I would just make an "L" shaped bracket like others have done to mount the scope. It's been awhile since I read your whole thread - do you have a real counter or a resin counter? If it's real, make your bracket so you can run bolts and nuts through the metal frame. If it's resin, I would use screws with big threads - like the smallest lag screw you can find. Maybe smear some E-6000 between the counter and the bracket as insurance. Your 5 year old will have some muscles playing with this...mine is well over 10 pounds, closer to 15.

I would have said the same thing, but I've actually seen posts about this guy on the RPF. Yep, "the maker of things".

Awesome! Thanks, Brian. I might stencil that quote on the shop wall as inspiration for the next time I don't know what I'm doing!

Awesome work thinning down those mag well walls! Looking good!

Thanks Brian! Santa put a Tamiya hobby saw in my stocking and I'll be putting it to good use with the Hengstler soon. Thanks for posting about it! Thanks Tino! I had to laugh at myself - I didn't even consider making a mold since I've never done it, but that probably would have worked just as well. Well, that rounds out my 3 fans on the FISD! I appreciate the support guys - I thrive on it! In other news, I received a TOTALLY unexpected request at church this morning... Apparently, there's a group in my area that does Star Wars podcasts. Somehow (word of mouth?), they heard about my work and want me to do a podcast interview about building Star Wars props. I just enjoy building things, so I don't know if I'm qualified to do an interview, but I'll give it my best (I don't even know what I'm doing half the time!). On my short list for things to mention are the 501st, the FISD, the RPF, Astromech and most of all, the FRIENDS I have found worldwide while participating in this hobby. CHEERS to all of you!

My rear resistors are 0.142" (3.6mm) diameter and 0.366" (9.3mm) long. Closest fractional sizes are 9/64" diameter and 23/64" long. They can be made with real resistors or styrene rod.

Thanks for your humbling compliments, Ian! I hope to be the master of something...someday! 20E7 - I LIKE IT! I'd need a good scale to measure the weight savings here, but I can definitely feel the difference between the two. The real ejector feels like a solid steel bolt, while the styrene ejector feels like, well, almost nothing!

Hi guys - I hope everyone enjoyed the holidays; I sure did!!! It's been so long since I've posted that I had to go back and read my own thread to know where I left off! First, a little music to read by...I was SHOCKED to find this classic tune by an unexpected artist. My wife and I both like Astrud Gilberto (The Girl From Ipanema / Fly Me To The Moon) and I was searching for Astrud Christmas music... That's when I came across this...some of you will recognize the intro immediately, but keep listening... Thanks for everyone who posted the weight of their Doopy kits. I'm still looking for the weight of a full PVC pipe build. I had to clean up my shop for our annual Christmas party, so ALL projects got boxed, stored or displayed. I continued to receive parts and pieces I ordered from Amazon, etc, so when I got everything back out, I started with something I've been wanting to tackle. This is kind of a minor update, but I was REALLY PLEASED with the outcome of this particular piece. I duplicated the ejector using 3/8" solid styrene rod. I ordered the rod from Amazon along with some other construction materials. Why duplicate the ejector? Partly because I've never seen it before and partly because I like the challenge. Only the rear is visible from the exterior of the gun. Having the ejector also provides options when detailing the chamber, depending on how I handle the bolt and magazine. First up, a shot of a real Sterling ejector alongside my 3/8" styrene rod. The first challenge was to figure out how to make the machined edge which protrudes from the side of the rod... Since I had about a foot of styrene rod, I decided to try heating the rod and bending it to acquire the necessary shape. I set up an angle finder using the real ejector, heated the styrene with a heat gun and bent it against a steel plate I have on my benchtop. Next, I sanded the bottom of the bend to a flat profile on the belt sander. Then, I spent a bunch of time marking off centerlines, machined flat areas and holes. I went a little wide with my marks so I would have material left for "fine tuning". I wish I would have taken more pictures during the process, but I got wrapped up in the fun of being back in the shop, UNINTERRUPTED, after the holidays... And, here's the final result. I even managed to make the special marking on the back of the ejector. I sharpened the end of a very small tension pin, chucked it in my drill and carefully added the marks. I imagine that mark is some kind of inspector or "quality" marking - it's on every Sterling I've ever seen. HAPPY to be back to work on this project!!!

You're welcome, Brian. Although I see the correlation, you might consider posting your 3D files and 3D printer discussion as a separate thread to avoid hijacking Andy. I see big potential for this and I think it's worth a separate thread.

Dang Brian, how much time did you spend at the library? These look EXTREMELY nice! Funny, the other day, my wife (this is no joke) says, "We could probably make a lot of stuff for the things we do with a 3D printer". As I'm choking on my beverage, I respond, "Why yes, YES we most certainly could". Power cylinders were in the top 3 things that instantly came to mind... I'd love to see what a set of these looks like straight off of a 3D printer... What brand/model 3D printer does the library have?

Hi Joseph, Read the two research papers by PlayfulWolfCub. You won't find better information. Then, just start trying things. Sounds like you've already made a few pieces - maybe post some pictures for feedback? Making power cylinders is trickier than it seems because of the scale...they're SO small that any error becomes immediately obvious. Making them correctly involves measurements down to fractions of millimeters. I've said it many times - the price Andy is charging is a BARGIN for the amount of precision work involved. I've made several sets (some with errors to help figure out the dimensions). I figured it takes me somewhere around 16 hours of work to make one complete set... And that's if I have ALL the materials readily available - also I've never done the screen accurate tin coating Andy supplies. Here are a couple pictures of a brass set I made next to Andy's metal and resin versions: ----------- Have fun, good luck and be prepared for frustration!

"SPEC"-TACULAR job with the scope, Ian!!! I didn't even go that far with it...taking out the little prisms scared me, so I stopped after the main optics were out. I know EXACTLY what you went through to straighten out the range finder - frustrating work, but well worth the reward! You might be able to paint the center section with texture paint, let it dry, feather the edges, then paint the whole thing to hide the green stuff... If you want to take it that far...even without doing that, you might not be able to tell with a couple good coats of paint. Good stuff!!!

A great example of why Vern is the MASTER of blasters...however, I DO have an explanation from my research... Turns out, the full auto bolt used in my steel pipe build was manufactured in 1958 at the FAZAKERLEY plant. The extractor is slightly different - instead of being solid, it has a groove machined through the middle. I also have two STERLING bolts which were manufactured in 1966 and 1972 and they match the photo above perfectly. Since my Fazakerley bolt is very early, perhaps there was a design change to correct or prevent a problem with the grooved extractor?

I'm pretty chuffed that Vern thinks I could even come close to taking up where he left off! I've built exactly 1 replica...

And that's how it starts... Glad to see another trooper bitten by the blaster bug. I enjoy watching these kits go from ordinary to extraordinary! Keep up the good work!

As long as you're not running electricity through your E-11, you won't have electrolysis issues between dissimilar metals. Aluminum/steel against brass is fine for a display prop. I made rails from both 1/16" aluminum and steel, but used the steel rail because it was stiffer than the aluminum rail.

NICELY DONE! Is the rear half a "regular item" that Snaggletooth carries or you just got lucky and he had what you needed? With a little more detailing and a transformer in the back, this would be really difficult to tell from a real Hengstler! Awesome mods happening these days!

For real metal hardware, the absolute best I can recommend is KG Gunkote. It's a baked on coating and it's much tougher than paint. The downside is it requires sandblasting for prep, airbrush application and an oven for baking. Obviously, this product WON'T work for resin parts due to the baking... I think there's another product called Durakote which is similar and can be found in aerosol spray cans (check Brownell's). For regular aerosol spray paint, I prefer Krylon - I've always had good results with it. I think most spray paints are similar, the preference comes down to how it's applied.

Merry Christmas, Ian! I did about a week of concentrated prep work and prop building for our annual Christmas party, then holiday travel to visit family. I got new tools, two Sterling parts sets, 4 magazines and black nomex flight gloves as Christmas gifts, so lots of work coming up! Stay tuned!

GENIUS! Very well done, Tino!!! You should be quite proud of your efforts! The ONLY suggestion I could make would be to countersink another hole below the large eagle and glue in the top of a flathead screw. After that, yours will be indistinguishable from an original.

Thanks for your compliments! I've shared many emails with Andy and I can assure you, for the amount of precision work, his price is a BARGIN. If I were to make and sell these at normal shop rates, I would have to charge almost double Andy's price just to break even. I own Andy's metal set #50 and I jumped on his "special edition" cylinders. I can make them, but it's cheaper for me to buy them. PLUS, Andy's cylinders come with REAL 'Metalmite' capacitors in the center. There's a LIMITED number of those left in the world...I've searched. As you make more, you discover little shortcuts and operation efficiency improves, but there's still no getting around the accuracy involved. I drew up the base plates in Autocad and got a quote for water jetting, but I'd have to order more than 100 to make the price even close to reasonable. That means these will likely always be a hand-made, one-at-a-time item. EDIT: One more thing to consider that I just noticed this morning - Andy is running out of vintage, REAL capacitors. As posted in his "Screen Accurate Power Cylinders" thread: Anyone who is following this thread & hopes to buy a set one day but is putting it off please note: As of 9th December 2014 I only have enough vintage capacitors to make 9 more sets of Power Cylinders. I search for them literally every day but they're very rare and hard to find. When I run out of them I'll still make Power Cylinders with my hand-made capacitors (which are extremely accurate) but nothing beats knowing that your Power Cylinders contain authentic vintage capacitors! Original posting: http://www.whitearmor.net/forum/topic/24179-screen-accurate-e11-power-cylinders/?p=374839 Main power cylinder tubes are 3/8" diameter. I tried aluminum, steel, brass and stainless. Steel is heavy, aluminum doesn't solder well and stainless is hard on tools. The brass was a pleasure to work after all the others. The capacitor tubes are 5mm diameter (if I remember correctly). I picked up that tubing directly from K&S Metals (lucky they're in Chicago) since none of the local dealers carry metric. I could have ordered it and had it shipped, but I wanted it that day... Silver solder was left over from the Sterling assembly. The caps from the following fuses are exactly 3/8" diameter...just a little too tall, but they can be carefully filed or sanded down. Then you have to remove the embossed lettering - I checked all the packages in the store; some of the embossing is deep, some is shallow. I buy the ones with the lightest possible embossing to make removing it easier. I still buy a set of these every time I'm at the auto parts store. BTW, Radio Shack carries these fuses too. They come in many different ratings 30A, 40A, 50A & 60A. They all have the same size caps. I disassembled them with a propane torch, but the flame is WAY too big. Later, I bought a butane pencil torch and that works MUCH better.

Power cylinder build: Skip the first several posts...I found a better way to do it later in the thread. Then I found glass maxi fuses - the metal end caps are EXACTLY what you need. By the end, I've got brass replicas that are extremely close to Andy's. http://www.whitearmor.net/forum/topic/26634-e11-power-cylinder-build/?p=336615 Andy Resin (left), Aaron Brass (center), Andy Metal (right)

Vern who?