My ESB Helmet

Nice start Joe... look forward to the updates!

That my clone....

Ha no my friend that is the OSCS helmet I told you about, yours is covered in filler at the moment!

no they are all mine!!! MINE i tells yer?!?! MIINNNEEEEEE

*curls up in a slobbery mess*

lookin fwd to this mate

Nate

Originally Posted by HeadlessHunter

Ha no my friend that is the OSCS helmet I told you about, yours is covered in filler at the moment!

I know... was only jesting ya!
go get sanding...

Are you sure that it is FPH #15? If it is, the helmets have learned to spawn themselves...or maybe a little mitosis for all you biology nerds. Thing is, I have a FPH #15 in my possesion at this very moment. Could it be from a different run?? Weird...

As soon as I saw #15 I was like huh?

Originally Posted by ShocKNurse

Are you sure that it is FPH #15? If it is, the helmets have learned to spawn themselves...or maybe a little mitosis for all you biology nerds. Thing is, I have a FPH #15 in my possesion at this very moment. Could it be from a different run?? Weird...

Ha ha oh dear my mistake it was #16!!! apologies!

Edited original post

Better than the last

that will be a tall order indeed and yes it is 16.............just here.............................................. .......................... I

Thanks Rob, oh and thanks for the number confirmation! Getting sloppy in my old age...

Whew!!! Too bad though, I thought maybe we had a Nobel Prize in order or something...

More trimming and primer coat #1, going back for a second all over sanding with some finer grit wet and dry to get any imperfections dealt with

This should be good... can't wait to see your work on this one Joe.

Thanks Alex, I'm excited to be painting another bucket, on the road to improvement hopefully

I'm looking forward to seeing this progress.

Oh My Lord!! What have I done? All becomes clear, drilled out the cast Borden to fit the real one

Originally Posted by HeadlessHunter

Oh My Lord!! What have I done? All becomes clear, drilled out the cast Borden to fit the real one

What have you done!?!!?!?!? It should be glued on!!!!




Nah, I'm kidding, nice work!

Ha ha nice try

Where'd you get the purdy MR casting !!! I want one

I'm sure you're going to do her up dandy brother Can't wait to see the progress on this !

FP

Chris you got a PM I was hoping to get a little paint down on this helmet over the weekend but another project took all my primer, cheers Gav So I have spent my time going over details like the keyslots again, just to make sure its all ship shape, as well working out a nice method to secure my Borden, I managed to make it removable for painting - method to follow

Originally Posted by HeadlessHunter

but another project took all my primer, cheers Gav

Me? nice work buddy...

Ok my step by step guide to fitting my Borden Connector, firstly you need to grind away the old cast borden so I whipped out my 'trusty' dremmel and fitted the smallest sanding drum, I then ground away about 75% of it leaving the last25% to be done by hand, I didnt want to risk sanding into the main part of the cheek after its all sanded smooth I took a 7mm drill bit and drilled through, but before you go drilling through your helmet its important to make a 'spot' to guide your drill through, otherwise your drill may slip and either hurt you, or hurt your helmet, what I suggest is getting your drill bit and holding it over the center of the area you wish to go through, then apply some pressure and give it a few light twists, this should creat a small spot face where you can later position your drill, you will also find you are less likely to shatter your helmet unlike if you just drive a drill through with a lot of force Lesson over Anyway the diameter of the real borden is 9.5 mm so I file out the remainder of the hole by hand, I am not making it a size hole as I just want the borden to sit in the hole, not go all the way through, from what I can tell there is about 2.5mm of borden sticking out on the original helmet, the rest is glued through the helmet. Next step I got some 5 minute epoxy and fixed my borden to an M5 bolt, I held it in place with a small g-clamp until the epoxy had cured (see picture) Next up I reprimed my helmet where I had removed the cast borden and made my hole (see picture) The borden, now attached to the bolt now simply drops into the hole and sits in the slight recess, I then used 2 washers and a nut to secure it from the otherside (see picture) the helmet is now ready for paint and I can remove the borden at anytime during the painting process, hope this is of some benefit to you guys

Big thanks to Gav MojoFett for the real Borden

Great tutorial and great helmet, this is going to turn out really nice. Nice clone lid in the background too

Nice... and a great tutorial bruv!

Well done!

Mojo, Email sent

Email replied too...

HH, any update?

I love this thread

well now that I have finished another project I can get back to this, horray!

Holy cow, an update! After MUCH (too much) thought and pondering I am back on this project, over the recent months there has been so much development in the way ESB helmets are painted, especially from Garret (TF) who's layered paint-job is easily up there with the best, all this made me reconsider how I approach painting my helmet, here is my helmet re-primered with Tamiya Fine Primer which I highly recommend, previously I have used a car body primer and not realised how heavy/thick it was, take it from me this Tamiya stuff is perfect and shows any tiny rough spots that you can address before painting

I once again decided to go topical with this helmet as I love to be able to get all the details as spot on as possible, however for the back quarters of the helmet I will be going layered as well as on the ears, one of the things I enjoy most about these paintups is the finish weathering which I think can really bring everything together, enough rambling onto the pics, for my base coat I used the traditional Panzer Olive Green BUT I added a few drops of German Field Grey, it gives a very nice tone in natural light, it doesn't really look that different to the POG in the photos for which I apologise, anyway enjoy and stay tuned for more, as always I invite critiscisms and comments either good or bad

Looking good Joe... I see what you mean about the mix?
I'm gonna have to get my @ss in gear to get these other 2 lids to ya!

Awesome Joe! Love the color!

Absolutely mate, I am very pleased with the results I got with the mix, I think for the ROTJ I will use purely the POG as it is ever so slightly darker overall

yea, at the moment I am starting my FPH in ROTJ style layered ... And like TF said, I will use the german field grey with a misting of black underneath.

Should be some kind of equal result then. I hope! :-)

I managed to take advantage of the good weather this weekend and get a little more done on this, I masked off the back panels and layed down a fine coat of silver, this will form the base of my damage areas, I then masked off the exposed areas and applied 2 thin coats of the dark grey which will eventually sit around the silver scratches, the grey was a custom mix of Humbrol grey 79 with a touch of German Field Grey to compliment the dome colour, I let the helmet sit for an hour outside and then removed the liquid mask. Next step is to remask the silver and grey and apply the tan colour

NICE!!!

Lookin good Joe.... better start to brush up on ROTJ! 3 lids coming your way soon...

Originally Posted by Mojo-Fett

Lookin good Joe.... better start to brush up on ROTJ! 3 lids coming your way soon...

Cheers bud, looking forward to it....I must be mad....yep, I am

Looks good man!

*Update*

I decided that whilst the helmet was at this stage that I would mask off and paint the satin black under cheek area, basically with this portion of the helmet it is best to mask off the black area and then apply the Caboose to the mandibles, this is a tip I picked up from Alex (Spidey) when painting my FPH you can then overspray slightly when you add the red So here she sits as of about 15 minutes ago, I will leave this for another hour and then take another look at the back portions

Edit: I forgot to mention I added a drop of panzer olive green and a drop of german field grey to the black

Your helmet turns out pretty good! It´s fun watching the progress!

Next up the grey and silver damage sections are masked off, I do all of this by eye staring cross eyed at the screen grabs until my eyes hurt

For the tan colour I have used TF's colour a mix of Humbrol Beige 28 + 103 I am applying this in 2 thin coats, the photos below show the first coat, I will come back in about 2 hours and apply the second coat, the helmet will then be left until tomorrow before I remove the liquid mask, this gives the paint a good amount of time to cure

Coming along very nice Joe!!

Thanks Gav, really enjoying this, now my 3rd ESB helmet, already looking forward to the 4th

interesting.....

and you say you do UK commissions do you......

fascinating....

Cheers Nate, had a slight disaster when removing the masking fluid from the back, it had eaten into the other layers of the paint and stripped it bare, so I took a deep breath, sanded the back all down to gel coat, re-primered and started again, pics tomorrow

!!!!!! oh man
I have only tried topical application (Mojo - stop glaring at me like that)

but I remember Mr Bungle telling me he had probs with removing masking fluid for his layered ESB paint job

good luck mate!

And....fixed, very pleased with the results, I did this all from primer, started yesterday afternoon

Nice job! You are exactly where i'm at with my helmet, though you're much quicker than me...:thumbup

Originally Posted by terminal fettler

Nice job! You are exactly where i'm at with my helmet, though you're much quicker than me...:thumbup

Thanks my friend, coming from you that's a real boost, although it was more determination than skill Your paint up has been a real help for techniques so...

** Update **

Over the weekend I have managed to get the mandible and trim area pretty much done, I started by masking the entire helmet except these areas and applying a thin layer of Tamiya fine surface primer, I then hit it with the Humbrol Silver number 11, following on from this I masked off the areas I wanted to show through with masking fluid and added the grey layer in 2 light coats, this was once again masked as well as the silver again before adding my red of choice, I went with Caboose as with my previous helmet, here it is now, all masking removed and a light buff with wire wool, there are a few areas I will go back and touch up topically as I wasn't 100% happy but I am pleased with the results especially as I was intending to do this helmet topically in the first place

** Update **

Only a small one but wanted to share anyway, just adding some fine detail to the mandible area, and buffing lightly with wire wool to bring it all together, were getting there next step is to finish the back panels

Very nice! I really like your paintjob!

I would suggest right after that helmet finished you start with the layered ROTJ helmet!

Thank you, funny you should say about that, the next paintjob will be a ROTJ

Originally Posted by HeadlessHunter

Thank you, funny you should say about that, the next paintjob will be a ROTJ

Guess what! I didn't hear from ya....... but 3 lids will be coming this weekend!

**Update**

Basically I decided to strip the whole helmet down (minus the back) and start again doing a fully layered paint up, I wasn't happy with the results of the topical damage, so here it is as of saturday morning, since then I have added the main green and started the weathering process, more detailed photos tomorrow

looking great Joe....
Can't wait to see what you do with my ROTJ version!

Lookin good brother!

Kody

Thanks guys, here are a few more recent shots

Love it!

nice, very nice

PM sent

**UPDATE**

Got the back about 95% finished last night, all the main colours are down and all that remains is to finish off the keyslot area and add final weathering, next step will be the killstripes Then I can make space for my next projects an ESB and ROTJ helmet which I will be working on simultaneously, on a side note I have just got back from meeting Gav (Mojo Fett) for the first time, it was great to finally put a face to the name and big thanks to Mrs Mojo for the cup of tea Enjoy....

....Masked killstripes, and then the finished article, I used 5 mm Tamiya masking tape to get the outlines then filled in the areas to be left green/silver with Windsor and Newton masking fluid

I love it, well done HH, it's one of the best layered paintjobs I have ever seen.

Good to finally meet ya bruv...
Can't wait to see what you do with my ROTJ if these pics are anything to go by!

Oh and Mrs Mojo says your welcome any-time but prefers not to be called Mrs Mojo....

Hey HeadlessHunter, you know that the killstripes color turns into a slightly orange to the back, don´t you?

Just a small tip! I can´t see it at this angle ...

great job you did here bro! Love to see that you turned it into the real deal: fully layered!

;-)

Manuel

It does turn orange towards the back of the killstripe pattern, I did it in 2 goes, laid down the yellow first and then misted with the darker yellowy/orange after, you are right it doesn't show in the photo, I will get some more up as I progress further

UPDATE!! I spent the last few hours masking off the dark grey and the silver on the RF side ear pieces and then applying 2 thin coats of my main colour of choice, after a while I started masking off the area that will be black and form the main part of the 'decal' I always prefer to paint these details on but thats just my choice, I usually regret it after about 3 minutes of trying to get the masking tape to form the correct shape Anyway, here are the results, more to come soon

Hey brother, just a small tip: I always use normal paper, draw the decals on and cut it out. Then I lay it over the ear, fix it on the table when in right position and afterwards airbrushign the color on. Works great and you don´t have to fight with those many pieces of masking tape! Cutting the decal is getting nice round corners ... when using masking tape I always had to adjust samll bits with masking fluid to get it "round" enough. :-)

Great job on the helmet Joe!

HH looking good!

About time I updated this, a few teaser pics before the final push to get this finished, I have loved painting this helmet despite the numerous repaints and starts from scratch, its been worth every minute

Very nice work Joe, any more updates?

*** Joe, this looks brill

VERY VERY AWESOME!

Very, very nice work there. Given me inspiration on how to go about my lid... when I get it that is..lol.

Wow beautiful work!