john django
Hunter
Hey FP,
AMAZING work, your dedication to your art is incredible!
You out-did yourself bro
Cheers,
John
AMAZING work, your dedication to your art is incredible!
You out-did yourself bro
Cheers,
John
NEW! FP JANGO GAUNTLETS - V.Final - FINALLY !!
- Thread starter fettpride
- Start date
Jimmy BufFETT
Well-Known Hunter
WHOA!Hey great jorb! Oh wait ... great jerb. Oh wait ... great ... jjjeeeeeeaaaaooooooeeeeoooooorrrrb!
Ha ha ha ... very impressive work there FettPride!
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FettFanatic
Active Hunter
Very very nice work FP. Those look amazing. The pictures are awesome, and I am sure that they don't do them justice. I am sure they are better than even the pictures can show. Sign me up for a pair. Keep up the great work. We appreciate your dedication.
Jun Garros Fett
Active Hunter
Ok. I'm just gonna sit here and drool at those pics for a while. :love :love :love
The best gauntlets I've ever seen.
Foxbatkllr
Well-Known Hunter
Amazing, FP!
Absolutely stunning! The finish is beautiful as are the details. I am not even into Jango and I am impressed! Also, looks like your photography skills are improving!
fettpride
Well-Known Hunter
WOW !!!
Thanks sooo much for the wonderful words EVERYONE !!
To answer a few questions that have come up real quick.
Shell alignment / closures -
The shells DO line up perfectly out of the mold. There is a VERY specific way I did this in the molding process. Basically, each arm gauntlet master was made FULLY ASSEMBLED. What this means is, the 2 shells for each gauntlet are one with each other for each gauntlet respectively. Then, a mold was taken of an upper shell for instance, carrying the mold about 1/8th of an inch down past the parting seam of the bottom shell. Then, a mold was taken of the bottom shell, carrying the mold 1/8 of an inch up above the parting line of the top shell. What happens here is, when each piece is pulled from the mold, carefully trimming at the part line of each shell, yields a 99.99 % perfect fit. I will illustrate this later tonight. I took a few pics of the molds so that everyone can understand this explanation. It's really very cool actually. This had to be done for accuracy sake. Jango's Gauntlets shells do not "tuck" inside of one another. And although I've never done this with my previous gauntlets, there was always a problem with the shells lining up coming from two separate molds made at different times, ect.. There is one caveat however. As some of you may know, fiberglass tends to "CREEP" over the first few weeks of its life, and sometimes longer. This means it can move out of shape. So, taking this into consideration, the shells could still be misaligned when received to some degree. So the first way to head this off, is to mold each shell with 3 dimensional sides, essentially closed all the way around. This will also be illustrated with the coming pics. This keeps the sides from moving inward during this crucial period. When received, they can be trimmed and fitted properly. But there is still a margin for error here, as if they're not fitted immediately after trimming, the "creeping" can still occur. The the last and final way of pre-empting this issue, is the "NEW" gauntlet shell closure as seen in the pics above. This keeps them aligned, no matter what. Forever. Keeping them latched when not in use, will keep them fresh for the life of the prop.
The closures are easier to use than one would think. If you have someone helping you suit up, it's not an issue whatsoever. If you happen to be alone, they can still be closed by yourself. With the help of a couple of knees
And in answer to some of your PM's, yes, our own absent Whojedi is partly responsible for this 
He had the opportunity of assembling the Jango Fett display at Celebration II. He had GREAT info. Perhaps someone could post a link to that info here for all to see. And I'm quite suprised no one has attempted this to date. Granted, it's a SERIOUS PAIN IN THE RUMP, but pretty cool when you get right down to it. This information was reinforced in the last 6 months as a couple of other members who have had intimate opportunities with a Jango display while it was touring Europe. They can chime in if they wish. All in all, it's worth the effort. You never have to worry about them coming loose when trooping. And you never have to worry about cracked shells when torquing on the industrial strength velcro
The finish -
As stated above, there are many steps involved. A special thanks to Terminal Fettler for chiming in today and reinforcing that ! Thanks man
I've seen your amazing work as well, and appears that you would know
I emphasize that the molds have to be nearly perfect, and the material vacuumed, for one main reason. I sort of discussed this in another thread recently, so I will paste my quote ...
So, essentially, sanding is a no no for this sort of finish. Of course, nothing is absolutely 100 % perfect, I degress. Even those pictured STILL had a defect or two (Need I say how much it really peeved me off?) And, no matter what you do in material preparation, you will still get a bubble here or there in the finish Just look at the real Jango gauntlets ! There are a TON of them But I've also figured aout how to fix these areas after de-molding if necessary. And believe me, that isn't easy either It takes double the aluminum filler to patch a small area so that it can be blended properly. I suppose what I'm trying to say is, PLEASE understand that these are still hand made, not machined, there will always be minor defects. It cannot be helped unless we take these to manufacturing
Brak's Buddy - Thanks man !! I had to learn something new on the photography bro, these things were a GRIPE to take pics of I think I shot over 700 pics to get about 80 good ones. Is THAT normal ? Perhaps YOU could get a few good ones for us at D-Con ????
Again, a HUGE THANK YOU to everyone for their kind words !! Picture galleries to come .... then I'm off to finish the revisitation of my ROTJ GAUNTLETS :cheers
FP
Thanks sooo much for the wonderful words EVERYONE !!
To answer a few questions that have come up real quick.
Shell alignment / closures -
The shells DO line up perfectly out of the mold. There is a VERY specific way I did this in the molding process. Basically, each arm gauntlet master was made FULLY ASSEMBLED. What this means is, the 2 shells for each gauntlet are one with each other for each gauntlet respectively. Then, a mold was taken of an upper shell for instance, carrying the mold about 1/8th of an inch down past the parting seam of the bottom shell. Then, a mold was taken of the bottom shell, carrying the mold 1/8 of an inch up above the parting line of the top shell. What happens here is, when each piece is pulled from the mold, carefully trimming at the part line of each shell, yields a 99.99 % perfect fit. I will illustrate this later tonight. I took a few pics of the molds so that everyone can understand this explanation. It's really very cool actually. This had to be done for accuracy sake. Jango's Gauntlets shells do not "tuck" inside of one another. And although I've never done this with my previous gauntlets, there was always a problem with the shells lining up coming from two separate molds made at different times, ect.. There is one caveat however. As some of you may know, fiberglass tends to "CREEP" over the first few weeks of its life, and sometimes longer. This means it can move out of shape. So, taking this into consideration, the shells could still be misaligned when received to some degree. So the first way to head this off, is to mold each shell with 3 dimensional sides, essentially closed all the way around. This will also be illustrated with the coming pics. This keeps the sides from moving inward during this crucial period. When received, they can be trimmed and fitted properly. But there is still a margin for error here, as if they're not fitted immediately after trimming, the "creeping" can still occur. The the last and final way of pre-empting this issue, is the "NEW" gauntlet shell closure as seen in the pics above. This keeps them aligned, no matter what. Forever. Keeping them latched when not in use, will keep them fresh for the life of the prop.
The closures are easier to use than one would think. If you have someone helping you suit up, it's not an issue whatsoever. If you happen to be alone, they can still be closed by yourself. With the help of a couple of knees
And in answer to some of your PM's, yes, our own absent Whojedi is partly responsible for this He had the opportunity of assembling the Jango Fett display at Celebration II. He had GREAT info. Perhaps someone could post a link to that info here for all to see. And I'm quite suprised no one has attempted this to date. Granted, it's a SERIOUS PAIN IN THE RUMP, but pretty cool when you get right down to it. This information was reinforced in the last 6 months as a couple of other members who have had intimate opportunities with a Jango display while it was touring Europe. They can chime in if they wish. All in all, it's worth the effort. You never have to worry about them coming loose when trooping. And you never have to worry about cracked shells when torquing on the industrial strength velcro The finish -
As stated above, there are many steps involved. A special thanks to Terminal Fettler for chiming in today and reinforcing that ! Thanks man
I've seen your amazing work as well, and appears that you would know I emphasize that the molds have to be nearly perfect, and the material vacuumed, for one main reason. I sort of discussed this in another thread recently, so I will paste my quote ...
So, essentially, sanding is a no no for this sort of finish. Of course, nothing is absolutely 100 % perfect, I degress. Even those pictured STILL had a defect or two
(Need I say how much it really peeved me off?) And, no matter what you do in material preparation, you will still get a bubble here or there in the finish Just look at the real Jango gauntlets ! There are a TON of them But I've also figured aout how to fix these areas after de-molding if necessary. And believe me, that isn't easy either It takes double the aluminum filler to patch a small area so that it can be blended properly. I suppose what I'm trying to say is, PLEASE understand that these are still hand made, not machined, there will always be minor defects. It cannot be helped unless we take these to manufacturing Brak's Buddy - Thanks man !! I had to learn something new on the photography bro, these things were a GRIPE to take pics of
I think I shot over 700 pics to get about 80 good ones. Is THAT normal ? Perhaps YOU could get a few good ones for us at D-Con ????Again, a HUGE THANK YOU to everyone for their kind words !! Picture galleries to come .... then I'm off to finish the revisitation of my ROTJ GAUNTLETS :cheers
FP
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jangofett76
Active Hunter
That's awesome fettpride. Okay like everybody has been asking how much are they? Thanks.
MandoMan
Active Hunter
And in answer to some of your PM's, yes, our own absent Whojedi is partly responsible for this
http://www.thedentedhelmet.com/showthread.php?t=2788
I can't even begin to comprehend all that info you just posted about the molding process.
But the end result is more than worth it! :love
obi sean kenobi
Well-Known Hunter
Beautiful as usual!!
fettpride
Well-Known Hunter
I can see where one might wonder that. And until I actually experimented, I wasn't sure how that would work either. BUT - it ain't gonna come out unless you pull it. Period
It's one of those things that is hard to explain. The pin that slides in is very snug, yet very smooth. Put simply, the hinge halves do all the work holding it in. If that pin ever just slipped out by itself, I'd buy your next set of gauntlets They won't come out even when they're not being worn.To further expound on the hinge setup, it is actually pretty simple. A standard piano hinge, just as what is installed on the other side, except modified slightly. On a piano hinge, there are "punch" points on every few links on one half of the hinge that permanently hold the rod into place. To do this right, the rod needs to be removed, obviously, AND you need double the hinge for your intended length, as the punched half of the hinge cannot be used. Once you get the pin removed (brute force), you take the unpunched half of the hinge and your pin, and mate it with an equal length of more unpunched hinge. When the two unpunched halves mate, you can slide the rod in and out at will. The rest of the hinge (the punched half) can be discarded. Make sense?
After you've done this, you can take a bit of 400 sand paper, and sand the rod a bit so that it's a little easier to move in and out of the joined hinges.
It gets a bit more complex for the left gauntlet though. The shape of the inside of the gauntlet does not allow for the hinge halves to lay flat for alignment so each hinge half has to be cut into sections so that when you put the rod back in it (to hold all the sections together), it can be layed inside of the gauntlet properly for glassing it in. And somehow, the pin still goes right in
It's a little more complex than that, and a real pain in the :moon , but from now on, I won't have it any other way. Once you go there, ya never go back, it's just so darn cool More pics will help clarify this I'm sure. I know I'll end up doing a tutorial on it eventually. It could help a lot of folks out.
FP
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