Tuesday, October 26, 2010

1/64 Scale Accessories

I've just opened a shapeways webstore for some of my 3D creations. These are all scaled for 1/64 "Hot Wheels" sized cars.

If there's something you've always wanted to see for your Car Wars Hot Wheels, let me know and I'll see about whipping it up in 3D.

http://www.shapeways.com/shops/wolfhoundjack

Wednesday, October 20, 2010

New Logo

Last night I put together a logo. I'll try to incorporate it into the blog layout sometime soon.

Graphic links to a larger, higher resolution version.

Thursday, October 14, 2010

Drive it like you stole it!

Well I went shopping tonight, and no I didn't steal anything.  Didn't have to the nice folks at Target knew i was coming and had all their Hot Wheel singles on sale!  So less than lunch at Taco Hell I picked up the start of a really nice stable of cars.  I picked out a really cool little VW Golf GTI that I'm going to outfit for small kart style races. For use as big series 5 and series 10 cars I picked up a classic '69 Pontiac GTO, big guns are the plans for this one.  Lastly because I could, what will probably be my series 10 racer a Aston Martin DBS, just for fun and snobbery!  I'll try to document their progress, I'll be using several of the techniques shown here in the tutorials so probably not much new, just sweet cars and big guns.

Saturday, October 9, 2010

Pimp my Hot Wheel

Images are links to much larger versions

This tutorial covers the repainting of a Hot Wheels 2010 series.


Step 1: Drill out the Rivets


Take a drill and drill bit roughly the same size or larger than the rivet head on the underside of your Hot Wheel. Drill the rivet until you start to see plastic shavings. Most Hot Wheels have two rivets. If the plastic bottom doesn't come off easily, drill some more.


Different model in this picture, but this is basically what it looks like

Step 2: Paint Stripping Soak


I use Simple Green (non-toxic since I have small children) but there are lots of options to strip the paint. Once the rivets are out, set the plastic parts aside and drop the die-cast metal component in your paint stripping soak.

When using Simple Green, I soak 48 hours for non-metallic paint and 96 for metallic paint. Then use a toothbrush to scrub off the rest of the paint. If any lingering paint exists in cracks/seams, I use a hobby razor blade to pick it out. The goal is bare metal.


Volkswagen Sp2 and a Dodge Charger soaking


What a Hot Wheel looks like stripped to bare metal

Step 3: Add Weapons


Add whatever weapons you like or have. I have provided images showing where I found weapons for mine.


Hood Mounted Vulcan Gun


Rear Mounted Oil Jet


Nozzle made from a piece of bent solder, inserted into a hole drilled with a drill bit and pin-vise drill.

Also, Stan Johansen Miniatures in Florida produces a fantastic line of weapon add-ons as part of his Road Warrior 20mm line. Simply buy one of the packs and glue them on. Good times. (Part number RW008 "Light weapons" which is $8.00 is a personal favorite).

Step 4: Airbrushing


I'm going for a Brazilian flag theme (the SP2 was produced in Brazil only from '72 to '76).


First color, the yellow


Masking off the yellow "diamond" in the center of the flag so I can paint around it.


Second color, the green


Masking tape removed

Step 5: Hand Painting



I cut a circle in a piece of masking tape and used that to help me paint the "night sky" blue globe, when I was done I removed the masking tape.

Anything you missed and anything you feel needs to be painted you do it now. I painted gun barrels, the oil dispenser, head lights, tail lights, touched up the green, yellow, interior of the wheel wells, and things of that sort.

Step 6 and 7: Blacklining and Gloss Coat



The blacklining was done with a Sakura 005 (0.2mm) Micron Pen (black ink). I simply traced over all the panel lines. It took very little time.

I also sprayed a couple of coats of gloss on top of the paint job to seal it all in and protect the paint. In my case, I used Pledge with Future (an acrylic based floor wax) because I can airbrush it and it's cheap. However any spray gloss will work fine.

Step 8, 9, and 10: Reassembly, Magnet, and Base


Reassembly is done with superglue. The picture below has a green circle that shows where I simply pooled the superglue after I just snapped the model back together. Easy. Repeat for both rivets.


Red circles show where I placed two strong Neodymium magnets from www.KJMagnetics.com. I did this because I want to still be able to roll my Hot Wheel along and play with my children with it as a Hot Wheel. However, I don't want it rolling around when I am playing Car Wars and end a turn on a sloped surface (hill, ramp, incline, etc.).

The base is created with a 1mm piece of styrene plastic but cardstock (an old index card or cereal box cardboard) will work just as well. I cut it into a 1.5" by 3" rectangle (standard token size in 3x scale IIRC). I spraypainted it black. Then spread a bunch of Elmer's Glue (PVA Glue) on it with my finger. I then dusted it with Corn Meal (finest grind I found in the store). Once it dried, I resprayed it black again. It's the best 1:64 scale "asphalt" surface (for penny pinchers anyway) I've yet found.

FINISHED! Pictures




Other tools I used not explicitly mentioned above (lots of other options, this just happens to be what I have)
  • Reaper Master Series Paints
  • Winsor Newton Series 7 "Kolinsky Sable" paint brush (Size 0)
  • Badger 150 Airbrush
  • Paasche D200R Airbrush Compressor
  • Hobby knife/razor
  • Self healing cutting board
  • Film can with pennies in it and hobby-tack/poster tack on top of it to act as a "handle"
  • Pin vice drill
  • Needle files and ultra fine sandpaper

    Thanks: Closing


    I hope this gives you ideas on things you can do to pimp your own Hot Wheels. I will most likely continue to post pictures to this thread (if that's ok with the Mods) of other conversions I do to continue to give ideas.

    We also discovered that due to the Neodyne magnets... the car makes a GREAT fridge magnet and storage on the side of various metal things is easy. :)
  • Friday, September 17, 2010

    Amateur Night

    Originally posted to SJ Games Forum by the LokRobster reposted here - Matt


    We used the 'Amateur Kart' [featured in a link on these forums, thanks!] for each of the four drivers, but used the 3x scale models we've been working on rather than actual sub-compact size cars or counters.

    The Amateur Kart is a $2.6k vehicle with very light armor, micro-missile launcher front, and a debris dropper rear, and standard 4DP tires. All the vehicles lost at least 1 tire and a few were disabled move-wise because of debris vs. tire trouble. We went with this for simplicity for our first event, next time we'll do a division event [probably 10] and use the CW sets or player designed vehicles.

    I liked the CW5 rules well enough, the super-simplified phases are nice - I can see how they cause collision-figuring problems, though! We're all pretty laid back and are more interested in fun than rules-lawyering; funny how much difference that makes.

    The whole event lasted 7 seconds and covered about 2/3 of the arena area we laid down.


    11x17 image, landscape. 1/60 scale 2 lane two-way divided highway

    Road section for 11x17 printing. 1/60 scale, 1" should be about 5'. At scale 60mph a car would cover a little more than one of these per second [actual length, 17 inches = 85 feet, car at 60mph is about 90ft/sec]

    images/textures are free use :D


    The Bronze, Main Police Force Interceptor w/ turret and side mounted launch pods, paint and guns by Ragpunk


    TX Bug "Crazy Dan" and his MG-armed VW. each turn [1 second] rolled die to see which of the 3 of us would control him for that second...


    '69 firebird w/ hood mounted guns and a top-mount VMG


    last of the v-8 interceptors... road warriored


    Green dropping debris...


    passing the spectator vehicle


    luckily he's just observing

    the green firebird is going 60mph, while the falconXb is only at 40mph...


    green firebird tried a bend but fishtailed instead, right in front of Interceptor -- debris drops right on its frontend!

    debris tore off the left front tire, while the black car's micro-missile shot blew off the green's rear right wheel.


    at 70mph, the Bronze is lined up for the killing run

    that's a LOT of debris getting dropped up there... and CrazyDan's bug begins its flight


    trying to aim NOT getting jumped on

    bug is going 50mph, interceptor at 40mph... lower right of pic, trench coat guy watches the action


    CrazyDan lands, blows out tires... doesn't hit anyone...

    no one is maneuvering, too many hazards and tire damage!


    Dan's bug is mostly disabled, heads straight ahead hoping to shoot whoever crosses in front of him.

    The Bronze is still going much faster than anyone else, the green firebird slows to 40mph in preparation for a bootleg reverse.


    Bootleg stop against arena wall.

    The Bronze crossed in front of the black interceptor and the bug, taking 2 shots to the right side and getting himself killed in the process. The Interceptor rammed the bug [t-bone collision], and found that ramming without a ram plate and weak front armor ain't a good idea...


    wrecked cars roll or skid to a stop

    final moment


    Green Firebird wins!


    LokRobster considers running for the still-running Bronze vehicle, but realizes he wouldn't make it...


    Taking a dirt-nap after getting blown up.