The creation of the blaster pistol
When I first started planning this costume, I wanted it to have a blaster pistol and even made a sketch of the costume having one, but when I tried to build one, I didn't have enough parts for it. After a while, I acquired a broken toy pistol that had the exact same look as the blaster pistol I had wanted to build, so I converted it into a blaster pistol.
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Pages - 01 - 02
This is what the toy pistol looked like before it was converted into a blaster pistol.
The mechanics inside were broken, but since I won't be using them anyway, it doesn't matter.
The mechanics inside were broken, but since I won't be using them anyway, it doesn't matter.
The grip plates had to be removed in order to disassemble the toy pistol.
Once I got the two halves of the toy pistol apart, I started removing the mechanics from the inside.
The markings that said Wings Pistol No.77000 were removed, and the surfaces where they had been were sanded smooth.
To make the toy pistol look more like a blaster pistol, a tube with a cone shaped end was cut to the right length to fit inside the toy pistol.
After some of the toy pistol's front had been removed, the tube was glued onto the inside of it with super-epoxy.
The trigger was glued onto the tube with super-epoxy.
After some super-epoxy had been applied on both halves of the blaster pistol, they were held together by clamps until the super-epoxy had hardened.
After the super-epoxy had hardened, the surface where the two halves were glued together was sanded smooth.
Since the grip of the toy pistol was made to fit the fingers of a child, I wanted to smooth it off as well as elongating it.
The finger tracks were removed from the other grip plate also.
After the finger tracks had been removed, the downwards curve was sanded to the right shape.
The finger tracks were removed by a grinding bit.
To make the grip plates fit onto the new elongated grip, I used masking tape to mark off where the downwards curve from the middle should begin in order to properly shape the grip plates.
After the final application of bondo underneath the grip, it was sanded smooth.
Bondo was applied over the crease to give the whole surface of the blaster pistol a seamless flow.
To prevent the two halves of the blaster pistol falling apart, the plastic was melted together on top of the crease.
Even more bondo was added underneath the grip to elongate it to the desired shape.
Bondo was applied over the opening and underneath the grip.
After the finger tracks had been removed, an aluminum plate was placed inside the opening so that the entire grip wouldn't get filled with bondo.
After the part was placed onto the side of the blaster pistol, the other rectangular holes and the two screw holes were traced onto the blaster pistol, then cut and filed open.
To attach a part onto the side of the blaster pistol to make it look more realistic, a hole had to be drilled.
The grip plate and the end tube were sanded smooth.
Bondo was applied onto the other grip plate also, along with the tube sticking out the back of the blaster pistol.
After the bondo had hardened, the grip was sanded to the right shape.
After having bought a tub of bondo for Shano Andora's helmet, I could finally finish the grip plates with it since I had lots of it left.
The fiberglass bondo was sanded to the right shape, but still needed more filling.
Since I had run out regular bondo, I had to use a blob of fiberglass bondo instead to give the grip plate the proper shape.
After sanding the surfaces of the grip plates, they were taped onto the grip of the blaster pistol after packaging tape had been applied to prevent the bondo from sticking to the grip.
After that was done, the downwards curve was sanded to the right shape.
Two more parts were attached to the other side of the blaster pistol.
Yet another part was glued onto the side of the blaster pistol, and the previously attached parts were covered with masking tape.
An adjustment knob was glued onto the back of the end tube.
The front sight was made of three aluminum plates that were glued together and filed to flow better together.
The plastic front sight was removed in order to replace it with a new metal sight.
An aluminum plate was folded into a back sight that was glued down into the holder.
A few more parts were glued onto the top of the blaster pistol that would represent mounts for an optional scope.
Both parts were glued onto the blaster pistol using super-glue.
To mount a back sight holder and another part on top of it onto the end of the blaster pistol, some of the plastic had to be cut away from underneath both parts to make them fit onto the blaster pistol.
A few parts were glued onto the inside of the rectangular holes to make the other part look more functional.
After the top part was put over the other parts, super-glue was applied onto the two screws to make sure they won't fall out of the holes.
After the paint had cured on the blaster pistol, the masking tape was removed from the parts on the side of it.
A shoe shining sponge was used to make the grip plates even shinier.
After the paint had cured, candle wax was rubbed onto the surfaces of the grip plates, and a polishing rag was used to seal the wax onto the surfaces.
A lighter brown colored paint was rubbed over the surfaces of the grip plates so that it would accumulate in the scratches, making the grip plates appear to me made of lacquered wood.
After the paint on the grip plates had cured, sand paper was used to make small scratches along the surfaces of the grip plates.
All the parts were left to dry in a heated cabinet for 24 hours.
The grip plates were painted with a mixture of whatever paints I could find to make a dark brown color.
After a couple of coats of high gloss black spray paint, it was starting to look very nice.
The spray paint had supposedly expired, so it didn't taste that good anymore, but it still worked very well for this.
The spray paint had supposedly expired, so it didn't taste that good anymore, but it still worked very well for this.
After having drawn a metal wire through the holes for the grip plates to hang the blaster pistol up for painting, masking tape was applied where the grip plates were to be attached.