Heavy Mods & Scratchbuilds SUPER AWESOME MEGA SHAZAM FILLED COMBINER SIZED CUSTOM HANDS TUTORIAL THREAD!

[Cliffjumper69]

Well Kids, I've had a few people ask me about my custom hands I've built and being the pro that I am I've decided to share my trade secrets with you peasants! lol

This is my first tutorial so if anything isn't clear, let me know and I can fix it
Lets get started,



First the tools and things you will need,
Cutting mat/Rotary mat
Yard sale/Room for rent/No smoking signs (They are at Canadian tire and cost $1.00 Vs $5.00 for 2 sheets of styrene, very thin but really good for details and filling gaps)
Styrene.(I'm using 1mm thick for my hands)
Sticky tack
A clamp.
Tooth picks
Gorilla super glue (Its the shiznit!)
Drill with a 5/64" drill bit. (This job will go allot smoother if your drill has a built in level)
Razor knife
.080" Styrene rod.
Styrene L brackets (Cant remember the size)
Square styrene tubes (1/4" is the size I think)
Metal ruler

Ok so Ill start by showing you the finished product, IMO I think Primus and Unicron hands are hella lame and with a little effort and some work you can create a one off set of combiner hands



And a pic of them next to Unicrons hands.



First step grab your piece of styrene. I'm using scrap styrene for this tutorial. Use the sticky tack to hold down the corners of your styrene so it doesn't slide around on your mat. Using your ruler and a pencil make a line thats 1.5" across.



Make the cut, go very slow and don't put allot of pressure on the blade. Go over the line 2-3 time and stop.



Now all you have to do is just snap the piece you just cut and you should have a nice line.



Use you ruler and measure out and mark four 1.5" x 0.5" pieces that will be used for the outside of your first part of your finger. (3 pieces in the picture but you get the point)



Make the cuts again, just like the step above, go slow, 2-3 times and snap them. Once all 4 pieces are cut set them aside. Every finger will have seven pieces of styrene glued together.
Now with another piece of styrene, measure out three 0.5" x 0.5" squares.



Cut them out and snap them off. Now grab the four 1.5" x 0.5" pieces

[Cliffjumper69]

Now using a tooth pick and a small amount of super glue cover two sides of the squares.



Stick them together and line them up before the glue sets, you have a few seconds. After they are lined up put them in your clamp for a few minutes.



After that do the same thing to the four 1.5" x 0.5" pieces.



Put them in the clamp for few minutes



Now after they come out of the clamp you want to glue all three pieces together. Put a bit of glue at the end of the 1.5" x 0.5" piece and spread out the glue.



After you have done this to both sides put the pieces together you just glued into the clamp. I put three glued together scrap pieces of styrene into the other end just so everything stays in line once the part is in the clamp. No glue is required.



After a few minutes remove the piece form the clamp and you will have a very rough basic finger part.



Now all you need to do is sand the piece so everything lines up and everything is smooth. I'm using my mouse because I cant find my sanding block.



Once you have everything smooth, its time to round off the open end. This will allow your finger to bend nicely.



After all your hard work you will have a basic finger design. Sand the tip so the finger isn't boxy.

[Cliffjumper69]

Now were about to start the second part of our finger.



First you want to cut three 1.5" x 0.5" pieces of styrene. glue them together and clamp them. After that's round the end that will be attached to the first part of your finger, and the other end that will be attached to the hand.



With another piece of styrene mark out four pieces 0.5" x 0.5" with an angle on them. This will be the outside of your finger.



Once you cut them out they should look like this, if they do, glue each pair together and clamp them.



Glue the outside pieces in the middle of the 1.5" piece and put them into the clamp.



After a few minutes sand everything smooth.



Now comes the really hard part if you don't have a level in your drill. After you put your finger together and it moves smoothly, time to drill you hole. Go slow, take your time and try to drill a nice straight line. If the lines off your finger wound bend properly.



After you drill your hole time for the mock up pin. I use tooth picks for mock up pins because its cheap and you need to pull the pins out to measure the fingers you made for the other hand.







Now that you got your first finger guess what, three more to go, and a thumb Just follow the same steps for the other fingers and you'll be fine. Make the middle finger the longest, the ring the second longest and the pin key the smallest.



For the thumb, I glued seven pieces of styrene together and made a non articulated thumb. I drilled a hole in the end and glued a ball joint into the end. Ill leave the thumb design up to the builder, this is my thumb as an example.

[Cliffjumper69]

Now the hand. This part was a real pain to build. My hand is glued together but I made a diagram to show you what went into building the hand.





The top part of the hand is a 1.5" x 1.5" square. I cut out two squares and glued them together. It is the blue dot in the diagram.
At the end of the hand is five 0.5" x 0.5" squares glued together. The two on the ends are three pieces of styrene glued together, and the three in the middle are five pieces of styrene glued together. Glue them into place leaving a gap for the fingers to fit in between. They are the red numbered dots in the diagram.
Cut a piece of the styrene L bracket to 1.5" and glue it up against the five squares for added strength. The L bracket is the yellow dot in the diagram.
Using your squared styrene tube, cut two pieces at 0.75" and glue them into place as shown by the green dots in the diagram. After the glue has dried the time to cut out the place where the socket will be for the thumb. Cut along the dotted lines as shown in the diagram. Your sockets may be different and you'll need to come up with a way to attach them. I used some parts form a junker Cybertron Red Alert and they fit nicely into the hand.
Use styrene to build up the sides of the hand and to fill in the palm. I added two extra 1.5" x 1.5" squares and glued them to the top of the hand to make it bigger.
Now for the wrist joint, I used a lego knights joint and cut the end off.





I sanded off the pegs, and added two pieces of styrene to the sides so it would fit nicely into the hand. After you get the wrist to fit just glue it into place.



After everything is finished you will sick set of combiner hands. To make a pair of hands your looking at about 10-15hrs of custom work. BUT once you've mastered the art of making hands it will take less time. My hands still need work they are about 75% complete but you can use the Yard sale/Room for rent/No smoking signs from Canadian Tire to cover the open parts and add detail to the hands. Apply this tutorial to making any size hand, deluxe, voyager or bigger!



I hope you guys enjoyed this tutorial and I'm looking forward to seeing a whole set of non Unicron/Primus hand combiners in the future!

[Robimus]

I'm pretty sure I'd get the finger stuck to my head trying to apply the glue, lol.

Its amazing to see the step by step process. Thnaks for sharing.

[Sun Swipe Prime]

very cool

[Sideslap]

That's really cool. I've always wanted to make custom parts especially for my gundams but never had the time or design skills to do as such. I do have a couple of questions though.

After all is said and done how sturdy/durable are the hands? will they hold up with normal wear and tear and play? or are they mostly for display purposes?

Secondly you don't mention what to do with the toothpicks once you're heading into the final steps, should they be replaced by metal pins or something of the like?

Thanks for the tutorial and keep up the good work.

[Tekkamanraiden]

That's an awesome tutorial, I always suspected that's how it's done but to step by step tutorial is awesome.

[Cliffjumper69]

Originally Posted by Robimus

I'm pretty sure I'd get the finger stuck to my head trying to apply the glue, lol.

Its amazing to see the step by step process. Thnaks for sharing.

Ive done that. I was working on the hands and went out for dinner not knowing I had 2 pieces of styrene glued to my arm and my neck lol

Originally Posted by Sun Swipe Prime

very cool

Thanks

Originally Posted by Sideslap

That's really cool. I've always wanted to make custom parts especially for my gundams but never had the time or design skills to do as such. I do have a couple of questions though.

After all is said and done how sturdy/durable are the hands? will they hold up with normal wear and tear and play? or are they mostly for display purposes?

Secondly you don't mention what to do with the toothpicks once you're heading into the final steps, should they be replaced by metal pins or something of the like?

Thanks for the tutorial and keep up the good work.

The hands are very strong. If buit right they will stand up to anything. Ive dropped my hands a few times and nothing happened to them.

When your hands are ready for paint and final details, swap out the tooth picks for the 0.80" styrene rod. You will need to lightly sand the rod before putting it into the holes. Metal pins work great too!

Originally Posted by Tekkamanraiden

That's an awesome tutorial, I always suspected that's how it's done but to step by step tutorial is awesome.

Thanks! I had no idea how much work went into making my hands. I thought it would be a few hours for my first set, but it took me 40+hrs to build them. Now that the tutorial is up I hope I can save people lots of time

[Dragon Knight]

Nice! I want to attempt at scratch building parts for custom models. So this tutorial's going to come in handy.