Happy Halloween Bat Cones! :)

[Revell-Fan]

It has become a tradition that my colleagues at work get a small treat for Halloween. This year I chose the hanging bat cones from brother:


The pattern is very simple and consists of only three parts with two of which are mirrored (the wings). Since the provided pattern was too small for my purpose I enlarged it by about 75 % and printed the outlines. I also made another pattern for a coloured inlay to spicen up the look a bit.

The pattern was glued to some scrap cardboard and cut out. This gave me three stencils for tracing on black and purple card.

I used a white pencil so that the lines were easier to see on the black card.

I always make a limited edition of 15 pieces which are given to those who I meet first as soon as I enter our house. So it's kind of a lottery who will get one. Naturally, if someone doesn't get one and asks me for one I'll make another.

15 bodies and 30 wings had to be cut out.

To bend the bodies into a smooth cones I brushed them with water.

The inlays were traced, cut out and formed:

 

[Revell-Fan]

They were attached to the bodies. In order to avoid a sloppy result I only put a ring of glue around the top area of the cones:

Then I punched through the hole marks - which was a huge mistake (more on that later).

SPOOKY EYES!

A pair of waggling eyes was glued to the face:

Not bat so far..!

Some ice (s)cream, please?

 

[Revell-Fan]

Some string of about 50 cm length was knotted to the holes.

The wings got some marks with a silver sharpie.

and were attached to the body.

I used the seamline on the back for sligning. So far so good.

However, when I lifted up the bat I noticed something very bad (no pun intended, this time):

The bat is extremely top or back heavy and tends to turn to the back when it is hung up. Reason for that: The hole marks were wrong! They need to be about 3 cm away from their designed position. I took one cone and punched in another set of holes but I missed the spot; it was still not correct. I had no time and no material for another try (I would have definitely destroyed one bat to find the ideal spots) and chose another solution.

I made some small cuts into the wing thumb:

 

[Revell-Fan]

The string was pushed through the incisions.

To make sure that they don't get out the top area was covered with a strip of scrap card:

This solves the balancing issue and enables you to adjust the angle of the cone when it is hung up by pulling the strings back or forth.

 

[Revell-Fan]

TA-DAAA!

Alright then - time for some sweets!

And ready for dispatch!

Yesterday all bats were send to their new owners and created many happy faces!

Thank you for watching. And Happy (belated) Halloween to all of you! :Bat:Bat:Bat:Grin::Grin::Grin:

 

[Rhaven Blaack]

These bats look GREAT!!!
Thank you very much for sharing them with us!!!

 

[micahrogers]

so cute, and a great idea for the office.

 

[Revell-Fan]

What surprised me the most was how simple they are to make. Last year's spider was much more labour-intense. A shame that the hole positions were wrong, but thank goodness there was a solution which also enhanced the final look: If you pull the strings you'll move the wings in and out, so they bow naturally like a real bat. Of course the wings will flap if you move the cone up and down, too.