WALL-E!

[zathros]

There's a really super detailed one of these out there. I haven't seen it in a few years. I may still have it on my hard drive, but with the recent disaster, who knows. I did make a set a tracks for "Wall-E" for somebody some time ago, but the model was never built. Kind of wasted my time of that. I like yours. It will make a great display model. I might clear coat it to seal it from moisture.

 

[Revell-Fan]

Thank you!

I guess you mean "the original" life-size one by Elso:

He provided a full blueprint on his blog and used this model as a base for the simple one I'm building.

In addition, there is a Wall-E builders' club like the R2 builders' club. I haven't visited them yet but I read that they have lots of useful info to make a life-size one. BTW, someone rightly said Wall-E was suffering from "CG-itis", meaning that nearly all of his movements you see in the movie are impossible to achieve in real life (like folding up into a box). It's similar to the Swiss army knife of the galaxy, R2-D2 (where does he keep all this stuff inside?). These droids are Tardises on tracks.

 

[Revell-Fan]

Go on, I dare you!

Would anybody hand me a Mjolnir, please?

 

[Revell-Fan]

Alright then, here come the hands.

I wanted to add more points of articulation to the model and started with the hands. Minor surgery is required, nothing wild, but the results speak for themselves.

Two fingers, one thumb and one middle hand. I added some black dots marking the center of the face.

I started with the middle hand. This is the piece to which the fingers are attached. I added some pieces of card right behind the dots for reinforcement.

A view from the front with a torch behind.

Then I made some small x-shaped cuts into the holes

and widened them carefully with a shashlik rod:

Not too wide, there is supposed to be some friction to hold the fingers in place later.

The thumb was treated the same way:

The rod was cut down to approximately 15 mm length and pushed half way through the hole. The end inside was fastened with a drop of glue:

And closed.

 

[Revell-Fan]

Then the thumb rod was pushed through the corresponding hole in the middle hand.

To hold the thumb in place but to avoid it from falling out a strip of scrap paer was rolled around the other end of the rod:

Then the middle hand part was closed:

and we end up with two rotating thumbs. One displays in an open hand position, when you turn it 180° it represents a closed position.

The other fingers are aligned and another wooden rod is pushed through the holes:

The rod is cut off with a Knipex. One hand done. The other one is made accordingly.

 

[Cybergrinder]

Here we go

 

[Revell-Fan]

You are mean. :Grin:

 

[Revell-Fan]

Next mod: The lower arms.

The original design provides a 3 cm long tube for one lower arm that is simply glued to the upper arm. I turned it into a stamp-like cylinder that telescopes and swivels 360°.

The new parts:

The stopper helps to keep the tube aligned and prevents it from being pulled out:

The lower arm tube is glued into a ring.

The flaps at the end provide a strong connection of the parts.

An extra lid is attached to even increase the strength.

A hole is cut into the upper arm part. It is reinforced with card:

The lower arm tube is pushed thrugh the hole and the upper arm part is closed.

The lower arm is fully movable.

 

[zathros]

Wow! You're going bonkers on this one!!

Do you have the link to that blueprint? That is something I missed.

 

[Revell-Fan]

Of course. There are several entries on the blog covering the different sections of the body. It starts here:

http://elsocraft.blogspot.com/2008/06/

You have to look through all posts from 2008. The drawings are very detailed and precise.

 

[Revell-Fan]

With a moving lower arm and posable fingers it was imperative for me that the shoulder moved, too. I wanted it to move in two directions, vertically and horizontally. However, looking closely at the design of the shoulder I quickly realized that a joint that moved the arm away from the body would require some major surgery because the arm was connected to the body with a tube. That tube is fairly small and it does not match the texture you can see on the model. In addition, the upper arm is made of a number of tubes which interconnect at certain points. Adding a horizontal swivel joint would mean a tremendous rework of the entire shoulder which I could not manage in the given time frame. For these reasons I decided to skip the horizontal movement and added a simple swivel joint to move the arm up and down.

Here are the parts:

The small shoulder tube is on the top left. Top right are some plates to cover up the holes. Second row: Two cylinders and the shoulder parts with hole markings (the white circles).

All parts are assembled separately from each other.

The shoulder piece is glued to the upper arm.

There is a small lip which has to be cut off. Then the short shoulder tube is glued to the shoulder. The hole positions must match.

The hand is attached.

The guidance rod is assembled using water-forming.

The rod is pushed through the holes.

 

[Revell-Fan]

The flaps are glued to the shoulder.

The cover is glued over the holes to conceal them.

The thickness of the rod was determined by the dark stripe on the main body. You might wonder why I chose an even smaller rod for the rotator. Of course, I could have simply prolongued the shoulder cylinders but this would have given me only a swivel joint and prevented me from adding a special gimmick. The arms move in a very peculiar way which I wanted to replicate (not fully, but you should get the idea ). If you have the chance just take a look at the movie again to see what I mean. All I can say now is, if you liked this update you'll love the next one. Stay tuned!

 

[Rhaven Blaack]

The arms look FANTASTIC! You are setting the bar high on this one.

 

[Cybergrinder]

@Revell-Fan , well, you asked?

 

[Revell-Fan]

The arms look FANTASTIC! You are setting the bar high on this one.

Thank you!

@Revell-Fan , well, you asked?

Okay, winter time is sled time!

I was thinking carefully about how to achieve a back and forth motion of the arm. I tested several ideas in my mind, abandoned them, came up with new ones. After three days of mere thinking - the build was literally on hold because of this - I almost gave up. But then, during my lunch break, I got it! A rail / sled system that would hold itself in place.

I fired up SketchUp and rebuilt the upper box that forms the torso. Then I created the sled and the rails. On paper everything looked like a walk in the park - but reality turned out to be a complete nightmare! The first rails sat too low, the next ones too high. Then the sled got stuck. I was about to abandon the idea, but after seven or eight test builds (!) I chose to combine the upper rail that sat too high with the lower rail that was too low - and it worked!!

PICTURES!

I started with the sled. It was made of one piece.

Easy peasy. A hollow tube was inserted. It will hold the shoulder in place later.

Again water-forming was applied. The flaps are pushed together so that they wouldn't get stuck while being pushed through the holes.

These are pictures of the white prototype. ONE of the MANY prototypes...

The flaps are glued to the outside

and cut to shape.

The sides are cleaned up by adding a piece of black paper.

 

[Revell-Fan]

Now on to the rails.

Their shape was determined by the upper half of the torso. On the top it was straight, on the bottom it was angled.

The top rail:

On my later attempts I re-designed the flaps in a way that the part keeps its intended angles and stabilizes and supports itself.

The lower rail:

 

[Rhaven Blaack]

Thank you!




Okay, winter time is sled time!

I was thinking carefully about how to achieve a back and forth motion of the arm. I tested several ideas in my mind, abandoned them, came up with new ones. After three days of mere thinking - the build was literally on hold because of this - I almost gave up. But then, during my lunch break, I got it! A rail / sled system that would hold itself in place.

I fired up SketchUp and rebuilt the upper box that forms the torso. Then I created the sled and the rails. On paper everything looked like a walk in the park - but reality turned out to be a complete nightmare! The first rails sat too low, the next ones too high. Then the sled got stuck. I was about to abandon the idea, but after seven or eight test builds (!) I chose to combine the upper rail that sat too high with the lower rail that was too low - and it worked!!

PICTURES!

I started with the sled. It was made of one piece.

View attachment 168855

View attachment 168847

View attachment 168848

Easy peasy. A hollow tube was inserted. It will hold the shoulder in place later.

View attachment 168849

View attachment 168851

Again water-forming was applied. The flaps are pushed together so that they wouldn't get stuck while being pushed through the holes.

View attachment 168854

These are pictures of the white prototype. ONE of the MANY prototypes...

View attachment 168850

View attachment 168856

View attachment 168853

The flaps are glued to the outside

View attachment 168852

and cut to shape.

View attachment 168858

View attachment 168857

The sides are cleaned up by adding a piece of black paper.

I like how you re-enforced that hole. It looks really good and it makes sense. You did a GREAT JOB on it!!!

 

[Revell-Fan]

This is the outer shell of the upper half of the torso:

It is turned around. A few selected areas are coloured with some printed decals so that the white of the back side does not show through on the finished model.

Then the rails are glued into place.

I used regular UHU glue in order to avoid warping. The pieces must be absolutely straight, so you have to work very carefully.

A screen is added - again to hide the inside of the model. The lower half (standing upright in the pictures) stays loose.

The sleds are inserted. They are not glued and move freely back and forth.

A view at the other (right) side:

The box is closed.

I folded up the flap and used it for alignment.

The side parts are simply glued to the sides of the rails. Their flaps were not necessary and were cut off. I also cut away the upper dark strip in order to allow the sled to be visible (and usable) from the outside.

 

[Revell-Fan]

Alright, here are the promised pictures of the lower torso box that were missing in one of the posts above.

The upper torso box is glued on top of it:

The white marks on the back indicate the position of the "trunk" piece and some greeblies.

The energy level display is glued into place:

 

[Revell-Fan]

Now let's get back to the laminated torso plate from a few days ago.

Two textured plates are attached to the bottom.

The plate is glued to the torso box.

No traces of grey card any longer!

The neck is installed. I applied some glue to the flaps at the bottom of the neck and the area beneath the texture. You should not apply glue to the flaps of the torso plate because it would be smeared down when the neck piece is put through the hole.

You should check the position of the neck to make sure that it is straight up.

Some greeblies are attached to the sides.