Done / Completed The Expanse - MCRN pistol - machined aluminium conversion kit

[RandomMaker]

So... Very... Pretty! (My grandfather was a machinist and my family in this country dates back to a blacksmith in 1727, so maybe that's why I've always been a sucker for nice metal work!)

Also thanks for the dimensions, that should be more than enough for me to mock up a wood top piece that's close in size, for fitting the holster, or close enough.

- Dave

 

[EvanW]

Promised update!

sorry for the delay, I had to jump on prototyping my next big project to launch the interest thread. And it also took longer than expected as it is a very complex project, Chewie's and Leia's brass handcuffs!
Now that this is done, the interest period is running until the 6th and then I have to wait a bit for the materials to arrive, so I'm trying to finally finished this project before starting on the handcuffs! That leaves us until probably next Monday or so, hopefully this works!

I'm telling this again, but this was the most difficult machining project I have ever made, almost to the point of regreting to do it, it was a crazy endeavour to try to machine those extremely complex parts by hand, and since they take basically 12h per part, if you make one mistake at any point, you ruin 12h of work, very painful!
Anyways, none of the part are going to be 100% because I'm not a machine, but I'm really trying my best
At some point, when that project should have been finished already, I couldn't even see the end, there was so much more to do, I just gave up on trying to figure out how much more time was needed to finish it! Now, i'm finally starting to see the end. it's not finished yet, but the main parts of the V2 have been almost done for a while and now, the V1 will almost miss just the final 45° machined opperations. almost there!
that's not all, because when this is done, I still need to do the lathed parts and the extra lower part for the V2, but I'm hoping the main parts will finally be finished in the next few days.

Hi Ethan,

Conversation request sent.

Thanks!!

 

[eethan]

Hi there,
sorry again for the delay, I am almost done with the main parts, just a bit more cleaning up, then I still need to do the lathed parts and the small extra part for the V2s
did the 45° cuts:

 

[eethan]

Hey there,
still slow, but still moving forward!
I machined the bottom of the parts:

turned the front barrels, drilled the holes on the top and installed the barrels:

and now I'm doing the big back barrels:

 

[eethan]

Gosh! I really hope you guys will like those when you finally have them in hands! I'm so sorry for the delay, those and the darn Covid/thyroid have been the bane of my existence!

 

[Griefboy]

They look amazing and the fact that they are so difficult to machine will make it unlikely to be produced again anytime soon. I feel very lucky to get in on this run. So close now!

 

[RandomMaker]

Gosh! I really hope you guys will like those when you finally have them in hands! I'm so sorry for the delay, those and the darn Covid/thyroid have been the bane of my existence!

I have to get a napkin handy every time I look at the update pictures so I don't drool all over my keyboard.

They look AMAZEBALLS.

 

[EvanW]

Looking great!!

 

[crighton]

If you have any more slots I would like one.

 

[eethan]

If you have any more slots I would like one.

It's possible someone will drop because of the delay, I'll let you know.
More update tonight or tomorrow

 

[eethan]

Hey there,
so, I'm mostly done with the machining, just the extra part for the V2s. and printing the black inserts for the rear barrels.
here are some pics:

V1

V2

 

[Farrells Props]

This looks better then the actual props used on the show!

 

[eethan]

This looks better then the actual props used on the show!

Thank you that is kind of you, the real props are really well made and I tried to reproduce the idiosyncrasies and machine them as they did the original

 

[Farrells Props]

Thank you that is kind of you, the real props are really well made and I tried to reproduce the idiosyncrasies and machine them as they did the original

I've handled some of them myself and genuinely, yours are looking better finish-wise!

 

[eethan]

hey there,
sorry again for the delays! I have printed the black parts and they worked a charm
they are pretty thin so I had to ask my wife to airbrush them black in the end. They'll cure and i'll do my best to attach those as soon as possible!
still have the extra V2 parts to do, but I'll contact people for the V1s as soon as I'm finished with those for sure
thank you all for your patience on this very small but very complex run

 

[eethan]

Hi there,
some photos of the resin details installed, very happy how they turned out

V2 under-barrel part is in progress too:

 

[Griefboy]

Those look amazing! What did you end up doing for the V2 barrel? I don't recall ever seeing a good reference picture of it.

 

[eethan]

Those look amazing! What did you end up doing for the V2 barrel? I don't recall ever seeing a good reference picture of it.

thank you almost ready!
the V2 has one pretty good ref where you see the front, it's a double diameter big hole and I did the same on my replicas:

here for instance (old wip photo):

 

[EvanW]

Looks awesome! Can anyone recommend a paint brand and color for these when I am ready to build onto my prop

Thanks!

Evan

 

[eethan]

Hey there,
this is the final delay for the V1, I realized while doing that extra V2 parts that you guys asked me at some point if I could do the plate that goes at the bottom of the handle, so I tried today

another very difficult part for this run!
It would be easy (but expensive and with a wait time) to just have those laser cut, but when you see the refs, the part is really adjusted, and since the CNC aluminium bottom part of the pistol has an angle to it's depth, laser cutting the plates wouldn't allow such a precise adjustment because the sides wouldn't be tappered.

so! here comes some old school machining!
I machined a small mdf template by hand on the router with a template for each corner, trying to be as precise as possible to copy the size of the pistol part opening:

when this was as close as humanly possible, I made the final tiny adjustments by sanding the sides with a sanding beam flat on the bench, to keep the sides well squared:

and I did this until I was completely happy with the fit of the template on the pistol:

then there is much more problem solving to be done to attach all this to be machined, having something flat around it for the router, and here we go:

and the part is machined following the template, with the begining of a big rounding bit, that was, it gives an angle to the sides:

and the final part:

there will be a resin part to attach it to the magazine I guess, I still need to work on that.

I'll be sending messages now if I can, explaining the buying process and asking if you want that part
cheers all