Decepticon: Mudflap Function: D.E.R.T. (Decepticon Earth Recon Team) Leader Tech Spec: -Strength:7 -Endurance:9 -Inteligence:7 -Fireblast: 5 (note: he does not have ranged weapondry, but he's powerful in melee combat and has wrist claws) -Agility/Speed:6 -Rank:8 (He's a team leader) -Skill:9 -Courage:9 Quote: "Ready to get down and dirty, Autobot?" Rival: Autobot "Maverick"; Street Demons leader (Autobot parallel team to the D.E.R.T., both teams have customs planned but right now only the team leaders exist in toy form...for now...) Most Decepticons have a strong distaste for the planet Earth, but not Mudflap. Some criticize his name because he actually has no mudflaps, but those critics fail to realize that Mudflap doesn't need any because all the mud gets on him. Mudflap loves nothing better than to shoot through a wild trail, splashing into huge pools of mud and covering his alt. mode. If that wasn't enough, Mudflap also has taken a liking to the Human sport of mud wrestling, even starting to talk like mud wrestlers from the southern United States. While some "higher-class" Decepticons shun Mudflap because he's perpetually covered in "Earth filfth" and talks funny, his willingness to perform recon missions in the dirtiest places on Earth has earned him a spot on the newly formed "Decepticon Earth Recon Team" (D.E.R.T. for short) as its leader, with a band of other Decepticons who also don't mind getting totally coated in dirt to lay down the hurt on the Autobots. When I first saw pictures of Crossovers Wolverine, I knew that the toy simply looked like crap (a bright yellow and blue Rally truck?) and that it could be so much more. Everybody seemingly started making Trailbreakers out of this guy, but I wanted to try making a custom Decepticon who could be set in the Classicsverse (Classics/Universe 2.0/Generations, take your pick, they're all the same to me). The name "Mudflap" seemed to click into place soon after, and everything afterwards seemed to fall into place like puzzle pieces. While brainstorming the backstory for Mudflap, I wanted him to be a very unique individual, even among the Decepticons (who are either unique individuals, Starscream repaints, or reflector clones). Since I'd already established this guy loved nothing better than getting coated top to bottom with mud, the most brutal sport that took place in mud that I could think of was Mud wrestling, and it just fit into place as well. The claws...well, that's all the base figure really had to offer me aside from a kick-ass alt. mode, plus I didn't want to mess with a spring-loaded action that might involve small springs (I took apart the chest cannon from Movie camshaft when I was making Burnout...I'm lucky to have ever gotten that thing working again to be honest). Plus, if Mudflap deploys the wrist claws in the middle of a wrestling match, you could say he was fighting dirty (instant rimshot)...okay, no more punny jokes. I know he's got some paint rubbing problems, but in all reality he's not done, and the paint problems are mostly just in the high-friction joints and those annoying sholder pannels. He's missing the Decepticon symbols (one goes on the truck roof, not sure where to put at least one more for robot mode) and I want to put an "01" on him somewhere to designate his D.E.R.T. registration. I plan on picking up the 'Con symbols soon, but I can wait. The "Base" paint coat used was Floquill water-based "CNW Green" (I'm into model railroading, so alot of the paints I use for that carry over into TF customs) while the layers of mud are several applications of some mix I made using brown Indiana Ink, some drops of various craft-quality brown acrylic paints, and a little water to thin it out. The Black parts (excluding the parts already black from the plastic) were painted with Floquill "Steam Engine Black", the tires then getting some coats of my "mud mix" afterwards, the spare tires on the back included. The lights are just craft acrylics which were sealed and then covered in my mud mix before getting sealed again. Same goes for the orange in the leg triangles. I'm not sure why I wanted those to be orange, but I made them orange anyways. A close up of the head area, to show that I put red into the tray the head sits on. The head itself is the original figure's head, but I sanded down the spikey bits, grinded the mouth and most of the nose off, and then gave him "glasses" and the face mask from styrene (the shape of the head even after the grinding helped tremendously, especially the fact the area where the visor went was already flat from Wolverine's "mask" eyes). I think he looks a little like Grimlock now, personally, but the head's original "grinning gimace" looked too stupid for a Decepticon like Mudflap, and the eyes still made the figure look too much like Wolverine as well. I'm not honestly totally happy with how the "Weathered metal" look came out on this guy, but to be fair my only other attempt at weathering a TF at this point had been Burnout who had a ton more sculpted detail and less flat surfaces. Still, it looks passable from a distance, and I can always redo it by simply painting over it all in black. I used Testor's oil enamel paints for the metalic worn look; Aluminum and Silver. Silver was also used on the other metailic details seen on this figure; namely those in the belt, what was the original color of the chest grill (before I splattered it with my mud mix) Overall, however, I'm very happy with how this guy turned out so far, and I can't get wait to get started with the other members of the D.E.R.T. Here are just a few fun shots I also took for the heck of it: The better Mudflap (I would have liked that to actually be Animated Waspinator instead of Legends ROTF Mudflap, in reference to what Wasp said in Autoboot Camp about "Mudflaps", but I do not own that figure, soo...) Hound vs. Mudflap; battle of the naturalists! Legacy of Mudflap (my Classics Erector is a movie 1 Mudflap that I slapped some Autobot symbols on, so ignore the one on his chest. He's still the Mudflap figure from both the first movie and Cybertron lines, though, so that's why here's there)
Thanks! The original idea was to try and make the mud really look caked on using a soddering iron to deform the plastic, but I scrapped that in favor of just using layers of paint because I didn't want the parts to ruin the effect because of how much contact parts make with this figure. Glad to see I still achieved that effect! That was the goal, so thanks! Well, the D.E.R.T. group is more fan-created than being in any real fiction (although a friend is working them into his fan fic), but right now there's five other members planned. The trick is actually getting ahold of the proper molds (which shouldn't be a problem in the long run, since most of them use molds from older lines). Yeah, I can't wait to get ahold of that upcoming Ironman Crossover, the one that turns into the three-wheeled vehicle. The Alt. Mode is an almost dead-on match for G1 Afterburner, who I intend to make out of him. Thanks!
