UPDATE 8-22-12: Post #14 I did some earlier work on this guy in my paint details thread. Since then, I did savio-prime's shoulder, wrist, and leg mods. I also added some more detailing, and plan to continue with more later on... 1-10-12: I did savio-prime's new wheel mod. Here's a quick tutorial. 5-23-14: More mods and painting: Post #18
I'm working on this too; I'm doing him up in DOTM colors. I did figure out a way to flip the grill. It's not a complete hood flip like savio, but it's close enough.
Thanks! Yeah, I was considering it (I have the Galvatron), but I liked the effort/reward ratio of these other mods enough to do them right away. Plus the grill being upside down doesn't bother me as much as the blockiness of the shoulders and legs... Cool, can't wait to see it! I was thinking of just painting some green on the area in front of his face to make it look a little more like the CGI model... Awesome, do you have a link? Otherwise I can do some searching... AHA, found it! http://www.tfw2005.com/boards/radicons-customs/351791-movie-ratchet.html That's great! But I'd like to keep mine transformable...
Painted feet/roof I added some paint to his legs and feet/roof. I also painted the dull gray lights silver. I'll probably paint his toes back to black later on and paint the black areas above his doors green as well...
Looking great there! Don't ya love how much that opens up his head area??? One of my favorite mods and so easy!!!
Sure do! You come up with such great ideas! I noticed the flap on mine doesn't go back as far as yours does, must be because of the further modding you did...
Wheel mod tutorial Here's a quick tutorial of how I did the wheel mod... First, to make it easier to get to the places I needed to cut, I removed the head by unscrewing it in the back and pulling it apart. Then I cut the wheel attachments at the point that's level with the top of the torso/bottom of the head: I used flush cutters to cut them off. It took a few snips for each... Then I put the head back on and closed the flap, having it all in vehicle mode. I put some Plastic Fusion on the sides of the flap, a bit away from the rest of the torso so it wouldn't fuse the flap to the torso. Then I simply applied the wheels to the sides of the flap, lining up the cut areas as closely as possible. I held the wheels in place until the PF cured enough to hold them, only took a few minutes. It may be easier to do one at a time... After I let it set overnight, I cut away the extra PF and plastic. Here are some close-up pics: The flap actually stays in place better in vehicle mode now than before, at least for me. I was planning to use some magnets if that wasn't the case... I suppose the extra plastic could be removed from where the wheels used to be, but I'm leaving mine on and planning to paint them black to help the vehicle mode look. I hope this was helpful!
Excellent mods (props to savio too) and thanks for the tutorial. I'd love to do some of those, but I'd hate to ruin my Best Buy Ratchet. I might brave the wheel mod, but the hood/chest flip mod is frightening.
Yeah, I'd need a spare before I dare the chest mod. The chest doesn't bother me too much, either. That's the great thing about the shoulder and wheel mods. IMO they're both easy and fix the more glaring issues... With the attachments not working, you'll have to upload your pics to a picture site (I use Image hosting, free photo sharing & video sharing at Photobucket) that will generate URLs for them. Then you can just post them in the forums, using the "Insert Image" icon above the text areas... Something else savio-prime did was give Ratchet the gun from the deluxe toy. I really liked the look and wanted to do the same, but I also want my deluxe Ratchet able to hold it. So I used a packaging rubber band
Thanks Tim! Yeah, the toy originally had black feet but I painted them to try and match the movie model better...
I pretty much had a perfect storm with this guy. He was next up in my rotation of TFs to revisit and work on, and one of the light pieces I had put on a shoulder was broken off (probably by my son ). While looking on eBay to find a replacement piece, I found a better deal in buying another whole Ratchet (black repaint). At this time, savio-prime posted new mods he did to his (http://www.tfw2005.com/boards/radicons-customs/820436-dotm-voyager-ratchet-version-7-a.html) and karekature posted his (http://www.tfw2005.com/boards/radicons-customs/971431-leader-class-ratchet.html)... Mods this time around: - I did some work on his flip-out weapon so the gun from HftD Ratchet can go in it without a rubber band like before. I found a small piece that fit in the slot of the gun and used Apoxie Sculpt to attach it to Ratchet's flipper. I also used more Apoxie Sculpt to create a type of mold for the gun to fit in. Next time I work on him I'll probably sand it down some and maybe try to improve the fit... - savio-prime's extra thumb mod: http://www.tfw2005.com/boards/radicons-customs/820436-dotm-voyager-ratchet-version-7-a-17.html#post10673885 - karekature's gave me the idea to put wheels in the shoulders. Mine are a cheat, though... - I wanted the big claw to go on Ratchet's back, like it does on savio's, so I went with a poor-man's mod and attached some clips to the flip-back piece that has the front wheels on it. These clips kept it from staying closed in vehicle mode, so I added a couple Lego piece posts that go into the screw holes on each side of Ratchet's head in vehicle mode. Next time I work on him I'll probably sand down the Apoxie Sculpt here as well... - I wanted the pieces on the front of the shoulders the way savio and karkature did, but I was afraid to try such extensive mods. So instead I just cut those pieces off the spare Ratchet I got on eBay and attached them to the shoulders. - New Reprolabel set. I specifically got the new set for stickers for the shoulders, but there were some new ones that I also used. I thought of replacing some of the worn stickers, but decided to wait until they get even more worn. - Painted his head and legs some. Next time I plan to focus on the arms. I started experimenting with a chest rotation mod on the spare, but the piece I tried didn't work. I had been working on Ratchet for quite a while, so I decided to leave him as is for now and revisit the chest mod next time... ETA: A Facebook friend asked for more shoulder pics, so I'm posting them here as well...
