I've gotten my first Alpha tests prints in hand and I have quite a few changes/tweaks that need to be made before this guy is ready for public release.

I ordered the parts in White Strong Flexible Polished and the eye and light channel parts in Transparent Detail. During this test I tried going without the usual sprues on small parts thinking that just maybe I wouldn't need them. As it turned out, the print job ended up taking way longer than normal and when I did get the parts in hand I was missing several portions of Nail's kit and had doubles of a couple of Disposal's parts. For example I ended up with 3 feet and 3 thigh bones, 2 of Disposal's chest panels and none of Nail's.

I also was planning on ordering a protoskeleton in Alumide Polished but that portion of the order got cancelled stating the parts were too small to polish. (Even though the exact same parts in WSF got polished.. go figure). I sprued the connector joints and reordered and had those cancelled on me too. So I sprued the whole thing up and reordered in WSFP. It's on it's way. Still need a complete set of Nail armor though.

When assembling the parts I do have (enough for a complete Disposal) I found that the polished ball joints were so incredibly loose that they would barely hold together. It was like I had a tiny marionette but without strings. I glued all of the connector joints into their skeletal base sockets and added a glue layer to thicken the ball where it would connect to the limb bones. He stands on his own now but I'm not brave enough yet to try posing him.

That said, I've made some changes to the protoskeleton so that the connector joints are already a part of the base skeletal parts rather than having to plug into them. This will sacrifice a bit of articulation but hopefully should make for a stronger part. I've already ordered this update to use w/ Nail.

The other concern is the size. It's all well and good for me to design these and order them and do what I have to to make it work but it's another thing to expect paying customers to do the same. The tolerances are just too tight at this scale for Shapeways to handle effectively so I'm going to scale up the figure a bit. The resulting figure will end up being about 3.5" instead of the current ~2". I want to keep the end price for this guy as low as possible so I may try a test at this scale but with enlarged balls, anticipating the polishing process.

Here's Disposal partially assembled, next to a Kreon for scale.




The visor was printed in transparent detail material which has a yellow tint to it. I colored it using a dry erase marker.. lol


Next to the Kreon and legends Megatron for scale


with the Kreon and legends Prowl






Here, I'm shining a small flashlight over him to show off how the light piping works. I think this might be the smallest transformer figure to have light piping ever.. but I'm not sure ^__^


with the source material ^__^

 

Nice! I hope to see the painted version soon.  

 

This looks awesome, man.

 

That looks so fun! Great job.  

 

I love you.

 

Thanks man, I think I'll probably leave this one unpainted and save that embeleshment for the Beta/final version ^__^

Thanks guys  

Daww, I love you too Ryoku. -__^

 

Aside from the loose joints and the random duplicate of pieces I'd said this prototype was a success!

 

He is a treasure!

 

This is just amazing. Great work!

Is there any way we could see a picture of just the skeleton assembled?

 

Want! when can I order?

 

I want one too lol

 

I agree. I've got some changes I've already made to the skeleton and it's "enroute to the printer". For the next round I'll try increasing the size of the balls to account for the polishing and see how it goes. I think I'll order the Pipes armor set for that test ^__^

thanks man, every time I glance over at him I'm struck by just how tiny he is  

Thanks a lot mate  
On this version I made the attachment points too tight to be able to safely get the torso and pelvis armor parts back off but I'll be sure to get some skeletal shots for you when the Alpha2 skeleton arrives (due 5/11 or so)

Thanks guys ^__^

I'm going to be seeking some volunteers for Alpha2 and Alpha3 tests in the next week or two so be sure to follow me on twitter or facebook to be kept up to date on that as I won't be advertising those tests on any of the forums. (links in my siggy)

 

That's fantastic, man.

 

Oh that is SO cool, love this concept so much.

While you're scaling him up, might I BEG that you go just a hair bigger and get to 3.75"?

Not only is it a standard format for toys, it would also put them directly in scale to G1 Action Masters, which is a pretty appropriate gang of bots for your fellows to hang out with, I think.

Just a thought, but it'd increase my interest 10 fold to have them in THAT scale  

 

I have to go with him in upscaling it, would look great with say power rangers or kamen rider figures

 

This looks so cool. Can't wait for fembot designs.

 

hmmn... I'd be all for upscaling the model as it would give me more room to add more detail to the figures. The down side though is that then these guys quickly outrun my toy budget and I couldn't afford to test anything   blowing this figure up to 3.5" gets us into the neighborhood of $45 - $50 per figure. Still, since I know there is a market there so I'll do what I can to offer them at that size and chop away at the cost as much as I can ^__^

 

This is fantastic!
How much did this version cost to print if you don't mind me asking?

 

I need one now...

 

When I get my sterolithographic printer in a few months we might be able to figure out something more cost-effective.

You have the 'garage's full support.

D/L