Apsaroke Crow

[Guy]

I received this kit for Christmas from the Mrs and now have the chance to start the assembly process. This kit will probably take me until Christmas to finish as I work on my own projects on the weekends and work on the various commission figures durring the week. Below is the box art painted by Le Van Quang, of PiliPili Miniatures and was taken from his website.

With the recent heat wave here I was not able to do much work out in the shop where I seperate the grinding, sanding and filing from the area where I paint. White metal dust and in this case resin dust does not mix with wet painted figures. I have a small area in the garage where my drill press, dremel with flex shaft and grinder is used.

The mail tools I used for the clean up of the 120mm horse were the small dremel sanding drum and also a cutting bit used to clean up and underneath overhang areas of the horse.

Notice I use these tools with a cover for my mouth and nose as breathing any of the resin dust from any resin figure can be dangerous. I use the dremel tools very carefully and Take my time

The first thing I did was to bring out the main parts of the horse, minus the ears and tail for right now and examine what I need to do to them prior to assembly.

The next step was to mark with a red felt tip the areas I will have to remove. PiliPili has marked most of the areas with X's which helps in knowing for the beginner, what to remove, but I went one step further for the new people to the hobby so they could actually see the mold pore plugs that get removed.

After carefully removing the plugs using both dremel tips I carefully drilled into each hoof and inserted a brass rod for mounting to a work base and later to the permanent base.

** continued in next post **

 

[Guy]

The next step was to take all the cleaned parts and return to my work area in the house and start the assembly process of the horse. Here I have the two back legs.......each side covered with a thin layer of epoxy where they will join and let it set for a couple of minutes. Then attach the two halves and adjust the halves while you can and wrap a small rubber band around the assembly to keep pressure on the two halves.

My next step was to attach the rear leg assembly to the mid-section of the horse and again use a small rubber band to hold in place.

I followed the same procedure for the front two legs and after drying, attached this assembly to the front of the mid-section of the horse.

Below the horse stands pegged to the work base I will use to paint and assemble the whole horse and rider. I have epoxyed the head and ear parts together and fastened to the main body of the horse.

The next part will be the tail, which I forgot to pull out of the box, and will have to do some small sanding off of the mold plug before attaching to the rump of the horse.

Several months ago I ordered a Ken Thomas 6" Antique Oak base with an Oak Veneer wrap around the base for this project.

More to come next weekend.

Thanks for looking and if any question comes up.....feel free to ask.

 

[Brad S]

Wow Guy! Nice SBS with excellent pics and explanations. I've never owned an Pili Pili kit but have always wanted one. Looks as if the parts fit pretty exact.

Brad Spelts

 

[Guy]

Thanks Brad,

I have found Pili Pili's kits to have pretty good fitment. I thought this sbs showing the process might encourage newer members to to try Quangs excellent selection of subjects.

 

[Christos]

Thanks for sharing Guy!
Great sbs!
christos

 

[Bruno]

Hi Guy,


the Pilipili Indian figurines are outstanding in her historical athenticy and of cours with the sculpting ability of Quang. Im very interested to see the next steps.

Thank you very much for your posting.

Best regards from a very hot and sunny Bavaria with 35 grad Celicus.

Bruno

 

[Wendy]

This is a very nice kit, by the looks of it. Indeed, Quang's sculpting is impressive to say the least.
Mounted figures are my favorite, though I'm stuck at smaller scales (i.e. 28mm) as larger figs tend to be rather cost prohibitive. Some day I'll take the plunge and buy a 54mm mounted fig (sigh).

Questions: how did you peg the horse to the work base? Do you use a work base for all your figures?

Looking forward to seeing this one painted.

Wendy

 

[Guy]

Originally posted by Wendy@Jul 24 2006, 06:38 PM

Questions: how did you peg the horse to the work base? Do you use a work base for all your figures?

Looking forward to seeing this one painted.

Wendy

Thanks for the feedback guys

Wendy ~ I usually drill up into the feet of most (but not all) of my figures and paint it while on a paint base to eliminate handling the finished base. The figures are not glued to the work base and after the figure is finished....the base groundwork is finished, I epoxy the finished figure to the finished base.

 

[moore]

Hi Guy,
This is great.... I want to do a horse so bad.... it looks like a
lot to put it together and knowing what to cut off and what not to.
Your pics and explaination is great. I know hands on would be
even better. I have one horse with a mounted figure I got from
Michael Roberts at the Atlanta show... but its probably going to
be in the box for a while. But this gets me really excited to make
that a goal to do.
Thanks
Dee

 

[Guy]

Thanks Dee,

I always do a mounted figure on the side, so to speak, because it does take some time to complete as compared to a full figure or bust. You'll just have to get the figure out of the box and start cleaning him up and do a little at a time. You can always post any questions here if you run into problems.

 

[michelange]

Very good and very great project Guy. I like your step by step, your pictures are very good and it's easy to understand your work , even if me, one does not control English well

 

[Guy]

Thanks Bruno. I am trying to do a sbs for those who have never done a large resin horse and hopefully make them more comfortable in trying one. The old saying "A Picture is worth a thousand words" is so true.