[Barry]

Last night I completed the hip pods and spine.

1. Spine installed.



2. Hip pods assembled.



3. Hip Pods installed.

[Barry]

1. Shoulder bells assembled.



2 & 3. Shoulder bells painted and fitted.

[Barry]

The pieces are starting to come together nicely. A few adjustments and it's ready for the transfer to aluminium!

[Barry]

1. Show me a clean floor and I'll show you no work being done....



2. A couple of cartons of beer went into this shin.



3. Left leg complete. Got to make another boot out of cardboard tonight to replace the foam trial boot.

[Barry]

1. Last boot. Practice makes perfect. I'm so glad I have approached this incrementally. The fibreglass/car-bog method was good to learn, but messy, expensive and time consuming in the extreme. Doing a boot in foam was also a good learning experience, but still not practical. Finally moving on to cardboard before the aluminium build, each part I make just gets better in quality as I gain experience. This is the third boot I have made and I reckon it's 100% on the first one.



2. Forearms assembled.



3. Articulated handplates assembled.



4. Only the hands left to go now.

[Barry]

A bit of fun with the camera around the observatory.

1. I reckon I should be able to see Loki coming for miles with this...



2. It's a bit bright though...



3. Jarvis, where's the remote?



4. Brothers in arms.



5. The fibreglass one on the right is on a stand so it looks taller.



6. That's right, you just stand over there in the corner and think about what you have done...



7 & 8. Do I look battle damaged?

[Barry]

Well the hand was a tricky one. So fiddly! I had to modify it a bit and make some of my own parts as this pepakura file wasn't really designed for the medium I am using.

Got it done though in a marathon all-nighter. Nearly 5am and I've been going for ten hours. zzzz....

One to go.

[Barry]

1. Last items on the painting rack.



2 & 3. Gauntlet and handplate attached top and palm views.





4. Arc reactor fired up.



5. YAAAYYYY!! It's finally finished! Next stop - Aluminium build!



Now I'm going to BED!!! For a month.

[Barry]

1. Prototype three now a bigger fit by 15mm. Much more comfortable. I've modified it so that the bottom plate at the back of the head now swivels up inside the helmet to allow room to put the helmet on, then swivels back down into position behind the head.



2. Resized helmet on the left 15mm larger than the one on the right.



3. Aluminium templates marked ready for cutting.



4. Cutting aluminium templates on the bandsaw.



5. Cutting with the bandsaw, staying 1/2 millimetre to a full millimetre outside the edge line to be filed flat.



6. Chin piece cut out.



7. Stitch drilling the shaped hole out, staying a couple of millimetres inside the edge line to be filed flat.



8 & 9 Filing the stitch-drilled holes flat to the edge line.





10. Chin and lower lip pre-assembled, ready for welding.



11. Chin and lower lip pre-polished. This will make it easier to finish polish once it's all welded together.

[Barry]

Here's a short video of the cutting of metal on the bandsaw.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=qVcamMXnyOw

[Barry]

1. Chin, sides, top and one back plate cut and pre-polished.



2. Beating it into shape using a curved-face rubber mallet and a foam mat on concrete. Got to be careful to hit it in key points and not too much, or it begins to stretch the metal.



3. For the tighter curves, I re-shaped the end of an old plastic mallet on the grinder.



4. Curves looking good.



5 & 6. Temporarily tacked together with a bit of hot-glue to get an idea what needs to be bent more or less.





7. Yep.... Fits.

[Barry]

Faceplate cut and pre-polished.

[Barry]

I made a few tools today to help me shape the metal for Iron Man.

1. A short piece of an old post, reshaped into a mallet-head with a wide and narrow end, an old broken sledge handle, cut down to make a good handle for the mallet.

2. A thick piece of steel with a slot cut in it at the thickness of the aluminium I am using, then a spanner on the side to provide enough torque to bend the sheet-metal right on the line.

3. Finally, a short but thick piece of steel, shaped on the grinder to act as a battering ram to achieve very tight and precise curves.

[Barry]

These tabs all fold up to form a step to the next piece. The large blank bit in the middle needs to be cut out, but it is best to do that after the tabs have been bent. I'm thinking that instead of these clunky tabs, I will cut them all off and just cut a long flat strip, then curve it into a ring to form the circular step instead.



More helmet pieces cut from aluminium.

[millicat]

This is so freaky because we watched Captain America - Winter Soldier on the weekend and then the next one these past two nights ... aswell as The Avengers. My 7yo Eve gets on my computer tonight while watching the second Captain America movie and googles Thor and finds out how to make his hammer lol .. and then googles Iron Man and I was thinking I should show her your Iron Man tomorrow cos she will think it's super cool .... and low and behold .. you've added more photos. We started watching the first Iron Man movie this evening when the other finished so will be watching the rest over the next few days until bedtime for Eve.

You have done some amazing things and after watching Tony Stark create his first Iron Man suits ..... seems you're taking after him sorta kinda lol. you know what I mean.

Edit: You know the name Loki is quite popular, I know three cats named Loki and one little pup at our rescue with the name aswell. Had to educate fellow dog walker that it was not pronounced Lockie ... but Low-key. Explaining Loki is Thor's brother, well he was clueless as to who Thor is lol. He is 65yo so can cut him some slack.