#4956686
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Remember when I proudly state “no more mistakes!” Yeah, well, I screwed up. Again. :walterpeck:

It’s all part of the process, but when I’m this close to being done, it’s a blow to my positive momentum.

But, on to the update…

Started by marking the position my speaker will sit on the MB. Yes, I tested it with and without the electronic components to make sure the shell fit over and was flush with the MB. This process has been a lot of placing and testing and resetting and adjusting and plugging and unplugging.

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Onto drilling. Since I’m installing a kill switch and a charging port, I needed the holes for those. I didn’t have the precise drill bit, but made due with one slightly bigger. Luckily the nuts cover the additional space. Honestly, I hadn’t planned on doing this step, but when it came down to it, I saw how necessary it was.

I went with this for the switch (https://www.lowes.com/pd/Hillman-Heavy- ... 5001916089) because I liked the look, the price, and the black rubber blends in with the MB paint.

And this for the charging port ( https://www.amazon.com/dp/B07MLQCDN3/? ... dp_it&th=1) because of the rubber stopper.

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Since I was needing extra lengths of wire to connect the kill switch and the charging port to the battery, I needed a way to splice them together. I found these great doo-dads at Lowe’s. You just plug your line into both ends. Simple.

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I could have just bought a spool of wire, but I already had plenty thanks to buying the DC connectors and charging ports in bulk. It isn't as clean as some builds, but the power flows as it should, and that's all I'm asking for.

For the speaker grating, I went with the Alan Hawkins template.

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Then gave the MB a new coat of paint.

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Once the paint was dry, it was time to set the electronics in their final places.

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I had some precut foam strips with double-sided adhesive that I used for the battery. I’m not really concerned about the adhesive wearing down with the heat from the battery because of the kill switch. I really don’t plan on having the pack run for extended periods.

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All brackets and shelves are held firmly in place with superglue, as is the speaker, just to keep them from sliding until I get the JB Weld on them. For the soundboard, I tapped small, shallow holes in the MB that don’t go all the way through for the nylon spacers to thread into. It’s secure, but not great, so I’ll hit that with some JB Weld as well. Then, got all the wires bundled and zip-tied.

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Once the glue was dry, I put the whole thing on the MB and powered her up. Works just fine. Once it was happy with everything, I slathered on the JB Weld (seriously, this stuff is amazing!!!!) along the plate edges where they meet the MB. Even put some on the nylon spacers holding the sound board.

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Now, I needed to get the ribbon cable from the pack down the loom hose. This gave me no end of consternation as the hose is not split (I didn’t want it to be, either). My solution was to thread some extra speaker cable through it, tie that around the ribbon cable, and tighten it with zip and twist ties, then just pull through. Took a little wiggling in spots, but slipped through with less hassle than I had been dealing with.

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This is a found piece I’m incorporating into my build to attach the hose to the back. It’s from our old sink and held the sprayer hose.

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AND HERE’S WHERE THINGS GO WRONG.

I drilled the mouse hole in the wrong place! How did I do this, you ask, when the pre-marked hole is clearly there?!

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Well, I had the shell upside down. I knew that the hole was supposed to be on the next panel to the right of the mounting hole, so that’s where I drilled. What can I say? I was feeling pretty excided about being THIS close to done, and my brain was like, “I got this.”

Not to let an opportunity go to waste, though, I fit the connector into the shell. While I kind of like the flash the silver brings, I’m going to paint the top section.

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Still trying to get lemonade out of this, I tested mounting it with superglue on the outside and hot glue on the inside. Very strong. Had to go at it (gently) with a rubber mallet to knock it out.

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Now I have a giant hole in the fiberglass to fix. Luckily for me, I sucked at making the electronic mounting brackets and had little bits of aluminum sheeting lying around. A little JB Weld on the underside to hold it in place.

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And a lot more JB Weld to secure it.

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Just need to fill in the shallow hole.

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Just like the last time I boogered something up and grew frustrated, it was Clippard to the rescue so I could finish positively. I swapped out my Karniverous resin for the real deal. So shiny (it won’t last).

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Next up:

- Filling the hole
- Cutting the mouse hole (for real this time)
- Paint touch-up
- Install wand light ribbon cable
- Final shell mount
- Attach loom
- Gun lights!
#4956749
And now my clear Arcolectric is missing. I spent 2 hours on the floor of my garage and digging through my waste box and couldn't find it. It was in the plastic container I keep all the electronic components it, in a little baggie with the red one. I'm sure at some point, when digging through the box all week while working on the pack lights, it jumped out and ran away.

I've ordered another from GBHQ on Etsy, but it just ANOTHER stupid setback.
#4956809
The last week as been trying for me and Gladys.

Filled the hole and let it dry.

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Cut the mouse hole and attached the sink thing. Now, as many times as I tested and retested and check and rechecked the fit of the shell over the MB and the electronics, I never had any problem. Never. Until I put the shell on to drill the mounting hole. Suddenly, the whole thing is off by 1/8 of an inch, which means that the hole I drilled was in the wrong place, causing me to have to epoxy over it, let it dry, sand it again and drill a new hole, which, if it isn’t right, is going to be covered with a washer and cap head screw for aesthetics only.

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And because I didn’t have a big enough headache, I started on the Spongeface bezel. It was all right until the decal. Again, followed the directions to the letter and in real life, nothing happened the way the instructions said. Put it in water and it instantly floated off the blue backing, curling and folding. I used two super fine-tipped tweezers but it is so delicate that it would float away if the tweezer got anywhere near it. Eventually, after a lot of cursing, I managed to get it out and it immediately tore with the tweezers. I tried my fingers, a slip of index card. It was rough. But I got it on the plexiglass and lined up the ripped edges.

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While the bezel decal dried, I assembled the gun’s external details using the Mack’s Factory items I’ve been accumulating. And, wouldn’t you know it, I somehow ordered the 80% size of dry transfers. (I had the graph circles and INTESIFY from my resin build, but everything else is slightly smaller.

Oh well.

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Wired up the trigger box, too.

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Then, attached the trigger box to the body, installed the rear cylinder and barbs/hose. With the bezel, I ended up not using the tint. Even tracing it with a razor to the exact size of the plexiglass, it wouldn’t fit and kept falling out the back or crinkling.

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l3w1sb159 liked this
#4957164
Picture this: it’s Friday night. There’s an even your GB troop is attending on Saturday. Your week has been filled with nothing but setbacks and aggravation. What do you do?

Well, I stayed up until 4am bringing Gladys to life for the very first time!

I had finally gotten myself to the stage where I was ready to just cram everything inside the gun body and be done, but I wouldn’t have been happy with that, so I did take my time.

For the emitter bulb, I didn’t want it clacking around inside the acrylic tube, so I needed something to hold it in place. I had some foam all ready to go when I happened upon a little, round, rubber thing in my box of random greebles. I think it was from an old 5-disc CD changer and was used to accept the disc snuggly as you slid it into the player without damaging it?

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It went around the wires and right up to the bulb as if designed for it.

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Remember that “cork” I used to join the emitter tubes? Well, it just so happens that the little rubber thing fits perfectly inside the opening. And the notches hold it in place without the need for any kind of adhesive. Again, like it was made for it.

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Farther down the same acrylic tube…. I knew I wanted the ear button/light wires to vanish inside the front handle because I didn’t want to drill into the gun body again. The solution was to drill a hole large enough for the white connector to slip into (turned out to be ¼”). I placed it just above the tapped hole for the screw which fastens the outer handle and the inner master tube to the acrylic.

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Then, I had to match it on the front handle, but not make it so big that the fastening screw wouldn’t hold.

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Once that was done, I slid the acrylic guide tube into the metal master tube, lined it up, then slid both into the front handle. Remember that narrow slit in the master tube (cut to allow the handle to rotate, but I didn’t want mine to do that)?

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Well, it is just wide enough for the white connector piece on the ear wires to pass through. And with the ¼” hole, the hole thing went sneakily inside the front handle assembly and out of sight. A little twist of the acrylic tube, and the metal screw went into the previously drilled hole without cutting into the wires. Hand-tightened enough to hold in place but not pinch.

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Some black electrical tape to hold in place. Fit the emitter tube over the placed blub, too.

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Then, just attached the front grip with the cap head screws and slapped some black tape over the exposed wires. Attached the second banjo and the red tubing and the whole front handle was ready to go onto the gun body.

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But first…the vent light.

I had another one of those rubber doo-dads and used the same trick for the vent light that I had for the emitter. The rubber piece fit inside the bottom opening of the reflector cone, and the notch held it in place without need for glue.

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But the reflector was too tall to fit inside the gun and still allow room for wiring. So, I marked where the bulb came to and used my Dremel to cut it evenly.

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It came to 5/8” in case you were curious.

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Then, a test fit and finally, the whole thing glued in place.

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Everything wired up, just waiting to be plugged into the board.

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Time to connect the ribbon cable from the Sound Board, down the pack, and out through the shell…

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Not to bore you with detail pictures of stuff that doesn’t matter, here she is.

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They grow up so fast, don’t they?

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So, like I said, The Real Ohio Ghostbusters had our Slime Time event on Saturday and Gladys made her big debut. As you should come to expect with these updates, there was a slight issue with the V-hook on the gun track and I didn’t feel comfortable with it, so we used her as our display piece.

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After along night (we raised almost $1400, which is our second highest total for a single even of the year), I just kind of set her in my reading chair. Woke up to something artistic. I call it GLADYS IN REPOSE.

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I’m not done with her, yet. Still some things to tweak and change. I’ll be making some replacements and updates, but this is probably the last big update for Glady. Thanks for following along, and thanks for the advice/tips.

-- Nick
10/11/2021
tobycj, JWils23 liked this

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