Imperator Furiosa Tutorial: Arm Part 2

In part two I will show you how I added all of the details to my hand base that we made in part one. Make sure you have plenty of reference images, and continuously refer to them. First, you need to make the piece that goes just below the elbow. Trace out a pattern on newspaper or wax paper. Test. If it works, cut out in foam, cover in worbla.

Paint brown. Next, use a hose clamp for the metal detail around the circumference.

The hydraulic rams gave me the most trouble on this project, so let’s cover those first. I made these probably 4 times before I found something that works. Put on your elbow piece (that you just made) and your hand. Measure out the distance. You will need this to make the rams. There should be four, but because my arm is so small, four was too much, so I went with three. Make sure you use your reference images to mark out where they should go. Number them (in chalk so they wash off). For the connections, I used these plumbing parts (not sure what they are called):

Cut off the 90 degree angle so they lie flat on your arm.

Paint black. Be sure to use a paint made for plastic.

At first I just glued these on. But they kept popping off. Therefore, I ended up drilling a hole through the top, down through my worbla base, and inserting a screw to hold it on.

The last image is to see how it looked with the screw. Now, for the hydraulic rams themselves, I first used straws. They ended up being too bendy, but I do recommend using them to get your lengths right. You will need a large diameter pipe with a smaller diameter pipe that can insert into it. I got all of these from the plumping aisle. Cut your lengths from the pipe.

Now those 90 degree pipe things we used for the connectors have an inner piece that pops out. You need to connect the pipes to this piece. For the large pipe, I used small pieces of the smaller pipe and used pvc glue to glue part into the popped out piece and into the large pipe (ignore the small pipes in this picture, the idea didn’t work).

The smaller ones were a bit more difficult, and I had to ask my dad for help. What ended up working is a bit confusing, so I hope I explain it well. We used old bicycle spokes, cut them down, bent the end, and screwed them in. Basically, it created a metal prong that sits on the lip on the pipe, then gets tightened to hold it in place. Also, since we couldn’t find a small enough washer, we used a drywall plug and cut it down to make a washer so the screw wouldn’t pull through.

If that part is confusing, google how a bicycle spoke works and that might help. Or send me a message/comment and I’ll do my best to explain. Pop the removable part back in. Now you have your hydraulic rams. You will need to put the small pipes into the bigger ones for them to be complete, but you get the idea. I will come back to these and details later.

For the tubes, I got a bungee cord (painted black, then silver), shoe lace (round style, in black, painted silver), and an orange tube (couldn’t find a yellow one. Figured this was close enough).

Let’s work on the hand base now. The thumb area has a few details. I didn’t add all of them, but I did a fair bit. Try to drill and screw in your details wherever possible. Glue of any sort will not be as good as screws. Here are some pics of my detailing process.

If you have any questions about how I did anything, let me know. Most of this was trial and error and I had to redo things often. The thumb bits were redone about 3 times. The air compressor handle took 4 tries. Keep trying things. And use your reference images a lot.

Now back to the hydraulic rams. There is one with a wrench on it and one with duct tape. Also, some of the hoses are tied down. Add those details.