Eye Lens Redux

Eye Lens:

Here we go again! My second (and hopefully FINAL) attempt at making the eye lens for the build. 

To recap my requirements on this sub-project:

- Must not limit my vision, much

- Should have detail

- Tinted yellow

- Must be lit up.

- Lights must not be seen from the outside

- Lights must not be glaring back at MY eyes.

Had put a lot of thought back into this one. Going to start off with a piece of clear lexan plastic. I think this is good approach.

Since I already have the shape of the eye lens from the previous build attempt. I'm going to use it as a template for the curvature. Here I'm laying it down on a piece of 2x4 wood. I needed a shape to put the melting plastic onto. And the wood can handle the heat.

Cutting the shape out with a jigsaw.

I stole this toaster oven from my wife years ago. Started out when I was secretly baking my sculptures in it before. Got caught by the wife.. and said something, something.. and she just gave me the oven! Woohoo!! Score! Anyways, inside the oven is a couple strips of lexan plastic. Warming it up for 5-10 minutes. The moment I can see them droop, I pull them out and put it on my wooden form....

Almost lost this piece. You can see some bubbling at the corners! Luckily, the bubbles are outside and would be cut off.

Cutting them out with my dremel.

Quick test fit. PERFECT!

Now, for the details. I'm thinking of frosting them in. To achieve that, I just mask out a simple design. With my dremel again, I used a steel brush attachment, and just went over the exposed areas.

I could use some fancy window etching solution to frost the details. But, that would mean money. And I rather not spend money if I didn't have to. The return wasn't worth it. Simple economics. hehe

TEST: Can I see out of the new lens? 

Yes! Yes, I can. Even in the frosted areas, I can see vague shapes. So, this is successful.

TEST: Does the detail light up? 

Yes, perfectly!! Success, again!

TEST: Are the lights visible from the outside? 

Nope. Since the lights would be mounted just out of sight. It's perfect again. Another Score!

TEST: Would the lights be glaring back into my eyes/face?

Nope, eventually, I will be mounting the LEDs with hot glue. Then I'll be painting the globs with dark matte paint. The light would only be directed at the lens itself.

PERFECT SCORE!!

The One-Day V-Fin Diet

Weight reduction: 

The v-fins were still heavy. Too heavy to have on comfortably. To alleviate possible neck strain, I'd have to reduce some weight on it. And since I know the resin inside is the major culprit, I'd have to gut it out from the backside. Time to break out the dremel tool again.

Don't want to take away TOO much material. Leaving some behind for structural integrity. Everything seems to be still solid, so, I'll clean her up a bit and close it up.

5-min epoxy to glue the new (plastic) plate over the hole

Contact cemented some Velcro strip to each side. Since the v-fin is still considered heavy, I'm not going to rely on the velcro's default adhesiveness. Didn't think it would be strong enough to not rip off. So, some contact cement will put it on permanently. Strong stuff. The plastic or helmet would rip off first before the velcro now!

Lock that face

While I got the face to retract all good now. It doesn't have a stopper on either the down or up position. A lot of ideas were thrown around for this. I even wanted it to be motorized using servos and stuff. But, that may be too complicated. And more importantly, too heavy. That's a lot of weight.

So a simple magnet system was made. One to catch it when the face is down, and another to catch it when it's up.

I used rare earth magnet. 3 total. This one is on the face. No 2 magnets actually touch each other. Because they're just too strong! I had to separate them with a  piece of plastic. 

The second magnet is on the brow lip. This one would catch the face when it's in the down position.

 And the third magnet would be up on top. To catch the face when it's in the top position.

The magnet on top is held down by epoxy putty. Love this stuff. Dries hard. Like cement hard. 

(that's what she said)