Making the destroyed usable again!

[Ray (Flock Man)]

When ever you buy batches of heads off ebay you always get a few bad apples in the bunch. Normally I would use these for testing, etc., but it's fun to mess with them in a few spare hours and make them usable again. Of course they are not the best custom work and at best (I feel) OK, but they are out of the Junk draw and back in action. Now to dream up something to fix the other 2+ dozen destroyed heads I have.

This week I was able to play around with a few and start them on their way to usability.

Some had holes and cuts or missing pieces/ facial parts. Anyway here's a few I've started.


This head was sliced through the eye and across the side. Once glued painted scars and a yellow flock mix covered the glued spots. A beard covers the gouges on the face.




I was using this head for testing color. It had a dime size hole through the forehead and a sliced face around the nose and eyes. The camera really doesn't do him justice. He looks cooler in person.



This is another FrankinJoe that needed a lot of gluing of slices and gouges. Once again he looks 100% better in person. The camera with the flash on does nothing for him.

[Ray (Flock Man)]

Camo in action! (Note rifles were made by Member Rob1)




This one would be better in a dark jungle Dio!

[Ray (Flock Man)]

another stained horror made usable again!

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[traud]

Excellent work on the stain removal and the flocking. Actually the full flock looks pretty good on a vintage GIjOE.

[rob1]

Ray,
I had a stain that was red and removed it with this stuff I found at the fabric section at Hobby Lobby. It was called Grandma's Secret Spot Remover. It was for clothes, but I gave it a shot because nothing else was working. The red stain looked like it was from a red marker that faded to pink. I applied it to the spot and let it sit outside in the sunlight. Three hours later it was gone! The stain remover smells like oranges. I remember someone telling me that lemon juice works great for stains. What did you use to remove red the stain?
Rob

[Ray (Flock Man)]

Thanks!
I used the oxy cream and a light polish sanding with a fiber bit on the dremel. At the hair line when I looked inside the head the marker or ink had soaked right through, but with a lower hair line it covered it. These were some of my lost cause test heads and at least now my son and I can take them to the beach or park and use them. Some I put on Cots or 40th bodies. Another one I did was real bad, but now he is flock black and I painted the entire head brown. I have to post the pic of it.
Rob I tried your chip in the nose fix and it came out pretty good and am still working on the Joe with the drilled out eye sockets. I'd like to add some 1/6th doll eyes to it and really make them glossy and wet looking like real eyes. Someone told me to use Tic Tac candy, but I don't know what those would look like in a month. I'd like to get the head to look like the old Eagle Eye Ad where they used a tricked out A T head and put the moving eyes in. When I was a kid and saw the EE joe in the store- I said, "that looks nothing like the Joe in the back of the comic book ad."

[rob1]

Ray,
I tried the oxy cream and left it on for 3 days with no good results. I still can't get rid of these blue spots on some of the faces. How long did you leave the oxy cream?

Maybe you can use glass beeds or fake pearls for the eyes. That would be cool if you could get them to move. Even better would be a little motor that could move them. Those comic book ads were cool, but the never portrayed how the figure actually looked. The best example was the Intruder figure. It looked huge and tall in the comic book, but when you saw it on the self it was a midget caveman. What a cheap figure! Hasbro did a very poor job on that!

[Ray (Flock Man)]

I was told that the blue dots- thought of by many as mold spots, are not that at all, but are poor mix of the dye that colored the soft PVC head. At the same time I’ve looked at websites that show pictures of people using like a Removezit type cleaners and after long periods of time the blue is faded out. There have been times that I’ve even seen these blue spots inside the head.
I can’t find the link, but at one time I looked at a site where someone was casing mego type heads and was having trouble using a combination of tint compounds (don’t know the correct term) and was getting blue spots and at times greenish spots.
As a test I even sanded one spot down to a paper-thin amount of head left and the spot was right through.

This red marker stain wasn’t too bad because the lighter it got, it seemed to blend into the natural flesh color.
I put the cream on about once a day for 3 weeks and grew impatient and started buffing it out.
Painting the other head African American worked nice, but if I repaint Caucasian it looks painted. I think if I put my old air-brush together I may get a smoother result for Caucasian. Down side is with age goes patients- at least with me. Where I used to be able to sit for hours fiddling with small parts and such, life just doesn’t allow and when I do have time, I don’t have the patients. My biggest critic is my son on these projects. If it looks like jack-sh*t he tells me straight off. The camo- Joes above, he said, “Dad, they’re ugly, but I think we could still use them!” He is right about the ugly, but from my point of view there are not bad compared to how they were (basically trash).

I thought about making them like a Batman Joe or something like that where I could hide 80% of the face damage, but then I would want the cowl to be removable, etc. It’s funny, I loved the removable cowl on the mego when I was a kid, but really it fit kind of stupid.

On that mego topic, I bought all the Planet of the Apes (repro’s) for my son and he flipped. I have to say they are cool. I think I’ll get the Star Trek figs next. I was telling him about Evel Knievel figures and the stunt bike and at 6 years old this kid never heard of the guy, but he liked the idea of the figure and bike. I think the kids now miss out.
Sad part is, I used to see the rug as the beach and the kitchen floor as the water- now the rug is the rug and a pillow on the kitchen floor doesn’t look like an island, but at least to my son it does.

Ray

[rob1]

I'll try the oxy cream a little longer and see what happens. I've seen the remove-zit cleaner as well. I think experimenting is the best way to go.

I have only 1 Planet of the Apes figure (Galen). My Sister gave it to me in 1975 for a birthday. I didn't have the other figures so I didn't play it that much. It sat inside of my desk and is actually in mint condition. The reproductions are cool and are being made by Paul Clark (Dr. Mego). He's made the Star trek as well. The bridge is being reproduced too.

The Evel Knievel figure and bike are reproduced as well. My wife bought me one and it's true to the original. I have the original crash car but it doesn't work well. Some kid in the 70's broke some of the teeth from the gear that makes it rev-up. My original cycle was put through hell. It started to break after awhile. That thing jumped everything!

[Ray (Flock Man)]

This is the finished formerly lost cause and now with new flock, new eye paint, Cot's bendy hands, Cots clothes, holster… Guns, and dogtag made by Rob1- this Joe is ready for action once again. I have some other boots, but even though the old Joe style boots are kind of goofy… Joe needs to have his standard issue boots. JMO!

Another of my New Age Adventure Team!

[Ray (Flock Man)]

For mego's the short flock is perfect. Just can wait to do all the rest. I have an idea for using the short fibers on the Batman cowl or even on a Spiderman head to give it a velvet look and feel.

[Ray (Flock Man)]

Jango done in .030 flock fiber!

Vintage GI Joe flock is great for Joes, but other sizes work better for Non-Joe figures. JMO!

[traud]

Are those solid colors & are they cheaper Donjer & finally do you have a link to the short flock site?

The flocking work looks great btw.
I gotta get me some of your glue.

[Ray (Flock Man)]

I think you could get it at Donjer in larger amounts. It seems like the .030 they sell for fishing rod grips and craft flocking for lettering, etc.
I bought smaller amounts of various colors from a link posted by a member here restoredoll.com/ I think it was. Anyway it is great stuff for mego's, eyebrows, and even on Dragon or modern Joes if you don't want the vintage Joe look and size flock. I did do some mixing and it's a little different, but the finish looks pretty damn good. Hard to see really in the pics, but they are sharp in person. I'll bet you could even use the rustoilum type flocking glue for them- (haven't tested this so don't hold me to it).
Good to have in the flocking tool belt for sure.
Joe flock is great, but it doesn't work for many other figures (to me anyway)-
Next I'll use the 1mm and then a mix up using the .030 all the way up to maybe 5 or 6 mm. Try out some ideas I have for a German Dragon head.

Thanks
Ray

[rob1]

Ray,
The modern Joe's are excellent! That's how they should look if Hasbro were to bring them back. The leather coats are a nice touch. The Apes look great as well! Nice work!

[Ray (Flock Man)]

If Hasbro brings them back I think they should use the 40th Action Man head sculpt and paint style. I have done over 30 of these because the factory flocking falls off and I can't get over how much they look like vintage A.T. Joe's. The 40th GI Joes look like flocked 40th Joe's, but the 40th Action Man heads (with their not really perfect eye paint kind of like the vintage Adventure Team eyes were.
If you get a chance to buy them cheap enough (hard to do) Flock them and see what I mean. Just change the beard lines a little. Action Man beard lines are kind of "U" shaped. The mustache line is opposite of Joe's.
Maybe I could sneak some pics in here without buyers getting too angry...lol!

Now looking at it I think I'll change the white turtleneck and use either the black one I bought or use the gray for the Sea Adventurer and the black or white one for the Land. I am loving the bendy hands that fit vintage Joe arms.

[Ray (Flock Man)]

Another wreck made usable!

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[rob1]

Ray,
Looks good! Did you melt the eyebrow area and re-shape it?

[Ray (Flock Man)]

Hey Rob,
Hope things are well.

Yes. it's a bit shiny, but because of the overcast day it's hard to see in the picture
I have to say it did come out pretty good all and all. Still has a lot of life left in him.


Ray

[rob1]

Ray,

Everything is well! Sorry I haven't posted any current projects. We had problems with our computer and are getting everything back in order. Soon I'll send some pictures and share some stories.

Rob

[Ray (Flock Man)]

Just making sure. I feel like the members here are friends now, you know.

Life does tend to keep us busy!

Ray

[Ray (Flock Man)]

Next up!

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[Ray (Flock Man)]

Once again, brought back from the dead!

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