Big Daddy Boots and Tank

Big Daddy has a few accessories. The tank, shoes, knee guards, metal weights for the shoes, and a few bolted metal ring accents on the arms and legs.

The tank isn't too hard. Here's what you'll need:

An 10" diameter cement column form: $10 from Home Depot

1" MC foam strips x 2: free from a friend.

A 1" thick Styrofoam circle (about 12" diameter): cut from free scraps from the furniture store

 A friz-bee: $1 at the dollar store

A 5" Styrofoam circle: $1 at the dollar store

5" bolt and nut x 3: $1 from Home Depot

2 Metal mounting strips (about 8" long): $2 at Home Depot

Masking Tape
Hot Glue

And a piece of Styrofoam for the end cap: cut from free scraps from the furniture store

First, I cut the concrete column form to 24" tall. Then, I covered the exposed Styrofoam with masking tape and put 2 strips of MC foam around the tank for decor.

Next, I hot glued on about two dozen little hex bolts I'd cut out of MC foam on the foam strips.

We used two long bolts to mount the tank to the suit. On the inside of the tank, we glued one of the metal mounting strips/brackets, then inserted the bolts through it and hot glued them all in place. The other metal mounting strip goes inside of the suit. We drilled holes for the two long bolts through the back of the suit. To attach the tank, we simply inserted the bolts, then screwed the nuts on from the inside of the suit.

 After attaching the valve handle to the tank lid with a long bolt, I hot glued the tank lid and the end cap to the concrete column form.

Now lets move on to the shoes!

For the shoes you will need:

2 Big blocks of Styrofoam: free from the furniture store.

 A pair of old shoes: couple bucks at the thrift store (Use a pair of shoes or boots that cover your whole foot, but that you can slip your foot in and out of fairly easily.)

1/2 Sheet of Foam Core Board: dollar store

1 can of Insulation Foam:

Duct Tape:

Masking Tape:

Cardboard:

And your trusty electric turkey carver:

First we cut out a few pieces of Styrofoam around the shoe to create the sides and back of the boot.

Note: Our shoe had about 6" of lift and and extra 3" on both the front and back.

Next, we shaved the Styrofoam down to the general shape of our Big Daddy boot and curved the bottom front of the shoe to make it easier to walk in.

Using that shape, we cut the shoe souls out of cardboard and hot glued them to the bottom. Then, we tape/glued/secured the shoe to the Styrofoam keeping it centered.

Note: We put a piece of foam core board in between the shoe and the Styrofoam because we were afraid with it's uneven surface, the shoe wouldn't glue to the Styrofoam very well. But it probably wasn't necessary. You'll see why later.

Then, we hot glued on our extra side and back pieces of Styrofoam.

We filled in the whole top of the boot with expanding insulation foam. (This makes it very secure.)

Once the foam set, we carved them down to our desired boot shape and tested them out. 

We covered the bottom of the shoe (the cardboard footprint) in duct tape, and covered all the rest of the exposed Styrofoam in masking tape.

I then added a strip of MC foam around the bottom (covering the duct tape ends) and put another strip of MC foam over the top. Once more, I hot glued on a bunch of those MC foam bolt heads for flavor.

Big Daddy has some weights on his boots too! I cut a couple of these out of Styrofoam scraps and covered them with masking tape.

Now the boots are ready for paint (which we'll cover later).

In the next chapter, I'll tell you how to make the arm and leg accent rings! Stay tuned!