Just when you, my faithful-few readers-- thought you'd probably saw the LAST of any kind of posts about the Loydster customizing / tinkering on the bigger-sized toy Batmobiles! Here I go AGAIN!
Well, what can I say-- cool-- or in this particular case-- potentially cool-- 'Bat-stuff' STILL draws me in... like metal to a powerful magnet! -- OR a moth to flame! As the title of this post says though, this one has just GOT to be the LAST of at least anything 'large-scale' that I try to tinker on and display.
As is the way it usually works with me, I stumbled across yet ANOTHER 'action-figure-scale' toy Bat-ride at a Thrift store. This one was HARD to pass up! Mostly because the asking price was only a dollar and fifty cents!---
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| The latest candidate for a 'Bat-custom'! The Spin Master 'Bat Tech' Batmobile, from a year-or-three back. I snagged this one for a mere buck-and-a-half at a thrift store. I saw cool potential in it, but did a bit of 'mental-wrestling' before I decided to take it home! |
Even though the price was an AMAZING bargain, (it was also in excellent condition-- though slightly scuffed a bit here and there! Hey-- it DID used to be a kid's TOY!) actually going through with BUYING the car was more of a bit of a mental 'tug-of-war' with me!
I must've picked it up & put it down TWICE before I finally decided to give in, and go ahead & Snag it! The over-riding cause for the 'mental debate'? The obvious question, that my long-suffering & EVER-so-patient wife also ALWAYS asks me: 'where in the world was I going to put it?!?' (Once the custom-thrashing was done, that is!)
Finally, I went ahead with the purchase. I decided I would figure out how and WHERE to display it-- later! My mind was ALREADY racing with LOTS of WACKY ideas! Later that same evening, I dived RIGHT into customizing the FRONT half (or 'nose') of it's body!
This particular car, in scale with (roughly 5 inch) 'Batman' action figures-- is a pretty COOL design, at least from about the middle of the front fenders back to the rear wheels. (Which strongly resembles the '89 movie car!) The front end though, well THAT'S where the design kinda falls apart! It 'sort of' looks like the front of the tumbler, from the 'Dark Knight' movies. Meaning it's front half resembles a sort of 'crab' or maybe a lobster!
For the 2005 movie car, that was an ok design-- being that it was supposed to be a kind of experimental 'military'-type of vehicle, that Batsy had adapted & utilized for crime-fighting. But the 'mash-up' of the two DRASTICALLY different designs, into this ONE toy car's body--- just made it look REALLY weird, and-- frankly, kinda clunky to me!
Anyhoo--- I dug around for ALL of the clear-sheet plastic I could scrounge up! Including cutting-up the clear plastic lid for one of the boxes I keep oddball stuff in, here under my little 'micro-desk'!! I even stayed up 'till the wee-hours (unusual for me now, at this point in my life!)-- 'til around 1:30 in the morning--- basically 'fabricating' a completely different front-end / 'nose' for the car!
Considering that I did it ALL by the seat-of-the-pants, and had NO ideas scribbled down on paper or ANYTHING (as I sometimes will do!)--- It turned out pretty well!! Over the first week after the initial 'thrashing-session', I did some additional fiddling around with it, to get it to where I think it's in it's final, permanent state. I've gotta say, I'm pretty satisfied with the outcome!!---
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| The 'new and IMPROVED' version of the 'Bat-Tech' Batmobile! (At least I think so!) The Bat-symbols / wheel-centers (photo-copies printed onto cardstock paper, of course!) stay stationary as the wheels turn (now that's just NIFTY!) They're also from the '66 TV version of the Caped Crusader's ride. (In this case, they're black-- instead of red.) |
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| Another neat-o 'design element' with this car? You can see the shape of Batman's cowl (or head!) repeated at least 4 times, from back-to-front (that's including my new front-end 'addition', of course!) along the body! The front 'grille' pieces, by the way--are cut-up sections of 'zip-ties'. |
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| My all-time favorite 'Bat-vehicle' detailing paint-- 'gun-metal' acrylic, was once again used for various areas around the car's body. It really makes it look a LOT more like a scale model or even 'movie prop', than a former little kid's toy! My son Wade says it now looks like a combination of the '89 car AND the one from the '92 animated series. I agree with him! |
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| I also happened to have an almost EXACTLY-right-scale Batman figure (found at the SAME thrift store, for a BUCK-- a few weeks before I stumbled across the car!), that I decided just NEEDED to be displayed along with this trusty 'black chariot of JUSTICE'! (You can go ahead and hum-- OR whistle-- your favorite 'Batman movie or TV theme' right here if you want!) |
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| Now the 'ol mental-GEARS started to GRIND-away again! JUST where in the WORLD was I going to be able to display this latest over-sized 'Bat-doo-dad' anyway??? The 'limited space' problem here in the 'Cozy Cottage', had once AGAIN reared it's ugly head! |
It was near the end of all of the tinkering, that I once again started having ANOTHER case of 'mental-hoop-jumping'! Just WHERE exactly was this latest 'Caped-Crusader-related-gee-gaw' going to be put on display? At first, I was simply going to put up a little shelf, get a low-budget display case for it-- and place it in the 'shed-annex-Man-Cave', and display it out there. Not the best of choices, but better than being stashed into some kind of storage. OR-- as my wife only HALF-jokingly suggested-- 'HANG it from the ceiling in the 'Man-Cave'! (Now... that would be just WAY too DORKY for words!-- Sorry, oh wife-o-mine-- but my shameless GEEKDOM only goes so far!)
But-- as the thrashing was winding down, it started to reach it's final form--AND-- it was looking EVER-increasingly COOL to me. I then realized... there just HAD to be a way to put this thing into the collection, on display-- right HERE in the 'ol 'Crime Fighting Headquarters'!
Then-- one evening, a couple of weeks back, I was sitting at my little 'micro-desk'-- but facing toward the bookcase, that also houses a good-sized CHUNK of my collection of toy and scale-model 'Bat-vehicles'. That's when a DINKY little cartoon 10-watt light-bulb, lit-up over my LARGE-square-sized noggin!---The Loydster now had an 'idea'! The idea to 'move some books around'!---
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| It would take some effort (and also some CAREFUL measuring!)! BUT-- the 'Bat-ride-and-bookcase-combo-shelf' held at least PART of the solution to my 'lack-of-display-space' problem! I would first need to figure out what I needed to remove, (from the group of BOOKS, 'natch!) to fit in a 20 or nearly 22 inch-long display case (the size of case the would the car would fit into) on the next-to-bottom shelf.--- |
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| NEXT-- I ordered a 'budget-friendly' / nothing-too-fancy 11x8x20 display case, online-- then cleared-out the books from the spot I wanted to utilize for the newest 'Custom-toy-Bat-ride's display spot. THAT meant, that I now needed another (SMALL-scale, of COURSE!) bookcase to put the now 'homeless' set of books into! |
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| Low and behold, I just happened to have a little 12 inch wide by 24 inch tall wooden box, out in our shed! I'd been using it as a kind of 'catch-all' place-- to stash odd-sized tools and other odd-ball items, in the shelf where what's left of my old toolbox resides-- in the corner of the shed. After doing a bit of measuring, I realized by putting a shelf into it's middle, it would be the PERFECT size to house ALL of the books I'd removed from the other shelf! I then sprayed it with some 'medium brown' enamel-- I had left over from a previous fix-up around the house-- and 'WHAM'! --It now sits in the little space (and I do mean--LITTLE!) next to the doorway into the 'Cave. AND-- it doesn't even interfere with the door opening into the room! How nifty is THAT?!? (I picked up the 'also-JUST-right' metal sign ---displayed on it's top-- at a nearby 'Hobby Lobby'!) |
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| Late just this past week, the display case FINALLY arrived! It was 'roomy' enough, that I decided to add-in a set of 5 Hot Wheels '66 TV Batmobiles (previously displayed elsewhere in the 'Cave-- they're ALL in various COOL colors!), to keep the 'big custom' company! The case sticks out an inch-and-a-half or so over the edge of the shelf-- but... so WHAT?!? |
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| The display just would NOT be complete, without a couple of 'Puck Lights' to really make it 'fit in' with the rest of the bookcase. Thanks once AGAIN, Amazon! |
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| The little home-made sign says it ALL! The 'ol hidey-hole has officially reached MAX-capacity! |
So, as my 'better-half' has also said-- MORE than a few times-- unless I want to start a 'rotating exhibits' policy, like a museum-- it's time to STOP adding stuff into the (VERY) limited space of the 'Man-Cave'! Of course, as I've also said here on the bloggy-woggy-thingy-thang-- the wifey is usually RIGHT!
Although, I've gotta say-- this being the FINAL 'big-scale' custom-toy-job-- I SURE am glad that it came out as NIFTY-NEAT-O as it did! I'm also pretty happy with the way the 'display-space' for it worked out. The HAPPY result is, I have one LAST item here in my little 'Crime-Fighting-Headquarters', that brings that big 'ol goofy-GEEKY-grin to my face! Seems like a 'win-win' situation to me!
See you NEXT time, gang! stay SAFE, SANE, AND HAPPY out there!
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