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I like the concept of the Stormsurge. It gives me this mental image of a bunch of earth caste engineers getting horrendously drunk and deciding that the orks might be onto something with this "more dakka" thing. Unfortunately, the execution is a bit lacking in my opinion, as the "armless, open-topped, walker squatting its way around the battlefield" looks kind of dopey. So, I'm embarking on a quest to give the stormsurge a massive overhaul.

Goals:
Increase head size
I like my giant robots to have proportional heads. No tiny baby heads here.

The right to bear arms
What's the point of a giant robot that can't punch other giant robots?

Install roof
Goes without saying that making your giant robot open-topped is a bad idea.

Swap cannon and missiles
As much as I love shoulder-mounted cannons, I can't figure out how to mount the missile launches to the arms without it looking like an oversized missileside (And I'm not exactly thrilled with how those look either)

Add removable destroyer missiles
I like to have my one-shot missile magnetized and removable, so the existing ones have got to go.

Rebuild legs
If I'm going this far, I might as well go all the way. Forget little kickstands, we need Armored Core-style quad legs for real stability.


Progress so far:


The pictures are a little low quality, I'll try to improve the lighting, at least, for the next batch, but I'm stuck on my phone camera for right now.

Not one piece is 100% complete yet, but I've found a suitable head and arms (as common as the conversion is, hulkbuster arms are just too perfect to pass up), and have remounted the weapons. I've also started filling gaps with milliput. This weekend I'll make another pass with the milliput but the legs and head can't be worked on until I get some more bits in the mail (I'm going to add larger fins to the sides of the head).

I'm still trying to decide what to do with the sub-weapons and destroyer missiles. Currently, I'm thinking of building a magnetized gun mount either on the side of one of the missile launcher or the free hand.

I'd like to build a missile rack in place of the tiny thrusters of the Stormsurge's back to hold the destroyers, but maybe that moves them just a little too far from their original mounting point.

Which Hulkbuster did you get those arms off of? They have multiple toys at multiple scales and I'd like to get the right one because those arms look perfect. Thanks.

 Kasrkinlegion wrote:
Which Hulkbuster did you get those arms off of? They have multiple toys at multiple scales and I'd like to get the right one because those arms look perfect. Thanks.

It's the Disney Infinity one. They're a little rubbery, but solid enough. I was able to pin them to the body without much trouble. I'm a bit worried about how well they'll hold paint, but I'll do a quick test on the hulkbuster body and report back tomorrow.

Unfortunately, I've been slammed dealing with Real Life issues for almost two months now, and have made exactly zero progress on the project except for getting in the second pair of leg parts. One way or another, my problems will be over at the end of the month, so I'll be back to work on this in June.

Quick note, paint sicks to the material no problem. At least, the primer I used did, so I assume anything that goes over that will work just fine. The material's quite rubbery, so if the part was thinner, it might sag and crack the paint. Thankfully, the arms are chunky enough this isn't an issue.

Also, if you go this route, don't bother trying to strip the paint off the hulkbuster. It's not actually painted, that's colored plastic.


I've actually made a little bit of progress on the leg assembly, but I've reached a point where I'm stuck. I'm trying to figure out a way to connect the two hip joints, and I need to find some armor plates or other material to cover the connection point so it looks more "natural".