Building a Tolkien Dwarf part 2

Moving forward and with only one week until Megacon, I continued my work on the axes while my wife put the finishing touches on the outfit. The harness came out real good for our first time. I was actually dreading the harness but she made it look easy. I assisted with the leather work here and there as well as threw in a couple of ideas for termination points for the straps.

Front and back view

The harness was made with 3 belts, some leather and raw hide strips for lashing everything together. I carved wooden buckles and the center piece for the harness and then hit them with the hammered metal paint. I unfortunately did not take a pictures of the painted chest piece but you can see it if you blow the front view picture up.

The belt clips

I also needed to finish the main belt buckle which was a bit more intricate. The buckle that Dwalin wears in the movies looks like individual pieces of metal melded together. I used a pencil and drew the design  on the piece of particle board that I had already carved out based on the best pictures I could find of the buckle. Once that was done, my friend the Dremel and I hit the patio for a serious grinding session.

Before paint

Painted

Needless to say, I was pretty happy with the way this turned out. It fits perfectly over the weight belt which I use for the harness base.

Now it was time to tackle the axes. I already had the heads done and had been waiting on my maple dowel to get here. Luckily, it shipped on time so I proceeded. I will be honest. I asked around a lot before I decided on a specific plan for this project. My biggest dilemma was getting the 5/8" thick ax heads through a 1-1/2" dowel AND have the dowel core-drilled to accept the haft base. The haft base dowel was 7/8" so I picked up a 7/8" spade bit at the store and commenced the marking, drilling and cutting.

Maple dowel marked for core depth and length

As you can see in the picture above, I marked a depth that I thought would be adequate on the right. I also marked the total length right around 10". With that done, I then marked two spot that I would be drilling for the ax heads. Basically, my plan was to drill two holes through the dowel where the top and bottom edges of the ax head would be. This would make the final fitting better since the ax heads have beveled edges. Also, I marked a line through the top hole since I would be cutting the top section of the dowel off and using it as a cap later on.  I also marked the wedge that I would be cutting out.

Holes drilled now for the cutting

Once the two set holes were drilled, I started the core drilling. This required me to hold the dowel as steady as possible while drilling into it lengthwise. I do not own a workbench nor do I own any clamps. So it was not an easy task, but I bought a new bit for this and it worked perfectly. I drilled down to my depth mark on the dowel and then flipped the dowel over and cut the wedge out with my jigsaw.

Core drill complete

 

Wedge cut out and cap cut off

 Once everything was cut and drilled, I slid the ax head into the slot, did some fine tuning on the cap with the Dremel and set up to drill the cap and ax head. With the cap seated in place, I drilled down the center of the cap and into the ax head. Once I cleaned the hole out, I tapped a dowel pin down into the hole to finally make the ax head and upper haft one piece. When I repeated this procedure on the second one, the cap split unfortunately. I was able to salvage it, however, so all was not lost. Plus, I had about 12" of the maple dowel left just in case. For a finishing touch, I put wood putty into the seams where the ax head met the upper haft and let it dry. Later, I would sand away any rough spots to get ready for final paint. Oh yeah, I almost forgot. I also used the Dremel to make the upper hafts octagonal. I felt that the angles would set off the top of the ax pretty good. To finish, I faceted the cap as well.

Ax head fitted into the newly cut slot

Wood putty around the connection of ax head and upper haft

 Now I needed to get the smaller dowels ready for the final connection. I bought some cheap stain ($4) and stained the dowels a deep, rich brown. Once they dried, I glued the carved pommels to the base and wrapped the lower haft with leather straps. I used a small finish nail where the leather stopped on the haft.

Lower haft with wrapping and pommel

My plan for connecting the upper and lower haft sections was similar to the connection of the ax head and haft. I was going to use a dowel pin after drilling a hole through the two pieces. I slid the smaller haft inside the upper haft and then drilled a hole through where the two met (about 2" in.) I then tapped a dowel pin into the hole and voila!

Now, here is where the fun began. At some point, I had taken a break and worked on some other pieces (call it ADD if you want, I call it rapid sequencing.) When I arrived back to this point, I inserted the lower haft into the upper haft and drilled the hole as I did with the first one. Ugh. I swear a gremlin must have jumped onto my patio and planted an extra drill bit on my work surface. After I drilled a pilot hole, I grabbed what I thought was the proper drill bit and secured it in the drill.

Sadly, seeing your dowel pin slide right through the hole you just drilled really, really sucks. After mimicking Yosemite Sam for a few minutes, I decided on a plan of action to overcome this little issue. I used the Dremel on a spare piece of 7/8" dowel and carved myself a custom dowel pin to fit in the over-sized hole. Crisis averted! I apologize but I did not take any pictures of that process because of my lovely faux pas.

I applied a final coat of paint and then etched in the dwarven runes. I chose to go with the same runes that the WETA prop axes had on them. WETA made all of the props for the movies, by the way. If you get a chance, look them up. They sell replicas and statues from the Tolkien movies.

To be honest, this was a journey. I learned so much and I'm very grateful for that. If I were to pick my favorite part of this whole experience, I would have to say that using the Dremel to create things was the most satisfying. Without further ado, here are some pics of the final pieces. I will only be doing one more thing to them this week and that is using a wood burner to do some fine etching around the edges. Nice, relaxing fun.

We will be shooting some pics on here of the whole costume next time. See you then!