Introducing... The Hammer Of Doom:
To celebrate Halloween this year, some good friends hosted a LARP & Furries-themed costume party. Just days after the event hit Facebook, a post entitled 'Gigantic Dwarven Hammer' was featured on Instructables:
I'd already been considering ideas for comedically oversized weapons to supplement my LARP/fantasy costume, so the timing couldn't have been better. But the work that went into the original Gigantic Dwarven Hammer was immense - replicating such a masterpiece would require far more time than I had available to devote to the project.
Unperturbed, I decided that I could build a less intricate version, committing less man-hours at the expense of a little visual impact. I initially planned to follow the basic design of the original, using styrofoam sheeting to create first a frame and then the walls of the hammer. But a breakthrough came when discussing places to purchase said styrofoam with my wife, who commented that it was a shame I'd just thrown out the packaging from the oven and dishwasher purchased for our recent kitchen renovation.
Fortunately, I'd only thrown out half of it...:)
Standing in my workshop staring at the random pieces of styrofoam packing, a design began to take shape. I soon realised that if I let the existing shape of the styrofoam dictate the eventual shape of the hammer and not vice versa, my job would be made that much easier.
By simply cutting a single base section of packing in half, shaping it a little and joining the halves together I had the basic shape of a rectangular hammer head. I then added a few embellishments, utilising the existing shape of the styrofoam where possible. I was especially happy with the grooved, reinforced sections that added some nice detail to the base.
For cutting styrofoam the Instructable suggested a hot wire cutter. But the cheapest one that I could find online was $80 so instead I used a small, fine-bladed, single-handed saw that I'd bought to cut plasterboard during the aforementioned kitchen renovation. It did a reasonable job, but weeks later I'm still finding styrofoam particles in far-flung corners of my workshop.
The Gigantic Dwarven Hammer Instructable did provide some other invaluable hints:
- Glue everything together with Liquid Nails - most other glues will melt styrofoam
- Constuct a 'T'-shaped handle and frame using PVC pipe and a standard joiner. Use this as the 'skeleton' of the hammer.
- Paint with acrylic paint - this produces a nice matt finish and also won't melt styrofoam like some other paints.
- After coating the hammer in gray, drybrush with a lighter gray to really set it off.
After a few coats of paint, some drybrushing and a wrap of red electrical tap around the handle, the Hammer of Doom was complete!
To add to the LARP-ness of my costume, I made some health and mana potions by filling old plastic test tubes with dyed water and sealing them with wine corks:
I was really pleased with the result. It wasn't my intention to go dressed as Thor but it kinda turned out that way, which was cool.
The Hammer of Doom was a big hit at the party, even with the Furries...
Much kudos to JarOfEyeballs for creating the amazing Gigantic Dwarven Hammer and inspiring this project!