# Floating Zero from Nightmare Before Christmas



## jdblue1976

As requested here are details from my Floating Zero prop, my first. I don't have pictures of all phases of the build. I started taking pictures with the intention of documenting the whole build but alas I was pressed for time and forgot all about the pictures.


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## jdblue1976

*Head Scuplting*

I bought a piece of open cell foam from Michaels to carve the head out of. 









Michaels only had open cell or the green floral type foam so I went with the open cell. Open cell is easy to work with but isn't exactly easy to finish. At the time I was thinking I would cover it with felt, but it didn't take long to realize that wouldn't work.

Foam Putty to the rescue.









After some research I found a product made by Woodland Scenics for railroad modelers called Foam Putty. (Bought it at a local hobby shop) This product is like a very lightweight drywall mud. Spread it on, work it like clay, then sculpt or sand it after it dries.


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## jdblue1976

*Hinge for the jaw*

After carving the lower jaw I created a hinge template out of cardboard.









I fab'd the hinge out of scrap sheet metal I had on hand.









I carved out a pocket for the hinge then used the Foam Putty to integrate it into the jaw.


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## jdblue1976

*Neck and Arms*

On the bottom of the jaw I notched out a slot for a wooden dowel to which I mounted the arm armatures.









I used wire hangers to make the armatures that are threaded thru eyelets. I also drilled a hole in the end of the dowel to receive wire that would make up the backbone.


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## jdblue1976

*Jack-O-Lantern Nose*

Right after last Halloween I pickup some small decorative pumkins from Michael's that were the perfect size for Zero's nose. They are made from foam so I used a soldering iron to hallow out the middle from the bottom. I then used an Exacto knife to carve the J-O-L face. The foam was white so I painted it yellow. Also the outside of the pumkin was too yellow so I painted a little red on it.









To make the nose glow and flicker I used the inards of a flicking LED votive candle. I mounted the LED in the bottom of the J-O-L and ran wires to the battery/on-off switch which was mounted on the back of the head.









I made a trough in the roof of the mouth to run the wire in, then covered it with Foam Putty.


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## jdblue1976

*The Movement*

Here's a preview of the mechanism. I didn't take any photos during the fab so I'll have to get more with it in place.









I did a lot of pre-engineering on this so I'll try and convert those files to post here as well.


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## Wildcat

He looks awesome and the movement is great. Interesting looking mechanism. Would like to see a diagram of it.


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## jdblue1976

*Movement in Action*

Here's the movement in motion. I'll diagram it and explain it next.


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## Spooky1

Wow, that's a lot more complex that I imagined. Nice work.


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## Spooky Dave

Excellent prop, wonderful motion. Love the ingenuity! Agreed, that looks like a fairly complex mechanism. Bravo!


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## jdblue1976

*Mechanism Overview*

Here's an overview of the mechanism.









Basically I hung him like a marionette. The red lever controls the height of the head, the blue is the arms(wings) and the green is for the tail.
The deer motor from Kindy's is crappy because it has very little torque. (Maybe that was a newb mistake on my part.) Had to add an anti-reverse device because these motors can go either way. Also because of little torque had to add a bunch of batteries to counterbalance the weight of the puppet.


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## jdblue1976

*Head and Tail Movement*

Follow the colored strings to the appropriate lever.









The head and tail work like most FCG do. Except for that extra pulley.









That "Extra Pulley" was intended to make the puppet kind of bounce up instead of being a pure sin wave motion. (I think it would work better with a motor that had torque, and I didn't have to use batteries to counterbalance everything, maybe next year.)


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## jdblue1976

*Arm Mechanism*

I added a cam to the crank so I could make the wings go up and down.









I roughed out the motion in Autocad and produced a motion study in Powerpoint so I had an idea of how the wings would work relative to the head. Once that was roughed out I had a rough cam profile. I had to adjust the profile after it was fab'd out of MDF. Again, I think the wings would work better with a motor that had torque.


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## jdblue1976

*And finally*

I had every intention to make the mouth open and close. But because of the lack of torque I'm not able to pull that off. If I had the arm lever pull up on the mouth too, then that would throw off the counterweight of the head.

Let me know if you want more detail on any thing.

Thanks for all the positive feedback. I really enjoyed making it and I'm already thinking about what to make next. (Oogie Boogie perhaps)


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## RoxyBlue

Thanks so much for taking the time to write this up. My jaw dropped when I saw the complexity of the mechanism - Spooky1 was looking over my shoulder and said "It's like a marionette"


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## psyko99

The design is ingenious. I don't see anything newb here. Most of the prop building we all do involves a lot of trial and error. Awesome work.


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## Toktorill

Fantastic prop! Very cute, awesome motion, and brilliantly thought out!


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## Vlad

Just fantastic!


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## Jaybo

Hmmm....I'm going to go out on a limb here and guess you just might be an engineer? 

Your prop looks wonderful! Any chance we could see a video from outside at nighttime?


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## jdblue1976

Thanks Jaybo.

Is it that obvious. Yes I'm an engineer of the electrical kind.

Regarding the outdoor nighttime video, I'm trying to find a camera that will pick up the black light. My cellphone does well in the daylight, but not so much in the dark. I may have to breakout the old school camcorder.


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## jdblue1976

*Tombstone*

Of course Zero needs his tombstone.


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## jdblue1976

*Finished Video*

As requested here's the final product. (Sorry for the low quality)


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## RoxyBlue

That tombstone is perfect, as is Zero. This is one of my favorite props of the year. His movement is so ghostly and smooth.


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## Lunatic

JD, that really is a beautiful prop. I'm very impressed with your creativeness including that awesome mechanism. It lools fantastic!


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## jdblue1976

Thanks guys. 

I'm glad Halloween is here. It's time to enjoy it.


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## hauntedkimmy

Amazing!!! I love Zero! Wonderfully done!!!!!


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## jdblue1976

Thanks!


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## JustJimAZ

Just echoing other comments here, but really, this is well done. The whole effect is great!


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## jdblue1976

Thanks!


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## mister witch

This is first rate work I am impressed with the look and movement!! Bravo.Thank you for sharing all the tech behind the prop as well.


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## jdblue1976

Thanks very much. It's my pleasure to share. 
I've learned a lot from this site as well.


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## Joiseygal

Amazing job! The movement is awesome!


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## Chickenwire

top notch!


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## jdblue1976

Thanks


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## diggerc

Looks awesome


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## diggerc

OK so i'm home I cant see youtube videos at work. That is amazing!


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## jdblue1976

Thanks


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## Lord Homicide

That. is. rad............. unreal movement. i love it!


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## jdblue1976

Thanks


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## Pumpkin5

:jol: JD, seriously? This is probably one of the finest prop creations I have ever seen. I am completely blown away...it is just beyond great. I absolutely LOVE this guy. Zero...in all his glory!


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## STOLLOWEEN

A fantastic creation...it's a magical Halloween creation.


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## jdblue1976

Thank you very much.


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## Headless

Sensationally fluid movement JD - Awesome job!


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## heresjohnny

I'm glad this thread got bounced, love the use of strings and cams.


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## jdblue1976

Thanks


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## jdblue1976

Update, I've finished Jack Skellington for this year's addition to the display, so I will go back and do some modifications to this design to make it easier on the deer motor. I'll add pulleys where the eyelets are because they fray the string and are a source of drag. Also, I replaced the string as it was fraying in spots so I went to a thicker string thinking this would be better. However, this caused problems where strings sharie a pulley. But because the strings are thicker, they fight each other which throws off the movement. 
All of this because I don't want to spend $80 on a motor with plenty of torque.


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## heresjohnny

A couple of things you might consider. One, this motor has worked well for me so far, much more torque than a deer motor for about the same price..
https://www.surpluscenter.com/item.asp?catname=&qty=1&item=5-1702

Second, when I use strings and pulleys I try to use heavier weight spiderwire. It is a braided fishing line that works well in eyelets.


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## jdblue1976

Thanks, Johnny. 
I'll order one of those motors today and give it a try. I saw that one listed at the Surplus Center before but it didn't list the torque, so I wasn't sure. 
I'll wait on adding the extra pulleys to see how well the new motor works. I don't need a whole lot of additional torque, it's just that I've got so much counterbalance right now that the strings are going slack on the down part of the cycle, which is screwing up the fluid motion.


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## heresjohnny

I know what you mean about counter weights. The motor is quite strong. Check out the video on http://www.hauntforum.com/showthread.php?t=33118. The motor drove a fairly heavy armature, without counterweight for several hours. No guarantee, but so far I am very happy with it.


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## jdblue1976

I've got one on order. Can't wait to try it out.

Thanks again


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## jdblue1976

Got the motor yesterday and fab'd up a new mount for it this afternoon. It works great, plenty of torque, but it runs hot. Using a meat thermometer it looks to be in the 130 F/55 C range. You can touch it but not for long.
I only removed just enough counterweight to get the motion smooth.

We'll see how this goes, may need to put a fan on it.

Thanks for the tip Johnny!


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## heresjohnny

Hey HD, my motor runs hot also, but it never seemed to get too hot. Maybe a heat sink. Got any video off the final result? Would love to see it.


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## jdblue1976

Johnny, I ended up putting a muffin fan on it. Bought one online for like $7. I fab'd up a mount out of scrap sheet metal. Really made a difference. My only concern was the heat would shorten the life of the motor.
Sorry but I didn't take any new video before I took it down.


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## jdblue1976

To answer some inquiries about Zero. The head is 13" long and is covered in "Foam Putty". The body is about 32" long and is made of satin, as are the ears. The wing span is about 25". His eyes are black felt.
The dimensions of the mechanism really depend on the torque available from the motor. I'm using a 1 to 4 ratio on the lever arms that lift him up and down to get about a 2 foot of rise/fall. The arm on the motor shaft is about 3" long. It has a large washer on the pivot point that spins around so the strings don't tangle or bind.
As I stated in last years post I went to a better motor so I could remove some of the couterweight (batteries). That's been working out well. No overheating with the fan mounted on it.
To get his head to glow under blacklight I've brush on laundry detergent with whitening. The prop is inside so I don't have to worry about it getting wet.


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## Sreilley

*Zeros ears*

Hi....can you tell me how you attached his ears? And did you use wire to give them the wind blown look? You did a fantastic job!!


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## Hauntiholik

Sreilley said:


> Hi....can you tell me how you attached his ears? And did you use wire to give them the wind blown look? You did a fantastic job!!


Sreilley, this post is 2 years old and jdblue1976 hasn't been on the forum in a year. You may not get a response.


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## Lord Homicide

Sreilley said:


> Hi....can you tell me how you attached his ears? And did you use wire to give them the wind blown look? You did a fantastic job!!


I would assume similar to the picture that shows the piece of sheet metal taped to the head...


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## jdblue1976

Hi Sreilley,

Yes the ears have wire running thru them to give them the wavy effect. The wire then extends out the ear and pokes into the side of the foam head. I used hot melt to attach the ear fabric to the head and keep it the wire from coming out. It also allows the ears to move/pivot. I used 12AWG copper wire.

Lord Homicide: The sheet metal was a bracket for the jaw. I actual intended to be able to open and close the mouth so I made that a more robust pivot point. The ears only need to be somewhat flexible.

BTW: I still get notifications if someone comments on my threads.


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## jdblue1976

Just an update for everyone. The mechanical mechanism that makes zero flap his arms (wings) is not very robust. I wouldn't try to duplicate it. (Not that anyone has asked.) I'm planning on converting all the motion to all servos and sync it to the rest of my display.


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## Sreilley

Thank you for the reply!!


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## jdblue1976

*Time for a change*

Quick update. I just started working on converting Zero to servo control. Let me know if there is any interest and I'll start posting updates/info.


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## RoxyBlue

I think there would be interest since this is such a delightful prop and anything NBC will have a following

Feel free to start a new "Floating Zero 2.0" update thread. That way the details on the changes will be right at the beginning of that thread and easy to find.


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## Jaybo

I would love to see an update. A new thread is good idea too. Just place a link to the new thread in this one. That way you won't lose all the people that are subscribed to this thread. 

Sent from my SM-G930T using Tapatalk


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## jdblue1976

Started new thread "Floating Zero 2.0"

http://www.hauntforum.com/showthread.php?t=43341


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