Isaiah's Thousand Sunny for Magic Wheelchair

Back in May we got the call from Magic Wheelchair with our marching orders for San Diego Comic Con.  There was a young man named Isaiah who would be turning sixteen years old just a few days before the convention began.  Isaiah is a huge fan of the One Piece series and wanted his wheelchair turned into the pirate ship from the iconic anime series.

Initially, I was told he wanted the ship to be the Going Merry, which looks like so:

Piece of cake.

When we sat down to have our initial video conference with Isaiah and his mom, he dropped a bit of a bombshell.  It turns out he'd changed his mind and decided he'd rather have the bigger, newer, decidedly more complex ship from the series, the Thousand Sunny:

That one would take a bit more doing.

Still, we had plenty of time and half of a plan, so we got to work.

The first thing I did was purchase a model kit so we would have a three dimensional blueprint to use as reference.  You can pick up this model kit here: LINK

Because I manage my time poorly, that kit sat unopened in its box for weeks before my friend Dani came out to the shop to help with this build.  Since I was still noodling over exactly how I wanted to tackle this project, Dani spent the beginning of that first day building the model:

Once that was done, we got a slow start by cutting out the overall footprint of the ship from a piece of plywood.  These humble beginnings started the build:

After staring at it for longer than I'd like to admit, I finally knuckled down and gave it a little structure:

Then we made the first cutouts and added caster wheels:


By the end of the day we had the bow cage framed:


Then we got a chance to begin the skin:


The next time Dani made it up to the shop, we got focused on roughing out the stern section:


At this point, our plan was to make the ship almost completely one piece* and just have the stern pop off so Isaiah could drive his wheelchair into the hull, get lashed in place, and then we just hook the stern in place behind him.  

Nothing to it.

To get the right profile to the front end of the ship, we taped a trash bag against the hull and filled it with expanding foam.  Then my friend Jeff Watamura spent the next day or so shaving it down to get the shape right:

With the hull forming up, it was time to start on the detail parts.  First up, the figurehead on the bow:


The diameter was going to be just a bit too big for my vacforming machine, so I decided to cook a sheet of styrene until it was nice and soft, then drape it over the top of a trashcan so it could sag into place.  This created a pretty uniform dome shape.  We made two, cut a ring out of one of them, and laminated them together with a bunch of clamps and some solvent cement:


We used the cutout to mock up this quick and dirty proof of concept:


The lion head was digitally sculpted by my friend Zander Brandt, then printed on my fleet of FDM Printers before seaming and prep work began.  Here's the printed lion head on top of the shield:


The rivets were cast from an old rivet mold we had left over from another project and the bones were made in much the same way we made the bones for Meredith's Skeletor throne last year.

Somewhere in there, we stopped in the evening for libations:


Jeff spent the next few days fine tuning the shapes of the bow.  Mostly while sitting on the floor in the midst of a pile of foam dust:


Zander continued to crank out all of the little detail models we needed.  Here's the printed details for the little round house that hangs off of the stern:


Once the rough shapes were pretty much dialed in, I snuck into the shop when nobody was around and build a single layer of fiberglass skin on bow blob:


Then got started on the bodyshop work for the curves of the stern:


Meanwhile, Dani got started on skinning over the bow blob with bondo so we could make it all smooth and fair:


At this point, it was starting to look like a thing:


And we started putting colors on some of the parts:


We passed the requisite dorg inspection:


It also started to become clear that this thing was going to be huge.  At just over ten and a half feet long, it was going to be difficult to transport and store.  So I scrapped the plan to use the stern section as a backdoor.  Instead, we fixed the stern section in place with glue and screws and split the hull in the middle:


This made for two much smaller sections that would be easier to move around, pack, and store when not in use.

After a few hours, we had the aft house printed:


One of the fun technical challenges was making the railings for the curved stern section.  Since the stern was made entirely by hand, we didn't have precise models, drawings, or even measurements to tell us the exact shape of the curve we'd have to fit the rails to.

Instead, I had Zander model a straight section of the railing which I printed multiple copies of, fused them all together, and made a long, skinny mold:


To make sure the railing would have the exact right curve to fit the edge of the deck, I simply bent the long, skinny mold in place to match the curve:


The I mixed up a batch of resin and filled the bent mold:


Once that had cured, I demolded it and had a curved section of rail that fit the edge of the deck perfectly:


Then it was just a matter of casting more railing:


In no time at all, I had all the perfectly curved railings we'd need:


Meanwhile, Chuck got to spend her days prepping the other printed parts for primer and paint:


Jay spent some quality time smoothing out the bow bulge:


To make the raised trim, we outlined these areas with double-sided mounting tape.  Then built up Bondo in between the tape strips.  Once it was sanded smooth, the tape was removed to reveal a raised strip that was proud of the rest of the surface by the same thickness as the mounting tape:


Once everything was smoothed and primed, Keegan got to work making sure the edges were nice and sharp:


He and Madison have helped with more than a few of our Magic Wheelchair builds over the years:


At this point, we'd done everything that absolutely required all of the tools and funky smelling materials in the shop just in time to load everything on a truck and head to San Diego.

The next day we finished a few other projects and got a late start on the southbound trip to the Comic-Con.  Wednesday morning found us in the hotel putting the finishing touches on the build:


Magically, the two sections fit in the room with plenty of room to spare for me and the crew to unload our luggage and still have space to sleep:


Jeff turned up and helped out with rigging the ratlines on the main mast:


These were made of bungie cord for maximum flexibility.  In order to make the ship small enough to fit through a standard doorway, the masts were fitted with a pin that could be pulled so the upper mast section could telescope down into the lower section and rotate so the yards run front-to-back.  All of which could be done by one person without needing any tools or heavy lifting.  And it looked the part too:


While I was finalizing the rigging, Chuck lashed the sails in place on the yards:


And Rachel painted the outline around the logo on the main sail:


With some armature wire threaded into pockets in the sails, they became poseable, making them look like they were always full in a steady breeze:


With all of the finishing touches complete, it was time to meet Isaiah and do the final reveal.  He showed up dressed for the occasion:

Here's a short video of the reveal itself:


After the countdown and the unveiling, he was eager to get into the ship and set sail around the convention floor:


Usually it's a bit tough to navigate the crowds at San Diego Comic Con, but this thing was such a spectacle that most folks stepped back and made a wide berth so they could get a look:


There was no shortage of One Piece cosplayers who showed up to pose for photos with Isaiah:




And he managed to get the ship autographed by one of the voice actors from the show:

I'm really happy with the finished result and can't wait to get started on the next Magic Wheelchair build.

For more information about Magic Wheelchair including how to donate, volunteer, build a costume, or apply or nominate someone to get a costume, check out MagicWheelchair.org.

In the meantime, stay tuned for more.

*this painfully unfunny joke became a staple of the shop more often than I'd like to admit.  "How should I make this?"  "Can you make it...  ...one piece?"  Not funny, but we laughed at us every time.