Rowdy Roddy Piper (Iron Grenadier Instructor)

In 2007, the powers-that-be decided to make wrestling superstar Rowdy Roddy Piper a member of the Iron Grenadiers. He filled the role of Combat Training Instructor and was responsible for training IG Guards, Iron Anvils and Undertows. He was the final character that I had not yet made for my IG Army.

Parts: Head & Legs (Build-n-Brawl Roddy Piper), Arms, Torso, Sword & Belt (25th Iron Grenadier), M41A Pulse Rifle (Marauder, Inc.).

Razorback (Iron Grenadier High-Speed Assault Vehicle)

This is just a repaint of the classic Razorback, inspired by my overwhelming desire to have things uniform and standardized. Essentially, I just wanted my Razorback to match what I view as the "standard" Iron Grenadier paint scheme (you may be starting to notice a pattern here). The vehicle's two main body pieces and the engine cover were painted gloss black (NOTE: I actually wanted the body to be flat black, but the decals adhere much better to a glossy surface. So my solution was to use gloss black, apply the decals and then use Testors Dull-Cote to dull the shine). The clear pieces of the cockpit canopy and the gunner's turret were cleaned with Windex to be as perfectly clean as I could possibly get them. Then, I sprayed the inside of each piece with Testors Candy Apple Red. By painting only the in side of these pieces, I hope to avoid the paint rub that would definitely have resulted on the turret bubble. The missiles and cannons were sprayed with Krylon 14K Gold Plate. I have not found a better gold spray paint than this one. I had planned to order decals from my usual source, Ruben Jiminez, but then I realized that the original decals used a lot of black which would not have been visible on this vehicle. So instead, I improvised. I hand painted the numbers in gold and then trimmed some red tape to the proper size for the stripes on the turret housing. After the detailing was done, the whole thing was given a liberal application of Testors Dull-Cote before the clear red pieces were put on.

Snake Eyes (Desert Fatigues)

This was something that I did quite a while a go, and it's been collecting dust on my workbench. Snake Eyes is normally the guy dressed all in black, but there are some environments where that might not be the best option. I wanted to explore that a little bit and see what the results were like. This is almost certainly going to end up on ebay, but I figured I might as well get it out there and see what people thought of it first...

Parts: Head, Sword & Scabbard (RoC City Strike Snake Eyes), Body (PoC Dusty), Uzi (25th Snake Eyes), Suppressor (Marauder, Inc.), Backpack (RoC Gung Ho).

Cheesehead (Badger Driver)

This figure was created specifically for the Pimp Daddy Destro My Ride Contest at HissTank. The contest's Vehicle Category involves making a dedicated vehicle for a character that never had one before and the Figure Category involves a new character to be the driver for a vehicle that didn't come with one. For the Figure Category, I decided to create a driver for the G.I. Joe Badger vehicle. The character is loosely based on my 7-year old son (in the respect that he wanted it to be him and helped me decide on the background). I had a lot of fun working on this! Hope you dig it!

BADGER DRIVER
Code Name:	CHEESEHEAD
File Name:	Maue, Adam T.
SN:	073-16-AB02
Primary Military Specialty:	Infantry
Secondary Military Specialty:	Motor Transport
Birthplace:	Sun Prairie, WI
Grade:	E-4 (Corporal)
Cheesehead has the typical Midwesterner’s temperament – he takes things as they come and not a whole lot gets him upset. He was born and raised just outside of the Wisconsin state capitol and grew up rooting for the UW Badgers and the Green Bay Packers. Upon reporting for his Greenshirt assignment to the Joe team Motor Pool, Clutch immediately began calling him “Cheesehead” in an attempt to get under his skin. Instead of getting upset, Cheesehead just accepted it. No one was more surprised than Clutch, when Cheesehead elected to keep his unofficial nickname after his final selection to the main element of the Joe team. He requested and was assigned as a Badger Driver. It didn’t take him long to upgrade the armament and put his own personal flair on his vehicle!
Cheesehead is easy-going and affable – until the shooting starts. The last place you want to be then, is in his gunsights. The guy just doesn’t know the meaning overkill!

General Mayhem (Iron Grenadier General)

Yet another in my series of Iron Grenadier customs. General Mayhem was originally introduced as part of the 2006 G.I. Joe Convention set. He was formerly a SPETZNAZ (Special Forces) commander in the Russian Army and was intended to be Voltar's replacement, but since my Voltar is still alive and kicking, I had to figure out a way for the two of them to co-exist. My solution was to make General Voltar the commander of all conventional IG forces, while General Mayhem commands the IG SpecOps forces.

Parts: Head & Helmet (Slayer Design Studios), Entire Body (25th Iron Grenadier), Pistol (25th Red Star), Belt & Holster (25th Battle Armor Cobra Commander).

Voltar's Violator (Iron Grenadier Commander's Cycle)

This vehicle was created specifically for the Pimp Daddy Destro My Ride Contest at HissTank. The contest's Vehicle Category involves making a dedicated vehicle for a character that never had one before and the Figure Category involves a new character to be the driver for a vehicle that didn't come with one. For the Vehicle Category, I decided to create a vehicle for the Iron Grenadier's field commander, General Voltar. Because the contest required you to name the vehicle, I'm calling it Voltar's Violator. I had a lot of fun working on this and got to use an old vehicle that has been sitting in my fodder box for nearly 10 years! Hope you dig it!

Tiger Rat (Ground-Attack Aircraft)

This is essentially just a re-paint of my little brother's 1988 Tiger Rat. The Tiger Force colors have always been annoying to me, but it was a very cool plane, so I wanted to do something with it. As usual, the reproduction decals are from Ruben Jiminez.

Ace (Fighter Pilot)

This is basically a spiffed-up version of the 25th Anniversary comic pack Ace figure. I painted the name tag on his flight suit and "improved" his flight gear. The helmet and oxygen hose were added from my parts box.

Solid-Lock (Radar Intercept Officer)

Since 1983, we've seen Lt Wayne Ruthel's name on the side of our Skystrikers, proclaiming his status as Ace's Radar Intercept Officer. When I set out to make a figure of this mysterious fellow, I first searched the customs forum over at HissTank to see if anyone else had already done so. Surprisingly, the only other Lt Ruthel I was able to find was by HissTank member Shipwreck. (Click here to check it out: Lt Wayne Ruthel - Code Name: Solid-Lock).

I had a very specific idea of how I wanted my figure to be outfitted, but I had not yet thought about a head or a code name. Since I liked what Shipwreck had done with his, I decided use the same head and code name on mine. Does that make him an "official" charcater yet? LOL

Skystriker XP-14F

The Skystriker I shared with my younger brother Mike was more or less destroyed during our numerous childhood battles and I ended up selling it for parts back before I got back into collecting G.I. Joe toys (oh, how I regret that decision). I recently managed to pick one up for a pretty reasonable price and set about restoring it. The only significant parts that I needed to find were the cockpit canopy and some of the missiles. I picked these up on ebay (for almost as much as I paid for the entire Skystriker, but that's another story). The hardest part of this whole job was removing the stubborn adhesive left behind when I peeled off the old decals. I used Goo Gone to get rid of the adhesive and then soap and water to make sure all of the Goo Gone was removed. I painted the cockpit interior a dark grey and the frames of the seats were done in metallic grey. The engines were painted with the same metallic color used on the seat frames. I Dremeled the back pegs off the seats so that the newer style of figures would fit easily.















I had always hated how the AIM-9 Sidewinder short-range missiles on the Skystriker had the fat tabs in the middle of them (probably to prevent breakage). So I dropped them entirely in favor of two additional AIM-7 Sparrow medium-range missiles.









When I realized that the missiles from the Transportable Tactical Battle Platform were styled the same as the Sparrows, I picked up four of those (and a fifth to replace the one missing from my own TTBP).









I also went back to ebay for two AIM-54 Phoenix long-range missiles to replace the ones with broken fins that came with the Skystriker. To add a bit of "real-world" flavor to my Skystriker, all of the missiles were painted and detailed according to dozens of reference photos I pulled from the Internet.









For reproduction decals, I went to my usual source, Ruben Jimenez.


















Once everything was finished, I also whipped up a flight crew (Ace and Solid-Lock) for my newly restored Skystriker!

Iron Maiden (Iron Grenadier Intelligence Officer)

As soon as I saw this head and torso set at Slayer Design Studios, I knew I'd have to give this a shot. The Baroness had her own squad of female troopers when she was with Cobra, so why wouldn't she do the same after joining Destro's faction? I know I'll probably take some ribbing for the cheesy name, but it's the best I could do on short notice!

Parts: Head & Torso (Slayer Design Studios), Arms (RoC Baroness v13), Legs (RoC Dr. Rex Lewis), Sword & Scabbard (25th Anniversary Iron Grenadier), M41A Pulse Rifle (Marauder, Inc.), Braided Hair (Star Wars Princess Leia).