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Gypsy!

She's... just a girl...



Well, Gypsy is the hardest of the three 'bots to construct but given enough time, the results are great. I am not going to write out the plans completely, but if you click below you can find the complete text of Monte's plans with my own notes added here and there. It's not perfect, but I built it in Word, so it has a few quirks here and there. But it does have all of the necessary info to build a great Gypsy.

My pride and joy. Everyone should have one. If not as a puppet, as a piece of dysfunctional furniture that emits a sweet, slightly yellow glow over you living room. Ok, I think I've been spending too much time with Gypsy and not enough time with actual girls now...

Gypsy Instructions (Monte's instructions with my own little touches added):

Gypsy Tips:
1. Most people construct a Gypsy that is extremely tall and unwieldly! I prefer to make mine to the scale of the actual prop, used in MST3K:TM and Seasons 8-10. The measurements are:
From the top, make a 4" piece of PVC. Connect this via a 45 degree angle (a "45" to save typing) to a 3' piece by a 45 to a 2 foot piece to a 14" piece by a 45. This produces a Gypsy that is about shoulder height, like the ones seen here (all BBI shots:)

A slightly taller version was used in the Joel era, with a different hinge placement and parallel bars places by the hinge, not to mention smaller foam insulation: (thanks to The Bot Building Extravaganza for this pic.)

2. When trimming the inner lining for Gypsy's lower lip, do not cut it straight off like Monte's plans. This causes the jaw hinge hole to be dangerously close to the edge. Instead, simply add on an extra 1/2" or so to the lip to compensate (I learned this the head way).

3. A neat little detail that makes Gypsy look more finished and 'bot-like is to paint the ring around the flashlight lens silver, like seen below in the pic from MST3K:TM. Unfortunately, this detail often gets left out.

4. Look at all the pictures and videos you can before trimming the seat to make it look as accurate as possible. To save time, here are a bunch of reference pics as well as the pics above(also nice examples of G's color):

The last pic shows the nicest color, in my opinion. It's from Monte's site. He provided me with the kit (I won it on Ebay) and it's a great source for most of the parts (all you need left is about $20 in hardware store materials & paint).

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