Overview:

This is the second installment in our rescuing a friend section, In this episode we will restore a vintage 1964 GIjOE that was recovered from the inner depths of my parents basement. This is one of the few figures from my childhood that managed to survive, and by the looks of him he barely made it. You may ask yourself why on earth would waste the time to salvage this guy, well there are two reasons the first is sentimental value and the second is I needed something to write about.

The goal of this project it to restore this figure so it can be used to display costumes and accessories.

Evaluation:

This guy needs a lot of help he has missing Left hand, Left forearm,  a busted right arm, cracked hip and two cracked knees. He also has a serous hair rub problem and discoloration on his face paint. We do have some good news,  his bands are clean and tight with some rusting on the clips.

Planned Repairs:

After a complete cleaning this Joe will receive a new right arm, Left forearm, left hand, right shin, left shin, and a new paint job.

Tools and supplies List:

The following tools and supplies were used during this project

Parts List:

Our guy is going to need more than his fair share of parts and lucky for him when it comes to classic Joes there are multiple sources to choose from. Before we start placing orders for parts we need to determine if we want to use vintage or new parts. For this project I will be using a mix of both Vintage and new parts just for demonstration purposes.

The following is the list of parts that we used for our project.

Step One - repairing and replacing  Arms and Hands

The first step was to remove the busted right arm and replace it with a Classic Joe arm. The arm I used was part of a LOT of parts I bought off of eBay (when all said an done it cost about a dollar). To remove the broken arm I used a restringing tool made out of a wire cloths hanger. By pulling on the arm and pushing the tool through the hoop in the band, I was able to unhook the old arm and them connect the new arm.

Next I replaced the left forearm with the forearm from a Real Heroes Action Figure that I had in my parts bin. The hole was a little small so I used a round file to make it larger. I then added a classic hand from the parts LOT I purchased from eBay.

Step Two - New legs

I initially tried to repair the original shins with a glue that was for vinyl but it did more harm than good and I then opted to just replace them with new new shins. I used the two shins from the Real Heroes Action Figure i had in my parts bin. The holes for the leg needed to be made bigger so I used a round file i also made the hole for the feet a little larger.

Step Three -Paint Job

The paint job on this Joe really needed some revamping, years of neglect and basement dwelling has taken its toll. The first step was to repaint the hair and eye brows for this I used a flat black latex paint I purchased from the local craft shop. I used white, blue and black for the eyes first painting the area white, then adding blue dot then a touch of black for the pupils. His lips and scar a mixed up a custom color using another Joe as my guide.

The the following shots are of the finished product and as you can see he is very displayable now and a far cry from when we started.

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