El Cabroncito: The Littlest Bastard

Born out of an illicit love affair between a top lucha libre legend and a female midget wrestler, El Cabroncito’s father denied his son his lineage, fearing it would tarnish his highly respected reputation.

Son of a ruda: Tati "La Tigresa" Morales held the Women's Mini-Championship until the day she gave birth.

Raised in the bullet-riddled slums of Mexico City, Cabroncito vowed revenge on the lucha icon. Harboring an intense thirst for violence and a serious Napoleon complex, the little bastard was quick to pull a tee-ball bat on anyone that pointed out his diminutive stature or rumored heritage, earning him a reputation the most dangerous little person in the country.

Keep walkin', gramma: A young Cabroncito holds down the corner with full-sized authority.

As his legendary father grew old and sickly, he realized the damage his selfishness had caused and tried to resolve his error before his death. He invited Cabroncito on a Mexican talk show where he revealed to the viewing audience their family bond and his hidden shame.

Let's bring him on out: The calm before the storm.

As he kneeled down to offer a hug to his newly accepted son, Cabroncito fired his smallish foot deep into his father’s crotch before snatching his dad’s legendary mask from his head, revealing his face for the first time in his historic career. The television hosts, along with the entire viewing audience, gasped at the atrocity, unable to process what they were seeing. The last image broadcast was El Cabroncito flipping off the camera as he lit the host's couch on fire with his zippo.

Meanwhile in Tijuana:

Nursing a bloody mary and looking over a list new Bastards to potentially recruit, Ultimate Carlos glanced up at the TV just long enough to see a half-sized psychopath kicking an old douchebag in the plums.

“Great...” He thought to himself, “Now I gotta travel all the way to Mexico City.”


Say hello to our little friend: El Cabroncito is the newest member of The Battling Bastards.



Bootleggin' Bastards

As we gear up for this Friday's sale, let's take a minute to look at the step-by-step process of turning a bunch of chemicals into a little plastic Mexican.

The lab: Tools, paints, sprays, dyes, sandpapers and 2 dozen random action figure limbs.  There is a crap load of materials needed at any given point during the process, and it's handy to have them all at an arms length.  Shouts out to my Dremel: stay grinding.



To kitbash a figure, is to give it immortality.  Here I take one of my all time favorite figures, a Dick Tracy Mumbles, add in a head from classic lucha rudo, Pierroth (from the 90's CMLL figure line) and and add pegs and sculpting that will help with easily pouring the resin.



The next step is to create a mold for each seperate piece, which is likely the most labor intensive aspect of the process.  This involves making two halves for each mold, using a combination of Legos, clay and silicone rubber.  Many factors, including gravity, air flow, and mold volume, make the process a little trickier than it sounds, and using quality silicone can make mistakes somewhat costly, so mapping out good molds is key.



Once the molds are in place, I cast each piece by measuring out and mixing together resin and pouring into each mold.  The resin has a short working time, so once poured and the mold is secured with rubber bands, they are quickly placed into a pressure pot hooked up to a compressor and pressurized by 30-40 psi.  This shrinks bubbles forming in the resin and helps ensure a smooth cast.

The resin takes less than 10 minutes to set, then it's out of the pressure pot so I can get the next batch in.



The cast looks good and bubble free!  With this small victory achieved, it's time to trim off any flash that bled out of the main mold area, which generally can be done with a fingernail or small knife shortly after casting.  This is followed by sawing off the vent holes and sanding down the seams with 3 different levels of wet sand paper.  A somewhat daunting process when you multiply each figure by 8 pieces!

As I previously mentioned, I had never painted figures prior to Ultimate Carlos, and ended up trying a few different paints and small brushes.  Getting a clean application can be nerve-racking, but I am starting to enjoy the meditative qualities of painting tiny shoes and sculpted hankerchiefs.

Each figure is sprayed with an industrial aerosol gloss, glued together with high quality adhesives and packaged with their numbered, photoshopped headers.  Don't miss out on your chance to score one of the 6 original Battling Bastards figures, this Friday at 6pm PST in the Scraped Resin store.

The Battling Bastards have arrived!

A new line of resin Mexican bootleg figures enter the ring.

Battling Bastards is the first line of bootleg figures from Scraped Resin, with Ultimate Carlos being the first Bastard to debut. 

Casey Jones' "Clean Up Mexico" initiative was not proceeding as planned.

Each figure is 1000% handmade, from the mold-making and casting each of the 8 separate parts in resin to the painted details and packaging.Boasting 0 points of articulation, these 4.5" figures proudly stand tall on their own.

Every girls crazy for a sharp dressed bastard.

This first release features a Noir colorway, with black and white resins exclusively used to create 6 unique Ultimate Carlos figures, which will be sold blind-bagged with bad-ass, numbered header cards.

Rumors that Ultimate Carlos was cloned from Tequila's toenail clippings have since been proven false.

The figures will be available 6pm PST on Friday, 3/1/2013 for $50 each, shipping included.  Check back next week for a peek behind the curtain as I walk you through the process of creating each Bastard by hand.

The Ballad of Ultimate Carlos

For years, Carlos toiled in the midcard as a high-flying tecnico who had a decent following, but could never break through to the main event.  On one fateful night, his boss told him he'd be wrestling the champion for the belt, but the champ had other ideas.  Worried that Carlos was not in his league, he used his influence as a top draw to rewrite the night's script, resulting in him squashing the challenger in 30 seconds.  Seeing his opportunity slip away, Carlos decided to take his fate into his own hands. 

That night, Ultimate Carlos was born.  Coming down to the ring wearing a suit, rather than his wrestling gear, the champ assumed it would be a forfeit and began mocking Carlos.  In the midst of doing a fairly unconvincing chicken dance, the champ was blindsided from behind as a group of masked lucha thugs began beating him unmercifully with bike locks and broken beer bottles. 

Declaring himself the new Mexican Heavyweight Champion, Ultimate Carlos threw down a challenge to any bastard tough enough to battle him: You want this title?  Come take it from me! 

Having assembled a collection of the most ruthless lucha thugs in Tijuana, Carlos and his gang of masked rudos terrorize the wrestling populace, proving they are the toughest bastards in Tijuana, the World AND ALL OF THE KNOWN UNIVERSE.

Marble Madness

Here's another preview of the upcoming Ultimate Carlos resin figure, featuring the two marbled variants up for grabs.  The black-and-white effect is achieved through using two different resin colors during the casting process, and I must say, these little fuckers look dapper as hell.

Stylin' and Profilin': Just because you punch faces for a living doesn't mean you can't look good doing it!

This first wave is going to feature black and white resins exclusively, with some red paint thrown in for good measure.  I'd never painted figures before, so it's been a learning process, but the application is getting cleaner with each Bastard.  Marble Jacket Carlos below has some bonus swirl action on his right leg, part of a mistake that seemed too cool to toss.


Fists of marble: Each figure is cast in 8 separate parts.

The last two figures of the first wave of Battling Bastards are almost ready and I hope to have pics of all six figures, along with release date and pricing info shortly.  Make mine marble!