Dossiers A Better Life The Psionic Predator, by Charles Cosimano | Page 49

The first thing you need to do is make the horns. You do this by cutting two 3" diameter
circles out of the posterboard. You then draw a line from the center of each circle to its
edge and then cut along that line so you have a straight cut from the edge of each
circle to its center.
Now start twisting the circle, using the cut, to make a cone. When you have a pleasing
cone, tape the posterboard in place and repeat that with the second circle so that you
will have two cones about the same size, the closer the better. When that is done wrap
each cone in duct tape and set them aside.
The helmet in the drawing and the photo each have a crest for the central crystal but
you can dispense with that and just have that crystal exposed on top. The horns act as
transmittal amplifiers so they are necessary.
Ok, set the horns aside for a bit and look at the hard hat. Take out the liner. Now,
mark the holes that you will have to drill. You will need a hole at the very top, a whole
on each side a bit down towards the front and three holes in the front spaced so that
the potentiometers and knobs will have enough room between them. Make sure that
the three front holes are large enough for the screw part of the pots to fit through them
but not so large that the nut holding them will go through.
Mark where the hole for the jack will be.
Drill the holes.
Set the helmet aside and wire the pots together in series with a wire at each end of the
chain long enough to reach the top of the helmet when they are inserted.
Wire the three crystals by coating each in glue and wrapping the wire around them.
When the glue dries, position each one over one of the holes provided and run the wire
into the helmet. Glue the crystals in place and mount the horns over the side crystals.
Glue the horns in place.
When the glue sets, cover the crystal on the top of the helmet in masking tape and then
paint the helmet.
While the paint is drying, wire the jack so that the wire will be long enough to reach the
top of the helmet and cut out the foil circles. Put a SMALL hole in center of one of the
circles.
When the paint dries, attach the wires from the side crystals to the wire coming down
inside from the central crystal. Twisting the wires will work fine, just be sure that the
wire from the central crystal can reach the top of the liner of the hard hat.
Insert the pots and the jack.