My second deer customer (ever) brought me a nice 10 point that he shot in the head. The bullet entered below the ear in the back and came out between the antlers. The skull cap is completely shattered, should I use shed antler connecters, or a shed skull cap? How do I secure an antler to a skull cap? Also the base of both antlers cracked a couple inches up. I was thinking about super glueing the cracks shut and maybe using brown magic sculpt on the seams but I'm afraid it will show. My other problem is getting the antlers to sit properly on the form since I have little experience and the skull is too shattered to get a good "burr to eye" measurement. How can I get the antlers positioned to exactly where they belong? OH, and I'm worried about the exit hole. I need to football cut around it (thats how I learned) and I'm afraid of there not being enough skin to span to each antler. Any suggestions on this? Thanks for any input! These forums have been a life saver. Thankyou! Brad
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The football is used to hide the cut hairs on the "upstream" side of an ENTRANCE hole, not an exit. You should sew it however it's necessary to get it back into place.
As for the skullcap, it's your choice. Especially with not having seen it. I try to piece mine together with metal strips and epoxy resin with fiberglass strands. Your E-N measurement should be all you need for the form and just set your skull plate about 1.24 to 1.5 away from the eye orbit. That's a good "average" scale to pull from. When you test fit the hide, you should be able to see if it's too close or too far away and make corrections then.
YOu can fix the skull wito bondo, just figure out a way to hold the pieces in the proper shape and then fill with bondo. You should clean the skull first, and then maybe ruff the pieces up a little to help the bond. You will have it back together and ready to cut to fit the form in just a few minutes, depending on how much hardner you mix in. Don't over do it. you can creat a lot of heat if you do.
It cost a few bucks, but man is it slick! Beats all that pieceing together