Animated Swaying Zombie Prop

Another prop for the 2025 haunt display is now done! My new swaying zombie animatronic is now ready to go out into the yard...

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After reviewing last year's display, I knew that I wanted to add some new props with movement this year. My time was short, so I needed something quick and easy. A few years ago, I had built a side-to-side rotating skeleton with lantern sitting on a tombstone with a quick and dependable kit from Spider Hill Prop Works, so I went back to them to see what they had available.

I settled on their Animated Swaying Zombie kit, complete with mounted wiper motor and all PVC pipe sections, and got to work assembling it. I really have to give a big shoutout to Spider Hill, because this kit had literally everything needed to assemble the full figure along with detailed instructions on how to assemble it. The figure went together quickly and easily and was soon ready for finishing. And the fit and finish on the completed kit was top notch.

I used a prop head from good friend to the Cemetery, Dave at Closed Casket Studios. The decayed head worked perfectly for this piece, and the best part is that I already had it sitting in my collection! The detailed sculpt really set the entire piece off nicely...

For the clothing, I lucked out and used a full, already-distressed suit that I had used for a zombie costume 10 years ago. It was just sitting in my basement unused, so it worked perfectly for this. And luckily, it fit the dimensions of the kit nicely.

I also ended up grabbing a cheap pair of white plastic zombie hands from eBay to finish the figure. The white plastic ended up matching the color of the prop head and they were pretty close on scale to the rest of the figure. It took a bit of rigging, but they fit snug into the pipe ends of the arms, and they look good when the arms are swaying freely as the figure rotates, almost as if they are reaching out to grab you.

To finish the piece off, I added an MP3 player with external speaker to the inside of the body. I had an old zombie audio track (unfortunately, I can't remember where I got it) that I dug up and used, which ended up working perfectly. A really nasty, gurgling vocal to add the final accent to a really great prop.

I am SUPER happy with the way this one turned out and with how easily it all went together. It is going to look fantastic sitting next to my crypt, right next to the walkway where all of the trick-or-treaters have to pass by to get their candy. I think it will be an intimidating challenge for some to get by as it growls and rotates...

Animated Grave Breaker 2023 Prop Upgrade

Two years ago, I picked up a cheap Grave Breaker prop from Halloween City and transformed it into a ghastly, twisting corpse powered by a reindeer motor. You can check out the corpsing portion of the project here, and the animation portion here. It was a fun little build that added some much-needed movement to the front of my display.

Fast forward to today and I have now added a second version to my Cemetery. A few weeks back I was in my local Michael's checking out their Halloween wares, and I came across another Grave Breaker static prop and threw it in the cart. Cheap to begin with, but makes for a great starting point on another animated ghoul that I needed to add to my display...

I followed the same corpsing technique as the first prop, giving it a grotesque, dead flesh look. I ended up adding whisps of hair from an old wig to give it just a bit more creepiness (I simply snipped sections of hair from the wig and applied it randomly using contact cement.)

After the corpsing portion was done, I turned to animating it. The first prop turns side-to-side, so I decided that this version would rock front-to-back. I ended up throwing a linkage arm together with leftover pieces from the first build, powered by a vertically-mounted reindeer motor that I had left over. I mounted the arm to a single piece of PVC, pivoting on a single bolt and washer axle. (Take a look at the original supply list here.)

I'm really happy with the results of this one. It's a huge upgrade to the out-of-the-box piece, and it all went together quickly and fairly easily. I love the subtlety of the movement, as its slow, creepy lunge is just enough to catch your eyes and will look great among the tombstones at the front of my display.

Grave Breaker Prop Upgrade: Part Two

Last Saturday, I shared Part One of my store-bought Grave Breaker prop upgrade, giving him more undead flesh and overall creepiness.

This week, I'll show you how I took it even further, adding motion to the formerly static prop!

After the "corpsification" was complete, I decided to finally use an old reindeer motor I had laying around and animate this guy. I ended up using HiLo Greg's excellent YouTube tutorial with a few minor modifications. I made my way to my local Lowe's and came back with the following items to build it:

- Hillman 1/2" x 5.5" mending plate (5-pack)
- #8-32 x 1-1/4" round combo bolts (I only needed one at this length)
- #8-32 x 1/2" truss combo bolts (x4)
- #8 flat washers
- #8 lock washers
- #8-32 nylon insert lock nuts
- #000 x 3-7/8" eye hook screw
- 3/4" PVC pipe section
- 1" PVC end cap
- 5/32 x 1-1/2 cotter pin
- Gorilla Glue
- scrap 1" x 6" piece of board
- scrap 1" x 2" piece of board
- FrightProps Fixed Speed 110V AC 5RPM Deer Motor
- I also bought a 90-degree angle bracket, but I ended up not using it.

Right out of the gate, I noticed that my reindeer motor did NOT have the plastic swing arm piece that I see on most motors, so I had to start by fabricating one. I used a handful of flat washers on the spindle to build up support, and used half of a mending plate for the swing arm. I ran a cotter pin through the spindle hole to secure the arm in place. I ended up hitting it with a few drops of Gorilla Glue just to make sure it wouldn't move at all. 

Once the fabricated arm was solid, I then made the next swing arm connection with a full mending plate. I ended up using an inverted 1-1/4" mending bolt (threads facing up), a stack of flat washers, and a nylon lock nut. I needed to stack it so that the connection arm would clear the motor spindle when it rotated around. I connected the other end of the mending plate with the 1/2" truss combo bolt, flat washers, and a nylon lock nut to the remaining half of the first mending plate (waste not, want not). IMPORTANT! Leave a little play on both lock nuts so that the bolts will be secure, but still loose enough that the arms can still pivot around, as they will move back and forth.

The half mending plate section was then FULLY connected to a 90-degree angle piece of plate with 2x 1/2" truss combo bolts, washers, and lock nuts. Make sure this connection is tightened completely!

The 90-degree angle piece of plate is then screwed into a small section of 3/4" PVC pipe. I used 2 wood screws that I had laying around, and they need to be secured to the vertical PVC pipe tightly.

The last part of the build was the PVC pipe shaft. I used a small piece of pipe, as I wanted to keep the corpse figure close to the ground. I also took the 1" cap and screwed it down onto the scrap piece of 1" x 6". The slightly oversized cap acts like a cup for the PVC pipe section to rotate back and forth in smoothly. I also screwed a scrap piece of 1" x 2" next to the PVC pipe and screwed the eye hook in at the top. The eye hook acts as a guide to hold the rotating PVC pipe at the top while it rotates in the end cap at the bottom.

Once all of these linkage pieces were assembled and rotating correctly, I had to adjust the placement of the motor itself on the 1" x 6" so that I got a full, clean rotation on all of the pieces. Once I found a clean spot, I screwed the motor housing down, using existing screw holes on the motor's body.

Once everything was fixed in place and moving smoothly, I simply slid the slightly smaller piece of black pipe on the corpse prop right down into the PVC pipe shaft. It fits snug enough that I don't need to glue it in. It holds as is and rotates smoothly.

And after I had all of the final adjustments dialed it, I simply plugged it in and let it run! Flawless, slow rotations back and forth adding just a little bit more creepiness to an off-the-shelf Halloween prop!

And here is a video of the motor and linkage arms, working in sweet, sweet harmony.

The final step will be to add some finishing details. I'm going to paint the wood and PVC section black so that you can't see it at night. I'm also going to add some creepy cloth to the bottom of the prop's shirt so that the motor section is hidden from view.

I had a blast figuring this thing out and I'm REALLY happy with how it tuned out. Huge thanks to Hilo Greg and his video for giving me a template to work from! This will be placed up front in this year's layout and will provide some much-needed movement to break up an otherwise static display.