Bobblehead 'Trumps' all others
A Butler man and his partners have gotten a lot of attention for the larger-than-life Donald Trump bobblehead statue that sat outside of the Quicken Loans Arena in Cleveland during the Republican National Convention.
Christopher Tomko and his company, Freshmade 3D, are now hard at work creating a Hillary Clinton bobblehead statue also for the Youngstown/Warren Regional Chamber.
Tomko, a 1989 graduate of Knoch High School who earned a bachelor of the arts degree from the University of Wisconsin, founded Freshmade 3D in January in Youngstown, Ohio, with Brett Conner and Rich Wetzel.
“We are a 3-D design and manufacturing company. We make rare and custom auto parts,” said Tomko, who commutes there from Butler.
“The chamber of commerce in Youngstown wanted to take advantage of the convention to draw attention to Youngstown,” said Tomko. “Youngstown is known as the 3-D printing capital.”
“Our company is using an innovative approach to using 3-D printing for everyday things that people can use, like car parts,” said Tomko.
Bobblehead Trump was more involved than designing and printing a carburetor part.
The bobblehead was designed and produced by Freshmade 3D, said Tomko, with assistance from Youngstown State University and Humtown Products. It was built using multiple 3-D-printing techniques involving sand, metal and plastic.
The statue, at 7 feet tall and more than 300 pounds, is actually larger than life.
The body, which was printed from fiberglass-reinforced sand, took about 30 hours to print, according to Wetzel.
The head, printed in plastic, took 225 hours, with Trump's famous hair printed separately. The entire statue was coated in aluminum. It is valued at about $35,000.
“The head had much more detail, and also Trump has a lot of hair and it took a long time to print all that hair. There is a lot of character to his hair,” said Tomko.
If the statue was created to draw attention, it worked. Tomko said the Freshmade 3D partners and chamber representatives met with a crew from the Danish Broadcasting Corp. for a documentary that will air in Denmark on Sept. 11. They also met with the Nikkei Asian Review, which has a circulation of 3 million in Asia, as well as a local television station.
“We haven't heard any feedback from Mr. Trump himself,” Calvert said.Tomko said Freshmade 3D now is working on a bobblehead Hillary statue.Kim Calvert, vice president of marketing for the Youngstown/Warren Regional Chamber, said plans to have both Trump and Clinton bobbleheads on display at the candidate debate in Dayton this September fell through when the debate was moved to Hofstra, N.Y.“I don't know what the plans for the bobbleheads are,” said Calvert, adding the Trump statue was in the Mahoning County GOP headquarters, soon to move to Kent State University's Trumbull campus.Calvert said work will continue on the Hillary Clinton statue.Tomko, son of David and Terrie Tomko of Butler, said it's a pretty big coup for a company that was only formed six months ago.“We do work mainly for restoration shops because they serve a broader market. We try to cater to them, but we would love to work directly with individuals,” said Tomko.
