My websites were always targeted primarily for the hardcore fans who almost know it all. The purpose of my sites was too shine light on some very obscure interviews and facts that aren't accessible in well known books or extras that are still available for purchase. However, times change, and new generations and fans come along - and I realized that a lot of my audience consist of fans who aren't diehards who know every book and interview by memory for decades (like all the fans at the Terminator Files Forum years ago), or just never went outside the films. So this is the first part of a different type of FAQ section, for those less initiated in Cameronverse.
Let's continue with "What Are the T-800s Made Of? How Much Do They Weight?"
Now, some may say why do I even include a question that has a clear answer in the first film, but the casual or new fans don't know every line of the film or perhaps misremember things due to fan-fictions such as some Wikia pages.
In the very first version of the script called treatment, written by James Cameron in July 1982, the Terminator was actually made out of steel and titanium. Below, the first version of the dialogue by Reese explaining what the Terminator is to Sarah:
This changed rather quickly, and in all the following incarnations and versions of the script, the dialogue changed into what we have in the movie and the novelization. The Terminator is now said to be made out of futuristic, fictional metal called Hyperalloy.
The change was made for the fictitious material so there wouldn't be a conflict with the known properties of real-world metals.
Alloys are a mixture of metals. Hyperalloy is either some type of incredible dense metal or a new composite laminate. Purposely, there is very little description of the material, and Randall Frakes' novelization for the first film gives it the only extra description other than Reese's statements of it being "fully armored, very tough"
Going with natural tech progression, the assumption is that it's stronger but lighter than known metals.
With the advancement of alloys surely they'd get lighter and stronger. Titanium for example, is much much lighter and stronger than steel, so surely a more advanced alloy invented by an AI would follow the same progression, and that is supported by the film as well - When T-800 jumps on the hood of Reese's car, he doesn't even bend it or make a smallest dent.
Few more, out of many, examples: the Terminator had to quietly climb up to Sarah's apartment, Matt was able to tackle the Terminator.
Reese drove into Terminator with the ‘73 Chevrolet at the Motel, and not only was he able to knock him down and set him flying even, the car didn’t even had a dent, only a small bend on the bumper
And the elevator is operating fine and normal with John, Sarah, T-800 and T-1000 in and on it.
And there's no issue driving a car or a bike or any slightest indication of abnormal weight on those. Or standing on those. No dents, no carriage sagging, and the flimsy Chevrolet S-10 isn't even slightly lopsided when the Terminator stands up on its side
The concrete doesn't even crack when the Terminator hits it jumping from the tanker truck and hitting it so hard that sparks fly and the Terminator keeps rolling.
And little John was able to help the T-800 get up. There are numerous examples onscreen itself showing that the Terminator is no heavier than a very large man
It would make sense for a Terminator to be 'light' too, to be agile and covertly infiltrate places. It's servos and hydraulics aren't that big, so having a lot of weight would be very detrimental to overall performance.
That very fact is indeed spelled out in writing, confirmed in the official The Terminator RPG World Bible
The closest thing we got to an exact weight as far as Cameronverse is in Cameron produced and overseen Terminator: Dark Fate. In there, Sarah says to Carl that he weights 400 pounds, but it’s an intentional sarcastic exageration on her part, which means he weights less than that, so the area between 300-350 pounds (135-155 kg), so a weight of a large strong man.
As far as vulnerability, we know multiple shotgun hits from Winchester 1887 can stun the Terminator and break the cable connections, but not damage the actual endoskeleton. We know Plasma weapons easily mow Terminators down (but how could they not when plasma reaches 10,000 Degrees Fahrenheit!) and the molten steel, which reaches about 2,500 degrees F melts T-800s almost instantaneously.
As for the T-1000, the answer is also in the film, and he is made from also a fictional mimetic polyalloy. Here's a meaning of the "Poly" prefix
As with hyperalloy, there isn't much known about the T-1000's Polyalloy. It's denser than T-800's
Robert Patrick confirmed that James Cameron said to Arnold that the T-1000 is more dense on Paramount channel
It's also more heat resistant than the T-800's composition, since it takes considerably longer for the T-1000 to melt in the molten steel. Also, just like the T-800, it isn’t unusualy heavy, as evidenced in the film - he inflicts no damage to the elevator when jumping down on it, doesn’t impact or dent the trunk of the police car when climbing on and sitting on top of it etc
Here James Cameron briefly talks about the T-1000'a composition, in an interview with Syd Field from 1992
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