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I just wrapped my styrofoam ones in electrical tape to keep em from crumbling and they've been great. Seen guys with balsa wood painted black too.

As Daniel suggested having tight elastic close to the ends usually does the trick but for those that still have issues I came up with this tab idea, works well. Tabs our ABS and @ 1" wide.

Another 5 hours. Vents are done for now. Want to add some putty to the edges to sharpen them up a bit. But that’s about it. Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk

Hey There! A BBB is enroute to me today from across the pond, arriving tomorrow!!! I'm so excited that I want to share. Ahhhhhh, so flippin' excited. I'm currently working on finishing up my WTF Hero build for a garrison friend, and that build will continue (documented on that thread) until she's got full approval. She's aiming for Centurion, so fingers crossed that I can get her there! In the meantime, I get to do my third TK build. The RS Hero TK! Yay! (This build wouldn't be happening at all without @TheSwede and his input, so... Thank you, Daniel!) In the meantime, since I don't have any BBB pics yet, I will share a few choice pics from last weekend's troop. Wearing my RS Stunt TK, of course. First, the ANH scene we recreated... Next, an official BadA$$ pic... Then when Vader left, we goofed off... See y'all soon!

Bought this kit last year, got the trimming and a bit of gluing done last fall, but finally got some time this summer to work on it. Most of the trimming, gluing etc. went pretty well. I initially wanted to use the bracket system, but unfortunately missed the key part about not trimming the torso with a wider return edge than the cut lines on the Anovos armour. Instead, I decided to use the snaps instead. Here are a few progress pics from the last couple of weeks. Arms. Just need some trimming for proper fit. Using poppers for the back. Shins rear cover strips Front section awaiting straps Sniper knee done and lines up pretty well

Although I can't go through checkout and confirm apparently the Big Boys Toy Store are still offering Anovos TFA helmets with a flat rate shipping $4.00 (I gather that's shipping in US) https://www.bigbadtoystore.com/Product/VariationDetails/22866?fbclid=IwAR0CcXKMnjXXJKMpFALEykFdQGs-GX10nXHXFT7GgCY7yT1ooE02tPG-kmw

Very nice work, you may notice is some of your images that the drop boxes are not in alignment with the end of the plastic belt section, you may want to add as couple of dabs of E6000 glue to help them stay in place. Good luck with approval.

If you buy the real leather replica MP40 magazine pouches from Blaster8266 on MEPD, they come with black lightweight wood inserts already. They're a little more expensive, but I like that I can use them when I go Sandy someday, and already be at the highest accuracy level.

Hope you're doing ok and definitely work on that OT!

Wow - that's fantastic!!

Okay so here's my swing at the blaster:

Is a kit ever really completed? After having recently completed this TK and Mr. Cricket's TK, I went about doing a full cleaning of my nerd room. When I have a clean space to work in, I end up with some serious bursts of creative inspiration. Today was the day I had a serious "A-HA!" moment. This lightbulb moment was about my voice amplifier. Many of you put your amp in your chest plate, and that's fine for a lot of you. I found that (like a lot of you have reported) I ended up with feedback when I would try to increase the volume of the amp. The mic is just too close to the amp when it's placed in the chest if you want to be heard easily in a crowded troop. Being on the thinner side, I relocated my amp to my belly- namely, it's velcroed inside the recessed ab button box of the ab plate. Relocating the amp to the ab helped a lot, so I could turn up my amp even louder. But I still had some issues with being heard by Imperial Citizens. When I made my amp even louder, I'd get feedback. I figured that the placement of the amp into the ab was about as good as I could get. One of the Biker Scouts in my Garrison has a white cotton duck pouch that houses his amp, and WOW... he can be easily heard anywhere! I sewed one of these for my TK- figuring that if I had an extra box on my belt, it would blend anyhow (and certainly not as conspicuous as those non-canon binders I see everywhere). I thought that this would be the solution for my Hero! Nope. This solution will work on a Stunt, but not a Hero with a grappling hook box. Sigh. The grappling hook box is positioned where the cloth amp box needs to go. I don't want it on my back plate because that would look very odd. And I can't swap it over to my left side because I like to holster my blaster, and the cloth amp box would get in the way of the blaster while holstered. Ugh. I will be able to use the cloth amp box for my Sandtrooper, but I need something for my Hero. Back to the drawing board. I was looking at my super-clean nerd room today, and began looking at my Hero kit (currently displayed on a mannequin). I examined everywhere I could place the cloth amp box... then inspiration struck. "Why not hide the amp inside the grappling hook box?" Whaaaa???!!! OMG! Would it work? I have a brand new extra Aker amp (happily discovered when cleaning up the nerd room), so I first eyeballed if the amp could even fit. Yep. Size-wize, it's a go. After this, I'm sure you can imagine what happened next. Dremel. Lexan scissors. Pliers. Glue. Velcro. And in less than an hour, I had a secure and fully functioning grappling hook amp! Okay, I know that the center hole isn't exactly canon, but it's a small enough mod that it works. I could even make it less visible with a white grommet- maybe I'll hit it with some paint? I kind of like the black grommet, though. The mic cord routes behind the back of the belt, under the kidney notch, under my shirt, up through my neckseal, and to the mic taped to my cheek. The cord won't really be visible at all. And I can really make this thing LOUD now! The benefit of having the amp in the box is that the box amplifies the amp itself. I can't wait to use this at DragonCon!!!

I'll fill them with something. Thanks guys.

High density foam worked for me and easy to cut, any type of foam, polystyrene would be ok, I've see a few guys make cardboard sleeves which also work.

Excellent

Pretty sure I am the only one still waiting since Anovos said that almost all would be delivered by Celebration 2019. Guess I'm just not lucky.

How is your strapping? Keeping them close to the ends and thighten them up usually helps. The belt is not ment to go over the posterior plate. Here´s some reference for you

I can attest as an OT TK and trooped together, this armor looks awesome and with the backpack appears very heavy! He gets tons of looks and to anyone with OCD his armor is "correct" compared to our wonkiness.

Thank you! That makes sense, I should have guessed that in order to be a “Newly admitted member” I’d have to request member status first

Thanks for the tips. I think I’m starting to figure out the Fliker app. I’m learning. Lol

No idea, but I'll keep you posted if I find out! Sorry for the lack of updates lately - I've been mentoring a couple guys in my Garrison, helping them finish AM ANH-S suits, so I haven't been working on my projects as much, butttttt... ready to submit one of my mentees for basic approval today! Now that he's done, time to focus on my stuff! Taking the armor to my paint shop today to get a more precise quote to have it automotive-quality painted. Our build group meetup got rescheduled, but I picked up my undersuit from the tailor and it fits much better now. Been messing around with Plasti-Dip and Flex Seal as well... More on that later...

If you had seen the Legion TK profiles back in they day, it was not uncommon for older Legion members to have their official 501st profile photo with a pauldron. Thankfully FISD played a very big part in getting that changed.

I am super impatient when it comes to this build. When I get impatient, I get... er...crazy... no.... reckless... no.... I think I mean... brave. I had intended on using boiling water to further shape my kidney before installing permanent strapping. The top left corner of the kidney does this really odd flare outwards, and it was hitting my left arm in an awkward manner. So instead of waiting for the whole boiling water bit, I decided to take a heat gun (GASP!) to my kidney. Heat guns terrify me, but I wanted to move this build along! My biggest challenge in dealing with the heat gun is the lack of control I seem to have on it. I feel like I always need an extra pair of hands. I suddenly realized that I own a vice, and figured I could use that to hold my heat gun while I shaped the part of the kidney that needed shaping. Here's what my super fancy setup looked like: And it worked quite well! I took the advice of many troopers before me and kept the heat on low and kept the plastic moving. I just applied gentle pressure to curve the kidney the whole time, and before I knew it, my kidney was shaped how I wanted it. Whew. I was so encouraged that I shaped the lower left corner of the back plate, too (because it needed shaping to match the kidney now). That turned out just as well. Now, would I do this same thing to my shins to shape them to close perfectly? No way. I am not that impatient! But for the small things I needed, it certainly did the trick! I trimmed more of the width off of the chest plate (because I couldn't move my arms across my chest), and some extra off the straps at the top of the chest and straps at the top of the back. And now I've got everything assembled on my duct tape dummy... which looks super crazy with those untrimmed shoulder bells. Linebacker trooper for sure! Next up: Get the permanent torso strapping installed (kidney/butt brackets are already installed) so I can size the arms and legs.

Okay, now with another DragonCon in my rear view mirror, it's time to get to work on this kit! I can't help but sharing one of my favorite pics from the con... When the worlds of Star Wars and Pokemon Go collide, you know you're at DragonCon! And now, the BBB day box pics, because that's kind of a thing, isn't it? Awww, aren't they cuuuute? I love how well-wrapped each piece is. And this was something I didn't receive in my last RS kit... pre cut and drilled aluminum to make my own thermal detonator clips. Nice! Took everything out and inventoried... And the helmet bits and pieces are all there, too. Old TK, meet new TK! So today I spent about 90 minutes doing all of the rough trimming of the kit. I used my compass tool to draw consistent cut lines to the returns. It all went faster- and smoother- than I expected. Not very much plastic left over at this point. I know there will be more extra scrap once I begin the front side assembly phase of this kit. At any rate, I honestly don't think I could possibly use all that extra plastic for ABS paste anyhow! My biggest challenge for this kit will be to not build it for my husband! I had him try on some pieces, and it all fits him very well. He is super excited to become a TK, and I will be building an RS Props kit for him once I'm done with this one. Hoping to have this kit finished by early December. Must stay on target!!! Tomorrow will be focused on trimming the front seams and gluing inner cover strips to forearms, biceps, thighs, and shins.