Smitty

Is that what we are calling that god awful bucket these days? I would avoid that package. You really cant go wrong with Deckards FX and a screenaccurate helmet. I guarantee* that it will be cheaper and better. *NOTE - guarantee does not offer any benifits expressed or implied and really holds no weight

Here's the pics of the handpainted traps. Sorry it took so long but right after my last reply I seemed to have lost internet access.

ANH helmets were a mixture of decals and hand painting thus both methods are acceptable for elite status however in ESB the traps were all decals based upon the info we have so far thus handpainting is no good for ESB elite status. Give me a few minutes to take some pics and upload them to the server.

HIPS just like my TE2 Looks like .090 maybe. Its about the same thickness as my TE2 which is .090

Ain't that the truth. I had to get creative to make this hobby work for me.

Maybe, I've been tossing that idea around but I thing I'm gonna stay on the fence as far as ESB Elite goes while the ESB Elite standards seem to be up in the air. The namely the trap/ear slateblue/ANH grey and decals vs. handpainted, because as it stands right now it has hand painted traps and doesnt qualify for elite but I rather like the hand painted traps. I'm thinking of painting the ears to match the traps because right now the ears are ANH gray and the traps are slate blue. This used to be a ANH bucket you can see some of the orinial gray behind the black teeth and some exposed ANH grey on the traps.

My latest bucket project Trooper Expert signed ESB Bucket This was second hand at least, looked pretty good on the outside and looked like someone had burned down a trailer inside of it. Check out the undercut on this one compared to my TE2. The outside of it doesnt need much work other than a good buff down with a Magic Eraser. So I ripped out the lens material, it looked like someone's dog was chewing on the green acetate film. Then I scraped out all the glue and other adhesives and pulled out that nappy crumbling foam that was in there. Washed it out all nice and what not and got this: There are still globs of epoxy that were left in place that TE utilized to prevent recasting. Mainly the tear traps and chin vocoder. So then I installed batting helmet interior from a Rawlings batting helmet and now it looks like this. I left a piece out of this helmets padding and put the large pads in a different place than on my TE2. Its an improvent. Nice tight grip and vision is better than my TE2. I still have to screen the frown and add lens. I'm hoping I can still get my hands on some of runriott's lens. Those things are great.

We used to whistle the imperial march when the brass showed up for morning quarters in the Navy. That was a tyrannical bunch. It wasnt so bad in the Navy beacuse we were all nukes, therefore geeks. Now that I'm in the civilian sector I know what its like getting thrown into "general population".

Oh I get it all the time. But you can always hear the faint whisper of "I wish I had one" under their words

"Set for Stun" the owner is known as Dave M. and it provided the ears for some of the more popular helmet molds. Do I win anything?

Double post for the win! CS3's owner wants this instead of the CS2 Crosshairs. Perfect timing, I'm doing the reticle this weekend.

That would be funny on a ROTJ blaster. I'm all ANH at the moment.

KICK $%#!

I have found that placing the unit high up in the chest plate with the speaker firing towards your chest reduces feedback because the soundwaves are hitting the underarmor and is absorbed. If its too low it will fire against the ab plate and reverbrate off of that and I think thats the source of the feedback issues. My main problem now is placement of the mic in the helmet. IMO the aerator speakers just arent loud enuff to be practical. Im considering trying to incorporate a wireless link between the mic mounted in the helmet and the unit mounted in the chestplate. That way I can just swap out helmets for whatever Episode I want to represent.

Looks great. What kind of helmet is that? Is that the new FX helmet?

I blame the "Illuminati".

Ive yet to build my own yet. I think I will be building CSX in parallel with the next couple of blasters.

Not yet mom, I still have to attach my thermal detonator, and I need a blaster, gloves and neckseal

Had the armor party last night. What a Blast! Hal showed up a nice set of FX armor. After seeing an FX bucket in person I dont think it looks nearly as big as some of the pictures show. Kris showed up in republic commando attire that was simply amazing. Kris' daughter had her Boussh (spelling?) helmet. OK about this bounty hunter helmet...not everyone can wear it. I couldnt even get my skinny little head in that thing. She was the only one there that could get it on. I got CS2's stock upgraded. When the pizza guy showed up we pulled a little Mos Eisley road block action. That was fun. I'll post more pics when I recieve them. Oh and one more thing. The ATAT pilot helmet is frikken huge. At one point we had a line up of a TE, TE2, MRUK and FX stormy buckets on the back of the sofa. i hope someone got a picture of that!

Dude I think it looks great, but I see you are suffering from the same delimma as me. That beautiful gloss white paintjob on the TE2 is whiter than the ABS. And don't the VaderDave buttons look good! I installed them on my GF and its like a whole new ab plate. I'm tossing around the idea of painting my GF to match the TE2....but man the very thought of painting ABS with enamel gives me chills.

I am running the same thing as Drosch in mt helment with no feedback issues at all. However today I started experimenting with putting a brand new unit in my chest plate using the speaker that is built in and youre right, with the unit speaker in the chest plate you do get some feedback. Fear not though, since you arent the only one working on the same delimma.

I have voice electronics and thats it as far as electrical goes.

Ok, well I have to get some flat black for CS3 anyway...2 birds one stone.

Yeah Ive noticed that I keep having to regroup the shoulder bells to the front. One good thing about going all industrial strength velcro is that you can move it around if needed Youre supposed to paint the inside of the butt black? I didn't know that.

I just sent someone some T track for this very purpose. Is the bayonet clip not an elite requitrement?