Kirby

THanks guys.. I really got more accomplished in the 9 hours Sunday than I have in the last several months.. I owe Jay Parsons a big thank-you...We would have gotten more done, but breaking this stuff back down ate up a lot of time... Plus we still had to trim a lot off to fit this AM even with me being a big guy....

Here are a few pics from the work we got doen on Sunday... Have one of the thighs sized and reshaped more ANH style than the AM is normally. Cover strips on both the thighs and shins (replacing the overlap build I did previously) The kidney and ab finally put together... next thing is to match the other thigh up and clean up the edges some more.. and then finish the other side of the ab/kidney-attach the butt plate.

I have issues with brush marks. Always makes for fun painting around the house. I had the same issue with my bucket. So I didnt mind the taking time to mask it off,and spray it on.. I did the frown, vocoder, and bumps (I did the bump stripes with a brush) Used decals for the rest and pinstripe for the black bump outline. Then again Im a noob so what do I know...

Yeah, I try not to go overboard with the glue. But I did notice when starting to pry these apart, Im pretty effective at spreading it around...

I forgot that you told me you use cut polish in an email... Meguiars is one of the polishes that I have, however, cut polish it is not.. I just looked fine scratch and blemish, so looks a trip to NAPA, Autozone, Advance somewhere like that is in the works today... Thanks guys.. Going to get this armor looking right and put together in the next quarter century...

OK I am not sure what I am doing wrong.. I hope that it shows up well enough in the picture to demonstrate my problem. I have decided to scrap the overlapping build and go witht the cover strip method. I am trying to gegt rid of the scuffing I made for the original overlap. I have had 3 sessions of progressing 400,800,1000,2000,2400,3200,3600,4000,6000,8000 grit wet sanding following the directions I have read about doing wet sanding. alternating between grits, doing it under running water even giving a light soap clean between grits. I have tried 3 different scratch removers that I have on hand and still this is the best I have managed. It looks good from certain angles but from others it sort of jumps out as different from the rest of the finish.. Obviously the cover stip will cover a majority the imperfection, however, there will be some showing, so I need to figure this out. Has anyone had to do a major repair, say from a fall etc. That hsa had success in a really getting it restored. Maybe Im just going over board and this is acceptable and I should just move on?? I am in dire need of some help...

I was kinda leaning toward going back and replacing all of the over laps.. I havent seen anyone say that it wouldnt be worth the effort. I can slap it in reverse.. I want this to be nice when its all said and done.. I think I fell into to that trap of trying to rush for approval so I could get that first troop in.. Im not going to make that one anyway now, so why not go back and do the right thing... Thanks everyone...

Pics do tend to make it easier...OOps Still need to cut a little more off the top, and replace the return after that.. But felt I would wait until I decided on this first.

Ok everyone.. I really want an honest opinion... I have been building my AM and I went with the overlap not coverstrip method of assembly. Everything looks OK with the exception of the thighs. These dont looke good at all. I have assembled using E6000 so it wouldnt be a huge deal to pry these apart and go back with the coverstrip. Is it would the effort to go all the way back to do it the better looking way? I would love to just pop the thighs apart and do a cover strip on just them, but Im sure that would be just as bad looking. Any thoughts from the masses?

Well I found some 1" today.. So thats what I will roll with then...Glad its just the dust...

I have searched for a specific mention of what is used for the drop box strap. Im coming up empty, I thought it was simple white elastic, but after looking at all the pics on here, I havent seen white elastic that looks like what everyone else has. Are these attached with something else, or are my eye just shot from too much ABS dust?

Well thought it best that I add some more pics of my progress to this point... Hoping to have a little build party today and tomorrow and really get some work done... My wife and daughter pitched in by buying some new shoes, boxes worked perfect for holding my ab buttons to paint.

So does about an inch or so back from where I marked leave a little more room for the "curve?"

Pardon the crude paint job.... Basically this set up? I knew about the straps just couldnt figure out how much to leave to attach.. I wish I was able to use my old computer, I had something already bookmarked regarding pretty much every question I have been asking lately, but now that I am seriously building I cant seem to find all the ones I found previously ... oh well thankfully I have everyone here to keepp me going in the right direction....

Well I think im am getting a little closer to the finish line.. I have been running into some issues test fitting the thighs before I start trying to glue(Ill save that question for another post) and I realized that I had some questions on the cod and but plates... Should I keep the lower returns on these? and should any of the connecting plastic be trimmed I doubt anything needs to come off the butt plate, but I was thinking the code didnt have anything and was rounded?