sith_241

Maybe i was unclear. They are not structural (glued in front and float in back) but they do take a beating, both in the bin as well as getting banged around from trooping. I personally use a small elastic strip to keep them in place on the back. My strap system underneath holds the armor in place.

On a troop yesterday i experienced the dreaded cracking of one of my ABS shoulder straps! As many of you know, these poor little straps take a ton of abuse due to being bent in a curve as well as getting pushed around by the chest and back plate when the come in contact. What was happening was small cracks were forming along the edge of the strap and several spots were starting to "crease" and form small square angles as the plastic bent. To fix this, i heat formed a second set of shoulder strips out of spare .080" ABS i had. I put them in the oven for about 10 minutes @ 200F to let them warm up fully. I then pulled the new strips out and formed them to the exact curvature of my existing shoulder straps. Once cool, i checked that they had the proper curvature and final trimmed them to length. Next, i used some plastic welder to repair the small cracks along the edges of the strap. Then, i glued the new strips to the underside with a generous helping of E6000. I am now happy to say that the proper curvature has been restored to the straps (the new strip pushed the sharp angles out) and now they are quite stong (since they are about .160" thick!) I will post up some photos of the repair when i get home. I hope my experience will help some other TKs out who run into this problem. I think you could probably even fix a fully broken strap with this method, though it would likely take some more glue.

The problems with liquid cooling a helmet probably make it un-workable. #1 At the temperatures we are talking about ~100F liquid cooling is much less efficient than air cooling. You would need to run a lot of pretty well chilled coolant to make any difference. #2 You would need a good amount of surface area on a heat exchanger...which means it would need a fair amount of space in the bucket. #3 it would be heavy and you would need a way to circulate it...requiring some kind of pump somewhere. You are probably better off trying to find an optimum arrangement for air cooling. Probably and intake squirrel fan at the frown area and an exhaust squirrel near the bucket opening which should keep the air changing over inside the helmet.

Im 5'11" and 155 also...AP fits me like a glove. ATA took some trimming to fit in the ab section.

Appears to be the AP decals

Hooray, you finally made it! Now im going to make you famous on the garrison boards.

THIS

Posted to local board, great newsletter. The SiMan build is endangering my bank account!

I love me some AP action. And i love my AP suit of course too!

The Empire, now sponsored by Underarmor! Though your neck seal will cover it up im sure. Looking good

Contact them directly here centralcaliforniagarrison.com

The central California garrison has a few members here. Dont feel shy to pop into the Golden gate garrison and say hi as well! We are just around the corner!!

http://www.starwarshelmets.com/

Looking good

Agreed, i am 100% for a backing strip.

It about doubles the joint strength in tension and compression...so if you are worried about breaking it do it. Personally, i see no reason not to.

PICTURES! Then we can go bonkers with your problem. But 13mm is a bit narrow. I used 15mm personally. What type of armor is it?

correct. mine were marked in inches, so its a conversion difference basically.

With the sheets ATA includes you basically need to cut the strips for each part depending on how long they need to be. I used the small sheet to do the biceps and forearms and the larger for the legs. The long axis on the large sheet should be more than long enough for the legs. If in doubt, measure the section you plan to cover first to make sure there is enough material. What i mean by this is take a ruler to the return edge on the front of the shin, it should be x length...the plastic sheet should be much longer than this. I cut my strips the entire length of the sheet to start off with then trimmed them to fit exactly before gluing. Make sure to measure your widths and mark out your scribe lines with a ruler so they are nice and straight. Also, im assuming you are doing an ANH suit so you need to make sure the strips are the correct width for each piece. 15mm for arms and biceps and 20mm for shins and thighs. EDIT: Also, troopers with nice suits usually ask silly questions so we dont mess things up!

That looks much better. At that height, the TD accessories (shoulder pouch and pauldron should cover it ok.) And no, velcro does not hold up well. Especially on the TD, since you will have a pauldron, shoulder pouch and backpack straps moving around there you will probably be dropping your chest all the time. As Locitus mentioned, snaps are the way to go. Its very nice having a suit that does not need to be babied when worn.

Your shoulder straps look too long. The chest plate is riding way too low.

1.5-2 works pretty well. I think 2" is accurate though.

I used to the tool, not my pliers...your results look fine. That, or get a more precise hammer swing?

I did my last TD set in 2 weeks from Box open to first troop. TK would have been slightly shorter.

1-2mm is generally good for vac forming.