Jorran

Thanks for the suggestions, Tom! The work area will be interesting. We don't have a garage or basement to work in, so I think I'm going to conquer the dining room for the build. It's a small area, so this whole process might take some time. I did get some great news when I checked my email tonight - my kit will be shipping by the end of the week!!! HOLY CRAP!!!

Thanks for the feedback, all! And especially for the Gellin' advice. I will definitely be looking into those. About all that's left now is for my T/MC kit to arrive! I ordered in late DEC so there's probably still a bit of a wait ahead of me. I think this period is going to be the worst part.

The boots have finally arrived! It was a long wait but well worth it. They're just slightly too large in the toe (I wear a 9 1/2 US shoe and TKBoots only does full sizes so I got a 10), but the ankle area keeps my foot from sliding forward and back. Plus it leaves room for thicker socks on colder troops.

Thanks Tim. Yeah, I have an order in for the armor and helmet, and like so many others I'm in line waiting for TK Boots to get their next run out the door. Just getting this first piece of white armor on - even though it's the smallest part of the suit - really made my day yesterday. I can't wait to get started on the rest of it.

Thanks again for the recommendation, Brian. My Karin hand guards came in this afternoon and they look GREAT! Karin's sales link is here. Please note that she's currently taking a short production break. Leave her a PM or message in that thread for future business.

I'm definitely going to be keeping an eye on this thread, as I've also ordered a T/MC kit. Good luck, Robert!

Thanks, Brian! I'll look into getting a set of those right now.

Another piece is finally added to the puzzle! My black Nomex gloves arrived from OpsGear. The shipping on this was amazing - I received the package three days after my PayPal payment cleared. The fit and look are superb.

I've been in email contact with them as recently as last Wednesday. Their next shipment of boots is scheduled to be available next week. Not sure what happened with the website, but at least their email traffic indicates they're still in business.

Those look good to me. Once you get the doopy parts added on, a lot of the focus gets taken away from those holes. As they stand, after you sand them down, I think they'll be just fine. Of course, I defer to the experts as I'm still part of the n00b train.

Mine was also about 1.5 weeks from ship date, and I'm in Florida.

The neck seal has arrived, courtesy of Darman, who also provides neck seals for TIE pilots, clones, and animated clones. Velcro in the back (zipper is also available). Apologies for the blurry pictures, and the gold t-shirt is of course mine and not part of the neck seal.

Same here. Just keep working it - it took me a long time before I finally felt it breaking loose.

This is what I did as well. Someone provided a good reference photo of the original trigger, which I then drew an outline of on the Hasbro trigger. I cut that outline with a Dremel and sanded it down. It's nowhere near screen accurate, but I think it's a nice, simple improvement over the default Hasbro trigger.

I used a Dremel to knock out those holes. I started with a small metallic bit to start the holes and then progressively larger ones until I was happy. If you've got the drill and the right bits, Terry's suggestion probably works a lot better. I had to spend a lot of time trimming out the melted plastic from the inside of the holes where the Dremel did its damage.

Ah, good to know. Hopefully I'll be the first - of course, I have to get permission from The Boss to order the armor...

This is a fantastic idea! On the list of searchable armor types, should T/MC be there as well?

For those that bought a neck seal from TK-409, did you put your exact neck size, or add a half size to allow for movement? I don't want to order something too tight. Thanks!

Happy to help! The wire I used is from a company called Southwire and is called "Primary Wire." It's 16 gauge black electrical wire. Not sure how much that helps you across the pond, but hopefully it gets you headed in the right direction.

Thanks, Ged! I'll gladly defer that "Master Blaster" title to the many other threads that I shamelessly copied while doing my build. There's just so much good information on this forum and my garrison board. Quick note on that Mk2 Doopy Doo resin kit. They have an updated piece already even from the stuff I got in the mail. The power cylinders are new and look fantastic! The wire is basic black electrical wire that I got from a local hardware store (Lowe's). I don't remember the size of the wire off-hand, but I'll check tonight when I get home. The first thing I did was coil the wire around a pencil and put clamps on it. I let that sit for 24 hours and when I took the clamps off I had a really nice coil that was very tight. The wire itself is very firm so it held the shape well. Then I used a dremel to bore out small holes in the back of the power cylinders that were probably a good half inch deep. I covered the ends of the wires in E6000 and stuffed them into the holes, then let them sit for 24 hours. The next day I glued the other ends to the Hengstler counter, again using E6000.

I ran a similar thread on my garrison forum a couple weeks ago and got some great feedback, and now I want to open this up to the global Stormtrooper community. As best as I can tell from scouring our budget and talking to The Boss, I'm just a couple months away from ordering my armor...so it's probably high time to figure out what I'm going to get. I'm going for ANH TK Stunt. The most important factors for me are: 1. Cost. Between the armor and the blaster, I need to keep this whole thing below $1,000 (or as close to that number as possible). 2. Not needing to paint the whole suit. Due to our living accommodations, it's not easy to set up an area outside to spray paint with neighbors, kids, etc., all sharing the same common area. 3. Durability. We'll be starting a family in the next couple of years, so this will be the only suit I own for the foreseeable future - it needs to last as long as possible. 4. EIB. I want to be able to pass EIB certification. I'm going to keep my guesses as to what kit I should get to myself so I don't sway the jury. Just for reference sake in this discussion, I'm 5'9", 155 lbs. and have a fairly lean build. So what do you white plastic warriors think? Thanks in advance for the help!

Glad you had fun! We've had great weather the last two weeks, so you definitely got down here at the right time.

Thanks, man! Just take your time and do a lot of reading first, both here and in your local garrison forums. I am the least handy person you'll ever meet, but all of the steps you'll need to get a good result are out there. The multiple colors are so that when the black paint inevitably gets chipped away, it will reveal a more realistic metallic undercoat as opposed to the toy white plastic that you start with. The copper in the scope area is something I saw on a lot of other builds - apparently that part of the original E-11s was copper, so this is an attempt to get a tiny bit closer to screen accurate.

Well, I'm finally finished! I'll apologize in advance for the crappy pictures - our camera is ancient and doesn't do well unless I'm outside in perfect lighting. Having said that, here goes the final pictures. First, here she is after the final coat of black sprayed on. And after adding the silver detail. I'm going to let it weather naturally over the course of trooping. I've read that suggestion on my garrison's board and I like the idea. This has really been a great project to get my feet wet and I'm very happy with how things turned out. There are a lot of steps that I'd like to try again because I know I would do them better the second time around, but I suspect that's how these builds usually end up. I'm really hoping this passes muster for EIB as well. Now to turn my attention to collecting pennies faster so I can get my box of white plastic as soon as possible...

Thanks!! The next of my soft parts came in today. I've now got a sweet holster, thanks to TK8280 (FISD Sales Link).