NastyNoah

That Blaster makes me want to give up \1

I agree with this logic. I want my armor to look like it's from a galaxy far, far away, not a low budget sci-fi movie made 35 years ago.

I am ashamed of my Doopy/ Hasbro conversion now.

Looking good !

So would I still pass 501st approval with a Hasbro conversion where I leave off the Dopy counter ?

Thats what I thought at first until looking at some other builds on here. ----------

So originally I had planned on doing ANH stunt like the majority of Troopers start with. I checked out thier blaster build threads and thought it would be fun to do the Hasbro conversion, so I bought a blaster off of the eBay, and ordered a Doopy kit. Well that was almost a month ago and in that time I have decided I wanted to go the less taken ESB route. I read up on all the differences in the ANH armor compared to the ESB. I bought different hand guards, made a my own holster, ordered the correct stickers for the helmet etc... Without ever really considering the difference in the blaster until today I recieved this box today and immediately jumped on the FISD forums with the intent of doing a quick build tonight. Then I realized that I was going to have to do some major mods to my blaster to be somewhat ESB accurate. So here we go with my first build of any sort on this forum. Removing the counter !!!!!!! This is what I am starting with. I had already cut off the barrel and scope pieces, as I had seen in every ANH conversion thread. To remove the counter I first used a Sharpie maker to draw an outline around the area I wanted to cut away. I then started scoring the lines with my exacto. After about 10 minutes of scoring the same spot over and over I started to get some penetration on the straight parts that needed to be cut away, but knew the exacto was not going to be usefull on the curved areas. I was also getting tired of the progress moving so slow, so I whipped out the dremel and bore a few holes through it hoping I could break the pieces off in smaller sections easier than the whole counter at once. Here is the first of the small sections removed. Now it is looking a little better. I am headed back to the shed now where will cut and sand the rough edges down and hopefully post some picture of the progress later tonight.

Thanks guys I think I may go with 2 sets of hand guards. I didn't know how inaccurate mine were until looking at Verns, I will now be purchasing a set from John Danter in the future. Thanks for all the help and support.

Post a picture of how big of a chunk you knocked off. You might be better off just gluing and sanding it back on. Cutting off the entire scope and trying to attach one of Jesse's will be a beating.

Thanks Spectre, I was clicking on Alohas links thats why I was so confused. The Asian chick with the whip was my favorite.

Thanks John, the hair dryer did the trick. My next question is how should I go about attaching them to my Nomex gloves ? I know I should use black cotton thread to do this but the CRL says something that I am unclear of If silk or satin gloves are worn, the hand plates shall have the correct visible stitching pattern using black cotton, with a five point/star pattern, equally spread out with 2 on each side and 1 in the middle front, and needs to be double stitched at each point. I know I need to drill holes where the red dots are for the stictching. ... And should I add two holes or just one at the wrist area ? What is the five point/star pattern Stitch, could some one give me an example of this

What got me interested in building costumes was this past Halloween our 7 year old son wanted to be the Lego Joker from the Lego Batman series of toys and the video game. Since this is not a commerically available costume me and my wife decided we would try to make it for him. It took us several weeks of trial and error but when we finished it we were very happy with the results. This is how it came out With this costume he won both costume contests we attended and he was featured on the front page of the comicsalliance website. And that was all it took for me to go crazy about costuming. After Halloween I spent the next 6 weeks in my shed making more Lego themed characters. I now have 8 completed heads taking up the majority of work space out there. I thought I would share my Star Wars themed ones with everyone here. This one of course is Han Solo. I used a 12" concrete form tube, then cut foam insulation board to fit into the tube for the bottom. For the hair I had to stack rings of foam to get the correct hieght then I glued them together and sanded it down to get the right shape. This is my Slave Leia Farm boy Luke. My original plan was for the family to attend the next convention dressed as these characters but ever since I have found out about the FSID these costumes have been put on hold until another time. I still plan on finishing these but it probably wont happen until after I have trooped a bit. So let me know what you think ? If you want to know more about the materials I used and see pice of the buiding process just ask.

I checked out the web site and was very impressed with the rotating design, but did not see any boobies.

This cracked me up !!!!! :laugh1:

This is good to know, now I will post freely everywhere just to get a higher ranking.

Ok I have trimmed one of these and I still think it needs to be flatter. I dont have a heat gun so I could I drop it into some boiling water for a few seconds then shape it or is boiling water not recommended?

I purchased some AM handguards from a fellow member and I was shocked to see how big they were. I first mistook them for shoulder bells, these things are quite massive and I have fairley large hands. Can anyone give me some advice on how to go about doing this ? http://img72.imageshack.us/img72/4093/img1820tj.jpg http://img819.imageshack.us/img819/9522/img1819zr.jpg http://img821.imageshack.us/img821/6671/img1814wp.jpg http://img685.imageshack.us/img685/55/img1816c.jpg I have also noticed from looking at reference pics that these dont look to be the same shape, but I am unsure if trimming them down might make them appear to be closer to the correct shape or if I should use a heat gun and try to bend them to a flatter ESB type look? http://img215.imageshack.us/img215/3681/img1818qm.jpg I have taped off about one inch on the front and sides in this picture. Do you think this might be enough or should I cut off more and what is the best way to do this? I was thinking I would use the tape as a guide, trace around it with a pencil, then score with an exacto. I am hesitating doing this since this will be my first attempt at cutting, but as soon as an expert gives me the go ahead, I am willing to give it a try.

Post a tutorial showing how you did these !!!!!!!

I will be watching this thread.

Great job Darren ! I am going for an ESB trooper with my RT-Mod kit, do I need the different shoulder bells for approval?

I am a few months away from starting my RT-Mod, ESB armor. I have sent my down payment to Rob and now I am just waiting on my big brown box. In the mean time I am trying to learn as much as possible and have all my ducks in a row so my build will be fast easy and fun. The only armor part I have not been able to easily find has been the Snowtrooper-style hand plates. Where can I find these and should they be Latex or plastic ?

You have got to do the entire suit in chrome. I am in awe and jealous !!!!!!!!!

I am trying to acquire all the parts I need to assemble my Armor on a budget and within the next few months. I found a seller on eBay going by Swingman and picked up a pair of his boots. For the price I think they are "OK" but then again I have nothing to compare them to. I asked the seller before buying these if he had anything larger than a 13 since I wear a 14-15. He said the 13 would fit me fine. He was not kidding about that. These are the largest pair of boots I have ever worn and could easily pass for a size 16. There is no padding or insert sole in these so I don't know how they will be for Trooping yet. I need to get a set of insoles for them, to take up some space inside and add some comfort to them, then wear them around for a while to break them in. I can tell these are probably a better quality boot than other sellers on eBay since these are made from leather. My main complaint with them is they are just a tad too big, and the toe is slightly squared. Please let me know what you think about these and if they will be acceptable.

Do you make all of your costumes?