BIDS

FOREARM PROGRESS Here are the forearms with the outer cover strips cleaned up, and the inner strips fitted and glued in place. This has made the forearms much more solid feeling, and it's actually starting to feel more like armor and less like plastic. I've also removed the return edge off of the front of the forearm. Outer Top 20mm Cover Strip Outer Bottom 30mm Cover Strip Inner Bottom Strip Inner Top Strip Left Forearm Fitted Right Forearm Fitted Removed Front Return Edge With these cleaned up and sanded they are much easier to slide on, and now don't removed skin each time. I'm also now less worried about my arms swelling during a troop and not being able to get out of them. Biceps next.

ARM & LEG ASSEMBLY / COVER STRIPS A huge thanks to Scope & MadamSith for his help (and her patience) with the Arm & Leg Assembly. At the speed I was procrastinating I never would have performed the first cut or join without a push. Unfortunately the 2.5mm ABS I got hold of for Cover Strips was too white (I know right, I didn't think there was anything whiter than a Storm Trooper either). Suffice it to say that the cover strips that were cut ready to fit were all no good for outer strips and we had to cut a full new set from the 2 small pieces of ABS supplied with my kit, just barely enough. The cut onew won't go to waist though as I'll use them for the inner strips. Luckily for me, with Scopes help we managed to get all the cover strips cut and ready for assembly. With his and DarkVoyd's help we got all the arm & leg components assembled using these cover strips. This just leaves me to tidy them up and install the inner strips for strength. To allow for fittment the strips ended up at the following :- * Forearm - Frt.20mm / Rr.30mm * Biceps - Frt.20mm / Rr.30mm * Thighs - Frt.20mm / Rr.35mm * Shins - Frt.20mm / Rr.35mm

ORIGINAL OVERLAP ASSEMBLY SIZING As I mentioned earlier I had the arms & legs taped together where I thought they fitted, using the overlap method where possible, and the butt join/cover strip method where necessary. My plan was to overlap the top of the forearm, and butt the bottom so I could get my arm in. Biceps were OK with both top & bottom overlapped. Thighs were overlapped on the front & butted on the back. Shins were overlapped on the front & butted on the back. With the vote here being passed to make all ANH Centurion Builds use the Cover Strip Method only I had to rethink this a bit. After talking to many people her in regards to this method, and the fact that while there are some preferred sizes for cover strips, these need only be adhered to if possible. If necessary to allow body fitment these can be increased as necessary, but if possible to keep the increase consistent (e.g. try to keep the fronts to recommended, but increase the rear, and if possible to increase the bicep to match the forearm ect.). The other saving grace was the fact that the cover strip doesn't need to fully cover the flat section of the join. A gap of 2.5mm per side is perfectly acceptable.

TORSO UPDATE After I caught wind of the pending changes to Centurion Assembly requirements and with my AP on Saturday 27/10 I basically put the arm/leg assembly on hold until the vote on FISD closed, and I had more information on the changes. With help from those who came (thanks again guy's) I got the torso fully assembled, including the shoulder bridges & covers. With my decision to double up on snaps I chose to make the shoulder bridge snap plates using 4 snaps. This meant that each snap plate was 80mm long and glued into the chest/back using the same method as the others (loop velcro on snap plates). I made the shoulder bridges using 50mm white elastic and attached hook velcro to match the snap plates. I had taped the arms and legs together to get an idea on fitment and while i realized that my right forearm & bicep are bigger than my left, I didn't take into account that my right pec & trap are also bigger. This combined with the chest plate shoulder mounts being slightly offset meant that when we copied the left shoulder cover position to the right the chest/back sat crooked. I'm amazed at how strong a bond the Zap-a-Gap provides, Scope & I took 35-40mins to get the right cover off in one piece to be able to reposition it. While measuring the shoulder covers we also measured the elastic for the shoulder bridges. The following pictures show the torso progress after the AP (I'm holding the chest down in the 1st picture as I still haven't fitted Chest/Ab Straps to pull the chest down and keep an overlap). After everyone left I worked on the chest/ab straps and got them installed so that the torso was complete and would sit by itself. The blue tape here shows where I wanted the overlap to sit (center of this tape). This shows the elastic chest/ab straps installed. I've cut them a little long so that I can fine tune them during fitting. I've also included a tri-glide buckle in the strap so that these can also be adjusted on a troop if necessary. These next pictures show the torso fitted over the undersuit. As you can see it now sits without having to hold the chest down. I've got some temporary Ab/Kidney shims installed that are made from thick craft cardboard and attach using the snap plates which will be used when I've made the final shims. This has also been an ongoing hot topic here in regards to Centurion accurate shims so I'll work on this later. The suit looks very deep front to back as the crotch strap is not yet installed. Once on this will pull everything together nicely (I hope). I put the bucket on to get an idea of the feel of assembled armor. I can now understand the limited mobility/vision that everyone talks about.

Snap Plates & Strapping OK now I've got this box of shiney white goodness I really don't know where to begin. I figured the easiest thing to start on was the strapping on the torso. After talking to everyone I could and research build threads both here and on FISD (Darth Aloha's RT-Mod Stunt build is probably the thread I refer to most often so Eric's choice of Nylon for Snap Plates influenced me greatly) I choose the following suggestions to incorporate into my build :- * Use Quality Heavy Duty Snaps - I went with Mac Lace * Use 2 snaps on each plate so that if you have a failure while trooping you can continue without a problem and replace it when you get home * Use Velcro around the Snap for extra strength * Use Nylon rather than ABS for ease of installation & flexibility Using double snaps I decided to use 50mm webbing, and cut my snap plates at 40mm long. I then melted the edge using a blow torch to seal the webbing. I decided to use the Loop velcro on the plates to avoid any irritation from hook velcro and/or problems with hook velcro sticking to the undersuit during fitting. I glued the loop velcro to the nylon using Zap-a-Gap to hold it while I sewed around the border. I then marked out a center line through the middle of the plate lengthways (40mm long), followed by measuring 10mm in from each end widthways (50mm wide) giving 2 center marks. This allowed plenty of velcro around the snaps to hopefully give the best possible strength. I then used a hole punch to make a hole for each male snap. Next came the straps to joint the Back/Kidney/Butt together, and the Ab/Cod. I decided to use 50mm elastic for the straps to allow some flexibility during movement, while still allowing for the armor to be disassembled when necessary. I made these straps at 85mm long to allow for the 2 40mm pieces of hook velcro with a 5mm gap in the middle for flex. Once again I glued the hook velcro to the elastic so that it would be easy to sew. Look, proof that I used a sewing machine! Interesting considering the last time I used one was about Grade 9 @ High School. I then marked & punched the holes for the snaps to match the snap plates. Then all that's left is to fit the Female Snaps to the straps. OK onto snap plate installation & torso webbing. I decided on 3 snap plates between Ab/Cod, Back/Kidney, & Kidney/Butt. I marked each snap plate position with painters tape and scuffed the area with sandpaper for a good glue bond. This tape allowed the plate to be placed quickly & easily into position once glue was applied. As the nylon absorbs quite a bit of glue you need to buy around twice as much as you think and work quite fast when doing these. This picture shows the snap plate spacer I made using paddle pop sticks. I made this to fit over the male snaps so that even pressure was applied to the whole snap plate, rather than the clamp just pressing on the snaps. I also made sure I protected the front surface of the armor with painters tape to avoid damaging it with the clamp opposite the snap plates. As you can see in this picture the paddle pop stick spacer allows an even pressure to be applied across the snap plates.

HERO BUCKET ARRIVES - GIDDY-UP!!! I can't begin to praise Rob's (RT-Mod) service & product enough. He's a top bloke, offers excellent service, and an awesome product. Beautiful lines on his armor and best of all the Bucket fits (the first TK bucket I've been able to get on my Melon.

THE BROWN BOX OF SHINY WHITE GOODNESS What's got 2 thumb's and LOVE's Storm Troopers ?!?!?!?! This Guy !!! Kid at Christmas much ?

Well I finally got around to starting a build thread for my TK. Hopefully this might help out anyone going down the same path, & help me out with tips & pointers from those that have built tk's before and possibly avoid making a costly mistake. I've always loved the Hero suit from ANH and even though the vision out of those Bubble Lenses is questionable I had to go that way. After many questions to members both here & on the Redback Forum (my local Garrison) and countless hours online I finally decided on RT-Mod as the best armor option for my body size and the accuracy I want to achieve. My plan is to build for Centurion Level accuracy, and once 501st approved to apply for EIB & then Centurion. I've copied this text from my build on my local Garrison Forum and modified it to suit here so there may be some references that don't make a lot of sense. Several of the suppliers of consumables might not mean anything in the States so if any thing sounds strange I'd be happy to explain further. The following is the list of Armor, Accessories & Options that I selected for my build :- * Armor - RT-Mod from Canada * Boots - TK Boots * Belt - TK4173 (Rob) FISD * Bubble Lenses - Riveting (Steve) FISD * Neck Seal - Veedox (Chris) FISD * Holster - Muppet (Ken) Redback Garrison * E11 Blaster - Crypto (Martin) Redback Garrison * Grappling Hook Belt Box - VacTrooper FISD * Comlink - Evilbay * Undersuit - Long Reef Surf * Hand Plates - Latex Hero Handplates - Sonnenschein (Karin) on FISD * Gloves - Black Chemical Gloves - Sonnenschein (Karin) on FISD * Intercom/Static Burst - TK6294 (Jim) FISD * Accurate Brass Split Rivets - SeanTrooper (Sean) FISD * S-Trim (Helmet Opening) - TrooperBay * Balaclava - TrooperBay * Helmet Bag - TrooperBay * Hand Painted Emulation Decal Kit - TrooperBay

Great build thread Tony. I'm working on my RT-Mod Assembly, and while I've opted for the Snap Plate assembly, I've gone with the cover strip for Centurion. Your forearm and cover strip tutorial is excellent & I'll be referring back to this when I attach biceps to forearms. Keep up the great progress. Cheers Craig

Yeah thanks very much everyone, one less thing I need to worry about now.

I'd really love an outcome on this as well as I've got my RT-Mod and have an AP tomorrow. My plan right from when I first joined the legion was to build for Centurion from the start, get my basic approval, follow it up with an EIB, and then Centurion. I'd hate for this to be the thing that holds me up. I've glued snap plates into the sides of the Ab/Kidney and have made short straps (as if I have the mythical 40" waist I've heard about) to connect them both. I made a couple of templates (heavy white craft cardboard) up for shims just so I could try on the torso and I was going to copy them onto ABS. I made them with enough extra on each end to match up to the velcro on my snap plates and then I drilled out holes so that the male snaps located into them (I'd planned to put female snaps in the final ABS version). This allows them to fill the gap and can be achieved without a permanent mod to the armor as the rivets for the Left side can be installed into the Ab/Kidney as they would normally be. My plan has always been to loose weight, although I don't know if I'll get down to the 40" required to fit Robs armor without shims. With the shims attached in this way they can simply be replaced with shorter versions as you loose weight, and hopefully eventually discarded completly. Just my 2c as a newbie. Cheers Craig

Not sure where you are but I'd try a sporting goods store. Here in Australia I'd ask for Cricket Wicket Keeping Glove Liners, in the USA maybe baseball glove liners?

Hi Eric, Just wanted to say thanks very much for such a comprehensive build thread. I've just recently joined my local Garrison's Forum and have been fererishly researching armour. At 6' & 145lb I was initially thinking about AM, but as I want to build for EIB & then Centruion right from the start I think I'll go RT-Mod. Having to change AM armour chest/shoulder/back out or modifing it seems like a step backwards, and I've just seen the drama a local has gone though with the incorrectly molded AM shins. I emailed Rob and he responded with pricing quickly and answered all my Newby questions patiently. I've got my first armor party on this weekend so I'm really looking foward to not only meeting the guy's & girl's in the Garrsion, but to see some armor up close & personal. Anyway thanks again, your thread is bookmarked (along with the EIB submission) so I'm sure I'll be referring back to it frequently. Cheers Craig

Hi Paul, I'm new to the Detachment Forum and only just starting out on my Journey into TK costuming. While I've never met or corresponded with you, the level of respect you're held in by the members of this forum is great. Congratulations on a job well done, enjoy you're break. Regards Craig