DroidHunter

Step 1 complete. Mostly anyway. Now on to the bucket!

I share your pain my friend.

Clips just about done so I should be able to put the TD aside as finished in a day or so. I still have to attach them to the detonator and paint the screw heads black. I also need to tweak the clips just a bit. I don't own, or have access to, a vise so I had to craft these by hand with a little bit of elbow grease. They aren't as good looking as the ones made by TK_LEPER or Vern, but they should get the job done as far as board approval.

While I work on the earliest stages of my TK build, I squired an event at a local Barnes and Noble with my group, Garrison Carida. It was a great day for the kids and we managed to snag a potential new recruit or two along the way. Prizes were given out for best costumes. Unfortunatelly, the top two prizes went to rebel sympathizers. The winners were actually twins, a boy and girl dressed respectively as a young jedi and a princess in white... wait a minute... uh oh. Oh well, a great day was had by all and the troops suffered through some unusual October heat. Here are a few pics.

End caps not glued -- just pushed on. Only the panel is glued. Thankfully!

Glued my first piece. I was conservative with the E6000. The total length is just a hair over 7 1/2 inches and the gap between the panel and the caps is just over 1/2 inch.

Got it. I have my control panel down to about right between 4 1/2 and 4 3/4 inches. The end caps are cut (Dremel plus sanding) and the tube is painted. Now I just have to assemble. Problem is the end caps are a REALLY hard fit. I still have to trim like Panda Trooper shows here though, correct?

Here is the control panel trimmed down. Do I need to cut more off on the left? This is a little over 5 inches, and based upon the previous post, I'm guessing I should take off another 3/4 inch or so.

Thanks for the info guys. The Dremmel is my friend once again and I used it to start trimming out the control panel. As you can see, I need to trim a little more on the "bottom" and have not yet trimmed the top. I may have to bring the left in a little too, but not certain. I also started marking off cut lines on the helmet.

Is their a correct size for the TD control? Looked to me like trimming off the boarder was about right.

Dremmel it is. And I am only going to cut right along the finished edge.

Stupid thermal detonator. What is the best method for trimming off the ends of the control panel? Cutting the straight edge wasn't bad, but the bulbous end won't cut right using large scissors, small scissors or the utility knife. I'm thinking Dremmel, but any good pointers would be great.

Well, I made my first cut! No pics yet because I didn't do much. I started to trim the control panel for the thermal detonator. I grabbed a pair of Fiskars curved blade scissors, but they have a handle that is too small, and they don't appear to be a good substitute for the Lexan scissors IMHO (placed an order for a set of the Lexan scissors last night). Hopefully by the end of the weekend I will make some progress worth posting. I was suprised how tough the plastic was to cut. Anyway, it took me a week to work up the courage, but I am officially off to the races.

The panic set in about 10 minutes after I stopped staring at the contents in awe. The sense of "I can't believe I own this" gave way to, "Now that the hell am I supposed to do!"

Oh Yes!

The package is in the mail!

Summer got busy and I took a break from my side projects. But I now have word that my kit is next in line and should be ready in another week or two! Then its on to the build!

Great pics!

TK_LEPER made a great vid on building them yourself if you want. The strips of aluminum can be bought at Lowe's. Cut 'em, sand 'em and bend 'em. I'm in the process of doing that now, just need to make the final bends. But the one's mentioned above look outstanding if you would rather purchase.

Keep in mind, this post is more than 3 1/2 years old. Might want to pm the author for details instead of asking here.

Going to see what I can do to accomplish that. Just got word that Terrell is backed up about 6 weeks on armor so my date of arrival is now probably late August. So I still have time to get back to work on some of this peripheral stuff.

Actually, aren't there quite a few troopers who use an open ended TD (meaning one end is removable) to store things like keys, money and other items?

Thank you my friend. I'm watching your build thread closely.

I really hope to get back to the neck seal this week. In the meantime, a little more on the TD set up.

Been held up on the neckseal for a little while so no new progress pics. Life got in the way and my ancient sewing machine is now giving me a hard time. So on to the TD clips. I grabbed some aluminum, cut and sanded to a shine. Next step, into the vice grip for shaping.