Dark CMF

LoL. Timing is everything, eh Damon? Are you waiting on an RT kit? Thanks for your kind words, and for checking in!

Good to see that, David. As others have pointed out, the E-11 is a pretty good deal, honestly. For the price, you could buy, ship, and just about build the blaster to the same level of modification described in the auction. Very good find there! Keep your head up. It won't take you longer than a half hour to find similar stories here within FISD that end with people becoming rather awesome looking TKs, to include some of the EIB/Centurion folks. You've taken the proper steps to get it done right, and thankfully you realized that you should probably seek a correction before it was too late. Good luck with everything, we'll definitely be watching and waiting to help you out along the way on your journey!

I couldn't pass up the opportunity to mess with Steve, Steve. I've still got the last batch of "build work" pictures to post and share with all of you, but I am out of time for the night because I spent my "free" time tonight building thighs. They're assembled and drying. Tomorrow night, I'll attach the closure hook straps for the greaves, and put the thigh garter snap plates in the thighs. If I can find some proper material to use to fashion some quickly usable TD clips, I'll be taking and submitting my approval pics on Wednesday night! I will get the build photos shared here with everyone sometime in the next few days, also...

The ears are definitely the obstacle that most people fight through, You did good on the paint job, in every aspect. As for the tube stripes specifically, you absolutely nailed that one. Per the CRL, 9 to 16 per side... So, what you thought looked good looks to be spot on!

I only quoted you so that I could point out that I can't wait to see the special edition of your signature when it is finally released on Blu-Ray!

Glad I could help, Eric. Now that I've offered up my bit of funny for the day, I've got photo updates to add. This update: Shoulders, and buttons, and thighs - oh my! I started out with the shoulder bell's bicep strapping. I've got black one inch elastic, some painter's tape, E6000, and I've marked the area to be sanded. The sandpaper is standing by, ready to go. So, rather than try to use magnets or clamps which would probably wind up sticking to the E6000 and becoming a semi-permanent part of the armor, I opted to simply tape the opening of the shoulder bells closed a bit, to keep the pressure off of the elastic while the E6000 dried. 24 hours later, they're ready to go. Moving on to the thighs... First thing I want to do with them (and the only thing I'm positive about right now) is to get them trimmed to a more conical shape. In order to do so, I taped them shut and overlapped the backs at the bottom only. I then used a pencil to mark the line to cut the width out of the bottom of the back. You'll notice that the angle is slightly altered on the ridge at the bottom, this is to keep the bottom as straight as possible when they are assembled. Here are the thighs with the cut-out pieces beneath them. The "excess" was cut out of the inside piece of the thigh, as the outside piece has a raised edge at the joint. Not sure if I'm going to be making these next cuts or not. I've gone ahead and penciled in the alterations that I currently believe I may have to make in order to walk without hideous amount of armor bite because the thighs are very tall. As I believe I've mentioned here, when I place them on my thighs, above my knees the fronts are up in my hip bones and the backs are pushing into my cheeks. Naturally, without a full test-fitting I'm unsure if that will be the case when they're worn with the armor. Same principal, but on the outside. Once again - possible cuts for the top of the thighs, penciled in. Stencils in place, blue paint applied to a white paint mask. I put the stencils down, and then painted the areas white before applying the color. All buttons painted, and we're once again waiting. 24 hours later, the blue buttons didn't fair so well, but I'm happy (I think) with the gray for now. A little bit of touch-up, and they look much better. Moving right along... I drew this line in across the top of the cod because I'm going to be using snaps on straps to keep the cod in place. To me, it makes sense to shorten those straps and therefore, the distance that the piece can move, should it be compelled to do so. This will allow a little more flexibility, a little easier trip to the latrine, and again - less drastic movement of the piece while wearing the armor. Shoulder bridge straps and snap plates prepared to be sewn! (or "sew" I thought ) Preparing to sew the shoulder bridge attachments. I took the black webbing, and sewed it into a three-sided pocket. After that, I used a safety pin to move the elastic further in or out of that pocket for test-fitting purposes. In hindsight, I should have only sewed the two long sides, and left the bottom open so I could pull the elastic through it all the way for test-fitting purposes. The other side got sewn up completely, so only one side could be adjusted. Here's one of those pockets, ready to sew. So busted... Completely out of uniform here. :/ If you look closely at the left sides of the bridges, you'll see that there is an X within the box sewn around the outside. That is the anchor side that will not be adjustable for fitting. The right side is where adjustments will be made. This is going to be the Velcro/elastic band/webbing panel that will keep the right side of the abdomen closed. Here, the elastic bands have been attached to one of the Velcro pieces. A look at the other side of the same piece. Both pieces of Velcro attached to the elastic, awaiting the webbing pieces. Final assembly, ready for use. This is where I attempted to move on to sewing my strapping together, and broke a needle. As I've already chronicled above... All hell broke loose right about now. LoL That's it for this post. I've got another batch to share, but I've also got to get the grill fired up and get a marinated London Broil out of the refrigerator so it can come to room temperature before being cooked. As always, questions, observations, and comments are welcomed and thanks for following along!

Anyway Steve, as I was saying... Pink and flowered? We're doing serious stuff here. This is the mission of the TKs of the First Galactic Empire that we're charged with completing. I think you really need to reconsider your fashion choices when it comes to doing the Empire's dirty work. For example, this is my fetching Imperial sewing ensemble: Note the presence of black, red, and white... Skulls, roses. Love kills slowly, TK's ruthlessly. A TK's work is NEVER done, afterall...

Oh... The best is about to come. Muahahahahahaaaaa...

Speaking of funny guys, it's Ian!!! I've had no problems with Photobucket lately, Ian. The sticky Velcro seems like such an obviously great idea, until you try to use it, huh? LoL Eric, while I'm not positive whether it is a first, I haven't found any builds that used it in the past. I also can't find any RT Hero Centurions, so I'm hoping to be the first of those. We'll see though, I guess. I may simply have missed one in the threads. I didn't make any special requests of Rob for the return edge, the chest plate was the only piece that had one that I would call usable though. Rob definitely cleans the kit up very well before shipping it out. In looking at past RT builds, and my own armor, I'd say that Rob has been making some very subtle changes as he goes along. Little stuff like the Hero bucket, and the return edge on the chest are just some examples. I do wish that the forearm tracks would run the length of the outside plate, but I'm attempting to correct that one on my armor. We'll see how it goes. Thanks for chiming in. Your build was the first RT build thread I read, and has been referenced several times during mine so far. The wait list, and the frequency with which the builds are appearing here are clear indicators that we're going to take over eventually. LoL. They can't repel TKs of this magnitude. Steve, my belt is done already. Courtesy of TKittel and some build references along the way. I had a lot of anxiety over doing it for some reason, but just plodded on through it. As for the pink flowered apron... What's wrong with you, man?

Thank you again, gentlemen. Sew... (see what I did there?) The last 24 hours have seen a major break-through on the sewing machine hate. In hind-sight, the entire sewing machine problem rests squarely on me. LoL I made the mistake of "over-engineering" my straps to an extent, trying to use sticky-back Velcro, along with the snaps, elastic, and polypropylene webbing. The sticky-back Velcro gummed up the machine, causing me to break a needle. This is the beginning of the slippery slope of sewing machine "issues" that I've been dealing with. Once that first needle broke, I thoroughly cleaned the machine to eliminate the sticky gunk. I abandoned the sticky-back Velcro altogether moving forward, in favor of sew-in Velcro. After cleaning the machine, I replaced the needle, and all hell broke loose immediately thereafter. Funny thing about machines - sewing or otherwise - when they're properly assembled and maintained, they tend to last a long time and work beautifully. When a rookie/novice user attempts to make small repairs, for instance - replacing a sewing machine needle - but does not RTFM, mistakes get made. Yes, *I* put the needle(s) in backwards. That was the cause of all of my angst with the sewing machine in the last week. With that figured out, all of my strapping was assembled (save a few minor bits - shin closures, and elastic loops for the shoulder bridges) within an hour, and it is all currently awaiting the E6000 securing the snap plates that it will attach to, to dry. I've got pictures uploading to Photobucket now. With this out of the way, I have to put together those closures/elastic loops, put the snaps in the shoulder bridges to support the shoulder bells, build the thighs, and install the electronics. That's it before submitting my approval photos. After that, the fun of upgrading bits and pieces for EIB/Centurion begins. Should be submitting photos within days! Feeling accomplished. Also feeling half-stupid over the sewing machine problem, but hey... Tis solved now

Have to laugh a little bit at the talk about scratching one's face while removing the helmet. I do occasionally have a very distinct diagonal scratch on the tip of my nose when removing it if I'm wearing my armor. Not so bad if I'm only wearing the bucket. LoL

LoL.. Also, I just noticed that like me initially, and many others, you managed to post your build thread in the wrong spot. I'm sure that a friendly staff member will assist with this in due time.

Impressive work as always Aaron (cause for the nice fix notwithstanding)! As Eric mentioned, that original 4th tooth on either side is completely erased. I think your bubble lenses look pretty solid. Having both flat and bubble lensed helmets in my possession, I can mostly concur with you about the distortion. I see a definite "spot" mostly along the bottom of the sight line of the helmet which has a bit of distortion in it, but for the most part I can read things through the bubbles and everything. Not nearly as "crazy distorted" as I expected to encounter. I'll be following along with your work!

Thanks, everyone... The teething, sleepless two-year old is still a very real presence in the house. The sewing machine has also decided to hate me, and I'm seriously frustrated with it at the moment. I hope to be getting back into the build a little more heavily this weekend. Hell, I really aim to submit my Legion approval pictures early/mid next week to be able to troop in eight or nine days. I went ahead and trimmed the excess width out of my thighs, to get the conical shape, and will be cutting a bit off of the top of the cod as well in the very near future. The cod will be attached with snaps/straps, and I'm about ready to just glue the straps together for my approval/first troop and make improvements (i.e. my original plan) as I go along from there, since the sewing machine is really irritating me lately. I'll be looking to reshape (shorten) the tops of the thighs in the next couple of days. The width is great, but they are just too tall, when I wear them above my knees, they are already in my cheeks and in my hips. I've just got to draw a few lines, compare some pictures, make a few cuts to get them to where they need to be so I can wear them comfortably. I'd promise a picture update, but really, I'm not ready to post one just yet. I'm getting there, but I'm slowed by life at the moment.

Also... To all of you new folks, welcome to the FISD!!! If you haven't done so, please follow the link that Enrod posted to introduce yourselves. That is where everyone looks for new troopers, and you'll likely get a much warmer and lively welcome and response from the community there.

AM is 501st approvable. There are only issues when you apply for EIB and Centurion. With the newly redesigned armor, you'll have to replace the back plate with something else, as it is not accurate enough for higher certification. With the old AM, you had to replace the chest, and back armor plates for higher certification approval.

Looking really good, Ron!!!

I don't know where to get all of the links chronicling the history/backstory with Original Stormtrooper armor, but to summarize: For reasons related to a lawsuit, the guy is not allowed to sell his armor in the United States. I'm sure that someone else will see the title of the post and have a ready-made response which will include the links though. This topic comes up every couple of months, and it always draws attention to itself rather easily. Don't let yourself be drawn in by the "story" behind the armor. The original sculptors were Brian Muir, and Liz Moore. EDIT: In hindsight, I know that he/it gets an honorable mention here: http://www.whitearmor.net/forum/topic/19329-where-what-and-whom-to-avoid-when-buying/

I'm estimating a week or so.

Awesome! Congratulations for this level of approval. I'll save all of the exclamation points for the NEXT approval.

Looking good, Kyle!!

Greetings Matt, and welcome to the FISD!!! Take a look at RT-Mod, too. I'm about the exact same ht/wt, and I'm building one right now. Fits just about perfectly, out of the box, but that obviously depends on build, etc... Just another option for you to consider.

Thanks, Eddy! Next update: paint. Some of that paint (gray) is good, and some of that paint (blue) is bad. There may or may not be Re-Painting in the update. The update will also include... Sewing. This is not sewing of anything resembling professional caliber, but things appear to be staying together so far. With this new "skill" in my toolbox, I believe that I'll be ready for the 19th, pending my approval timeline, but I've got to finish the build, first. Moving along happily!!

Edit: Double Post...

Honestly Ian, I'm terribly scared of trying to hear gun the fully assembled belt, too. I'm not sure how much the movement will impact it staying in place, but during my test fit last night, I had it pulled nice and tight, without either of the snaps even attached, and it didn't appear to want to go anywhere. I'll still keep the heat gun in consideration, but I'm afraid of it. LoL