camprandall

Yeah, I would recommend it because that is a high stress point and it's a pain to fix it after all assembled. Hopefully it holds up!

Great to see another build progressing! Good luck!

Awesome!

Coming along nicely!

And one more comment on the gaskets. I am now realizing that it was a bad move to cut the arm gaskets to fit around the under armor snuggly because the intent was to put on the elbow gaskets and then slide my arm through the shoulders making for easier assembly. The problem is that I now have to put the shoulder gaskets/biceps on first since I can't fit the elbow gasket through the shoulder because it's too thick. What this means is putting the shoulder/bicep on and then sliding up the snug elbow gasket and attempt to tuck it into the bicep. It still ends up working, but if I had to do it over again I would leave it looser and keep it velcro'd to the bicep as I did before and slide the whole arm on as a unit, except for the forearm. Oh well.

Ok, so the JB Weld fix didn't hold on the yoke so I went with a more reliable method. I cut a bit of the inside supporting ABS insert so I could use a thick ABS backing strip behind the crack. It feels much stronger and should hold up well. The JB Weld stuff popped off of the ABS under pressure. A reminder of my first attempt to fix it. What I cut out... The backing strip I made. I used ABS that's about twice as thick as what this suit is made out of. The fixed piece with backing strip

Yeah, during our trimming session, one of us cut off the glue tab on the shin, which I then found in the pile of ABS scrap and re-attached. Then later, I glued the wrong side of the calf when making it and had to cut the whole tab off, sand down the backing strip that I couldn't remove, and make yet another glue tab. It ended up just fine, but yeah - I burned some hours plowing ahead without much to confirm what I was doing.

Send you a message! I'm excited to compare this to the ANOVOS.

Excellent! The TFA army is growing...

You're now an official TFA trooper! If you didn't screw something up, I'd be worried. I had a couple of those types of mistakes as well. I would bet you could fix it with a strip of abs and the plastic weld, but it's certainly a pain. Oh the fun of working without the ability to get replacement parts...

Looks awesome!

This is one area that I think worked out really well for me. You can see details at http://www.whitearmor.net/forum/topic/31068-clints-build-thread-tk-61281/#entry399100. I decided to drizzle a couple rounds of zap-a-gap on those inside seams, which made it real solid when I was trying to bondo the outside edge. It's impossible to use a backing strip on those curves so this worked out well for me. Good luck!

Yes, indeed! You'll get through it though. As for your comment about the detonator, that's exactly how we felt. I didn't do the JB Weld on that stuff because it's much harder to sand and the det has so many little corners to smooth out. I think applying bondo in all the cracks with a finger to keep the excess to a minimum would work great on that because it doesn't undergo the torque of the rest of the suit and shouldn't have any issues with cracking. I can't imagine trying to sand jb weld in all those little crevices and have it come out looking smooth.

I honestly think its both. On one hand the ABS is definitely thinner than my classic TK. I've already had to put some backing strips on 4 or 5 areas where the edge cracked even with a return edge there. But also, this new suit definitely has more tension due to the gaskets and the shapes and the way it goes together and fits so I think it's harder on the suit.

I haven't trooped it yet so while it feels nice and solid, I'm not 100% if it will hold up over repeatedly putting it on and off. We'll see! If this doesn't work, the next step is definitely cutting a piece off of the inside connector so I can back this with more abs.

So it turns out I had a pretty serious crack in the yoke directly over the shoulder after PCC. The problem is that the crack is perfectly aligned with where the inside joining piece ended so I can't just reinforce it with some thick ABS without cutting the connecting piece. I decided instead to pool a bunch of JB Weld on the inside which seems to have done the trick. It took a few rounds since that stuff is pretty runny and I needed it to fill in all the gaps between the pieces before it would pool up. Anyways, the point of all this is that this is an area under high tension when you suit up or kit down so it would be good to reinforce it as part of the assembly. Break Fix

Don't forget me. I'd like two pairs Large.

Not sure if I officially said or not, but I would like size L. Thanks!

Yeah, so I think Brian that you and I are the first two to get the latex and as you know, they are more of a dark grey charcoal color and not as black as the ANOVOS. Wyatt's current gaskets are a bit darker so he sent me a paint sample he mixed up specifically for latex to darken them and that comparison pic has them after the new paint was applied. It's almost identical now. You should ask him about it.

Oh, and since someone asked, here is what I did for fans in my helmet. They are all attached with industrial sticky velcro to avoid messing with the nice interior finish. I bought the AA pack and fans on Amazon. Here are the links: AA pack: http://www.amazon.com/4AA-Battery-Holder-Wires-Switch/dp/B003YD8DQ8/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&qid=1434339186&sr=8-1&keywords=4+aa+holder Squirrel fans: http://www.amazon.com/gp/product/B00EL938E6?psc=1&redirect=true&ref_=oh_aui_detailpage_o05_s00

And here is a thickness comparison. This is where all the added mobility comes from. It also points to much less weight too. ANOVOS Wyatt

Ok, so now that my gaskets are painted to match the newer darker ones Wyatt is putting out, I can barely tell the difference between these and the ANOVOS gaskets (aside from much better comfort, less weight, etc). Here is a side by side. Wyatt's is to the left. Here are some thickness comparisons. Here's your key to much better mobility. ANOVOS Wyatt

Wow, those spats look much better than ours did! I wonder if they improved those parts. It was about impossible to get the seam to line up perfectly while keeping the top edge flush. Looks great!

Here's a side by side of the latex gaskets and the ANOVOS rubber gaskets.

Excellent!