Red_2

Started measuring and gluing down snap plates the past couple nights. Tonight I tried the right side ab/kidne snaps to see how they hold and it was kind of a disaster. Realization was that when fitting the armor to my body, especially the kidney and ab, the masking tape was what was holding it to shape against my body. The strapping doesn't do that so it exposed the differences in how the kidney lays and the ab plate lays and how their edges don't match up. So I had to do more adjusting here and there. Super frustrating. But I think I've got it to where they sit right. The strapping on the back plate looks and feels good. Photobucket sucking tonight, so hopefully pics get up tomorrow. Gluing down more snaps tonight. Going to bed frustrated for now. Boo.

Did you trim from the top of the butt, Ron? Maybe if I took about a half inch from the top where it meets the kidney.

I'm wondering if I should think about trimming the bottom of the butt to help the thighs come up. Maybe that will help that gap between the cod and the butt. That will be partially covered by the drop boxes but I see in some screen shots, some troopers barely have that gap.

Reference pic for top of thighs in the front: Butt and thigh seam (side profile-ish): More butts. Kinda varies trooper to trooper here. Also check back of knees on the right most troopers. Trimmed away to help with mobility. That will fix my weird gap problem.

Got the back of the thighs cut. The seam at the back of the knee is weird. Large gap and they don't line up very well. But I'll worry about that later. With them on the bottom of the thigh hits about mid knee and I can't really bend my leg. It's also pushing the thighs out ward a bit so the centerline is less centered. Noticeable in the back pics too. Seems like it needs to raise up about an inch, maybe less. I marked below where I'll start to trim so I can match the cod line. Between the dots is where they're hitting the cod mostly. On the butt, I'm still curious as to how to trim the back of the thighs. I'll have to reference screen shots to see how best to trim them to match the butt line. Note gap at the bottom of the thigh at the squared off portion. How to fix that? edit: Nevermind, I just realized we trim that back portion to help the knee bend back. Profiles Gonna practice with the heating iron tonight/tomorrow. But I'll strategize the trim lines before bed tonight. - I have the cover strip curing on the front of the shins. - Got detonator clips and canvas belt coming in the mail. - Need to start strapping by mid week. - Started the acetone process on the boots. - Need to get a better foam set up for my helmet. Lots to do ...

Dag gom! It took you like 5 days to get past what's taking me a month or so.

Ten four, Ron! I'll clean up the return edges too once I make sure fit is okay.

Thighs getting sized down! Inner shims glue is dry so I started with the left thigh and squeezed that bad boy as best I could around my leg and taped it up. It's definitely gonna need to be trimmed on the inside where it meets the cod, and on the backside where it meets the ... backside. Because of the extra material I could only wrap them around my leg so much that I bet after the first trim I'll be taking a little more off. Trim line marked. Was a little hard to tell where the middle line for the back is supposed to be. After trim test fit. Still some overlap at the back of my knee, like I suspected. I positioned it so I could bend my knee freely and tried to get a close fit up and down the thigh. Plenty of room to maneuver. I am concerned about that gap at the knee. It wasn't there when gluing the inner shim down but as soon as I wrapped that thigh around, it showed itself. Me no likey. Still more to trim at the knee. Here was my proposed trim line for the back compared to the butt. I'm going to have to test fit again and try to get a more matching line. Result of the same process for the right side. I've cut a crap ton ABS off this kit so far. (Cue Leia quote ... )

Shins continued ... After trimming the fronts down yesterday, I test fitted the right shin first. I decided not to glue the front inner shims down since I wasn't sure how the fit/adjustment around the boots would go, so taped it just to be safe. The full return edge at the ankles is still present in this pic. They would eventually get trimmed down. The upper half of my knee cap clears the top of the shin. Plenty of movement. Yeeeaaaahh ... skinny legs. There's the trim line. Taking off most of the return edge at the ankles. Not all. Back trimmed and return edges at the ankle minimized. I walked around a bit and it kinda felt like they were gonna ride up but they never did. Was curious if anyone has ever put in stirrups. I might feel like they were more secure that way. The left side, same process. Back of left shin. (A little misaligned when taped down, but fits great.) Hopefully I get to attack the thighs tomorrow and get them fitted. In the meantime I'll glue the inner shims in on the shins. After that I think everything will have been fitted except the hand plates. Boom. Progress!

Thanks, Andrew!

Busted out the legs tonight. HOLY @#$%! The thighs are large. Whoa. Trimmed the fronts down to 10mm each side for cover strip space. Then glued down one side of the inner shim. I'll glue the other side tomorrow night so the thigh is at least fixed in the front, that way I can size it up knee to cod, that way I can find out where to trim down from the top. Clamps and magnets! Shins identified and marked accordingly. I also trimmed the fronts on these, and will glue up the fronts. When I test fit the shin over my boots it looked like the shin length was almost spot on. That'd be awesome. Interesting find: After I was done marking the inside of the shins left and right, I went to put the last piece down but apparently was trying to simultaneously cap the marker. So I accidentally put a black streak on the outside of the shin. Nice. Luckily it was on what will be flashing for me, but I still tried to quickly wipe it off with my thumb. Huge smear. I made a weird face, looked up and saw the bottle of polish on the bench and decided to see if it would buff out. After grabbing a rag and rubbing the compound in for a bit, the ink disappeared. Cool. Then I flipped the rag over to rub out the rest of the remaining compound and holy crap, it was like a mirror finish. Ha ha! The NE armor is super glossy out of the box, but I just made a section of it super super glossy! It looks like it has a clear coat in that spot. Anyhoo, lots more to get done tomorrow.

Thanks, BC! I started building the helmet mid-August, and got the kit the second week of Sept. I think. You can never over prep, I guess.

From here I'm gonna set the white elastic on the chest and back plate then go from there. Most likely I'll start hanging the shoulders, biceps and forearms next, while I start on the legs. Trimmed the shoulder straps last night, positioning them in the front has them almost touching the back panel on the back plate. Do we trim these shorter on smaller guys like me? Crunch time ... I need this thing wearable on Halloween.

Test fit! I truly *%@!* hate test fitting. For some reason all the taping and barely staying together feeling while trying to move around is a trigger for me. Like trying to stop small breaks in a damn with your fingers. Grrrrrrrr! But ... it has to happen. I tried using some sticky velcro as temporary straps this go round, it worked a little better. Looks like the chest and back plate sit nicely with a gap of 3/8" at the tops of my shoulders. That's even after cutting 1/4" from each side last night. I set the right bicep a tad high apparently. I think the shoulders look spot on. The gap between the back plate and the bells doesn't look bad. The wife says the back plate and the kidney almost sit perfectly flush but looks it'll need the help of the strapping to keep them together obviously. I may tweak the back of the right shoulder bell a tad. Seems to deflect back in this picture. I'd like to turn it in a bit. Helmet on! Chest swung forward a bit in this pic. The shoulders pushed it forward when I was clumsily attempting to put my lid on. Again, super frustrating to me. Hey, I almost look like a stormtrooper. Gonna need a bit of foam padding in spots, especially the biceps and forearms to get them to feel fitted.

Yeah, Mark is awesome customer service wise. Good luck on the build!

Just read through. Keep the faith! You'll get it done. Hope the strapping process goes smooth.

Test fit after trimming the back plate! I think it looks way better. Need to tweak the butt on the left side there just a tad, but overall it looks like it's coming together fit wise. I'll have some minor aligning to do here and there. I think I pulled the butt in a little too tight to the cod between my legs. No biggie since I haven't trimmed that part yet. Notched the kidney too. I did cut the ab plate another 1/4" at the neck line, but the plate sagged a bit when taking these pics so it does sit a bit higher when taped up correctly. I need to take a pic against a white back ground. I'm wondering if the butt may be too long from the top to the bottom for me. So next I'm gonna trim about a 1/4" from the shoulders of the ab plate and the back plate to create a little more of a gap between, then start sizing up some strapping there. I also think I can go ahead and start planning the rivets on the kidney and ab plate, and also for the rest of the torso. Can't wait to strap up the arms so I can see how it all looks top half wise.

To address the wide back plate I'm gonna trim the sides a tad. After looking at some references I used some trim tape again to mark where to score. After the trim. Obviously I lose the subtle return edge, but I still have some room to add a slight one back in. Just need to practice a little on some scraps first. I'll try it on again tonight to compare. I want to have the back plate and ab plate positioning down tonight.

Here's a better pic of the cover strips, Steve.

Thanks Steve! It's definitely been a tedious process. Was hoping to be further along by now. But I find myself being overly cautious on the trimming. The corners on the cover strips are rounded off, do you mean maybe to trim them down closer to the edges? I placed the strips so they'd be almost level with the edges maybe a millimeter or two past. But since the return edges slope they look like they go way past the edge from certain angles. Let me know what you think!

Yeah, I trimmed way further back then the notch, Ron. I'll need to add it back in, like I mentioned above.

Update ... Photobucket is horrible! Been mostly gluing cover strips down the past few days. Ugh, what a pain. Trimmed the ab plate and the kidney down to a good fit. Looks like I got the ab plate positioned now to where I don't think I need to cut the cod. I think I'll trim the neck line on the chest just another 1/4". The cod is in the right place now, no huge gap. The back plate looks funny to me. I tweaked the lower corners a tiny bit to get the plate to sit flush with the kidney. The back plate already looks wide on me, so it looks even wider this way. Before I tweaked the lower corners, as a reference. I wonder if trimming the side a bit would help define it's normal shape. Side pics. Gotta notch the kidney still. And I'm guessing I just go ahead and match the butt to the kidney plate and trim the sides accordingly. Right? Right forearm and biceps glued up!

Cruising along ... - gluing inner and cover strips to the biceps and forearms. - trimming kidney little by little to get the right ab to kidney fit. - trimmed some extra flash off the back plate Mostly trim here, tape up to fit, trim here, tape up to fit, all while waiting for E6K to dry. I'll post some pics up of the next big test fit here in a couple days.

Indeed. I'll start trimming the flash tonight.

Okay, so based on what I'm seeing I went ahead and took another 1/4" off the neckline to give some more up and down adjustment room with the ab plate. I was able to scoot the ab plate up a bit more to where it starting to feel like the cod is close to being where it should. Note: I've got the back plate on too here. Here's me holding up the back plate, trying my best to keep it flush. It is WIDE compared to me. Here's the attempt to tape it up. My wife says that the outside corners of the back plate hit the kidney in a way that makes it difficult for the back and the kidney to sit flush with each other. I put a dot where the wife says the back plate is keeping the kidney from sitting flush against it. I think it may just be a positioning issue. It's obviously low here. It'll be a veeery interesting process getting the ab plate connected to the kidney so that each feels fitted. I'll reiterate that the most frustrating part of this process is taping up the suit to test fit. Glad there's the wife to help out. Sheesh.