wh1plash

Howdy all So its been 7 or 8 years since I built my AM2 kit. Stupidly, I used some other ABS sheet that I had to make some cover strips, and unfortunately those non-matching pieces have started to yellow. Does anyone have a lead on some UV-stable ABS stock that I can snag somewhere to remake those strips? Looks like most of the stuff I can find online isn't specifically UV stable.

Looks like my access got dropped at some point, can I get re-enabled? TK-32917 Star Garrison https://www.501st.com/members/displaymember.php?userID=19830&costumeID=126

Got a bit of an update. The recruit received his box today. I got a couple pics but hard to tell since its a shadowtrooper and wasn't well lit. Another friend of ours (old hat 501st) saw it closer, he says looks like a mix of recast FX and AM1. There's also no return edge anywhere on the kit, other than the chest plate. The recruit emailed the guy and asked if he could return it, and surprisingly, the guy responded within a few minutes. The guy claims these kits are approvable by the 501st, depending just on how it fits you. The maker also claims to be unaware of what the term "return edge" means... But english is clearly not his first language. As it turns out I'm hosting an armor party at my shop on Saturday, so I'm curious to see it in person, and I want to take some good pics to warn other folks.

Just to show you, here's what it looks like when you print the PDF at 1:1 on a large format printer. Matches the ABS prototype perfectly.

Been working on this for a bit, and thought I would share my end result with the community. I think it'll probably help quite a few people. Who knows, maybe even become a sticky or something. Many yards of butcher paper died bringing us this information. If you have an AM2 helmet and want to make your own Echo-style helmet fan mount, print out this PDF on and just cut it out in ABS or something similar. I've got it scaled so it should print 1:1, and fit an AM2 helmet like a glove. In this case, I made it the right length to hug the helmet all the way around, so the battery boxes would be on the inside (facing your head). This is so I can get to the batteries easily without having to take the thing out. Here's the finished template as a 1:1 PDF http://brandoncrismon.com/501st/crismon_am2_fan_template.pdf And here are the raw 11x17 scans of my prototype. Obviously didn't fit on the scanner, so the weird lines are to help match it up: http://brandoncrismon.com/501st/crismon_am2_fan_rawscan.pdf

Doesn't appear to be. tkarmor.com redirects to mytkarmor.com. But tkarmour.com goes to this site I'm talking about. Thats armour spelled with a u.

No, the box hasn't arrived yet, but he has already paid. We haven't seen it in person yet. I wasn't aware he was looking at it before he made the purchase, or I would have warned him. Being the GRL, I've got like 34 recruits I'm talking to and helping along with different costumes at various stages of the process. There's lots of Anovos plastic dust flying these days in garages across our city. But this is a new kit I've never heard of, just trying to find out whats up with it, and put a warning out there if its a known recaster or something.

Yeah the recruit mentioned that he talked to someone from AU that had one of their kits and it was approved, so thats where he heard of them. I agree on the length of the pole, but the damage is already done since he made the purchase. Just wondering if anybody knew who they were. I find it odd that they mention on the front page that they are not re-cast, yet the back looks very much like old AM. And they also say they are the only 3-piece helmet on the market.

Hi guys I had a recruit recently purchase a kit from TKarmour.com which is a vendor I hadn't even heard of before. Searching on FISD I only find like two mentions of them on the whole site, and they are from like a month ago. Wondering if anybody has any good intel on who these guys are. Maybe someone we already know about that changed names? The fact that they have a straight-up website selling TK armor is the first red flag, and their parts look like possibly recast AM1.0? The chest and back for sure look like AM1.0. But from the other pics, its hard to tell, but I don't even see any return edge on the arms and legs and such. I don't want to tell him he wasted his money, but this is why all the advice out there is to read and research before you send money. I've helped people build something like 17 TKs in my garage now, so I'm pretty well prepared to help regardless. Just curious on what we've got.

Got my pilot and TK boots in today, very happy with both. Thanks!

Just got my refund from PayPal. What a waste of time. Just logging it here so others can see... Sheesh, maybe I'll start casting parts and put up a web store. Wouldn't be very hard to top Doopydoos.

Doopydoos didn't respond to the dispute that I raised with PayPal, so I just escalated it to a claim.

Just filed a PayPal dispute with Doopydoos. I ordered in Jan, its now April. The E-11 kit came back on Trooperbay last week, I ordered it, and received it in like 3 days.

I ordered an E-11 full kit and a DL-44 kit together on Jan 22. Over 2 months now, still nothing. I've emailed them twice because I'm actually selling my house and moving out of state next week, which is a problem if I'm going to get this order. Still no response or anything. 4-6 weeks I get, but 9 weeks without even responding to my emails? At least respond so I can change my shipping address...

Been slow going, but got some more progress on the helmet. Took my time on fitting the ears, and it seems to have paid off. Pretty happy with it so far. Also got my ESB-correct decal kit. Have a job interview out of state in a week, so I'm sure it'll even be slower-going if I'm moving.

Worked on my helmet some today, go the perfect low-brow alignment I was looking for.

Got a bit more progress. I read toybiz's build thread where he did this, so I thought I might post up my results if it helps anyone else down the road. As everyone knows, the MTK kit has some really odd biceps. The right one is good, but the left one is really oval-shaped, making it look huge if you size it so the skinnier side fits. A 3" PVC pipe coupler is pretty much the exact perfect size, and is really stiff. See how the bicep pieces are a much tighter curve: I tightened down some heavy zip-ties to wrap the half-complete bicep around the pipe coupler. I wrapped up a shop towel a couple of times to put in-between, so the ziptie wouldn't leave an impression when I cinched it up pretty tight: I boiled up a pot of water, where the water line really only went half-way up the bicep. Brought it up to where it was just starting to boil, but not really a full rolling boil. Moved the pot off the burner, and sat the bicep into it. Left it until the water was still pretty hot, but wouldn't burn my hands. Pulled it out, just so it would cool faster. Once it was totally cool, I pulled off the zip-ties. Now the bicep is awesomely round, and matches the other side just fine.

Yeah, I actually started out by posting this thread over there, but the people I know locally figured I'd just get more experience with that torso length on this board. The Tampa region 501st and RL people are really cool folks. There's an armor party posted for this coming weekend, but I'm not sure since its almost 2hrs from me. Been busy this week but got a bit more done. Shins are all together except for committing on the rear seam/velcro. Got the thighs mostly trimmed last night. I'm thinking maybe I can get most of the big trimming work done and bring it to that armor party this weekend to get second opinions before i commit on sizing (rear seams).

And of course, I thought I would post some of the obligatory "New Build Pics":

Hey guys! I've got a similar thread on the Florida Garrison forum, but I thought I might post here since it looks like there's quite a bit more traffic. I'm a Rebel Legion member, but looking to get a TK done for 501st membership too. I know that Rt-mod kits are the best for tall guys, but they seems exceptionally tough to get ahold of. Was able to get an MTK kit delivered, and have been working on it some. The real issue is that I'm 6'4" and 250lbs. I thought my weight might also be an issue, but actually seems fine (and I've lost 15lbs since December on my "TK Diet" ). As you can see here, my main mod is going to be to lengthen the torso. I even have a TON of material at the bottom of the chest plate still. I've done some research, and haven't been able to find a good example of somebody solving this problem. So I'm wondering if you guys have any suggestions for me. I was able to find an awesome 2'x4' sheet of ABS to help: What I'm thinking is to do the 'cod cut' separation between the cod and ab plate. Then link in a strip of ABS in-between, which I'll try to cover with the belt. Just wondering if the belt will lay right, and how that may affect the match-up with the pieces on the back. I'm thinking about using the ab plate as a template to cut some wood pieces and make a jig like this: Then I could use a heat gun to lay the new ABS strip and mold it to a similar contour as the cod and ab pieces. I did some searching but haven't been able to find anything exactly like what I was thinking. The Florida Garrison guys said I ought to stop by here and see what you guys think.