TK3202

Yes it's much brighter painted and is more glossy. Basically I helps it make it look like the mrce's abs plastic.

Follow this guy's tutorial first: <a href="http://forum.whitearmor.net/index.php?showtopic=3176" target="_blank">http://forum.whitearmor.net/index.php?showtopic=3176</a> Now, what he doesnt show is where to tape off other than the top of the ear. My mistake was that I took that much off the whole circle part of the ear AND part of the straight stem below it. Problem is is that once you get to the stem, you will have a gap there if you trim that too much. That happened on my first ear, the one on the right. Thing is though, it looks better than the second ear i did (on the left) because it made the ear thinner. If you don't trim that part off, it will look nicer, but won't be as slender. Either way, it doesnt matter... you WILL have gaps no matter how much you cut off the ear. Screw the ears on the bucket first. DO NOT USE A DRILL TO DO THIS. Use a screwdriver. Your ears while tightening them may buckel a bit from the pressure. This means they are too tight, loosen up a bit. In order to get rid of the slightly uneven cut marks and the cap which allowed you to see behind the ear I used white glossy caulk to fill it in. THEN take a wet paper towel immediately and run it over the groove with your finger so that you pick up all the caulk except for the cualk that is between the ear cap and the bucket. Already you should be able to look at it at this step and say "wow" because it looks SO much better filled in. This is when i took a tooth pick and lightly put some caulk on the end of it and filled in any holes that were caused by bubbles or uneven application. Now that the caulk is filled on both ear caps (front and back), let it dry for about 2 solid hours. You can do it earlier, but hey.. better safe than sorry. Take Testers brand model paint.. the glossy white kind, and with a small brush paint over the caulk that's between the ears. DO NOT paint the abs plastic or you will see a difference in gloss rather easily after it dries! ONLY paint the caulk itself. It's not dire than you do this, but lemme tell you.. after a couple troops, somehow all sorts of dirt, most likely simply oils from your hands, gets on the caulk and makes it look dirty. By painting the caulk you will now be able to perminately be able to have a shiny white bucket. The same process basically for the seam in the frown. Fill in the whole seam...doesn't matter how much you use really, just make sure it gets in the groove. Take wet paper towel, and clean off all access then after it dries, paint it. ABS polish will get rid of any accidently dried caulk that may get on you bucket! This is great if you happen to accidently let some dry over a decal or something like I did.. comes right off . So there you have it. A friend in my local garrison might be doing these mods soon. If so, ill take pics as i help him out so people can see the entire process. I didnt want to paint the whole bucket either, and this options lets you do that and get the similar results you would have if you had used bondo . And since I didn't have to rebuy decals or buy white paint for repainting it.. I not only saved time, but quite a bit of money. Some tips on cutting.. the electrical tape is best as it not only provides good contrast to the white ear, but is tough enough so that if your knife slips it may stop an unwanted cut. REMEMBER to go slow! Once you press hard enough, the knife will cut through the abs like butter and could cut your hand! I'm a graphic designer, so I'm used to using these, but I've seen countles people chop off parts of their fingers because they got to comfortable using these knives! Do what I DIDNT do, in that you should cut and check constantly to make sure you don't cut too much of the ear. If you do however, don't worry.. my right ear had a large gap and the caulk filled it in perfectly. It sounds more intimidating than it is. EVERY mistake I made was because I got too confident in what I was doing (drilling through my ear cap for instance...). It's going to take you a few hours. It took me a whole afternoon and night to complete this. Materials you'll need: Hard hat liner Sticky velcro Smitty lenses drill and drill bits x acto knife (hobby knife) electric tape caulk white glossy caulk gun Six 4 mm countersunk screws (though it's not what i used as the countersunk screws at Lowes arent long enough. I used machine screws with the same flat, bolt-like end). 6 washers 6 nuts Testers 1138 grey paint Testers White paint Testers small model paint brush Small files (Lowe's sells a set for 16 bucks that's perfect. Has 6 files of all different types of shapes) One toothpick for fixing caulk small holes.

Well guys, I've recently started to see what the rest of you see when you see fx armor with an MRCE bucket... the problems. After ordering a new neckseal and new ab buttons (and considering a new chest piece), I've gone to town on the bucket. The mods in total took about 8 hours in total to do for me at least. I put new lenses in first. The old ones had window tint on them which was coming off making it impossible to see. I put a hard hat liner in while keeping the existing padding where I could. The hard hat liner makes it so I don't need that pesky foam on the eyes. Here's a pic of that... I'd strongly suggest this mod. It's cheap, easy, and makes it so you can move your head quickly without it moving about on you. I didn't think this would fit in an MRCE, but it does just barely: While I painted my whole MR clone trooper bucket to make it a shocktrooper, I really didn't want to invest that much time into the stormtrooper bucket. I'm sure like many of you, the idea of repainting something that already has a nice finish is a bit daunting. I'm no pro by any means, but I think these came out great! Like other people have already done, I filed out the teeth so the holes are bigger, and repainted the frown. There is the extra tooth drilled out now, and the frown is extended. The ears weren't replaced, but modded instead so I wouldn't have to repaint. The only problem is, unlike other people who posted how to cut off the excess ear part, they didn't really show exactly where and how much. Also, even after cutting off the plastic tunnels that the old screws went in, the ear didn't really want to be pushed down flush with the bucket. I did the best I could, and screwed down the ear with the three screws and bolt set up. After that I used caulk and filled in the gaps between the bucket and the ears that were left. If you wait two hours, you can paint over this caulk with model paint, which I did with a glossy white, making it look a lot better. I also used this same tester's white to paint over the caulk that covered the seam where the frown is. The caulk unpainted gets dirty very easily, and it starts to show. You can use abs polish to get it off if need be as well. If any of you, like me, were a bit over confident when drilling out the ears from the inside and drilled straight through the ear cap like I did, using the caulk technique to easily mold it to the shape of where you drilled through is a breeze. Simply paint over it and no one will be able to really tell. The ear that had the hole in it is the second picture. So there you have it! Below is my modest version of how to mod the bucket without repainting the entire thing. I will be raising the brow a bit here soon, but otherwise she's done. Again, it's no TE or anything, but I'm really proud of what I've made an MRCE look a lot better without having to overhaul it.

Wow thanks! I'm assuming the "1138" testers paint is what i'd use on the frown? I can't seem to find the Humbrol brand here at the store.

I know I've seen the paint colors for the gray frown and the white to put over the screws on the ears, but I can't find it and I'm about to head out to the store since I'll be finishing up my mods today on my MRCE. Sorry again if this is a bit of a waist of a thread as it's elsewhere, but I simply find the threads that this all was listed before. Thanks!

I'd highly suggest NOT ordering from Richies. The guy's pulls are loose and he's always late on his deadlines by double the time he promises you from the start.

I used the caulk gun technique since I didn't want to repaint mine. It's not as easy as it sounds, and i got a little too much build up in some places. When I wiped it away with the paper towel like people told me to, it smeared along the edge of the groove too... which made the surrounding area non-shiney. Also, as time went by, when the helmet got dirty, the dirt would stick to the caulk that was smeared in the surrounding area making it very noticible (by me, not in pictures). However, now it looks great.. and it's only because I was using my abs polish to maintain my shiney look on my armor, and I realized that the abs polish took off all the caulk around the groove, and not the stuf in the groove itself. This left it looking neat and clean, and making it seem like I magically only got caulk in the very tiny crack along the frown. Definately try this technique out! It's cheap, and it makes it look great in pictures .

Oh no! whoops! haha , first troop after D Con, i guess im allowed one mess up

Thanks guys. Yea, I have some things to do to the armor, but I was just trying to get it wearable for D Con and the troop after that . I just didn't have time to order parts when I had a day to fit it to myself. I also need a new neckseal as this one is way too small and feels like a wampa choking me lol, so if anyone knows a good vendor for an accurate one, let me know. The ones on ebay look iffy at best, and aren't even black (shiny silver... wth?). Thanks for the compliments and suggestions. One problem I'm having is that my left (your right) calf leg armor is always sliding away from center. I guess I have to put some padding in there or something, which is odd as my other leg doesnt have any issues, and neither are loose or anything (had to shim them). Is this a common problem? Anywho, I'm just very proud of this. It's taken me 3 and a half (still working on the shock) suits before this to finally do the suit I wanted to do going into this, so it's a long time coming. Thanks for everyone who gave me advice and helped me along the way. I've already been passing down that knowledge to local mates who are thinking of going white. Thanks!

Well I got this together the day before I left for D Con. Modded the bucket with the caulk, tinted the lenses, put in screen mesh on the frown, and fitted the armor to my person. I still have more things to do, like put screws in the ears and the like, but as it stands, the TK is approved, and it's a great suit (my current favorite). Sad though how after 4 previous suits, how experience can help you go through steps that would have taken you weeks when you first joined the 501st haha So,sorry bout the long delay. Here are some, starting with my 501st submission pics, then d con (gf is in the red mando), then kings island's walk for the cure diabetes event just a couple weeks ago (no blasters aloud, so please excuse the bananas LOL). Enjoy:

Sadly, besides the helmet, I think I'd almost want to troop in that thing instead for the money HAHAHA. What garbage. I'd honestly love to see who buys this. Even if you don't do research, you'd think that the supreme version's face would look wrong with it's alien buggy eyes, and it's deformed and warped armor.