Kredal

The build thread continues! I cut down the shins to size, and reglued the cover strips. I also noticed that I still had the cover strip going up the top ledge on the backs of the shins, which is a no-no. So I cut that off while I was at it. Then I attacked the forearm pieces. Pulled apart one side, took off the cover and inside strips on that side, and cut down the inner forearm to where I can get my hand through, and back out, but just barely. Now it's not just a straight tube, it has some forearm shape to it. (which this picture doesn't show at all. Oops.) Before yesterday, I hadn't worn the full suit of armor for more than like 15 minutes at a time. It's amazing what you discover when you're walking around with it for 3 hours instead! (: There was really a lot more tailoring I needed to do to get it to fit me perfectly. The shins and forearms were the worst offenders, so I'm taking care of them first. I also need to re-attach my plastic shoulder straps so they're back a rung, and angled out about 10 degrees more than they are now. They don't lay flat on my back, and there's not enough back there to hold down with the small elastic bands. After I get acetone from the store, I'll try filling in my fake teeth, and if that's successful, I'll move on to filling in the REAL teeth on my helmet.

Congrats!

I got roped into doing a couple GISHWHES pictures too, yesterday! Technically, not supposed to make them publicly visible until the hunt is over, so I'll post mine on the 9th. (:

Score and snap! Remember when you're cutting with a utility knife, you're NOT trying to cut all the way through... Maybe about halfway through. 5 or 6 light passes over the same line is really all you need. Then bend it over along that line until it snaps! Sand down the edges with some 100-ish grit sandpaper, and you're good to go!

OK, so Gazmosis knows what he's talking about. (gasp!) I took off the return edges of my calves, ripped off the cover strip in the back, and had my wife help me out with giving them a new shape. Wow, look at how much they overlapped! I'm a little bit shocked that I failed THAT HARD at making them the right shape! So I'll split the difference there, recut and reglue the cover strip, and put new velcro on. The other leg isn't quite as bad, but still... (: I need to reshape my forearm pieces too. The front ends of them felt really big and wobbly.

Try that again. Whoops. (:

Bet you can't tell which one is me! (: Hint: I'm the one with the small Hero frown. It's a really small detail, but I bet you can pick it out of a lineup. (:

Minor pictureless update: I've gone ahead and made the extra strap from ab to chest out of non-stretchable strapping to ensure it stays in place. I cut off the corners of the butt and the back. I also replaced the two really short elastic straps for the right side closure with slightly longer non-elastic straps, so it's not a battle to get them in place like it is now. If I'm feeling really froggy at some point, I'll redo the rivets on the left side, and replace those elastic straps with non-elastic too. Also, and this is a Hero thing only, the bib on my neckseal has been tailored by my lovely wife so it lays flat across my shoulders, and won't bunch up between my neck and shoulder straps anymore, hopefully. My first troop is tomorrow at a blood drive! I'm really looking forward to it, and my armor is crated up until then! After tomorrow, I may take another look at my shins, and see if I can bring them down in size a little bit, at least around the ankles. We'll see about that. (: Also made practice teeth on a scrap piece of ABS... need to get some acetone and try making some ABS paste and see if I can fill in the teeth well.

Hey, looking good! There are a couple of notes that Gazmosis made on my EIB application that might help you. The bottom front corners on the butt plate, and the long extensions on the lower back can come off. Here is his picture of my armor, you can see that you have the same bits untrimmed, since we used the same kit. (:

I had a 50% chance of using the wrong belt to make Centurion? I chose... well!

There I fixed it! And here's the line drawn to cut up the butt. Does this look right?

OK, so I heard back from Gazmosis on my EIB application. The biggest take-away for me was to not measure elastic pre-stretched when you're going to put it in a place that stretches. I hit that problem on my shoulders, on my bicep-forearm, and on my side straps. I've fixed the first two, but I need to fix the last one before I get the spiffy blue badge. Second is filling in the extra teeth on the bucket to get it to look like a hero helmet. Before I go messing with it, I'm going to test on scrap pieces. I'll take a decent sized piece of leftover ABS, heat up a section with my heat gun, and stab it with a metal rod to deform it in a tooth-like shape, then let it cool. I'll make a few of these teeth, then try to fill some of them in with ABS paste, and remold some of them with a sealing iron. Once I figure out which method is better, and causes less damage to the surrounding plastic, I'll do that to the outer teeth on the helmet. Pictures will be taken! There are a couple other details about the shape of my butt and back plates, and extra return edges on my calves (that hide my giant legs, so not sure about those)... but the butt and back plates are very fixable. I followed the lines on the AM2 armor, and didn't cut them down at all. So now I'll do that. (:

Hi Steve! Thanks for the notes and the punch-list for Centurion. I know what I did wrong, and I just need to correct that re: the right side... I actually made this same mistake on several parts of the suit, and have been correcting it everywhere: I didn't compensate for the fact that elastic is stretchy. I made the measurements where I needed to (half an inch here, 1 inch there) and punched holes in elastic following those measurements. On the workbench, it was all correct... when I put everything on, of course the elastic did its job and stretched. I'll fix that right side strap before I re-take all the pictures, and will bring down the gap to 1/2 inch or less. (I have plenty of room in the armor, the elastic just gives me more than I need! New pictures will be coming soon! Suggested fixes: I will get the extra teeth filled in with ABS paste, or ruin my helmet in the process. (: I knew going into it that the Hero and Stunt helmets were different, but finding a hero bucket to fit my fat head and the rest of my armor was going to be more or less impossible. But that's what I try to do! I see what you mean about the butt plate, and see how it should follow the line of the thigh armor. I'll get my wife to pencil in a parallel line on the butt while I'm wearing it, and give me a point to trim to. I originally kept the back lines as they came since I didn't know what to do with them. I'll trim off at least that bottom corner that pokes out, but I'm afraid of losing too much armor back there. As far as the calves go... There's really not much extra space there. As I mentioned in my build thread, I have HUGE calves compared to the rest of my legs... The armor pieces are already clamped around them as tight as I can get while keeping the plates the right shape. Removing the return edge at the bottom might let me angle them down so they look skinnier at the bottom, but the top doesn't have any room to shrink, even without the return edge there.

Thanks guys. I've also fixed the super-long straps between the forearms and biceps. Before and after: I think I'll take more of the full body pictures this weekend and update this post to remove all of the shots where you can see my undershirt.

Any comments? Anyone? Bueller? Bueller?

Yeah, yeah, patience, how long will that take to learn?

It's supposed to be 10mm from the top and bottom, and 10mm in from the edge , and then split the difference for the middle one. If it's reinforced on the back, there should be no problem with stress.

Eclectic Products claims the temperature ceiling for E-6000 is 150 F. Are you sure they weren't talking about hot glue guns? (: Source: http://eclecticproducts.com/downloads/tds-e6000-industrial-english-clear.pdf, page 2 I wonder if these are the same people saying E-6000 reacts with metal in snaps and warps plastic.

Mandatory Information Armor = AM 2.0 Helmet= AM 2.0 (ATA ears) Blaster= Doopy Doo Optional Height = 6' Weight = 240 lbs Boots = Imperial Boots Canvas belt = TKittell Electronics= Aker + iComm Neck Seal = Veedox Holster = Darman Full body front: Full body back: Full right: Full left: Helmet full rotation: Mic tip detail: Lens color and bubble shape: Neckseal: Holster attachment (4 screws) Rubber gloves (with bonus latex handplate action!): Sniper plate left and right: Thigh ammo pack left and right: Blaster left: Blaster right: Blaster D-ring Thermal Detonator back: When I took these pictures, the chest piece was riding very high. I have since corrected that issue with an extra internal strap. Awesome bathroom selfie: Action shot: Internal strapping: Internal strapping +1: Thank you for your consideration!

Yeah, don't follow my lead. I managed to shave off a good chunk of skin on one finger because I wasn't wearing my cut-resistant glove that was sitting RIGHT THERE. Wear your protective gear, and if you don't have protective gear, get protective gear. (: http://www.amazon.com/NoCry-Cut-Resistant-Gloves-Performance/dp/B00IVM1TKO/ $12 on Amazon, way cheaper than an ER visit!

TK 44678 reporting for duty! (: Thanks again for all your help, everyone! http://www.501st.com/members/displaymember.php?userID=19211&costumeID=125 Now I just have to figure out how to get pictures there... I've request 501st access here, as soon as that's granted, I'll be submitting my Expert Infantry pictures.

TK 44678 requesting access! http://www.501st.com/members/displaymemberdetails.php?userID=19211

Thirded! Now, I've never been to an armor party, but I can sort of understand the point of view there. Limited time to do things, can't wait 12 hours for E-6000 to set, so use a faster method to get more building in. And MAYBE if you have several people watching you build, one of them will find and correct a mistake before it's permanent... but still, that's a huge risk.

AM2 kits come with a jar of Weld-On 771 ABS plastic pipe cement. I never opened my jar, since I really like being able to fix mistakes. There were a couple things in my build that would have been absolutely unrecoverable without E-6000.

Thanks! Couldn't have done it without your help!