themaninthesuitcase

Greetings troopers, We inch forward! We have now raised just over 57% of our years funding. If you have found this forum useful and can spare even $1 it would help move us closer to our funding goal!

All donations are welcome, if you feel we've helped you and would like to help out then please go ahead!

Seems the Etsy is dead, but found their Cults. Thank you!

On a less formal note: The prod looks really cool, what was your source for it? I sort of want one for my first order now.

Hey sally, Is there lore of the prod in use? We have the figure with the SE-44C and F-11D but I've not read the book so wouldn't know if we could make this a CRL option or not.

Welcome to the FISD, start by reading and asking questions. Mistakes can be expensive and are usually easily avoided with a couple of question.

Welcome to the FISD. Have a good read, starting with the links above and as you get any questions feel free to ask them.

One of these:

Do you want an aluminium plate? I have handful I’m not using.

Welcome to the FISD

Before painting check the match. There’s only so many places to get ABS in the IK so you might find that RWA and RS use the same stuff.

Welcome to the FISD. if you start either a build thread or a preapproval thread we can take a look at what you have and guide you from there. We have threads on pretty much all makes of armour so there should be something we can point you to, worts car there’s some experienced builders who can help you.

You don't have to be trooping Florida in peak humidity to fall foul of dehydration. I've seen more than one trooper over do it in conventions halls in London and need to helped out of armour.

This looks like great work (without cracking out the reference anyway). Blender has always been a black art to me, I've had a couple of goes but it just doesn't compute. To think you got here from nothing in around a month is awesome. I've made a few bits over the years, but always using CAD (fusion mainly). I've released those for free mostly as it's small bits and bobs. People will generally pay a fair fee, some sets have seemed "optimistically" priced but what do I know, people clearly pay for them. I have a couple of other bits I am sat on as I want to make sure I am happy with them on a completed costume first. Paid, free, other, there's a gap atm. Non-Saga armour just isn't really available. Stuff is slowly starting to appear, but rogue one came out 10 years ago now! It's now abundantly clear that this is the styling for anything made that needs to feature stormtroopers going forward. Heck they even used them in TROS https://propstoreauction.com/lot-details/index/catalog/508/lot/197721

Welcome to FISD. The other have you well covered, so good luck with your build!

Thank you to all of you who have donated, for those of you confirmed on our tracking spreadsheet I have now updated your forum profile with the 2026 supporter badge. Some of you have been more than generous, but all of you have our thanks. All donations matter no matter how big or small. It's your generosity that keeps the lights on and the droids working.

From the ground up? You'd want a vacuum former, and the bucks. Both of which are a bit above most peoples experience on here. There's more art than science to it and it takes a significant amount of time effort and money which is why most buy a kit rather than build from nothing. That said if no one did try, then we'd not have a kit to build in the 1st place. Good Luke with your project!

Screws came for the forearm inserts. This is a test pair which isn't the best printed or sanded, will also need to be painted.

For basic I would agree with Glen. The CRL doesn't make any mention of the colour of the straps only For Level 2/3 we have generally standardised on the brown suede side visible but at the same time CRL doesn't actually say it has to be black. So more of a DO discretion there, but the image is brown and the Images are to be taken into account.

Still need to do the final trim and sanding but the extensions for the forearms are almost there. This light is brutally unforgiving to the sanding I need to do, I tend to work on this in the evening so light isn't great. I might need to do a very thin coat of the ABS paste just to cover the last few flaws. See how another round of sanding goes. You can also see 2 issues that I am not sure I can do much about unless I resign to painting which I think won't be necessary once polished: There is a very faint grey line where the plastic joins. I have no idea why though. The ABS paste the same plastic there as it is on other areas you can see, and that's fine. Hoping after polish and final trim this will be not very noticeable. A small warp on the right most part. This pull was very thin and the ABS paste seems to have weakened it a bit as it was being worked. The warp lies below the reinforcement piece in place. Hoping once I sand back the reinforcement a bit and then glue and clamp onto the inner section this won't be too noticeable. This was the result of about 3-4 passes of ABS paste and filling. I ended up making some small sanding tools with my 3D printer, basically a stick with a wedged end, and using tick on sand paper to get good access. I am still bad at sanding but these tools helped alot by keeping things flat and so taking off high spots vs blending them in. Also glued in some clips, trying to emulate the strapping in the TLJ in the gallery : I have a temporary belt made up as well with the webbing to drop down. All a bit basic at the moment but it works and will allow me to do a test fit once I either get out my TK undersuit or get to the shop and buy a new one. When I do that I'll be able to size the thigh and then glue the inner seam into place.

I have a big Stanley box, and it's a really good option but the size has down sides. It takes up a lot of room at home, in the car, at a troop. That said it's also been a chair, a table and a step due to its strength. They aren't terribly heavy either despite their size so lifting them is more awkward than a strain. Though last year I swapped to a large suitcase I picked up in Wallmart on holiday. It's smaller and lighter. I do have to break the amour down more to fit inside but that's not a huge issue. The other advantage is a suitcase draws less attention if you have to walk, or use public transport. For my helmet I've always used a motorcycle helmet bag. These are tough, padded and also have a soft liner so the helmet is well looked after. My blaster used to just get wrapped in a towel and put into the Stanley box. With the suitcase it's a bit more snug, so I now have a Photography lighting bag I got on AliExpress which is about the perfect size. According to my order history I got the 55cm size. It's also discreet when transporting and doesn't draw attention.

Welcome to the FISD Grant!

Congratulations trooper!

See I am looking and basically see the same thing. NS TK, bit of dirt, pouldron, crystal backpack. Why have 2 CRLs that covers that exact same thing? Okay we could ague the toss on what "bit of dirt" means but it's not factory fresh, most NS suits I can remember have a lived in feel.

I'm of the opinion they are ALL Stormtroopers, but that argument sailed many years before I was here. The rough issue, for me anyway, is it's silly to have a duplicate CRL. The troopers in Solo, to me, appear to be identical to the ones in Rogue One. That CRL was created as the Jedha Sandtrooper - Rogue One CRL If you look at the above TOPPS reference, and the CRL they aren't sandy. Just lightly dirty but Jeddah has brown dirt. So it boils down to how to square that: The Jeddah is the one we go with as it already exists, maybe rename it as it appears to be the same troopers in Solo. We add optional parts to the Non-Saga CRL, for the pack and saying if you have the pack you need a pauldron. Doesn't cover the dirt though, most NS have mild dirt though to be fair. Whole new CRL but that feels way too far. Personally, not overly sure why this is even a thing: there is a CRL build it and go have fun. But if you can sell me (and Kris as LMO need to buy in too) on why FISD needs this then I am happy to listen.