themaninthesuitcase

Got news from Imperial Supply Depot that my new gloves are ready so those are now paid for. Probably won't be here in time for my first troop on Saturday but oh well. Should be good to go for centurion next week though which is nice. I also got a helmet bag today which I should have done a long time ago.

Someone on the FB group was asking how I wired my fans so I drew a schematic:

The end bits are 50mm sqares, the strips are 1.5" wide (yay for mixed units!). I can't tell you the length though. I basically cut long strips of paper and then glued them together to get the shape than transfered that to the ABS. If I come accross something suitable I will but once I rough up the surface the hot glue is actually pretty strong. It required some decent effort to pull it off the switch that came off.

When positioning the end cap clip it should only be engaged when the cap is fully pressed in. So if the cap is held out under the spring pressure (which is totally doable with the wire in the T-Jay kit as mine is) you have about a 2-3mm ish gap between the end of the clip and the cap. This threw me so mines actually in the wrong place. Ninja edit to add reference image: Looks like you've done a FAR better job of all your drilling than me too! Did you use a drill press?

I had an epiphany this evening: aka an I'm an idiot moment. I have LOTS of foam... So I cut some of the left over bits from the leg armour in half to make it 1/2" thick cut it to 2" square and bingo, no vibration noise! I also had to re-glue one the switches back on. This was the one I'd not roughed up the plastic on before gluing so this time gave it a quick rub with the 180 to give the glue something to grip to. Primitive but functional. The battery is held in with velcro in the chin. It's a bit long but there's not really anywhere else to put it. I will look into a new battery that doesn't need to be turned on and maybe I can find one a cm or so shorter. The green gaff tape is there as it sticks to the battery better than the velcro and also means I can write my name on it in case I misplace it at a troop. Despite the fans pointing directly at the mic it doesn't pick them up at all, so I am really happy with the Wireless Trooping Systems setup. I probably only need 1 fan running but having two gives me some options. They aren't the quietest fans ever but in a busy hall you wouldn't hear them, I might not hear you though however. This is all just held in with friction so easy enough to remove if I decide I don't like it. edit: just found a short USB right angle adapter I'll try but will take a while to get here.

They are an FISD member and there was a thread in one of the sales forums. I got mine on here.

I finished up the hovi tip update last night: After 4 coats of the matt white they looked like this (still not glued back together, just placed) For the mesh I used a sieve from, I think, Poundland. I applied a layer of tape to each side and drew around a 2p. I cut them out with some kitchen scissors, after telling the wife if this killed them I'd buy some more. With the tape on it was actually rather stiff. To bend them to shape I used an AA battery and pushed them over the end until it was as good as it was going to get. They are still slightly domed rather than flat but it will have to do. They were pushed in from the rear, using the battery to help align things. This scratched the paint a bit so this was touched up after they were super glued in place. When I went to screw them back on 1 came apart. They are made of 3 parts, 2 black plastic parts that might have been injection moulded and a resin part that was clearly moulded from a SLS 3D printed master. A couple of drops of super glue had it back together. Back on the bucket and ready for Centurion approval, just waiting on the gloves really.

The battery is 3350 mA and the fans quote 0.14A on them. If my maths is right that's in the 10-12 hour region.

not yet, the longest I've gone so far is about 5 minutes lol.

It's meant be white I've checked a few place but it's a real not big deal, but in for a penny... The Tamiya paint was £1.44 a jar (plus £2 because I didn't want to drive out to the store again which means a full shopping trip and so is cheaper). I needed it anyway to touch up the mess of the glue so painting the insides is not really any more work. I might have something I can use but I'm so close to done I'd rather wait and get the right thing which is some 2mm craft foam.

I've just posted a couple of images of my set up to my build thread: http://www.whitearmor.net/forum/topic/35424-themaninthesuitcase-anovos-ahn-stunt-build/?p=493944

Progress on 2 fronts: Front 1 - Fan brackets. I've not completed my basic bracket and fans which work quite well, there is one issue, well 2, though which I will come back to. The bracket is basically 2 1.5" wide strips with a kink at the end and a 5cm square to mount the fan to. They are joined in the middle by 2 M4 screws, and the fans are mounted with M3 screws. The fans are individually switchable via the switches which are just hot glued on. These are easily accessible from the back so a spotter could access these reasonably subtly to switch as needed. Who doesn't love lime green gaff tape? The wiring is all hidden along the back and secured with gaff tape because it's what I had. It's all hard soldered, no plugs to come loose. There's also lots of heat shrink to cover the joins and make things stronger. The power lead is a USB cable cut from one of those dual USB type A cables for high draw devices. I cut of the power only cable to use for this. The whole thing works really well and blows air up to the eyes and keeps the bucket from warming up. The battery fits nicely at the front of the bucket and doesn't really need any further securing there. Also being at the front means I can see it. Whilst Anker makes good stuff I'm still wary of having a battery so close to my head. I mentioned issues: 1 - The battery needs a button pushing to turn it on. This was not mentioned in the Amazon listing which is super annoying or I'd have got a different one. Whilst not a complete disaster it does mean if I turn off both fans after about 30s I can't turn them back on again with out taking off the bucket which means a trip back to the changing room. 2 - This is a bigger issue. The fans vibrate against the bucket and make a right racket. If I hold them to stop the vibration its FAR quieter. I'll need to add some craft foam or something to the back to stop the vibration transfer but that will gave to wait for now as the budget has been blown. So I have a nice fan set up I can't use yet, which makes me sad Front 2 - Hovi tips: I've discovered Tamiya paint is pretty decent, thin, but decent so I ordered their XF-2 matt white for the tips. As it's quite thin it's taking a few coats to get good coverage. Before paint After 1 coat After 2 coats. I'm hoping 3 coats should do the job which will be done this evening and mean I can get on with adding the mesh from a sieve. You can also see where I'm painting the insides of the "tube" white to better match the original items. Not needed but a nice touch.

Another red flag: "TK Armour UK" yet all the images are clearly Thailand (the cheque is from the Thailand garrison for example) A who-is lookup is more telling: https://who.godaddy.com/whoisstd.aspx?domain=tkarmour.com&prog_id=GoDaddy&k=TfquYX3SQOUSiZpPh%20TIvsLLyIvLQ5R5lK7aOzvlFcIgF2erynXesAUmXkSADzhK The address is 152 City Road, London, UK which according to google is a Virtual office company (ie a front). The email address is .au. In all a 10foot pole doesn't seem to be long enough.

From the horses mouth: -----------

The fans came today and have now been wired up to a USB cable for power, work great. I'll post an image tomorrow once I finish the tidy up work on the mount.

I've had mine for a long time now, around 99-00 ish. Back in the dark days before Microsoft bought hotmail, and yahoo! was still relevent I went through a few diferent psuedonums, but this one stuck. At the time I was listening to a cover of the Police song "Man in a Suitcase" by Goldfinger and well Themaninthesuitcase. The down side is it's a bit long so some places won't accept it so I also use maninsuitcase. Back in my mini days it was a mouthful so I was often called case, or old man case due to my often grumpy behaviour. It's pretty unique, though I messed up my Xbox live account and managed to orphan it and I some how don't have the yahoo account for it.

Now I have access to my reference images: Tantive IV boarding sequence: You can see the trooper just to the right of Vader has the very pointed tops as per our armour (I'd love to know which is the armour that was used to model from, maybe it's that one?) The rightmost trooper has had a far more aggressive trim. So on the Death Star: We see that more troopers had the more aggressive trim, here at least 3 have it, possibly 4. That's roughly what I need to do to my armour. Also note on the 2nd image how none have had the knee trim on the thigh armour. Whilst we are here the shoulder bell return looks tiny/gone on most of them. I might reduce mine (again once I can speak to someone and see some other armour) to see if this will help with the should movement.

The returns went long ago! Needed to trim them to get them on at all. The issue is the shape of my bum, the corners poke into it meaning the thigh wants to rotate the back outwards on both sides. It also means that they can't come up as much at the back as at the front. So if I trim the top it will make them more comfortable, stop them rotating and allow them to come higher, possibly enough to not have to trim the knee. But for now I've decided to leave them and see if I can grab some one at my induction troop for some advice on what the cut line should be. I have a film reference image that shows what I propose to do so it's not un-precedented, also probably a big issue with some female troopers seeing as I have womanly hips (thanks mum).

I'm currently thinking I'll mark the current point, pull the straps off move that in about 5-10mm and re-glue if that's not good enough then I'll re think. The real issue is my shoulders pushing it out, and I don't even have big shoulders. Could be the biceps moving it out I suppose as I left a bit of room in them for movement. Also having 2nd thoughts about cutting the back of the knee. I can walk okay(ish) so I'll leave it for now until I trim the tops which do need to be done. The extra space that gives me may well be enough to get good clearance for walking. The battery for my fans came today. It's an Anker PowerCore+ mini 3550mA @ 1A output. The old fans I have are around 0.1A and I'd guess the new ones will be in the same ballpark. It's nice and small* and I think it should fit nicely between the Hovi tips. I've also got some matt white paint in the post along with some screws to mount the fans. What I don't yet have is a helmet bag. However all the £5 here and £10 there for the finishing touches has cleaned me out without realising what I was spending so that will have to wait until the end of the month, though if I order with fast post maybe in time for my induction. I do have an IKEA fleece throw that I plan to use to make a drawstring bag to provide some protection. * Though you can get smaller I'm sure. Just if it's that close to my melon I want a brand I can trust.

I disassembled the hovi tips to swap out the mesh to the more accurate mesh from a sieve rather than the super dense stuff they supplied. Many have said this was easy, and for one it was! I just squeezed and twisted and the glue popped and off it came. The other required a lot or persuasion. There's about 3-4 layers of luminous green gaff tape on the pliers and 4-5 wraps of painters tape. You need that much or you'll scratch the tip, ask me how I know... Not too much damage was done and it will all be surrounded by the bucket so never mind. As you can see the nasty black glue (maybe a poly cement?) has gone all over the bit thats supposed to be white so time to crack out the paints again. Looking at the single reference image I've got, and the tips sold by others it looks like the inside of the tube also wants to be white? I have some gloss but I think I want this to be matt really, so I better get that ASAP.

After some bravery, some pipe grips and a lot of tape I now have my tips in 2 pieces. The correct 2 pieces too. The black glue stuff they used has covered the inner white bit a lot so they need a touch up. These are flat white, but I have gloss will that be okay? Im also sure I've seen tips where the inside wall of the "tube" is white. Should this be white or black?

I need to trim the back of the knee for better mobility. I've based this line on a production still (well ish, it's a far cleaner line) and have checked against a few other builds and it looks about right. I've not done the lower leg yet, will see how this works first as I have a lot more room on the bottom. I also have a rough idea how much I need to trim off the top (which isn't a small amount) but I want to see if I can grab an armourer/experienced builder at MCM to help with the line before I do that cut.

So adjustments and trooping prep: I've managed to fit all the sound equipment into the chest plate. I've used the 1" webbing and some snaps to secure the Aker speaker. I also have some velcro holing the iPhone 5s I'll be using for voice changing and clicks. The cables all fit but I'm not 100% happy with the routing for the white splitter cable. To fix this I've ordered a 13cm TRRS right angle adapter to allow me to angle the jack better and should reduce risk of damage too. It's on the slow boat from china so it will miss my first troop. Once I have the new cabling I'll look at positioning again, it's all just loop velcro so I can add more and then just put stuff where ever I want. One of the things wrong with the Anovos kit is the mesh on the Hovi tips. Some have replace theirs but pulling the tip apart and gluing in some sieve mesh. I've looked at mine and they seem to be an injection moulded shell with a resin insert and there's no way they are coming apart. With this in mind I'm going to leave them as is. I am considering replacing them with some CFO tips though which look like a nice accurate option. What I did do whilst I had it apart was to glue in some reinforcement behind the tips. The plastic is very thin here so I just used some poly cement to add a small circle of extra plastic for more strength. And finally I have now glued in the velcro for the leg padding to help hold stuff in place. I used E-6000 to hold the loop to the armour. Having dome the phone earlier I probably could have used the self adhesive stuff but then I'd be left with odd off cuts. The hook is attached to the foam with Evo-Stick contact adhesive. This is stronger than the foam so isn't going anywhere: This should hold the legs in the right place and stop my sniper plate hooking under the thigh. I still need to trim the "half moons" on the back to get me some more movement though. The only other thing that was mentioned at my EIB was the shoulder bell -> strap gap being a bit big. This is down to the elastic stretching out rather than the gap being big in the first place. Any tips? Should I double up the elastic or do I need to heat form the bells to flare them out a bit?

Just got passed at EIB! The genuine velcro came today for the foam parts. I went with velcro as it means I can adjust in future if needed. I've got self adhesive and sew in. I'll probably use the sew in and use E6000 to the armour and contact cement to the foam. Hopefully that will hold. I also got called up on the shoulder to bell gap, as many do. The gap is maybe 5mm before I put it on so it must be the elastic stretching out. I have a bunch left so What I might do is double up and see how strong that is. This of course is where I wish I'd used a snap for the attachment rather than glue but..... So basically all thats stopping a Centurion application is the waiting list I'm on for new hand plates which is quoted as "mid May".

Side note: Is there a decent resolution version of EIB and centurion logos anywhere? I don't need massive for a banner or anything just better than 30 pixels!