themaninthesuitcase

I started last night by trying to get a proper fitting of the leg parts with my boots on. Looking at the fit I think I'm pretty good for general fit on both the thighs and the shins. The shins just need the holes for the #4 hooks and the rear cover strips adding. Once that's done I can neaten up the trim on the curved sections and call the, done. For the thighs I am struggling to bend the knee. If I force them up a bit I am fine so probably only need 10-15mm or so but with them forced I am not comfortable at all. Looking at other builds and some reference I will start by trimming the top return. This is an image of a genuine thigh and you can see how it has very little return. I'll start by going this far and see if I can get the thigh up further. If more is needed it looks like I'll have to either trim off the return entirely or add a 'notch' behind the knee. I'd rather not do the notch as I think it's ugly but I already have a large gap between the thigh and skin so moving the thigh up even further would make this huge. Though hopefully the return trim I suggested will do the job. Whilst fitting the shins I found that the left pinched a bit on the outside. Looking at the return it was far larger than the rest. To address this I added a strip of 6mm Tamiya masking tape as a cutting guide and cut along the edge. This gave a much nicer edge and hopefully will stop the pinching. With the shins sized and sorted I tested the fit of the sniper plate. Whilst this fits it needs a fair amount of force to get into place. Looking at other builds and reference it looks like I can remove the return on the bottom of the plate. This would make the plate easier to flex and so glue into place. Would this be acceptable? I also used the tape trick to thin down the moulded hand guards, I don't plan on using these but figured I may as well do it. I finished off the evening by starting on the TD. First job was to add a light chamfer to the edge to help fit the end caps. With this done I measured the depth of the caps and scored a line this far from the end to help me mark out where the clips will go. I want to use nuts and bolts as I don't trust screws to not strip out. This means I need to fit the clips before the end caps, hence the marking out. How big should the gap be? Ive seen anything from 0 to loads. The image in the CRL seems to be right up against the end caps, is this the best bet? If so I'll attach right up against the marks and push the end caps on until they butt up. The more astute of you will notice the screw up in the above. The score lines are at the actual internal depth of the end caps. If they don't fit 100% full down you'd see the score mark. Doh. To fix this I used some 180 grit to lap around 1-1.5mm off each end to give some clearance. This should mean you can't see the mark any more but did make a HUGE mess. I then re did the chamfer again, and did a much better job this time. I'm about as far as I can go on the TD until I can get the M4 pan head screws, nuts and some washers. Pay day at the end of the week which lifts the parts ordering embargo. I'll also be ordering the Prym snaps which means I can get on with the body.

Tier 2, but I was also one of the first in the pay it forward chain of vouchers so I didn't pay the full $450. I can't grumble at the VAT and duty though I do feel the £12 handling fee a bit of a joke seeing as the whole point of Fedex is to handle packages, often across borders, and should be factored into the base international shipping cost.

With all the pollava over the shins it must be nice to get one with the snaps! I'm ordering my snaps soon and am really looking forward to it. The shins have sat for a day or so now as I can't face them at the moment!

If people want it its not hard to add back, about 4 clicks! I just wasn't happy with the finish due to the extra work required.

I seem to be winning the UK VAT bill game so far at £106 but if people ordered at the $650 tier then it will be more. Though on the plus side it's pretty much what I calculated when I ordered so not un-expected.

So should I loosen up the wrist a little? I can get my bare hand through but at a slight squeeze. I'll trim the returns on the thighs and see how that changes things. I clearly need to re check the sides I've marked on the biceps then. Would explain why they didn't seem to line up too.

Started this evening removing one of the strips I'd glued to the front of a shin to allow me to swap the shells round as suggested by Troopermaster. As I mentioned I'd added a trim to get the shins to get them to sit right when I had them paired wrongly (though following the numbering from Anovos). Here you can see the small gap this has caused. Once this was glued up it ended up being slightly wider but there's still plenty of meat to hold though glue. The trim was taken from the side with the scribble marks on, the cover film is still on and it's chinagraph so just rubs off. I also added the 2nd shell to the other shin. Once the glue had set enough I added the 2nd side to the shin I had added the cover strip back onto earlier and compared the 2. The result was 2 very similar looking shins rather than the 2 very distinct ones. The rears also are much closer to alignment and don't overlap horribly as before. I'd like to thank Troopermaster for pointing this out as it's giving me far better results. Next I taped up the thighs for fitting. I've not done any measuring or trimming yet. I simply butted the edges up and taped them. I don't haven any compression leggings yet so I pinched some of the wives cotton ones :shock: These are very tight fitting and I would say are very representative of what I'll be wearing under my final armour. Test fitting thighs - front by Christopher Pearson, on Flickr Test fitting thighs - rear by Christopher Pearson, on Flickr I've left those as links to the larger versions on Flickr. I feel the fit is generally good and the gaps are about right at the bottom though am close to maxed out at the top. They are also about 1/2-1" too long. I think if I remove the return at the top I'll be able to bring them up a bit higher as well as having more room. I don't believe that these returns are needed and removing them will improve the fit. What's the thoughts on this? I finished up the evening by sizing up the arms. I think I'll need to bring in the biceps a bit but I'll wait until I can get some better images of this. I think I'll probably need to remove ~5mm from each side of the back shell of each bicep. However this can wait for now. For the forearms the tops up at the elbow is a pretty decent fit. Not much room but enough. The wrists will need to be pinched down a bit I think. Right: Left: This is as tight as I can go and still be able to get my hand through without forcing things. It rubs a bit putting my hand through but leaves a bit of a gap afterwards. Whats the opinion on the sizing?

Thanks l, that's what I thought looking at the pictures. Will move stuff about this evening.

That makes all the sense in the world now. Would the side with a more defined "return" be the outer shell? On mine the left would become the outside. Hopefully I'll be able to sort this out this evening with out too much mess. I will have a bit of a gap I suspect but smaller than the cover strip and I can always reinforce from the rear if needed.

I've managed to get pretty straight with free hand score and snap or scissors so long as the line I was following was actually straight. For stuff that I did a less than ideal job I used some small files and sand paper to smooth and level high spots by eye. If you look down the edge from a tight angle they stand out a mile and you can hand finish to very fast. 0.5mm is easy doing this but probably more than what's needed.

My issue was more that the front didn't seem to lie right and just looked wrong. The change i made, I think anyway, gave me a nice result. I'll try remember to take some photos tonight.

More progress! Started the night by glueing the 2nd half to the left thigh. Again this looks like it will line up pretty well just a case of checking the fit once the glue's dry. After looking at other builds and checking the fit against the biceps I elected to have the elastic near taught. Basically this means it's not stretched but not baggy either. I finished up the evening re-trimming the shins to get the correct return edge for the 20mm cover strip. I started with the left. This has well defined return edges and was reasonably easy to mark out and re-trim. With both halves trimmed this left the two sides slightly different lengths. I elected to align the top edges and will re-trim at the ankle as needed. With this decided I measured, trimmed, softened the corners and glued the cover strip to one side of the shin. The right shin was a much bigger challenge. Again I consulted reference and other builds to try get a decent idea of where the return starts. Once both sides were trimmed down I taped them together and checked the fit. If you look you can see the two shells are fairly heavily splayed. On the left the rear of the shells overlapped and the fronts were in the correct place in relation to each other giving a flat front. On this side the front have a shallow V profile rather than being flat, especially near the bottom. To address this I needed to trim out some more of the middle of the joining face. I did this by taping the top and bottom of the shin in place and over lapping the middle section. I then aligned the shin as I wanted it and drew a new trim line using the side I wanted to leave alone as a guide. This was then re-trimmed with lexan scissors and smoothed with a file and 180 grit. The result is actually a curve rather than a straight line but it gives a much better looking front. BUT if you look along the edge from the correct angle you see the straight line I was after and which will butt against the other half. I forgot to take a photo of the result but it looks much nicer and matches the other side much better.

The finish on this looks awesome. Lots of handy tips and tricks to use as well.

Oh also I forgot to mention: First blood. I have a 2nd cheaper snap blade knife for things like cutting sand paper to not dull my good blades. Turns out the snapping on them isn't so good....

Back on the horse tonight. Turns out I now own many clamps. I started by adding the 2nd half to the right thigh. I did a rough test fit previously and I am hoping I'll only need to glue up the rears of the thighs. Once both are glued and set I'll tape them up and take some photos to confirm the fit. I would have done both sides but I only had 3 pairs of the stronger magnets left which wouldn't have been enough. I looked at some other builds and reference today and I decided I was happy with my proposed cuts for the right forearm and went ahead with them. After cutting I checked the length against the left and the 2 parts are now around 1mm different in length so this seems to hint I did a reasonable job. The cover strip was added one half at a time. The 2nd half was added about an hour after the first half was glued, this was long enough for the glue to have set enough to remove the clamps and add the 2nd part. I added some tape this time to help pull the parts together whilst the glue goes off. This is how I've looked most evenings. That glue isn't good for you, so if you don't look something like this you're daft. Yes, I know I need a new respirator. This one is clogged as hell and getting hard to breath through. I also started adding the elastics. After consulting various builds I started gluing some 1" elastic about 5mm from the bottom edge from the bell. I glued around 5cm to the bell. I started by marking out where the elastic would glue to allow me to glue the bell rather than the elastic as this seemed like it would be tidier. Once this was marked out I filled the area with glue to about 5mm from the front edge of the bell then clamped on the elastic. I moved the clamps about for a bit to ensure the whole surface was pushed into the glue. Seeing as I've not had any input on the length of elastic, and build threads seem to span taught to very loose so I elected to just glue one side of each bell. To reduce waste I haven't cut the elastic so I now have 2 shoulder joined by 1m of elastic. Once the length is confirmed I'll cut, seal and glue the other side. Finally the reason why I'm replacing the included harness: The velcro is rubbish. This is around the 4th or 5th time this has happened. Once they arrive from China I'll replace the harness with some air soft tactical pads. This should also allow the helmet to sit a little higher which will give me more movement. I'll also need to adjust the visor as it sits on my nose and isn't exactly comfortable. Tomorrow I will attach the 2 halves of the other thigh and start trying to figure out the sizing for the forearms.

Congratulations Tim. From the interactions I've had with you in my short stay I can already tell you will do a solid job as DL.

Having a night off today, I've been having a habit of working longer than I should on a school night so need to catch up on some rest.

This update covers 2 nights of work: First is this small gap on the top of a bicep okay? It's no more than 1mm. The left forearm, which was the one that aligned okay, now has the front cover strip fully glued on. I've yet to size the part so the rear is still to follow. I mocked up the adjustments to the right forearm. I've moved the front edge up about 5mm, this leaves about the same at the top. Closer detail on the amount I want to move: And the proposed wrist trim line: I have now made a start on the thighs. I started by trimming down the cover strip area: One inner, I think the left, has a large flare on the cover strip area. This caused a bit of a head ache. But after looking at a few pictures I went with the following as per UKWraths build. Once both sides where trimmed this gave this: I've now glued the cover strip to both the outer thighs now. Once this is set I'll add the inners. This feels line it will need a bit of rough handling to hold in place. Hopefully a few clamps, magnets and a lot of tape will be up to the job. You should hopefully be able to see where the cover strip starts, leaving the lower section free as per the reference images I stole from a UKG build thread. I finished up for the evening by using some of the cover strip off cuts to bulk out the back of the shoulder straps. This will add some extra surface area when I glue them to the front chest plate. Next jobs planned will be to trim the front of the calfs and add the front cover strips. Once all the clam shell parts have their fronts glued I'll need to source some under armour and start sizing. I'll be cutting nothing before I get appropriate advice as this would be easy to mess up.

Finished the biceps off this evening. I taped them up previously to test fit and if anything they are a shade small so I may need to trim back the return later. I still need to remove the excess E-6000 but I'll do this once the other side is done. I made a start on the forearms as well. I started by trimming to 7.5mm at the thinnest parts to allow for the 15mm cover strip. I erred on the to wide side rather than to thin so it may be a tad wider in places. One arm looks to line up nicely though the 2nd doesn't. Do I need to do anything special or just tim the strip as below? I've also drawn a suggested cut line to remove the wrist return. Does this look about right? And I finished up with a first fitting. They seem to be about right as is so hopefully nothing drastic to change. Once I've done the return I'll glue the front and seek better guidance on the proper fit for these.

Make sure you remove the plastic protection film first.

I have to be organized, I don't have a dedicated build area and with 2 2 year olds running around NOTHING can be left out!

I gave the E-6000 a poke before I left for work (at 6AM ). So after 8-9 hours the bond already seems to be pretty strong, I'll have no worries about popping the clamps and carrying on right after dinner this evening.

I did use the scissors to snip the corners, you're right it does help a lot. I also used it for relief cuts on curves to keep the snap as straight as possible. I think for the belt I'll probably drill out the back of the rivet then put the rest into the freezer. I've also read that CA is weaker in shear so a twist might be less risky than prying it off. For the snaps the CO of the UKG has suggested I used 1" webbing so I'll probably follow that advice.

Progress report with some pictures this time: From trying on various parts it looks like I'll be a reasonable fit for the armour. I should be able to get no side gaps as is. I was also worried about the legs as they look very slim when you see pictures but I need not have worried. Excuse the hairy legs! The only real mistake I made when trimming was a slight slip when doing the lower side of an inner thigh. The image below shows the damage. Cosmetically I'm not worried but will I need to do anything for stress relief reasons? When trimming the shoulder bells I started with score and snap and had serious issues with the plastic not snapping. I nearly had a few tears and on the corner it delaminated slightly. To remedy this I used some plastic cement and clamped the split for a while. As this will be under 0 stress I am happy with the solution. The 2nd bell was cut with scissors to avoid the issue. I'm pretty happy with how the main ab plate came out: Though the secondary one came out a shade smaller than I'd like. I found the curved edge hard to score on and had to come in more than I'd have liked. Ultimately it looks fine though. Fully trimmed all the parts now fit in the armour bin, this gives me more confidence they will do so still even once assembled. I also have now started the gluing process. I am using E-6000 for this, and this is my first experience with this. I tried to be sparing to reduce waste from squeeze out. I think I've covered enough though I think next time I'll use a bit more glue. I measured out the cover strips using the parts and smoothed the corners. I've seen corners square, rounded and with 45 deg cuts. I like the squarer look my self so just dulled the corners on some 240 grit. I also used this to roughen the back of the cover strip for a bit more mechanical grip. I didn't do this on the armour for fear of going to far, I simply peeled back the protective coating. I also marked a centre line on the rear of the strips to aid alignment when gluing. I'm not overly concerned with them being 100% perfectly aligned as the armour is famous for its flaws, this simply helped me line the parts up. For the gluing I squeezed out a small amount of E-6000 into a paper plate and used a glue spreader liberated from either Starbucks or Costa, I forget which, to apply a thin layer to the back of the cover strip. This was then lined up and clamped using the smallest clamps from Wilko (75p a go!). I need to buy more of these, 10 isn't enough. For those wondering the A tells me which side it was as I cut both the strips before glueing. After doing both sides on both biceps I ran out of clamps and was half way through my 20mm magnets. I have some 10mm magnets but they will need to be doubled up to be strong enough to use them. Progress will probably slow a lot now as I need to allow the glue to dry and it sounds like I might only be able to do one part at a time. I'll test the strength of the bond on the biceps once 24 hours has passed to make sure it

Also just ordered the cheap FMA tactical helmet pads from eBay seeing as the decent ones are prohibitively expensive to get to the UK. Though thanks to the lunar new year the estimated delivery time is approx. 1-2 million years (aka sometime before the end of March). Worst case I'll stick with the hard hat liner for a while and then switch out once they arrive. I also need to find a good alternative to plasti-dip. In the UK a 400ml rattle can is £11, or 250ml of the paintable is £8. Plus delivery of £6. If I can find something just as good locally I can potentially make a reasonable saving. However unless this is a known good substitute I may as well just get the dip. The cost of trying 2-3 things is a false economy. And finally, seeing as it's a shopping day, what thickness ABS is recommended for snap plates? 1mm seems like it would be a shade too weak, 2mm to inflexible. Is 1.5mm the happy medium?