WhiteWalker

Thighs are Done! Woohoo, finally finished up my white, plastic, crotchless shorts, ready to hit the beach now! Seriously, these were some of the toughest parts of the build. Because of the thickness of the plastic and the unwillingness of it to bend where I wanted it to go, it was a slow and tedious process. In the end though I won and here's how I did it: I noticed something was up at the beginning when I put one of the thigh edges together and saw this gap: There was no amount of trimming that would remove the gap and allow the edge to meet without totally messing up the fit. After getting feedback here and on the Anovos FB forum, I discovered this isn't unusual (even the famous ukswrath has a gap at the top of one of the thighs covered by the outside cover strip). With that in mind I just had to force them together as much as I could gluing one half of the cover strip at a time, starting with inside strips. One half at time, inside then outside, front, then back, with 24 hours of gluing set time in between. Some of that action packed work is seen in these pics: And now you can see the finished product, with ammo belt! I'm holding these babies up using the world famous pencap510 garter system as shown here. Based on feedback from other troopers, there's no better way to keep your plastic pants up!! So this mission is accomplished and I just need to finish up the shins and I'll be done, so close now I can smell it (or maybe that's just the E6000).

Successful Anovos to Kittle Belt Surgery! It survived, the patient is alive! I've completed the belt surgery and I've got a play by play of my procedure: Step 1 as already shown in a prior post, I cut the old belt away from the ammo belt leaving the rivets and cover plates intact. I have no intention of trying to remove those and risking damaging the plastic: Next up I used the old belt as a template to mark the hole locations for the ab snaps and the holster. I did not already drill the holes in the ab for those buttons, I will use the new belt and holes to mark those locations. Here you can see the new belt after I installed the snaps. Yes I know one snap is bigger than the other. My plan was to use line 20 snaps for this but I only had 2 and messed up the post on the 2nd one, had to go with a line 24. Please keep this a secret ok? You can also see in the picture above my method for attaching the ammo belt to the new belt, industrial strength velcro, the magic fastener!! Here you can see the snaps set into the ab plate using the new belt holes as my guide. That was a very tense measure, re-measure, and measure again period before I actually drilled the holes! Following both my hole locations from the old belt and the measurements given in ukswrath build, i made the holes for the holster and installed it as shown: Here you see my method for insuring the drop boxes stay in place, one again turning to my trusty velcro: And finally here is the completed belt and it fits great on the ab plate and ammo belt is strong. I think unless someone tries to pull me across the Death Star by the ammo plate, it will stay secure to the belt: Mission Accomplished!

Thanks Jeff, Kalani on the belt advice. I have not yet drilled the holes or installed the belt snaps on the ab side for the very reason you mentioned Kalani. I saw the measurements that ukswrath did and his caveat that he added to not use his numbers if you were going to use the Kittle belt (I actually read and remembered that!). I figured I was safe copying the holster and ab snap positions from the old belt and then install the snaps on the belt first. Then I can place the belt on the ab plate to see where to install the ab snaps. I already have my button plate glued on so I can use that for a reference. If I place just the belt without the ammo belt on the ab plate, should it touch the bottom of the button plate at all? And does my plan to use velcro to attach the ammo belt to the Kittle belt sound reasonable? I know it's the easy way out but if it works that way, why not? Thanks!

The End is Near! Well it's not here just yet but it's getting close. The work on the thighs continues to plod along one half of a cover strip at a time. Here's a photo 'play by play' of how I had to approach these, starting with inside cover strips on half of the thighs at a time and continuing in that fashion until the end. I was able to finally close up the thighs last night although I do still need to add inside back cover strips to finish them up: As another side project as I wait for glue to dry, I turned my attention to the belt. I've disassembled the Anovos belt as shown here: You see here the Kittle belt, the Anovos belt, and the plastic ammo belt. I've placed the old belt on the new one and made marks where the holes need to go for the holster and ab mounting snaps. I have no intention of trying to pry the rivet cover plates off or removing the rivets from the plastic, just way too many incidents that I've seen of destroyed plastic to make that worth my trouble. What I'm thinking instead is to use the industrial strength velcro that I have for the shins and use some of that to mount the plastic ammo belt to the new belt. That velcro is very strong and I don't see a lot of stress on this part so it seems like a good approach to me. If that proves to a problem at some point, I do have Chicago screws that I can use to create 3 small mounting plates on the belt to make the connection. As always any feedback is appreciated!

Hey Jeff, here's the link to the helmet pads that I ordered: http://amzn.com/B016GTU3PK

Here's the thread where I ordered my fans: http://www.whitearmor.net/forum/topic/35951-helmet-fans-by-eqdizzle-basic-and-double-tap/ I went with the Double Tap Slim, came with 2 fans, the AA battery box, and L-Ion battery. Took less than a week from ordering to receive it, very quick service!

I was kind of surprised that it fit me as based on my cap size I think my head is a bit large. It does sit nicely though right at the back of my neck. I assume you tried along the tubes on the side?

Waiting for Glue to Dry! As exciting as that headline sounds, I decided to turn my attention to the helmet as I wait for the glue to dry on my thigh cover strips. I made a couple of purchases as you can see: The helmet pads I found on Amazon and the fan setup is from eqdizzle here on the FISD. I'm new to the whole 'personal head cooling' world, but I'm pretty impressed with this fan setup. They're extremely light, and best of all they have 2 power options. There's the standard AA battery box that I see all the time on trooper's helmets, but there's also a very slim rechargeable L-Ion battery as well and they're easily interchangeable. I figure I'll use the rechargeable battery as my primary with the AA box with me as a backup if needed. Here's the install of the pads and the fans (with the L-Ion battery in place): I may move the fans a bit but as I have them now they blow air nicely in my face and nothing is in the way.

I posted this in the FB group but I'll ask here as well. No problem with the right thigh but I've got this situation with the left one: Can't get the edges to meet easily the length of the thigh with return edges trimmed the way they're supposed to be. I get bowing at either the top or bottom. What am I missing here? Sent from my iPad using Tapatalk

Hey Jeff, trust me I've used much of your advice from your build thread and when you stopped by to get as far as I have! On the back, from my limited view via the mirror I think it looks good, but once I get everything assembled with the belt in place, I'll have Frances take a picture so I can really see how things are looking back there. On those shoulder bells, I've got snaps connecting the shoulder bell straps to the elastic bridge strap but like you said, that may have to change in time. I do have Velcro connections on the strap to shoulder bell side which allows flexibility on where the bells sit on my shoulders. My snaps are all Tandy snaps and I do have a small set that don't say Tandy on the back that I've used for all visible snaps. You saw my snap setting tool set and combined with what you brought over, I've gotten pretty good at creating the snaps. They are definitely a pain in the butt getting snapped the first few times though, seems like you need to have the Incredible Hulk help out to button those things up! Ty, I noticed the 'butt wing' thing going on back there on the posterior plate as well. I'm not going to touch that though until I get everything assembled and see if perhaps the belt helps to pull that in. We shall see. Looking forward to catching up with you on Thursday to get the thigh garter. While I'm in the office, I've got glue drying on a thigh cover strip at home right now, exciting times!

Post weekend update: Didn't get a chance to work on things over the weekend, was over at the Disney Dark Side Run doing the 10K. Next year I've got my eye on the Dark Side Challenge! So here's where I'm at, done with arms and torso except for gluing on button plates and working on the belt. Saving that ANOVOS to Kittle belt surgery for last. I'm moving on to the legs now starting with the thighs. I think the leg work is a bit intimidating compared to the other parts, we shall see... Sent from my iPad using Tapatalk

How interesting on the snaps! Obviously like many folks this is my first experience with snap setting and I just put the pieces together in the way that I thought looked right to me. For some reason I put the female snap with the base and the male snap with the cap and continued with that pattern. I don't think I have any clothing items with snaps, but I'm guessing if I did I'd see what you're saying and that I have them backwards. Lucky for me they still work fine and there's no CRL requirement on that sort of thing!! From now on though, I'll switch over on future snap plates. My build order was start with the forearms and then work my way up the arms and down the body, saving the controversial shins for last. Another bit of my order logic was that I wouldn't know how much to trim off the top of the thighs (if any) unless I had the armor above it complete. That may not be a valid concern but seemed to make sense to me. For me it's getting a bit hot out in the garage, would prefer to work in the air conditioned dining room but for some reason my wife frowns upon me gluing and sanding on the dining room table. Go figure?

Pre Weekend Update: It's been just over 2 months since the BBB arrived at my door and I feel like I've made some pretty good progress. This week was another milestone as I can now actually suit up in the torso parts of the armor: I don't have the ab to kidney straps in yet but overall I'm liking the look and feel of things. Using the Anovos supplied strapping, I created double snap plates to connect the back pieces as shown here: For the chest to ab, I've got snaps on the ab side and went with velcro on the chest side based on some advice from Jeff. With the snaps he felt there was very little give when he had to turn from side to side and the snaps were prone to popping loose. With the velcro I feel I'll have a little more flexibility plus the means to adjust the fit if needed. If it proves to be a problem down the road, I can always add snaps: So I still have more work to do on the torso. My goals this weekend and upcoming week are: Install the side rivets on the ab and kidney Install the belt snaps on the ab, plus that extra bonus snap that does nothing! Install the snap plates and straps to connect the ab to the kidney Paint and glue on the button plates Install shoulder covers Maybe, just maybe work on the Anovos-to-Kittle belt transplant surgery. I've noticed now that I have my outside bottom edge kidney snap plates (the ones used for the straps to the posterior) in a position that may give me trouble when installing the kidney to ab snap plates. I'll have to get creative to work around them a bit but I'm sure I'll figure something out. As always if anyone sees anything that looks off, please let me know!!

Jeff (wingnut65) stopped by the house on Saturday and we had a mini armor party (it was not a 'play date' as both of our wives referred to it!!). If you haven't already seen Jeff's build thread 'An ATA for Tampa Bay', I highly recommend it. It has lots of great info for the new builder, very thorough, and all good stuff regardless of the type of TK you're building! Jeff delivered numerous items to help with my build, including different types of snaps and tools, chicago screws, the hard-to-find french blue paint, and more! He also had numerous hints, tips, and lessons learned from his recent build. With that, I've made more progress! The chest and back are now connected with the shoulder straps (glued in the back and snaps on the chest): I'm also well into getting most of the back snap plates glued in place (all double snaps based on Jeff's advice): I also installed the 2 snaps to the posterior plate using the small collection that I have that don't have Tandy stamped on them: This is also where I made my first measurement error, made the holes for the 2 snaps much closer together than I planned. Not sure how I messed that up but it is what it is now. You can see in the pic they're right next to each other, closer than what I've seen others do. However they work fine and I see nothing in the CRL that specifies any specific distance between these 2 snaps, only that you can either have 1 or 2. I think I'm fine leaving this 'as is' and it should be cool for any level of certification. Am I right on that?

A pre-weekend update as I've made it bit more progress with the build. First off though as I've moved into this new stage of the build, new tools and items have been acquired: The black nylon webbing, the soldering iron, and the small Tandy snap setting kit were all Amazon purchases. You just can't beat Amazon, order something and it magically appears at your door 2 days later! The white elastic was from Jo-Anne's, the bag of 100 snaps from the Tandy store, and the paint from a fellow member. The blue doesn't appear to be the French Blue though so I believe I need to swap that one out. As noted in my prior post there was much frustration with learning how to set snaps, but thanks to kman's great advice on using the philips screwdriver first, I was able to move forward in that task. Below you see my first snap plates in place on the chest piece: They may look a little off kilter, but I was very careful to place them with the strap attached to make sure the strap lined up properly. My plan is to have the snaps on the chest as you see here and the shoulder straps glued in place on the back. That will give the permanence of glue on the back but the ability to separate the back and chest pieces for storage. In this pic you also get to see my primary work table in all of it's glory! Apparently having gluing, sanding, cutting, snapping, and all other activities going on at the same time makes for a very messy work area. I'm hoping a fellow trooper can stop by the house this weekend for another set of eyes on my progress (and to hit him up for any spare build parts!). We'll see if I can get the chest and back together along with the shoulder connections and hopefully more snap plates installed this weekend.

Thanks! In that case I think I'll glue the bridge straps on one side and use snaps on the other. That will still allow me to separate the chest and back if necessary while cutting back on snap plates. Will also make life easier in sizing the chest straps and getting them 'just right'.

I notice in UKSWRATH's build that he glues in straps in many places where others recommend snaps. For example, he glues down 3 of the 4 chest to back bridge straps as well as the shoulder bell straps. Any reason to do it one way vs the other besides screen accuracy? Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk

And on the 2nd day I said let there be snap plates!! Thank you Kman for the Philips screwdriver trick, that did the job! Of course still a couple of lessons learned in the process. With my first snap plate, the snap post was too tall and when bent down would not go down far enough for the snap to work. I then tried doubling up the nylon strap and that worked, was able to push the post all the way down. Geez though, what a tedious task, sitting on my garage floor pounding on these little snaps with a rubber mallet! Sent from my iPad using Tapatalk

Thanks! I had to go check the Darth Aloha thread to read about his troubles with the Dritz tool and Tandy snaps, not good. I'll try the Philips screwdriver trick tomorrow, snap frustration too high to go back in the garage this evening!

After mangling a couple of snaps using the hammer and setting tool, I realize this is much harder than it looks! Has anyone used the Dritz heavy duty snap pliers? If so does it work well and would it work with Tandy snaps? Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk

There's a reason that we call the Florida Garrison 'a wretched hive of sun and humidity'. [emoji16]

Yep, I'll be working on the chest and back sections next and that will include adding the snaps and straps to make the shoulder bell connection. My first venture into the magical world of snap setting!

It's a milestone today as I now have my first pieces of wearable armor with the arms. Other than the straps from the shoulders to the shoulder bridge elastic I think I can say they're done (note that I am wearing non-regulation shorts). I think they look and fit well although I have no frame of reference as to how they should feel or my range of motion. Without the shoulders connected at the top I do have the feeling that they want to slide off a bit, but I'm thinking that's to be expected until they're secured. Next up is working on the torso parts as I collect my snaps, nylon, elastic, etc. Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk

Great advice, I'll go the nylon webbing approach as that seems much easier than finding and dealing with the material to make little plastic squares. I'm assuming the same E6000 glue will adhere the nylon to the ABS? Kman I already followed your advice and ordered that Tandy kit from Amazon that includes the old style snaps and setting tool. I also grabbed a cheap soldering iron while I was at it. There's a Tandy store here in Tampa so I'll pop in there this weekend for that 'big bag o' snaps'.

While I'm on this topic, what's your source for the snap plates? I might be able to scavenge enough flat pieces of ABS from build scrap but I'm not sure. Can I find some suitable material at Home Depot? Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk