kman

ABS paste is perfect for that sort of thing.

Very close, but yes, there are some tweaks needed. Nice job overall! The five main things that jump out to me are: (1) The backs of the shins are backwards... the opening is to the outside, and should be to the inside. (2) The drop boxes should align with the outside edge of the ammo belt. (3) The cover strips on the front of the thighs should stop roughly an inch higher, where the ridge begins, instead of continuing all the way to the edge. (4) The right thigh ammo pack should be glued in place better, so it doesn't drop down like that. It's ok (barely hanging on) in the first two pics, but slid down for the other pics. And (5) the top two Chicago screws in the belt, holding the holster on, need to be removed and the screw holes patched (steal a little matching fabric from the back of the belt or under the velcro). (ANH Stunt CRL only allows 2 screws, not 4) Otherwise, I personally don't see anything that would prevent basic approval, once the formal approval pics are taken as Tony outlined. Nice photo shoot, though, those are great pics!

UltraSabers customer service can tend to be hit or miss, but that's the case with SaberForge as well. SF is notorious for rampant QC issues with their fancy hilts, which lead me to decide to avoid them. UltraSabers tends to have very well made, very solid hilts with less to go wrong. The blank slate is especially nice if you intend to customize it anyway. (leather wraps, etc) The electronics in ALL sabers have ups and downs... tiny electronics that get smacked around do tend to have issues. Vaders Vault and Genesis are among the top tier blade makers (there are one or two others I'm forgetting, I know), but are priced accordingly. From my research, US seems to have far fewer issues than SF and the other mid-tier makers, so that's what I went with. I've been happy with the product, to date. The delivery time (under a week for mine!) is especially impressive, particularly given the extremely long lead times many of the other manufacturers can have.

I might put more effort into it at some point, but it's really not that noticeable. The photo makes it look way worse than it is in real life, especially since it's mostly hidden under the armor anyway.

Interesting, Mike. I wish UA would be more consistent in whatever they're using for their logos! The logo on mine was a white "painted" inverse logo on a black oval that was essentially a background layer. How long did you soak in acetone? The 100% construction grade acetone I used didn't seem to hurt the fabric, so I actually immersed it (in a lowball glass) for a good 30 seconds, then spent a fair amount of time rubbing the logo with a rag. As I wrote earlier in this thread, the white "paint" came off, but not the black disc that the white paint was painted onto. Whatever the heck that is, it wasn't budging! Once the logo was gone, the disc was just a sort of dark grey, since the white paint seemed to affect the black, but at least there was absolutely logo visible. Sharpie darkened it up from there, and I called it good enough. You can see the logo starting to go here: And you can see it as it is now, good enough to troop (IMO), here:

Congrats on the weight loss! I would think it would be pretty simple to just lop off an inch from each side, sand the edge to clean it up a bit, and re-glue the attachments farther in. (drill the three new holes for the rivet attachments... you'll probably need a new set of rivets from JustJoseph if the originals break when removing them but that's all of $3)

Subscribed.

If you have a copy of your current prescription, you can order a cheap pair of glasses and remove the temples to mount them in the bucket. (frameless glasses, or at least glasses with a thin wireframe, might be a good choice here, so it's easier to position and bend if needed, and less stuff in the bucket in general) I have not yet done this myself (it's easier for me to just troop without my glasses as my sight is not THAT bad, and I'm not driving while in armor!) but I've seen others do it (such as Brad, above, clearly), and plan to do so. I've ordered from eyebuydirect.com, personally, and found their glasses to be quite good, and the prices are stupendous. The frames are kinda cheap compared to expensive glasses, but that's the whole point, here, right? Under $30 for a simple pair of prescription glasses, shipped. No connection to the company, just a satisfied customer.

Boo.

Since I'll likely be headed down the HWT path (love the dual costume nature of that setup!), I'd be down for a couple as well.

Sure, let's just hope it drops below 70 this winter. I'll be wearing my patch shirt at LBCC... you going?

Sweet collection! I finally got an 11" Legion patch and started my patch shirt. While I'd love a jacket, given SoCal temps, I can't see ever being to actually wear a jacket more than once or twice per year, so I'm sticking with short sleeved shirts. I have serious envy for your multi-garrison patch and your original name tag, though...

I have the step up converter, I just literally have not had time to play with it all and see if it actually works. I want to test it with my volt meter before connecting it to a ROM/FX, of course! The step up converter is designed to provide 12v power to a router from a USB battery bank during a power outage, judging by the description in the Amazon listing. So it seems pretty perfect to take 5v power from a USB power pack and step it up to the 9-12v power the ROM/FX wants. I just want to make sure it doesn't exceed 12v and fry my expensive board! Oh, I also need to swing by a Radio Shack to pick up a 9v battery connector, hack off the existing connector, and solder it to the end of the converter wire, before I can get this going. Fingers crossed I have time tonight... I'd like to use this as a troop this weekend, if there's time to get it all going.

Congrats, and welcome! I'd read some of the sticky build threads to start off, to get a feel for it. The YouTube series from TK1636 is also excellent, and really demystifies the whole process. When you get ready to start, you'll want to consider the pros and cons of CA glue vs. E6000. As a first time builder, I'd recommend E6000, but there are definitely some who feel it's CA glue or nothing. (Unless you're in a hurry... then there's little option but CA glue). Are you set for tools and materials? You may want to read over this thread about build supplies: http://www.whitearmor.net/forum/topic/31404-supply-list-for-your-tk-build/ Ukswrath's Anovos build thread (also a sticky) is also an amazing resource, even if it involves another type of armor, since the general construction techniques are the same.

Renaissance Dancewear also makes excellent undersuits. ------------

Sort of halfway to Sandtrooper, eh? LOL

Congrats, Tom!

Depends on if you troop in high temps or low temps. If both, you may need more than one type. Most seem to go for the compression suits: Heat Gear or Cold Gear. Just have to get rid of the unfortunately placed logo (which isn't all that difficult).

It might, but fingernail polish remover tends to have a bunch of other stuff (including conditioner and dyes) in it that could cause unexpected results. It's also usually fairly diluted unless you have the hardcore 100% acetone variety. I'd pick up a little tin of real acetone from Home Depot/Lowe's, personally. It's just a few bucks and has other applications that can come in handy. (ABS paste, etc.)

Tagged to add to my arsenal.

^^ I agree. I actually like the neck seal, but it happens to fit me well. ("one size fits some") But I agree that it's longevity is dubious at best. When it starts to no longer work as it should, I'll be going with a Darman seal anyway, which has been proven to last for many, many years. (and which is custom sized so they fit anyone perfectly)

Anovos has started provided some replacement parts, but in a very limited fashion. If I was in your shoes, I would not depend on Anovos for available replacement parts. Most other vendors have fairly simple and readily available replacement parts.

Agreed that it's not worth the $200 they're charging for the upgrade. A Darman neck seal, arguably one of the best (and most popular), and custom sized, is under $50 (here on the sales forums). Black rubber chemical gloves are about $5. Then you just need all black compression top and bottom (or one piece). Should all come in for less than $200, easy to source (without a wait from Anovos), and under $200. (possibly under $100, depending on the undersuit you choose)

Well, I've neglected this thread for too long, been busy trooping! I've also been distracted by putting together an Imperial Staff Officer setup for use on days that I don't want to armor up (All approved, I'm ID-91423 as well now). But it's time to dust it off and take a few more steps towards getting my TK to Centurion, which I'm starting to get annoyed with myself for neglecting. I did come in a week ago and added navigation links to the first post, as it was getting far too hard to locate relevant information as this thread grew longer! Meanwhile, onto the upgrades and changes: I've done a pretty big overhaul of my helmet electronics. I'm still sorting out exactly how everything is going to be, but I've switched from the iComm+Ukswrath's amp to a ROM/FX, which does the voice processing and clicks and amplifies all in one smaller unit. Still running through the Hovi speaker tips. I'm going to try to build a 3D printed case for the ROM/FX inside my helmet, and my printer is down at the moment, waiting for a new belt, so pictures will have to wait until I'm farther along. My one complaint about the ROM/FX has been power... it needs 9V-12V to run. 12V worth of AA batteries is way too bulky, though, and 9V batteries are a pain (even if they're nice and small), plus the amplifier volume is lower with only 9V pushing it. But I'm making progress on that front, I believe: I found an incredible (and very small) Voltage Step Up converter, which converts 5V power to up to 12V. I need to test it some more with a multimeter before risking my ROM/FX, but I'm hoping that will let me simply use my nice rechargeable USB battery packs from the fans, for my ROM/FX, so I don't have to mess with freaking 9V batteries anymore. The downside is I'll have to push both fans with only the one (remaining) battery back, instead of them having independent battery supplies, but considering a majority of the time I only use one of the fans anyway, I think I still won't have any issue getting through a majority of troops. I should still get 4+ hours with two fans running, and even more with just one, so I doubt this will be an issue. I ordered Ukswrath's "echo-style" fan bracket, mostly to see how it compares to the one I built myself. Maybe I'll like it more, maybe I won't? If not, I'm sure it'll be easy enough to sell. As a bonus, though, that's designed and wired to run both fans off one USB power supply anyway, so it'll save me some rewiring. Anyway, onto the actual Centurion submission items: I have latex hand guards from JustJoseph63's sales thread. Two pair, actually, so I can put one on my "Centurion rubber gloves" and have another set glued to my regular "everyday" Nomex flight gloves. The color was not a good match to the Anovos plastic, however. Fortunately BJ Browne, in the Anovos Stormtrooper Kit Building Group on FaceBook, had a run of custom-blended paint intended to exactly match the Anovos plastic. So step one was to paint the latex guards. You can see both sets of guards being painted here. The upper guards are newer, and have been painted, while the lower guards are unpainted. The lower unpainted guards are part of JustJoseph's original run, and interestingly, you can see it's shaped slightly differently from the newer ones. (they're a little flatter and ever so slightly larger) Not a problem, just interesting. I used good ol' E6000 to glue the hand guards to the gloves, per JustJoseph's tests and recommendation. Interestingly, I'm told that whatever formula TrooperBay uses for their latex hand guards, it doesn't work as well with E6000. You'd want to use CA glue for those. But for Joseph's guards, E6000 worked best, per his tests. Here are the newer hand guards, glued to my rubber Centurion gloves: (Note: I think the guards are a little too close to the fingers on the gloves. Ideally, they'd be 1/4-1/2" lower. It works, but I like the spacing I used on my Nomex gloves better.) And here are the first run hand guards, glued to my everyday trooping Nomex gloves: (Excuse the dirty appearance of the left glove, I happened to wrap the gloves and guards in a magazine and taped the whole thing around a 32oz Gatorade bottle to shape it, while the glue dried, and some of the print came off onto the paint. It'll clean up, but I was in a hurry and snapped this shot as it was.) Also, just to show off the paint color comparison, here's one of the painted hard guards sitting on my Anovos shoulder cap: So that takes care of that step. The next two steps are cleaning up the helmet ear spacing a little (Thanks, Anovos) and ABS paste for seam removal for my side shims. I took the first step, adding Acetone into my little baby food jar of ABS paste, since it had long since dried up. It'll "rehydrate" and turn back to paste over the next day or so, and then hopefully I can start on those side shims. One of these days I want to replace my helmet lenses as well, with a better plastic that has more clarity, but it's not high on my priority list.

Looks good! Electrical box screws are the same format, as well. You also need to cut them down a bit, but otherwise they're perfect. (aside from not being brass, not that you can see under the paint)