R2Dan

It's Duplicolor "color spray". It's a synthetic resin paint, not acrylic. Bought it at the DIY store next door You mean two full-sized droids and a whole bunch of smaller ones are enough? Phew, I thought I had to get at least two more astromechs... good, then I can start working on the protocol droid instead

Here's a set, just painted with the same spraypaint: I'll give it two days to fully dry, then I'll check if it's flexible enough. The waiting game continues... oh boy! Oh, one more thing, if you're considering to order one set. Although they look nice and smooth on the pics, the surface is a little rough - it's not totally clean, but not horrible either. If you want something "flawless", you should probably stick to the vacformed handguards. These are for the "I want to look as crappy as the troopers on screen" guys

Good news guys! It looks like I found a spraypaint that is flexible enough when dry. Flexible enough means you can bend the handguard completely and it won't crack! I have only tried it on the backside of one of my handguards so far, but I'm very pleased with the result. I will try it on a good pull next, the downside is, it takes about 2-3 days to dry, but I guess it's worth the wait As I said before, once I get one set finished, I will be taking orders Here's a pic of me bending the spraypainted one, the paint doesn't show any signs of a crack anywhere! Cool

I haven't tried airbrushing it, as from what I've read on different forums this is not quite a good idea. If I can't find any other solution I will try this, but I don't really want to mess up my airbrush. I'm sure I'll find a way

basically that's the best option I've found so far, white latex paint. But as I said, it's hard to apply it without deep brushstroke marks, which looks really dodgy - it might be a problem with my brushes though, that's why I'll try some others. I might try and cast the handguards in white latex later, but for now I wanted them to be as screen-accurate as possible... yeah I know it's nuts

A little update: I have pulled as many sets as my supply of latex allowed me to, 9 sets with the first one being not too good. That makes 8 sets right now - The thing is, I'm now looking for a white paint that will work with the handguards. I've tried 3 different paints so far, one was flexible enough but is a pain in the backside to apply, the other two will crack when you bend them too much, which is not a good option either. I will try a few more paints this week - also different brushes for the one that seems to work the best - and once I'm happy with that I will make the first sets available! Not long to go

Okay guys, after a little more tweaking the pulls are coming out really well now. It does take a damn long time for the latex to cure though, the first set I made is still not fully cured! I'll be getting some white latex paint next week, I hope the first sets will be all cured then so I can paint them up, I will take some pictures then and offer the first sets up for sale Watch this space for more details!

very flexible, you can bend it without any problem. If you glue them to your gloves they will follow your hand "profile"

Another little update: I took the right handguard and temporarily attached it to one of my rubber gloves with doublesided tape. Here's a picture, so you know what it looks like finished - will take other pics with armour later

ok, 24 hours later and I managed to take out the pulls pretty easily. They're not fully cured yet, but I'm way too impatient. The left handguard mould needed a little tweaking/clean up, but else they look quite decent I'd say. What do you think? The white spots you see is plaster dust which was taken up by the latex, that won't happen on the next pulls I also sanded the left hand side mould a little as the surface seems a little bumpy. I guess tomorrow I'll have a second cast, hopefully it will be cleaner - But it looks promising so far

Hey John, I just tried to PM you, but your inbox still seems to be filled up, so I sent you an e-mail to the swdvds addy there. Would be great if you could get back to me!

I broke up the whole handguard into different layers, printed them out, cut them individually from styrene and then just glued them together... seemed the easiest way to go for me, but I'm an R2 builder, I guess I'm just too used to working with flatpack designs So you're making yours again? Dang it! Why did I go through all that trouble then? Maybe we can swap a set once I get mine done hehe

Sintra is even easier to work with, but it is not as sturdy as styrene. You should be able to make some cool stuff with it anyway @ Marcel: We'll see how it goes, if that first pull looks convincing, you'll find a signup list very soon

you can make good looking Boba armour from styrene, I've done that a while ago: There are dozens of plans online, you might want to give it a try

that's pretty much it, yes

Ok guys, I just poured the first set, now the waiting game starts. I have never poured something that thick from latex before, but according to John's experience it takes 3 days for the handguards to cure enough to get them out of the mould. Thank God I still have work to do on my trooper, that will keep me busy! ... oh and there's university, of course... damn that real life!!!!

the latex I have here right now has a natural colour, means it's yellow-ish just like John's were and I will paint them white. If there should be enough interest in handguards made from white latex I might do those as well. But first the moulds have to work

Hey guys, As John told us he's not doing the latex handguards anymore I thought I'd give it a go myself and started working on moulds today. I got one handguard done, and I'll do a first cast tomorrow I guess. Should work fine I think... I will keep you guys updated on it! IF it works out well and I'm happy with the pulls I will offer them to the group. However, please don't flood my PM box now, I don't know if it's going to work out for sure and I've never offered anything before. When I do it, I'll do batches, I don't have a price estimate yet either as I don't know how much latex will be needed to cast a pair, but I thought I'd let you know someone's working on them Here's a pic of the right handguard mould I made today, plus the master made from styrene: They will be different from John's, as I made the masters myself, but I think they should look good once done... fingers crossed!

there were no screws in the ears, only little dents. As I said I got this all as a kit form, so I put this bucket together, got six flathead screws from the DIY store next door, painted them white and installed those... easy as pie

Really? Amazing! Thanks a bunch mate! edit: Yeah I should have checked your site... so much for not rushing things this time

yep, I wrote you a message the other day - bought them on eBay

Really? Oops... oh well, I can still change the ones on the back... not much luck with the tube stripes I guess. Dang - Well, makes it unique, right?

it's polish My family is from Poland, but I've been born in Germany

Hi fellow troopers! As this is my semi-first post here, let me introduce myself. According to my mate Russ from the R2 builders club I'm "Dan Shu--uh L something... the German guy" I'm a pretty active member in the R2 builders club, have two droids, but I'm also a member of the 501st/German Garrison. I joined it some time last year with an old FX kit that I got cheap from a mate, but I never felt really happy with it. First the vacforming wasn't that good, second I rushed putting it together, so I could join the 501st asap Recently I had the chance to acquire a Movie FX (german armour) set, and I want to get this as close as possible to an ANH trooper, hoping to become elite one day So no rushing this time. I started working on the bucket, which is now pretty much done on the outside, except for the mic tips, which are just "borrowed" from my other helmet for now and will be replaced with new ones soon. I quite like how it turned out, although it's not as screen accurate as some of the other buckets around (might get a TE to replace this one later down the road, but for now this helmet will have to do) Anyway, I thought I'd share some pics of the finished helmet with you guys, as I'd like to get some feedback on it. So here we go: that's it for now... let me know what you think edit: Before anyone says something - the lenses are green acrylic, they always turn out black on pics though... I might have to change them... what do you think?