TK-Tom

Right thigh is fitted and trimmed, ready for assembly. Looks like I will have to do 1/2 the front cover strip at a time though. The front halves on the right thigh just do NOT align. Looks like there is a much greater curve in one half. I figured it would be easier to do 1/2 the cover strip at a time because of this.

I have the 2" elastic connecting them together, on both arms.

Left arm I made have a little more gap that the right, at the elbow. This causes the forearm to cover part of the hand guard. Without making the left elbow gap bigger, I could NOT bend my left arm hardly at all. So some questions: Is this too much gap for both my forearms? My right arm bends great and moves with a good range of motion. The left arm will not, without the extra gap that is in there. So if I keep it this way, I will have to trim some of the lower left forearm. But how do I do that? With a dremel cutting disk? The armor is fully glued now. Do I have to take apart and cut then re-glue? If I just cut it keeping it glued together, it will ruin the trimmed corners of the cover strip. What do I do here guys? TIA~

Before I get rolling on the Thighs, have some Arms issues...

Gonna start tackling the big guns right now...

Here's the 40 gallon container for my gear. Only $20.00 at Walmart. Fits everything nicely~

Thighs on tap for tomorrow night

Yep, I hear there will be constant maintenance and ways you can always improve the kit.

One issue I have with the bracket system is how close the kidney and butter plates are, makes it hard to paint those screws and keep them from rubbing together, taking the paint off constantly.

This armor building, to me, is like a "right of passage", like the trials a Jedi must face. Pretty cool. If you can do this, and do it right, you deserve to be part of the 501st. On a side note, I LOVE, LOVE, LOVE the E6000 clean up. Comes right off without damaging anything. One question, is it wise to lightly sand the areas on the armor that are going to get the glue? I have done so, so far, but I don't like when I go out of the area. Makes me have to use the Novus 123. (I will be using that when everything is fully done anyway, for the photos to submit. Gotta look sharp and shiny!)

Oh, you may notice a couple "extra" strappings on the inside of the clam shell on the back pieces. When I snap my cod to the butt plate, I get some lower butt plate flare. So I wanted to try to strap those lower corners to the front, inside of the cod piece to see if that will keep the butt plate tight. I know this is a highly unusual manuever, but I must do what I must. Also, there are a couple of elastic straps on the lower back plate. If I see the back plate is coming off my back too much, I wanted to try and use those to connect to the lower corners of my chest plate, to keep it tight. I have not suited up with these additions yet, I am waiting for the legs to be done so I can suit up fully.

You can see I have the Chest to AB piece using the bracket system again. Figured it out that I just need to use longer elastic to put the Chest armor where I want it. Also the left bicep to forearm strapping was a little too short so I have to re-do that tonight. When I bent my arm, the forearm was getting hung up big time on the lower bicep. Sorry guys, need to make the gap just a tad bit bigger. But no worries, when I had my arms straight down, the gap is not to bad INHO. The right side is perfect. So instead of starting work on the legs tonight, I will just glue up the LEFT bicep - forearm strapping and call it a night. I'm off work tomorrow so lots of time for legs.

Ok, so let's take a look at what I have completed so far...

I think I need one more post to be able to respond to a sales thread, so here it is...the Big 5-0!

I am ~5'9" to 5'10" and I weight about 185 lbs

Would Mineral Spirits work as well? I have that and it took the paint off the AB button plate nicely

So now you are caught up to date. Will continue the build story~ Bicep to forearm strapping is drying (using ~1/2" gap, so we will see how that fits later) Tonight I will be trimming down the return edges on the shins. When test fitting those, they really, really dug into me a scratched me up good. Also, my calves are another body part that responds well to my bodybuilding training so they are bigger than normal. Hopefully no shims needed because the shins do not get glued shut anyway. To Be Continued...

Way too much room in the forearms circumference-wise so I trimmed those down. Here is a BEFORE shot

Which brings me up to where I am today...working the arms. There is only supposed to be 1/4" to 1/2" gap between the forearm and bicep when arm is straight, but in order for me to bend my elbow, the forearm needs to be just below the elbow bone and the bicep needs to be just above it. Here I have the bicep a little too high.

Moving on, I replaced the Anovos belt with a Kittle belt - MUCH improved and I love it! Finally looking better... I did not take off the buttons and re-rivet them onto the belt, I secretly used industrial velcro. May not be happy with that solution in the future, but it is working great for now and you cannot tell the difference. (IMHO)