shashachu

Hi Josh! Thanks for making all of these changes, but they aren't actually required for EIB approval. (Although your armor looks great!) Mike was super eager to jump into reviews but hasn't yet been familiarized with our process. We will get this sorted out. Thanks, Sha Sha

Awesome!! Fast service from Praetorian, too.

Hi Shaun, Keep in mind that the suggestions with the helmet are just that, suggestions, but not required for Centurion. We know that things like repositioning the ears can be extremely difficult, if not near impossible for some bucket builds, but we like to mention details like that for those troopers who wish to do everything they can to match the screen-used suits. Ultimately, we are a costuming group, not a prop-replica group, so although we'd love for everyone to take every single suggestion, I'd hate for you to think we're asking you to spend money for a new bucket when it's not required. Don't hesitate to reach out if you have any further questions or concerns.

Oh, that's a bummer! On the bright side it should be totally okay for every day trooping, so at least he'll have a backup.

Hi Shuan, Thanks again for your patience, and for submitting the additional photos. Great job already applying some of the suggestions made by your fellow troopers. As I said before, this is a really terrific build and if fits you great. CRL and EIB Application Requirements: All required photos are now in and, after review, we are pleased to welcome you to Expert Infantry rank. On behalf of myself and the rest of the DO team, congratulations! Other-Armor Fit/Assembly In this area we review observations made by your fellow troopers and the DO team. Some observations may lead to suggestions to improve the overall look of your armor. Starting from the helmet, we do have a few suggestions. First, the paint. It's hard to tell if it's just the lighting in the photos, but the gray on your helmet seems quite dark. This is not a blocker as the CRL does not specify a specific shade of gray, but it might be something to look into. We recommend either Humbrol #5 Dark Admiralty Grey or Testors #1138 Grey Gloss. Secondly, the tube stripes on your helmet seem a bit far away from the cheeks, especially the left ones; they should be about a pencil-width away. Lastly, if you were keen to tackle repainting the tube stripes, you should double check their orientation; you'll notice in the reference photos that they lean forward, while yours are leaning back, so if you used templates, it's possible you had them reversed. I did also want to note that your vocoder paint shape looks fantastic. (Although the screen-used helmets did use satin black paint.) Reference Image: Onto the ears, as you might have noticed us mention on many EIB and Centurion apps recently, ideally the ears should follow the edge of the traps. On your helmet, your ears are sitting more vertically. It's certainly a challenging correction to make, but we mention it for troopers wanting to go the extra mile. Reference Images: Another small paint detail worth mentioning is that the ab button paint should ideally not quite cover the entire plastic button: Reference Image: Thank you for correcting the screws on your Thermal Detonator. Just a couple suggestions in that area. First, one of your TD clips seems to be sitting a bit far away from the cylinder. You might try to see if you can tighten the screws down. And if you're going for ultimate screen accuracy, the upper TD screws should be closer to the edge of the clips. Reference Image: Moving along to the lower limbs, as was also mentioned by your fellow troopers, your right thigh sits a shade lower than your left. I added extra strapping on the rear of my right thigh for the same reason. It may also just be a matter of twisting your thighs and shins inwards slightly so that they're all more forward-facing. Reference Image: On the fronts of your thighs, it looks like the cover strips might be a hair too long. It should be a quick fix with a pair of scissors or dremel. Reference Image: Finally, on your blaster, although some weathering is desired, there are a couple areas where yours appears overly weathered. On the scope we're suggesting you tone down the brass weathering. I had the same issue on my blaster, and a couple passes with black spraypaint fixed it up. It is also worth mentioning that the t-tracks and grip on the original blasters were plastic, not metal, so those should not show metal weathering (although in your case it could just be lighting/reflections.) Additionally, your D-ring, while present, seems a bit misshapen. Reference Images: Centurion Requirements: In this section we prepare you for Centurion. Because Centurion photos show more detail than EIB, items pertaining to Centurion might be seen there and not here. We try to point out all that we can from what we see but the final accuracy is the responsibility of the trooper. The CRL states: Drop boxes are vertically aligned with the end of the ammo belt with minimal gap between belt and box. Your belt boxes have a tendency to wander, as they appear misaligned in this photo of your belt: But are perfect in this photo of you kitted up: As was already suggested, a drop of E6000 on the elastic connecting the belt boxes should ensure they stay in place. Reference Image: Additionally, in reference to the ab/kidney cap, the CRL states: Ideally there no gap between the abdomen and kidney armor. Great job aligning the tops in your second set of photos, but unfortunately a gap appeared. I'm confident this should be a simple dressing issue or a matter of tightening your belt a bit before taking your Centurion photos. Reference Image: Lastly, although the CRL doesn't specify the size of the rivet holding the thigh ammo boxes on, yours appears very oversized compared to the screen-used suits. This is one of those areas where we're going to rely on our screen reference to determine that this should be corrected for your Centurion application. Reference Images: And that's it! We'd like to congratulate you on achieving EIB, and we'll see you at Centurion!

Yes, Praetorian are approvable all the way to Centurion. I believe actually Hyperfirm are no longer made, and one of the Hyperfirm founders now owns Praetorian.

Hi Zylo! Sorry for the delay. Unfortunately after discussion with the DO team, we agree that your blaster will not be able to pass EIB approval. In general we don't get too picky about blasters because there's a decent amount of variation between makers, but in your case it's missing several major details that normally appear on an ANH blaster. I know you said it's a Hyperfirm, but it doesn't look like my Hyperfirm that I bought a couple of years ago. 1. Rear sight too tall 2. End cap clip is the wrong shape 3. No inner bolt opening/appearance of spring. 4. Handle inset wrong. Should have letters, not grooves, and center should be a screw head. 5. Trigger is wrong style. 6. No charging handle. 7. Ejection port is wrong shape and too small. 8. No ejection port guard. 9. Lower T-track too long. 10. This rivet does not belong here 11. No flash guard. 12. Front sight wrong shape. 1. Missing bayonet lug. 2. Rear of folding stock is wrong shape. (Strange, because the other side is correct). 3. Wrong type of fastener. Here are some reference images: And photos of my own Hyperfirm B-grade: (Note that my own blaster is a bit incorrectly weathered, but it does have all the proper details.) I'd suggest you checking out the E11 forums for sources of other blasters, or looking through past EIB applications. Don't hesitate to reach out if we can be of assistance.

Sorry, yes you're in the queue, Zylo. I apologize for not acknowledging the updated photos. We will be with you as soon as possible.

Thanks, Shaun! We'll be with you soon.

Hi Eric, Thanks again for your patience, and for submitting the additional photos. Beautiful photos and very nice build! CRL and EIB Application Requirements: All required photos are now in and, after review, we are pleased to welcome you to Expert Infantry rank. On behalf of myself and the rest of the DO team, congratulations! Other-Armor Fit/Assembly In this section we review observations made by your fellow troopers and ourselves. Some observations may lead to suggestions to improve the overall look of your armor. Starting at the helmet, although there was a lot of variation on-screen, the Stunt helmets tended to have their brows a bit higher than yours, so we're suggesting you scoot it up a bit. Reference Image: (Ignore that guy on the right ) Continuing with the helmet, the mic tips should have a bit of white on the edges. And while you're at it, you could slightly update the shape of the vocoder, although what's there now is nice and sharp as it should be. Reference Image: Finally, with the Stunt helmets, the ears tend to line up with the edge of the traps on the screen-used helmets. Yours are actually very close, especially the left, but if you're aiming for ultimate accuracy and you can do it without damaging your helmet, you could try tackling repositioning the ears. Reference Images: Moving along, as was mentioned by your fellow troopers, ideally we want to have minimal black showing on the armor, but for taller troopers such as yourself, gaps are inevitable, so it at least cleans up the look of the armor to even those gaps out. So we're suggesting you raise your forearms a bit, which should hopefully be a simple matter of shortening the strapping between your biceps and forearms. This should also prevent the forearms from running into your hand plates. Reference Image: Continuing on down, ideally the corners of the ab button plates should be squared, not rounded. Also the smaller button plate should be a bit smaller, although it's not clear to me whether you'd be able to trim it down much without running into the buttons. Finally, the paint on the larger plate is perfect, but the smaller button paint is just a shade large; ideally the paint should be just smaller than the plastic buttons. Reference Image: Around the back, as was already pointed out, ideally the corners of the TD panel are squared off, not rounded. However if you do decide to make that correction, be careful to keep the clips flush with the edge of the panel. Reference Image: Tackling the lower armor, your thighs are a bit high; this is especially evident in the back where the gap between your thighs and calves is much larger than the gap (or lack thereof) between your thighs and posterior armor. You did mention that dropping your thighs caused the sniper knee to get caught under the thigh armor; I know that others have handled this by putting some foam on the front of the shin and/or the back of the thighs to prevent that. Finally, it appears that you might be able to heat bend up the bottom of the posterior armor some to keep it from overlapping the thigh armor. Reference Image: Great job with the left and right ridge alignment on the sniper knee. Unfortunately, this has left your sniper knee a bit crooked. It looks like you may have a bit of room to bring up the left edge to straighten it out a bit. Since this is just the way your armor is made we won't require a correction, but you might see what you can do to split the difference to even everything out a bit. The sniper knee positioning is the perpetual thorn in the side of any TK armor builder. Reference Image: Finally, this is definitely a dressing issue, but when suiting up be sure to have a handler take a quick look at your calf armor closure. The right one is perfect. Reference Image: Finally, with your blaster, there are a few suggestions. The grip, t-tracks, and rear or the Hengstler counter were all plastic, so they would not have metallic weathering showing. Additionally, the scope was originally brass, so any weathering showing through should be brass colored. It's a matter of personal style, but I'd also say that overall your blaster has a bit more battle damage than typically showed on-screen, so we'd suggesting you tone down the overall weathering. Reference Images: Next, it appears your charging handle is a bit shorter than we're used to seeing, or it could be the angle of the photo. If you do decide to apply to Centurion (and we hope you do!) we'd ask for a clearer photo. Reference Image: Finally, the coils connecting the power cylinders to the Hengstler counter were actually only shown in promo images, but we do allow them. However, yours do seem a bit long and saggy, so I'd consider cleaning them up or even just removing them. Reference Image: Centurion Requirements In this section we prepare you for Centurion. Because Centurion photos show more detail than EIB, items pertaining to Centurion might be seen there and not here. We try to point out all that we can from what we see but the final accuracy is the responsibility of the trooper. The L3 CRL states There should be a minimal gap between the shoulder armor and the chest/back plates. This is a tough one because you are a bigger trooper. I would see if it's at all possible to shorten the strapping between the shoulder bell and the shoulder strapping, as well as trimming off all the remaining return edge of the bottom edge of the shoulder bells. In the worst case, you may need to order bigger shoulder bells from some of the bigger armor makers such as AM, and I believe WTF has also started recently offering larger shoulder bells, but the color match could be an issue. The L3 CRL also states: Drop boxes are vertically aligned with the end of the ammo belt with minimal gap between belt and box. The corners of the plastic ammo belt shall be trimmed at a 45 degree angle that that meets the outer edge of the cloth belt. The top of the ammo belt should sit at or just below the bottom of the central and vertical abdomen button panels. There are a few issues here, some easier to correct than others. For the drop box positions, that should be a simple fix - shortening the strapping holding the drop boxes on, and adding a dab of glue to the strapping so they don't wander. The belt 45-degree corner is a tougher one, because your canvas belt just seems wide compared to the plastic. It does look like you do have some room to trim back the plastic some so that it might align better. Finally, for belt position, this is a correction I also had to make on my build. I saw that you said you have your belt low to cover the kidney/posterior gap, which makes sense. However, it looks like from the photos you might have a bit of room to scoot just the front of your belt up to keep it in place. I actually added a couple small strips of Velcro to keep my belt from sagging in the same way: Reference Images: Finally, the L3 CRL states: Ideally there no gap between the abdomen and kidney armor. Your ab/kidney gap looks particularly large in your arms raised photos, but it is still there in the arms down photos: Hopefully this should be a relatively easy fix of tightening/adding the strapping between the ab/kidney as well as tightening your belt. On my own build I used nylon to connect the left side rivets, and on the right I added an extra strap to help close that gap. Note also, that the tops of the ab/kidney should ideally remain aligned. This is really only evident in the arms raised photos. Reference Images: And that's it! Congratulations again on reaching EIB. I know it seems like a lot to get to Centurion, but it's clear from your build that you're a skilled armorer, so we have full confidence you'll be able to make the necessary corrections to reach Centurion. As always, reach out to us if we can be of help.

Hi Sven, Thanks for your submission, and thanks so much for the updated photos. Beautiful job on the ab/kidney alignment and evening up the gaps on your limbs. Very tall troopers such as yourself have to make as many modifications as very short troopers such as myself. CRL and Centurion Application Requirements All the required submission photos are present and on behalf of the DO team I'm pleased to congratulate you and welcome you to Centurion rank! Other-Armor Fit/Assembly: In this area we discuss any areas still needing some improvement. Although they did not hold you back from Centurion, at this level it's all about the small details that will really make your armor look its best. Since you already acknowledged the eye return edge and ear position, I won't mention those again. One small nitpick on your helmet: the left lower ear screw seems to be slightly out of place, causing it to be very close to the ear bumps. If you're feeling adventurous, you could reposition it and fill the hole. Reference Image: Another small suggestion I have is to watch your neck seal getting bunched up during dressing. Having a handler take a final look or even tucking it into your undersuit could keep it from trying to escape. Reference Image: Lastly, your sniper knee is well-aligned. Our only suggestion would be to trim both sides of the return edge a bit to match the screen-used examples better: Reference Image: And that's it! Congratulations on a really beautiful build and welcome again to Centurion! Now get out there and make The Empire proud!

Sorry, my reference image was small. Here's an annotated diagram: Basically a little handle that sticks out near the scope. I believe the thing that makes the "ch-chink" sound in action movies. Since the ANH blasters were made from actual Sterling machine guns, they retained most of the parts from the actual guns.

Pointed out here:

Eric - does your E-11 have a charging handle? It's hard to tell from the photo. Maybe it's just a bit shorter than I'm used to seeing? Reference:

Hi Eric, It looks like you have some sort of decal on your blaster, which unfortunately we're going to have to ask you to remove. This is one of those rare areas where trooping and screen accuracy collide a bit, but the L2 and L3 approvals are all about achieving the highest levels of screen accuracy. If you look back at some submissions from the UKG, you'll see they've been asked to remove the decals from their shoulder bells, for example. I know you said you're going out of town tomorrow, so if you're not able to get the new pics up before you leave, we will be here when you return.

Yup, he's provided that above.

And Eric, one last item: could you please post full left and right shots of your E-11 blaster? Thanks!

Definitely okay, but not required. Some people also just glue a small square of ABS behind the crack so the black doesn't show through.

Hi Zylo! I believe you already know this, but your TD screws will need to be replaced, as yours are dome headed Clips shall be attached with slotted, pan head style screws, and be black (two per clip). Reference image: Once you get that sorted, one of us will be with you.

Hi Eric, @gmrhodes13 is correct that the cover strip will also need to be shortened before we can proceed. Assuming you did your build with E6000, it should be a pretty simple fix - pry it up from the bottom, then snip it so it lines up with the bottom ridge. Reference: Apologies for not noticing earlier.

Hi Eric, Unless my eyes our deceiving me, you'll need to replace your TD screws before we can proceed with your application. The L2 CRL states: Clips shall be attached with slotted, pan head style screws, and be black (two per clip). Yours appear to be dome-headed: Reference: Note that when you're at the hardware store to get new screws, to make sure they are pan-headed, not V-headed. Please reach out if you're having trouble locating the correct screws; @justjoseph63 sells the correct screws if you're having trouble finding them locally.

I imagine that'd pop apart the instant you moved your arms. So on a display mannequin that seems fine but when you're actually trooping I think you'd need more flexibility.

Lightspeed! Thanks for the quick turnaround and for bearing with us as we navigate the Command Staff transition. I'll be with you soon.

Hi Eric, Great build and great photos! Could you please include the following additional photos: * Close-up of blaster D-ring * Close-up of TD screws * Straight-on photos of the left, front, and side of the sniper knee Thanks, Sha Sha

Hi Sven, Sorry for the delay; things have been a bit chaotic as we work through the Command Staff transition. One of us will be with you shortly.