CloseTheBlastDoor

Since getting approved and joining the 501st, it is hard to put into words how fun it's been! I did my first troop a few weeks ago, and had a blast. I've met people from around the world, and I feel like there are so many new things to explore. Also, being a part of the Golden Gate Garrison has its perks! Again, thanks to all those who've helped me get here! I'm ready to try for EIB! Looking at the CRL, I think I'm pretty close. Being as close as possible to Centurion for the initial build was my goal, and I've since redone the clips on my TD, as well as adjusted the shoulder bridges. Nevertheless I know there are still many places for improvement. I think what I will need to do is step through the CRL piece by piece with photos of where I'm at. I'll start with the helmet. Helmet CRL, L2 (slightly rearranged): Ears shall have three screws per side, one above and one below the ear bar and one at the base of the helmet. Ear bars have four bumps only. Not three. These seem good to me: Traps/tears and tube stripes shall have the correct ANH TK details. Ideally, the tube stripes are positioned approximately a pencil width from the side of the cheek. Fall of tube stripe tops ideally lean toward the front. I might be a bit wide on the pencil width, and I hope that the use of trap stickers is OK: Correct Aerators/Hovi-MIX tips are present. Screens used shall be of a wide type mesh, with the rim of the mic and the inside white or painted white. The mesh is what came with the WTF kit, but I don't know whether it suits the definition of "wide." Thoughts?

I've not in a while, but maybe I should! BTW I just glanced at your profile- happy 10th anniversary on this forum!

Awesome! I hope we get to do that travel (but not at the exact same time, since we'll miss each other )

Done! I could not have done this without you, Glen! A thousand thanks. If I'm ever Down Under, or if you're ever in the San Francisco area, I want to buy you dinner!

TK-47826 requesting 501st access https://www.501st.com/members/displaymemberdetails.php?userID=43737 Thank you

Definitely good advice! I still can't imagine getting to your level of comfort with that, though!

I'm glad that things improved for you. And I'm glad it's OK to have the rubber gloves for approval, but switch them out for actual troops. I can already see what a godsend the handlers will be, too! I am thinking also that the neck seal blocks airflow into the helmet, and maybe there are some clever ways to mitigate that issue. I'm thinking some airline tubing under the seal that runs between the helmet and the underside of the chest plate. I'm sure there are better solutions out there .

YESSSS!!! I would love that!

Thanks, I can't imagine what it's like to troop in that heat!

Thanks for the tips! Those gloves look nice.

Thank you for that detailed explanation, I will take it to heart! I'm sorry you had that episode pushing so hard, but am glad that you were OK!

Thanks all, for those tips! For the approval photos, I was only in my living room, which was like 70 F, and sweating like crazy . Maybe I was nervous, too. I will figure this out, BUT... I JUST GOT THE EMAIL THAT I WAS APPROVED FOR THE GOLDEN GATE GARRISON!!!! I am so overjoyed!!! Thank you to all of you for all of the support you gave me! I could have never done it without you! It's an amazing feeling! I will write more later, but just wanted to let y'all know. Party time!!!!

Still waiting on approval, but in the meantime I want to start thinking about heat. For sure it was too hot in the helmet, so I'm gonna get some fans installed. I think the neck seal cuts off a lot of air flow. The gloves also get pretty hot, and I've seen people use cotton liners, so I'll get those too. Any other tips on staying cool? I couldn't stay in the suit for more than 20 minutes!

Oh yeah, that's a good solution!

Thanks for the feedback and encouragement! It's a funny thing about the TD: I had it higher before, but then I saw somewhere that the row of buttons is supposed to point towards the back, not up, so I rolled the whole thing out a bit. I'm not a fan of how it looks rolled out like that, so I might have to make entirely new clips at some point.

Yup, I saw that creeping glove after the fact . For sure, adjusting the forearms would help. I was having trouble bending my arms. And boy did I discover how important fans will be in the helmet! I was indeed in search of my black background from my stock photography days, but could not find it. All I had was the white, I hope it won't cause too much headache.

Thank you, Glen, I tried my best with fitting everything. I suspect there will be feedback about thigh-to-knee gap, etc. I have always suspected that I have longer than average limbs. Probably some other boo-boos since I didn't have a full length mirror. Here's what I submitted:

Thanks, Glen! I checked with the Golden Gate Garrison, and there are no additional requirements. I think I'm going to go ahead and submit to them without the pre-approval, since every step of the way I've had your expert guidance!!!!! I think very little could go wrong. Will try and check overall fit first to look for anything glaring.

More other stuff: I finally got around to shaping and gluing the shoulder bridges: In this case, I found that careful use of a heat gun was better than a soak in boiling water. There’s really not much contact between the shoulder bridge and the chest plate, so I globbed on a bit more E-6000 in the pockets of the blades near the contacting edges. Also secured the ab button plates while I was at it: Dare I say that I am possibly at the end of the build (and I can’t believe that I’m saying that)! I looked over my punch list of items, and things are looking pretty good. What would be the next step? I see a place where I can request for TK pre-approval, is that where I go? https://www.whitearmor.net/forum/forum/193-request-tk-pre-approval/

Better, I hope?

Yeah, this one I was worried about, but it's the way the decals came -all together. Any idea how easy it is to remove and relocate them? They seem really delicate.

Thanks. Yes, I've seen others have to do this too. Not sure why the WTF kit does it this way.

With the visor I ended up not anywhere near where I thought, but it works. As mentioned in the previous post, the plastic wasn’t long enough to reach the ear screws, so I opted for the Chicago screw method. I made three of these posts like TKZombie did, out of the screw bases and some ABS: Traced and cut the visor, then drilled a hole in the center. After a test fit of the visor, it looked like I could get away with one screw, and some heat-bent ABS strip to tack it down: So the visor pressure-fits against the eye holes, and I’m gonna call this good enough. You’ll also note that I’ve added pads in weird places. This was an adventure. I spent a whole bunch of time discovering the true shape of my head. Basically it’s pointy near the back, then there’s a playground slide to the front of my face. And I guess my head is skinny, too, because the pads around the ears only barely touch me. And then since I’m Asian, my eyes are more forward to the visor, so I added padding at the nose so my face is pushed back a bit (see the Velcro in last photo?). Here’s what it turned out looking like. Still plenty of room for fans and electronics: This started getting exciting, so I went ahead and tried to finish the helmet. Studied a bunch of vocoder paint jobs, and got to work on that, since the other day I finally got a hold of the semi-gloss black. Lots of fine point painting, and mineral spirit toothpicking later, I had this: I think mine is closest to this reference: What say you, elders? I had done the hovi tips a little while ago, but didn’t post about them. I used the round mesh screens provided with the WTF kit, and I’m hoping it’s OK, because from the CRL I am still confused about what “Screens used shall be of a wide type mesh” really means. Dave’s Darkside videos were helpful here, too. Because the supporting area where the hovi tips sit is very thin plastic, they are backed with large washers about equal to the diameter of the tips. I then added the S-seal and the decals. Might I really be done with the helmet?

Ooh, that looks amazing! I had already gone past this point when I saw this. Hopefully mine will be as reliable as yours! Thanks for the suggestion!

I totally hear you on that. I try to build most everything with future repair/replacement in mind. For me, it's an engineering mindset, I suppose.