troopermaster

Looks mint Pete!

Continuity? Ever watched ANH? The ab plates were heavily modified for the new ESB2 suits (which are essentially ROTJ) so it's my guess that they just stuck the button plate back onto the moulds when casting it, not realising (or caring) if it was the same as before.

The ROTJ suits were already in the making probably before this photo was taken so I doubt this is 'The one'. As already stated, the plate most likely fell off and was just attached upside down.

You'll soon catch on with these idioms, they are "a piece of p!$$"

Me too

Lookin' good!

Jim, The piece with the 3 buttons on is the part for the belt rivet covers. You need to cut them to 1" squares then glue to the plastic ammo belt once it's been fitted to the canvas. Joining strips are included with the kit

Here's a couple of my old ESB helmets.

Incredible

I agree with Shawn, the frown should be thicker. Everything else is looking sweet!

Glue the parts together first and see how they fit. If you need to trim them, cut the backs of the knees first by removing the edge/trim on the bottom of the thigh and top of the shins. This mod will help a lot without chopping down the actual length of the legs. If it is still a problem, trim a bit from the bottom of the shin at the ankle area, following the same lines as the original shape only shorter. As a last resort, trim the tops of the thghs but that really shouldn't be neccesary.

I have some of the correct style snaps that I bought on ebay from a guy in Bulgaria. While they look almost perfect, the male part is too big (couple mm's) to be 100% accurate but they do look nice all the same. I can send you some if you want Keith?

Send me another message if you have a query

The problem Mark, is that Paul's calf muscles are larger than what the armour was made for so you would have to have one large strip. I tried that at first but it stuck out just as bad. I thought two smaller strips would be better but the problem is still there. I thought maybe some vinyl or leather on the inside to hide the black gap and just have one cover strip on the outside. I thought someone might have had the same kind of problems with their calves and might be able to shed some light on the situation for Paul?

Much better now Dan

The whole sole is not painted white, just the edges and heel. If you think they are black like ANH and ESB your wrong.

Yes, these new ones are not so sharp like the originals. The old ones were too sharp and the shape was not quite right. It was only up until recently when I acquired HD screen grabs from ESB that I decided to have a go at more accurate hand plates and these are the results. I'll have some hand plates available this weekend

DM's are very chunky boots and not suitable IMO. Personally I would leave them and get some chelsea boots and paint them white or at least get some CAboots and paint the sole white.

It could be a VM. I only know of two helmet makers who make their helmets with a seperate dome, VM and RT. It doesn't look like an RT to me. The 'tab' as you call it is actually webbing. This is the result of poor vacuum forming and it's caused be over heating the plastic and applying the vacuum too quickly. Can you tell if it's HIPS or ABS?

I personally cannot pull a welders visor on my machine, though it might be possible on a small version.

AA told me the bubble lenses were vac formed into a mould so the eyes popped out. This is easy to do if you have a control valve on your vac machine like I do, but I can only form 2' x 2' sheets at the moment. I searched high and low for green acrylic in 1mm but never found anything and gave up on the idea. Now I am forced to use way too thick 3mm perspex. It does the job, but not ideal.

Wasn't your first helmet an ESB2 with the square frown?

Looking good from here Shawn! Good to see Matt removed the rivet overs from the belt and has got some plastic shoulder straps, though they do still look ANH without the starting box at the front, better than elastic anyway. The shins are done right too. I know the originals were assembeld any old way but I think that if the shins are not made right they feel awkward when worn, at least they did when I treid wearing mine on the wrong legs. The only thing I am not too crazy about is the gloss black paint, other than that, it's looking sweet

Well there are only two people who are members here that might have photos of this mould from way back then, DL and JJ. If they do have photos that they would share, it could help help disprove Gino's claims. I for one know that the tubes were modified as well as the area behind the ear caps. I don't have any hard evidence to show unfortunately, just what I see when Gino's helmets are compared to the originals. I think there are photo comparisons with the Dave M. helmet somewhere, but Gino dismissed all the evidence as his helmet was not cast from the Dave M. Heck, I didn't know they had different moulds for each stunt helmet