Larger thigh armor - the push to Centurion

[PhoenixTrooper[TK]]

It's time to start working towards Centurion, and I want to get my ducks in a row so I have a direct path to follow. The first part I am looking at is my thighs. After years of fencing, ice hockey, and martial arts, even being out of shape I still have fairly large thigh muscles. When building my armor, the thighs didn't come close to fitting without shims. Further, due to the shape of my legs, the shimmed area had to have a V shape. There wasn't much extra material to work with, so I placed a piece of a For Rent sign inside the thighs shaped to make them fit, then put a cover strip over the outside. What I have now is this:

 

 

As you can see, it's a fairly large area that's been shimmed. Further, there's a natural lip built into the armor for the tiny legged actors that didn't need shims:

 

 

You can see it best here at the upper right, where the cover strip is meeting it.

 

So the question now is - how do I get to Centurion from here? Do I need to put a "fake" extra cover strip on the back for looks? I used a piece of scrap I had laying around to somewhat simulate what that'd look like:

 

 

Obviously that's not cut to fit or shaped, but it gives the idea. Is that look even desirable? I had to rebuild the legs twice already to get this far, so I want a solid plan going forward so when I'm done this time - I'm done. Thoughts?

[PhoenixTrooper[TK]]

bumping for advice

[Locitus[Admin]]

Inject two halves of the shim on either side of the opening. Make them flush with the existing armour. Fill any gaps and make it smooth and invisible. Then add the cover strip to cover up your new seam line.

[PhoenixTrooper[TK]]

Do you mean to cut the current cover down to fit inside flush like two butt joints without cover strips, then have a fake cover strip in the middle? Not sure what you mean when you say to inject it.

[Locitus[Admin]]

Pardon the extremely crappy drawing, but if you imagine the black is the default thigh, the blue is the shim(s) and the green is the cover strip.

[PhoenixTrooper[TK]]

Would there be a point to splitting the shim in half? Just do the blue as one piece at that point. Also, the armor itself will still have a molded ridge on either side of the blue. Is that ok ?

 

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[Locitus[Admin]]

The point is to make the edges flush and look more like the original thighs. And if you have moulded ridges in the back you should cut them off to make it level.

 

But if you are not interested in making the most of it and truly emulate the look of the originals, well then you can do whatever you like. I'm not here to argue it.

[JLight[TK]]

The point Mathias is making is that the points where the shim attaches to original thigh should be completely flush and therefore not have a visible ridge. To do that you would need to use ABS paste and then sand paper starting with a 200 grit and up to a 1000 grit and then polish it.

 

 

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[JLight[TK]]

You can search ABS paste here on the boards to learn how to make it.

 

 

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[I'm Batman[501st]]

Would there be a point to splitting the shim in half? Just do the blue as one piece at that point. Also, the armor itself will still have a molded ridge on either side of the blue. Is that ok ?

 

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That would be fine, because you're not going to see the join between the 2 blues. As long as the joins between the blue/black is seamless. As Mathias said, you should cut the ridges off so that seam is flush. (Hmm, pic didn't quote. Oh well...)

Edited June 5, 2014 by Sith Lord

[PhoenixTrooper[TK]]

Posting an update and a quick rundown of what I've done so far.

 

Bought a new set of thighs for the Centurion upgrade, so I could troop with the other set while working on this. I cut the back of the armor off before the ridge begins, and used some For Rent sign and painters tape to figure out what size the ABS shim would need to be to still fit. This is the right thigh, which previously had been said to be a bit wide at the knee, so I tightened it up quite a bit.

 

 

Once I had the correct size I used the sign material to make supports for the shim, and I cut out the shim and bent it into a curve with a heat gun. Once it was glued I took ABS paste and started putting it together.

 

This picture shows (left to right) my old thigh armor, the new one with fresh ABS paste and a scrap piece of cover strip laid on for appearance, and the back of a stormtrooper figure for comparison.

 

About 10-12 repetitive layers of ABS, sanding, ABS, sanding, ABS, sanding... I eventually decided it was probably the best it was going to get, and finally glued a real strip on it. Here it is as of right now, magnets still on as the E-6000 is fresh.

 

Oh, I also built a bottom ridge on to make it look right.

 

One more leg to go....