fragarock's RS Stunt build - Not to scale

[fragarock[TK]]

After seeing the post showing how the RS Props team cuts the scoop into the forearms I decided to do the same. But I figured I better look at the forearm variations in ANH before I did anything. So, the best shots were when The Falcon is first pulled into the DS. Here are some screenshots taken with my phone. After combing thru the film for about 40 minutes I noticed the following:

 

1. Each trooper's armour varies a bit.

2. There were a lot of broken pieces. When Leia is captured, one guy has his bicep held together with white tape.

3. Elbow end of forearms sometimes have returns, sometimes not.

4. Size and shape of the scoop out of the inner forearm varies between left and right and between troopers.

5. Scoop doesn't get cut out of the cover strip ridges, they remain unharmed.

 

So, I decided to follow what seemed to be the predominant scoop shape as shown for right forearms (left forearms were much longer scoops) as it looked better...more of a nice curve.

 

 

 

 

So here's what I did, drew a nice curve with the deepest part about 1.5" down from the inner elbow line.

 

Here's after I cut it out with scissors.

 

 

Then I trim the edges with an xacto to remove any burs or uneven cut lines. The plastic cuts easily especially when taking off thin slices.

 

Here's the top after trimming the scoop and sanding the edges. I kept the return edges where possible. You'll notice I am doing inner cover strips. This first one was supposed to be the outer strip but I botched it and cut it too short. So, it's now an inner strip. Quickly realized that I better order spare white ABS from amazon otherwise I won't have enough of the original matching color ABS sheet that came with the armor. Also, saving all my ABS trimmings for future ABS paste when I need to do repairs.

 

Here are shots before final assembly of cover strips. By this point I've aligned the top and bottom edges, took a heat iron to a couple elbow side return edges to make the inner and outer forearm pieces align better, and adjusted the overall diameters.

 

 

Here's the top cover strip going on. Sanded the back side of the cover strip to roughen it up and give the glue a better surface to adhere to. Didn't bother sanding the armor. Prior to this I installed the inner cover strip. Clamps, magnets, etc.

 

Here are final shots of the left forearm. This is top view.

 

 

Inner view

 

Bottom view.

 

 

And on my arm. I think I'll need to add a bit of foam near below the scoop to keep this from rattling around too much when I move.

 

[fragarock[TK]]

Now it's time to do the right forearm. While the left was very slim and had a curvature similar to an actual forearm, the right one is very boxy in shape. Also, it seems a bit wider and longer than the left one.

Here's the outer piece as it came out-of-the-box.

 

 

Here's the uncut wrist end.

 

Here's the top elbow end.

 

 

My intent was to make assembly of this piece faster since I had just done the other forearm and worked thru cutting methods, ways to glue, etc. So my plan was to trim the outer piece first as your trimming options are somewhat limited due to raised cover strip areas and the dimples. First thing to do is to shorten the length of this piece.

Grabbed my compass and used that to transfer a consistent offset line from the existing wrist return edge up. This gets rid of the return edge and shortens the length which I need for a better fit.

I also cut out the extra material from the return edge at the elbow end....didn't take pictures though.

 

 

This is the inner piece of the right forearm looking at the front. Elbow is at top, wrist at bottom. You can see it came with a lot of extra material on it. So, like I previously did, I placed a couple lines to identify a minimum 7.5mm edge to keep which would eventually be covered by the cover strip. Used scissors to cut this. Plan here was to remove the material at the front of the piece and then see how it aligned with the front of the outer dimpled piece that I previously trimmed.

 

Here you can see how much longer the inner piece is compared to the outer dimpled piece. At this point I had to make a decision what to do to get these pieces to align. Since return edges have to be removed at the wrist, I decided that's where I would cut this piece down to size. That would also leave me the return edges at the elbow end which I want to keep. In this photo, the elbow is at the bottom of the photo.

 

 

Here's it with the elbow ends aligned. You can see there's lots of material to trim out of the return edges.

 

Here's how it will look with elbow ends aligned.

 

Here I used my compass to make the offset lines for trimming the return edges. I left a bit more material so I'd have a bit of a safety factor to trim additional material out once I get the two pieces attached.

 

Here's the material removed at the elbow return edges.

 

At this point I've got the front cover strip edges cut down, Trimmed off extra material at the elbow returns, and trimmed the wrist end of the outer piece. Here's a test fit. Now I need to cut off the bottom wrist end of the inner piece as it's way too long.

 

I again used my compass to transfer offset lines from the existing bottom edge up to where I need the new cut line to be.

 

 

 

That's it for now as this piece is being glued with it's first cover strips. More update soon.

[fragarock[TK]]

Finally back to updating. I've completed the right forearm and starte the left bicep which is currently getting its cover strips. So, progress is being made although its slow.

 

Back to the right forearm. After trimming material from the bottom edge that was way too long I made my inner cover strips out of scrap left over from trimming and then glued them in place. Because this piece was a bit larger than the left forearm I had to trim out more material and at an odd angle to get the elbow and wrists ends to be similar in size to the other forearm. Removing this much material out of the inside piece means when the inside and outside piece are joined, they no longer make a nice circular shape, more like a flattened oval. This makes it harder to connect the back side joints together. So, my process has been to do the inner cover strips first, applying them to the outer piece. Second I do the outer cover strip on the front facing joint. That way I have a nice strong bond. That way, when I torque the back facing joint into place I don't have to worry about the front joint coming apart (the E6000 may be plenty strong but I like to be cautious). As you can see I had to tape the crap out of the piece while gluing the inner cover strips on the back side, otherwise it wanted to spring apart.

 

 

The rest of the process is just like the left forearm. I did have to take a heat iron and roll down some of the return edges at the elbow. Where the two piece come together at the top the return edges don't always align nicely so a little heat helps to match them up.

 

Here are shots of the completed right forearm. Here's the outer side.

 

Here's the inner side.

 

Here's the front.

 

Here's the back side.

 

While the left forearm didn't have a scoop taken out if it at the elbow, forcing me to cut one out, this right firearm does have a bit of a scoop. I may trim it down a bit so it matches the left one. Does anyone know if this is a critical item for approvals? Based on the film still I took, there's a lot of variation between left and right pieces anyways so I'm thinking it's OK to have them non-symmetrical.

 

Finally, I need some advice on reshaping these pieces, especially the bicep pieces. When doing the hot water baths are people using hot tap water or boiling water from the stove? How long do you soak the piece for and how malleable is it once removed from the water....how much time do you have to bend it before it stiffens up again?

 

Thanks for reading and any feedback you can offer would be excellent.

[Cricket[TK]]

Finally, I need some advice on reshaping these pieces, especially the bicep pieces. When doing the hot water baths are people using hot tap water or boiling water from the stove? How long do you soak the piece for and how malleable is it once removed from the water....how much time do you have to bend it before it stiffens up again?

For me, the biceps were the easiest pieces to shape in the hot water bath.  My hot water from the tap didn't get hot enough, so I boiled water in a 6 quart pot.  Using tongs, I dropped the bicep into the simmering water for not very long... maybe ten seconds?  I was always worried that I would leave it in too long, so I tried to keep it in there for as short of a time as possible.  I wore chemical gloves so I could handle and shape the bicep quickly after removal without getting burned.  I recall that there wasn't much time to work with it after removing from the hot water.

 

Once I got the bicep into the shape I wanted, I put it under a stream of cold water to help it cool faster and hold the shape.  If I didn't like it afterwords, I would put it back into the boiling water and reshape it.  

[fragarock[TK]]

For me, the biceps were the easiest pieces to shape in the hot water bath. My hot water from the tap didn't get hot enough, so I boiled water in a 6 quart pot. Using tongs, I dropped the bicep into the simmering water for not very long... maybe ten seconds? I was always worried that I would leave it in too long, so I tried to keep it in there for as short of a time as possible. I wore chemical gloves so I could handle and shape the bicep quickly after removal without getting burned. I recall that there wasn't much time to work with it after removing from the hot water.

 

Once I got the bicep into the shape I wanted, I put it under a stream of cold water to help it cool faster and hold the shape. If I didn't like it afterwords, I would put it back into the boiling water and reshape it.

So the E6000 glue doesn't come apart in the hot water?

 

Sent from my SM-G935V using Tapatalk

[Cricket[TK]]

The glue will soften, but with the short amount of time that you have them in the water, they shouldn't come apart.  My biceps were glued with cover strips inside and out before I tried this.  (The e6000 had cured for several days before I stuck them in the boiling water.)

You can also wrap the biceps with blue tape before dunking them in order to give the joints more support.

[illusionz_09[TK]]

Looking good!!!

Nice job, i'm def enjoying the progress.

[fragarock[TK]]

Hi Guys,

 

This next section shows work on my biceps...and trust me...they need some work. I started off with the left. To identify the left from right you have to know that there is a curve on each outer piece. This curve faces forwards when you wear it. Keep in mind that the outside piece has the raised edge on it. That's how you can figure it out. Pretty simple right?

 

 

Here's a shot of the outer piece.

 

 

First thing I do is cut out the excess material in the return edges. I use scissors to get the shape, fine tuning it with a dremel sanding drum. Then take some fine sandpaper and make it smooth.

 

Here's the top end after trimming. You can see I still need to sand down the edges.

 

After getting the top and bottom return edges trimmed I taped the inner and outer pieces together for some measurements. I measured the circumference around my flexed bicep, then around the armor piece. Subtract the difference and you know how much material to cut out. Remember to leave about 1/2" all around the inside between the plastic and your arm. In my case I needed to remove about 3" total material. You can see in the picture below that the inner piece has quite the cured profile where it tucks under your armpit. I didn't want to mess with that joint so the area I cut out was cut from the outer piece. Basically 1.5" from each side of the outer piece.

 

 

Top view.

 

Marking my cut lines on the outer piece.

 

 

Here are the pieces after trimming.

 

 

You'll see the top return edges on each side of the cut joint don't align. Since this top part will be covered by the shoulder bell, that's where the trimming will happen. I want to leave the bottom edges in tact. I simply cut this piece off which will show in another photo.

 

 

Next I do the inner cover strips which are from ABS I ordered from Amazon. It's bright white in color while the ABS sheets from RS are a creamy white. Since they're inside where nobody will see them, the color doesn't matter.

 

 

Here's the outer cover strip going on.

 

Here are completed assembly shots. Still need to trim off some of the E6000 that oozed out from under the cover strips. I use a pair of tweezers to pull it off.

 

 

Here's the top view. You can see where I simply trimmed off that upper return edge piece that stuck up above the adjacent piece.

 

Here's a rough test fit. Looking in the mirror so it looks like my right side but its' the left.

[fragarock[TK]]

Here's the right bicep trimming and assembly. In this shot I've already trimmed down the upper and lower return edges on both pieces. But haven't yet adjusted them for diameter around my skinny arm.

 

 

The uncut outer piece has a wraparound circumference of about 9" at the top. I'm gonna have to take about 2" total off that to fit my arm.

 

You can see there's a lot of space between my arm and the plastic. It's about a 3" gap. So, if I leave 1/2" all around, that means I need to take 2" of material off the piece. I'll remove the material from the outer piece, 1" from each side.

 

 

Here I've marked 1" of material to be removed from one side of the outer piece. Did the same on the other side of the same piece. Again, I like to cut with scissors then rim up the joint a litter. Doesn't have to be perfectly straight as the cover strips will hide any imperfections.

 

 

Here is the front of this right bicep. As you can see the top return edges don't align...not even close.

 

Here's the back side. Same problem.

 

After installing the inner cover strips I started thinking about ways to deal with this. On the left bicep where this happened, the height difference was small so I trimmed it off with an Xacto. On this piece difference is a lot and it's on both the front and the back. Crap! I could cut it off but then I have a lot of length where there should be a return edge but there won't be one anymore. This is covered by the shoulder bell but I just didn't want to make that big of a hack.

 

So......Time to be bold and bring out Mr. Heat Gun!

The front side difference was a bit shorter so figured I start there. I splurged and bought the heat gun with the digital temp reading. After testing on a piece of scrap with the same thickness as the piece I wanted to bend I found that between 350 and 400 would do the trick. I held the nozzle about an inch from the plastic, moving it back and forth constantly so as not to put all the heat in one area. Try to put the heat only in the area you want to bend but don't hold it still on a single spot, keep it moving. This took some experimenting and it's not quite working the way I want but it came out okay.

 

I softened up that tall return edge and bent it over using a pair of needle nose pliers. Threw some tape on the end so that I didn't transfer the texture of the plyers into the plastic. Once I bent it over, I heated it again and then used the flat end of a hammer to make the final push into place.

 

 

Well, that was semi-successful. So lets do the back side.

 

This time I stuck the heat gun in my vice so I could hold the piece in one hand while working the bend with the other.

 

Same process as before. Bend a little, heat, bend a little more. This one wasn't perfect but I do feel I'm at least gaining experience points for trying this. Ultimately will have to build a plywood jig like Christine did.

 

Once I had it bent, took scissors and trimmed down the return edge, sanded and viola! Here are the final shots of the assembled piece. Let me know if this seems okay or if something doesn't look right.

Outer right bicep front view.

 

Side shot.

 

Back side.

 

Here's the top/back side. Think I need to cut down the top of that cover strip? It's aligned with the top of the piece but the return edge curves in so much that there's a small gap as the cover strip can't bend that much.

 

Thanks for tuning in. Next will be shoulder bells.

[fragarock[TK]]

Let's continue the updates!

 

Shoulder bells seem like the next piece to make. I cut these down while the biceps were in various states of assembly. These seem to be the easiest pieces to trim as there's not much to them. Knowing how to do it is the problem. Luckily I remembered that Christine had contacted Rob at RS Prop Masters asking how to trim these. She relayed the info, from the bottom of the raised edge measure 12" up to set the top trim point.

 

 

From the bottom of the raised edge measure over 5". I took this to mean from the edge of the raised edge, not the center...but that's a guess.

 

 

Between those two points draw a line using your metal ruler. Cut, sand, etc. Do this on both sides of the shoulder bell. See how much extra material is on this sucker!

 

 

Now, when I first laid this line out I thought it looked a bit odd. Could this really be intended to have a taper to it? I figured Rob at RS knew what he was doing but I had to check the movie to be sure. Sure enough the shoulder bells do have a taper as you can see below.

 

 

And the full line up of guys showing off their fancy armor.

 

So once I was convinced I got out the scissors and started cutting. For comparison here's the trimmed one next to the out-of-the-box one.

 

Here's the finished version.

 

I left a bit of a return edge on the bottom, about 6 mm. Is this okay or is it supposed to me completely removed?

 

Trimming up the other one was the same process so I won't bore you with photos. At the end of working these pieces I have a couple questions that I hope you guys can answer.

 

 

1. Is there a way to tell which of these is the left and right? Both pieces are kinda wonky in shape so does it even matter?

2. This is an RS kit. See how much taller the one bell is compared to the other? Is this a quirk in RS armor or is it universal?

3. Should this taller piece be cut down to match the other one? If so I guess I'll have to trim off the bottom return edges.

4. For you shorter troopers, did you find that you needed to trim the bottoms of these anyways for them to look proportionally correct to the rest of your armor?

 

Thanks again for taking the time to look and comment.

 

I think the next area I'll tackle is the chest and back plate setup. Since so much of the main armor pieces hang off and interface with these, I better start getting them into shape. Working on the arm pieces has been a good start but these larger center pieces will make or break the armor assembly depending on how I get the to connect and get them reshaped to fit my size. Reading Diana's and Christine's build threads I'm sure I'll have to trim out the neck scoop to get the armor to sit higher on my chest and trim out the bottom of the chest so the ab buttons aren't completely covered.

 

Any recommendations on how to proceed with what will surely be one of the more complicated parts of this assembly?

[Cricket[TK]]

1. Is there a way to tell which of these is the left and right? Both pieces are kinda wonky in shape so does it even matter?

2. This is an RS kit. See how much taller the one bell is compared to the other? Is this a quirk in RS armor or is it universal?

3. Should this taller piece be cut down to match the other one? If so I guess I'll have to trim off the bottom return edges.

4. For you shorter troopers, did you find that you needed to trim the bottoms of these anyways for them to look proportionally correct to the rest of your armor?

 

Any recommendations on how to proceed with what will surely be one of the more complicated parts of this assembly?

 

1. The left shoulder bell has a swoop to it where it kind of flares out a bit at the bottom.

2.  Mine are the same.  Guessing it's universal for shoulder bells.

3. I wouldn't make 'em match.  From what I've read, they're gloriously asymmetrical.

4.  *can't answer this one for you yet.  Sorry!

 

Regarding recommendations on how to proceed with the chest, all I can say is to cut a little at a time as you go.  Trim, fit, trim, fit.  I ended up trimming a lot on all sides, but it took me a while to get there.  Be patient and you'll get there!  Good luck, trooper!

[Racermouse[TK]]

4. For you shorter troopers, did you find that you needed to trim the bottoms of these anyways for them to look proportionally correct to the rest of your armor?

 

I'm very short, I didn't cut of any.

[fragarock[TK]]

Hi Troopers,

 

The past week has been busy with project deadlines and a business trip to St. Louis to visit a factory. I haven't had much time to work on my armor but in a few hours of time here and there I did get something done...sort of.

I started to work with the torso pieces. After getting the hang of things with the arms sections I figured sizing and shaping the torso should be then next area to tackle. Going into this phase I was a bit hesitant since these are the biggest pieces and I didn't want to mess them up. Also, I am still working out how all these will connect and more importantly how they should interface with each other.

 

So, I dove in with some basic trimming. I know if you use the hook system you need a larger return edge to make the connection. I ordered the screen acurate strapping system so I may use that or go with the hook aproach. Since I don't know which way I'm going yet I figured I better leave a return edge.

 

For the hook system, what's the proper retrun edge size?

 

Here's a photo of the ab/kidbey piece out-of-the box.

 

 

Here I started trimming the top.

 

Here's a side shot where I've marked the line for trimming. For the sides, what is the proper return edge size?

 

 

Rough placement. This piece is really wide and stick out quite a bit pas my sides as you can see. A little heat bending is in order I think.

This piece came with the rivets for the belt already installed. I'm presuming these should align with my waist but I'm not totally sure. Part of the issue in figuring this out is that this piece is so big. Presuming the rivets are supposed to roughly align with my waist, where does the cod piece fall? Seems like it's a bit too low and I'll probably have to heat bend it to curve it under more. When the cod piece connects to the piece on the butt, how tight is this supposed to be at the crotch? I'm not sure if the cod and the underpiece of the butt part are supposed to be touching or just be close to touching?

 

[fragarock[TK]]

Like the ab piece, I started trimming out the butt piece. Again, I'm not sure how much of a return edge there should be.

Here's are some shots pre-trimming and during trimming.

 

 

 

 

 

I think I'll have to give this the heat gun treatment as well to bend the sides in around me a bit more.

 

For the chest and back piece I taped them together several (okay, about nine) times before I figured out how they should be connected. At first I connected the bridging on the chest and back so they were touching. Since I'm kinda stocky this meant the neither the chest nor the back would hang vertically and lay flat on me. Eventually I realized I'll need to separate them with a gap of about 1" or 1.25" where the bridge meets across the top.

 

You can see the bottom edge and sides of the chest piece flare out a lot. I'll have to heat gun them to make them curve around me better. Also I'll cut down the neck a bit to make more room....it's choking a bit.

 

 

First I trimmed the neck, cutting out 1/2" at the bottom of the scoop and flaring back up to the original neck line. After re-taping to the back piece and trying on again I needed to take another 1/2" out.

 

 

After getting it to a comfortable size I made a new return edge with the heat iron.

 

Here's the test fit with the new neck line. Getting better and makes more room to allow the chest piece to sit a bit higher on me.

Yes I am still wearing my black dress socks with shorts...that's just how I roll.

 

Next I bent the sides to fit tighter around me, especially the bottom portions on the bottom which were flaring out. Basically set my heat gun to 700 degrees and heated the area to bend then bent it over a little by hand letting it cool, then bending a bit more.

 

 

 

Here's the modified piece. At this point it seems to fit pretty well. I'll have a better idea how much trimming of the sides is needed (if any) once I work on the ab and kidney pieces.

 

 

 

Next it's the kidney piece. Here's the untrimmed piece....pretty bumpy and definitely not symmetrical.

 

RS even puts the kidney notch into the sides...who knew? I trimmed this up just like the others. Again, not sure of the exact return edge widths here so if someone knows please let me know.

 

 

 

Here's my next dilemma. The bottom edge of the back and top edge of the kidney are not level, they each have their own bumpiness. Should I attempt to flatten out each of these so that they fit together cleanly? I'm worried about having an uneven gap which will be unprovable. This shot show how uneven they are.

 

 

THis shot shows that the bottom of the back has a different curvature than the top of the kidney. Are they supposed to match up like the bottom of the kidney and butt match up? Also, looks like I'll have to trim off the pointy bottom corners  of the back piece otherwise they'll hang over or stick under the kidney piece. Anyone else have to deal with this condition? I seems so weird to me that they wouldn't match up.

 

 

That's it for tonight. Please let me know what you think about the alignment of these back and kidney pieces. It will really help to get some guidance.

[fragarock[TK]]

Realized I double posted the same photo in my last update. Here's the photo I wanted which shows the uneveness where the back and kidney align.

 

[fragarock[TK]]

Merry Christmas Eve Troopers!

 

My last posts were a while ago. I've been busy at work and my wife and I have been working to get ready for the onslought of Christmas parties and the big day tomorrow.

After I trimmed my chest piece I took a night to go review the strapping system of hooks and elastic that came with the RS suit. I also looked at ukswrath Anovos build and Tropperbay's videos. What I realized is, I should have looked at this BEFORE I trimmed the torso pieces. To get the brackets to mount with enough meat on the return edge to hold the screws I should have kept around 10mm. On some of my pieces I have about 6mm. This may be OK but it's cutting it close and I may have to reinforce with ABS strips to not only make these attachment points stronger but also make them a bit wider. Doh!!

 

I didn't get much feedback on my last post. Maybe everyone was thinking, "he really screwed up his return edges....let's not tell him".

 

I did take another look at how the chest and ab pieces fit together. Previously trimmed the neck and curved the sides to wrap around me. After looking at the relationship of these two I decided to trim off some material from the bottom, more like the Luke hero suit. This will reduce the scale of this piece and hopefully make it look more proportional to the rest of me.

 

I guessed at about 1.5" of material to remove to get the new curve. But I also needed to create a new return edge for my bracket system so I only cut away about an inch. I used my compass to transfer the original bottom edge profile up to the new cut line but I also enhanced the swoop a bit.

 

 

 

 

After mentally committing to what could be a serious screw-up I dove in and started cutting.

 

 

 

Oh man.....what have I done? No turning back now. Time to get the heat gun and try to make a new return edge. I set my gun to 400 and started at one end. To bend the sections I used a pair of pliers with the head wrapped in masking tape so that it wouldn't mark up the soft plastic. This may not be the best way but it kind of worked. Biggest complaint is i'd love to use something wider as the pliers can only bend about an inch of material at a time. There's got to be a better tool /MacGyver contraption out there. Here's the beginning of the bend.

 

 

I kept going, doing a bit more and more.

 

 

Here's the initial pass. The shape looked good from the front but it's pretty messy underneath.

 

 

From the front it looks pretty good.

 

 

The return edge was a lot harder to make than I thought it would be. Bending was easy but the curve of the armor and thus extra material in the bend caused some rippling. I'm not very happy with the look. Perhaps I could get away with leaving it but it would be slightly noticeable from below and would drive me nuts if I don't fix it. Note that the return edge is about 10mm.

 

Here's a rough fitting with the new bottom edge. Seems pretty good as my ab button plate will now be visible. What do you think?

 

 

 

To smooth out the ripple on my chest return edge I went back and looked at Christine's ABS paste extravaganza in her build thread. If it worked for her it should work here too. So I mixed up some ABS paste out of the some of my saved clippings (I'm saving them all for future repairs). While the ABS paste is brewing I went to work on my back piece.

 

 

 

 

Once I get the chest return edge smoothed out, I want to hook up the chest to the back with the real straps as well as the ab piece. That way I can start hanging the kidney and but pieces with tape and get a good idea how much I'll have to trim off THE BOTTOM (lesson learned from Christine) of the kidney. So I pulled out my notes from the other night when I went thru the strapping system.

 

The RS accurate strapping kit comes with the shoulder straps already containing the snap for the shoulder bells. Previously I determined that I needed 1 inch between the chest and back armor pieces so that made it easy to center these straps and glue them with E6000 to the back. I had to keep looking at it, making sure the snaps were pointing down. Once this was done I set it aside and went back to the chest for some body work.

 

I used a small putty knife to trowel on some paste. It was relatively thin, about the consistency of Elmer's glue. The point was to fill in the ripples and end up with a level finished surface. I figure this would take several layers to achieve the flatness. Here's the first layer sanded down with 400 grit sandpaper around a sanding block. I couldn't find my sanding block so I had to use one of my kids wooden toy blocks and wrap the sandpaper around that. Whatever works right? This seems to be okay to me. I kind of like the control I have with this method. I think it will end up looking good and be quite strong for the hooks to mount to.

 

 

Here's the second layer of goop. I'll let this dry and do some more sanding after Christmas.

 

 

The next piece to work on in between ABS gooping will be the shoulder bridging. The RS kit doesn't come with cut marks so how much flat area do I leave beyond the raised ridges when I cut these? Also since they are one big curved piece that doesn't bend much what's the best way to cut these out?

 

 

Merry Christmas everyone!

[AsBlondeAsLuke[TK]]

Thanks. Yours was the first build I saw on the FISD and convinced me that it was possible to trim the armor down. Glad to have any input you can share, especially on some of the esoteric cutting and trimming requirements (like the scoop out of the forearms).

 

You mentioned a FB page. What's the name of the page? I'd love to look it up.

 

Sent from my SM-G935V using Tapatalk

Hi Frank-

 

I can get you added in to the FB page.  It's a private group, but a very friendly one.  Please look me up on FaceBook as "Diana Wolf Torres" so we can connect and I can get you added in.  The group is almost at 500 members already.  So, rest assured you are in great company.  There are a lot of awesome building tips and tricks being exchanged on there and the best comeback lines to "Aren't you a little short for a stormtrooper?"

 

-D.  

[fragarock[TK]]

Hi,

 

Since I left off with a question on shoulder bridges, let's start there.

This piece didn't seem to flexible so I was worried about bending and breaking it. But I found it actually bends quite a bit. So I clamped it down and scored it a few times with my utility knife. Then snapped it apart. Pretty easy.

 

 

 

Once I had it apart I ground down the excess material off the sides using a belt sander, finishing off with some hand sanding. Here they are.

 

 

 

Now I'm going to fast forward a bit and jump to a critical area I really need some help on. I'm trying to install the screen accurate strapping between the chest and ab. When positioned relative to each other in the way I want, the wire hooks are really far apart. I can't really expect to have an elastic strap that long can I? That can't work! What do I do here? Do I need to cut down the top of the ab piece and reinstall those brackets so they're close to the brackets on the chest? I'm gonna have to cut off a lot of the ab if that's the solution.

 

Short troopers please HELP!!

 

[Cricket[TK]]

Yep, you're going to have to trim off the top of the ab if you want to use the brackets.  You'll be a lot more comfortable that way, too!  My ab was much too tall for me.  It was more like a chest plate.  You may also need to consider cutting your cod down so you don't cut off too much ab detail.  Here are some before and after pics of my resizing once I trimmed the ab and the cod down:

 

 

The return on the top of the ab wasn't created in this pic yet.  I took care of that later with a wood jig and a heat gun!  

Edited December 30, 2016 by Cricket

[fragarock[TK]]

Okay, with some input from Christine I now know how to deal with this ab-to-chest connection.

 

Getting back on track with the build thread, here's the other progress I made. I had been reconstructing a new return edge on the bottom of my chest plate. After the second layer of ABS paste and some power sanding with 220 grit sandpaper I got it pretty flat. Then I thinned out my ABS paste with some acetone to be able to put a really thin layer on the few remaining areas that had some air bubbles or slight divots. Once that dried (in about a couple hours) I hit it with some 800 sand paper by hand to get it nice an smooth. Then to bring back the glossy look, using my finger I rubbed some acetone over the surface.

 

Here are the before and after photos. The new edge has a few blemishes but they won't be seen.

 

 

After this I installed the hooks on the top of the ab plate. I cut the return edge a bit too small during the initial trimming so I figured I'd reinforce it with another strip of ABS. I used Zap-a-gap on these strips. Once dried I laid out the brackets starting with the center one. Note, the center one has to be bent a bit to conform to the shape of the return edge. Center it over the top and mark the holes. Then drill with an 1/8" drill bit.

 

Important! The brackets are all slightly different sizes. So keep track of which ones you're using in a particular location. Don't use one bracket to mark all your holes.

 

 

Here's a top view after drilling.

 

I bought a countersink bit to use at these bolt holes. That way the heads will sit flatter in the return edge. It's easy to use, just do it by hand with mild pressure. A few turns is enough.

 

 

Here you can see how one bolt that is countersunk compared to the other which is not.

 

Here are all three brackets along the top of the ab plate.

 

 

Here you can see how the bracket over the center needs to be bent.

 

Here's the finished top view.

 

 

That's where I left off last night. I then was trying to figure out how these brackets would connect to the tall brackets on the chest as laid out in my last post. So....I'm now going to have to cut off all this work I did as I chop off about 1.5" from the top of the ab in order to get its brackets to align with the brackets on the chest piece. Luckily this bracket work on the ab only took about an 1.5 hours. This is one of those learning opportunities. I should have put the brackets on the chest first then looked at the overlap between the chest and ab plates. Then I would have realized I needed to trim down the ab plate and not wasted time doing brackets.

 

More to come. Thanks for tuning in.

[Gwithian]

This topic is fantastic Frank, thank you. Like you I'm 5ft 5ins so I can see I'm going to have to do what you and cricket have done.... gulp, I'm not looking forward to cutting down the chest piece. <br><br>

Like you I have gone down the RS ABS route, but I only have the lid at the moment, I need to order the armour soon.<br><br>

Also like you my lid has a dint in the same place as yours, I just assumed that was part of the wonkyness of it all <br><br>

Cracking read, thanks and can't wait to see the finished costume

[fragarock[TK]]

This topic is fantastic Frank, thank you. Like you I'm 5ft 5ins so I can see I'm going to have to do what you and cricket have done.... gulp, I'm not looking forward to cutting down the chest piece. <br><br>

Like you I have gone down the RS ABS route, but I only have the lid at the moment, I need to order the armour soon.<br><br>

Also like you my lid has a dint in the same place as yours, I just assumed that was part of the wonkyness of it all <br><br>

Cracking read, thanks and can't wait to see the finished costume

Glad you're enjoying it. Hopefully you'll get some good tips of what to do and learn from the mistakes I make from time to time. It's a process and a long one so take your time and if you goof something up or hit a roadblock there are lots of people here to help out.

 

Sent from my SM-G935V using Tapatalk

[fragarock[TK]]

Hi there,

 

If you remember from my last post I was having trouble connecting the ab to the chest piece. I used the bracket and elastic loop connections and found that when I positioned the chest over the ab in a manner that looked and felt correct, there was a serious problem with the brackets. Instead of the chest brackets being high above the ab piece, they were way below it. After talking with Christine it became clear that my ab piece was way too tall and I'd have to cut it down. That would then bring the chest brackets above the ab brackets as the Imperial armorers intended. This is just one of the things we short guys have to do I guess....an stand on a chair to reach the tops of my cupboard shelves.

 

Here's the size of this piece as it comes from RS.

 

With the pieces connected, I traced the top of the ab line on the inside of the chest piece then measured the distance between that line and the top of the chest bracket. Since the ab bracket has to roughly align with the top of the chest bracket, the distance of 1.5" was how much material I had to remove from the top of the ab piece. Unfortunately it meant removing the brackets I just installed and the side rivet that came on the piece.

 

 

Here's what that cut line looks like on the outside of the ab piece. Yikes huh? I had to cut off 1.5" but also needed to keep about a 3/8" return edge so I only cut off 1 1/8" which is the line you see below.

 

 

Zip, zip, hack, cut, slice, !!!!! And there you have it!

 

So once that painful moment was over I drew a 3/8" line for my return edge.

 

Apparently I forgot to photograph the re-making of the return edge but it's the same thing I did on the bottom of the chest. Heat gun to bend then some ABS paste + sanding = new return. Then redrilled holes, countersunk them, and installed the brackets. I also used my new sewing machine which I can't believe I bought and which my wife thoroughly enjoyed teasing me about. RS provides a long strip of 1" wide black elastic to make the straps between the torso pieces. So I cut multiple 2 1/2" long strips, folded them over and sewed with a zig-zag stitch then reversed stitched in the hopes it will hold tight. I really have no idea what I'm doing with this sewing machine, just winging it!

 

Here's a shot of the return edge with the new holes waiting for brackets to be installed.

 

Here's the elastic strip, 2.5" long (typical for all 9 torso connections)

 

 

I also started to work on the back-to-chest connection. I actually did this about a week ago but here are some photos. RS provides the white elastic straps with the sew-in snaps already installed. Once less thing to do makes the price of this add-on assembly kit worth the price. You can see my assembly notes from various FISD posts and Trooperbay videos. There's an absurd amount of info you have to look at when figuring out how these pieces are supposed to go together. Makes more sense once you've done it but it's really daunting during the research phase.

 

 

I also attached my shoulder bridging. Also done about a week ago but while re-reading Diana's RS thread I realized I positioned them too far back and the backs of the straps were touching the OII plate on the back piece (She had the same problem). So tonight I ripped them off (than God I used E6000) and repositioned them with them between the 5th & 6th rib. Once they were in place I used the heat gun so they would arch over the gap and land nicely on the back piece.

 

Luckily while playin pirates with my son we rediscovered my old display mannequin for my Roman Centurion armor. When moving back from Sacramento I had packed it away and never re-assembled it...it's all carbon steel and super heavy and complicated to put together. But while my son wore the helmet and played with the gladius I fitted this up for my TK armor.

 

 

I then went to work on the brackets for the bottom of the back piece. Same process as before. But the reinforcement strip I cut were linear and didn't fit dug into my back when I tried on the armor. So, with the help of the dremel, they had to be ground down to follow the curve of the return edge.

 

 

Here was the first look at the torso pieces in action on the mannequin. At this point the chest, ab, and back are solid. I don't think I need to shorten their lengths anymore (although the do need to be curved around my body more).

 

 

Side view. The kidney-to-ab connections aren't done yet so there's an obvious gap still.

 

Back shot. Looking at this it became obvious that the kidney piece is proportionately too tall. So I had to try this on and see where how this was aligning.

 

Yep, looks and feels too tall. This side shot really shows the problem.

 

Ugg....more cutting. I need to take off about 1 1/4" on this sucker. Now I remember from Diana's and Christine's builds that you don't cut the top of the kidney...cut the bottom which will be hidden by the belt.

 

Time to get rid of that pre-made notch. Lots of lines in this photo. Top line is the new shorter size, the line below that is where I need to cut to leave material left over for a new return edge. again I left about 3/8" for that.

 

 

Time for some slicing and dicing with the scissors.

 

 

Again I used a heat gun to make a new return edge. This one came out a bit better than the one I did at the chest but still needs an ABS paste-a-thon to flatten it out. From the back it looks great, just not from the bottom side. So this is a work in progress. I'm on the second layer of ABS goop and will post photos once it's cleaned up and shiny.

 

 

Here's the second thin layer of goop. I show this because I heat-gunned the sides so that they curve around me more. This should help to reduce the look of this as it was too wide on me from the back.

 

Getting back to the back...see what I did there? Okay it's getting late and I need to get to bed.

The back also looks too wide on me so I took a shot at creating a better taper effect. The pic below shows what I want to achieve. The ends need to bend in around me more, just like the kidney.

 

 

Trusty heat gun in hand I worked on the left side first. I've found that a setting of 450F works well on small areas such as return edges. To bend large areas that temp isn't hot enough because the ABS cools in one area before you can thoroughly heat the next area. So on this larger area bend I set it to 650F but was very careful to watch out for melting.

 

Here's the other side.

 

That's it for tonight. Please let me know if anything looks too horribly messed up.

Thanks!

[Cricket[TK]]

Looking good, Frank!  Slicing and dicing all around!    

I'm glad you posted the pic of your ab/cod before cutting. Just for fun, I checked how long mine is now that I've cut mine up; it's 16".  Yours looks like it's about 18.5".  I can't believe that I cut off about 2.5" of just my ab/cod.    

Hey, something you may want to consider about when you bend your pieces to fit...  when you bend things, you'll end up crimping the returns in some way or another.  You might want to consider shaping things around you first before trying to finalize your returns.  I noticed on your back piece that the brackets on the returns are visible now after shaping it.  

Don't be afraid to try some spa time for your armor instead of the heat gun.  A quick dip of those back piece corners into some boiling water will soften them up just enough to get the shape you want.  You may even be able to flatten out those returns just with some boiling water (dip the corners, then gently push the returns on the counter so they flatten out).  You may need a few consecutive tries of dip/shape/dip/shape, but you'll get there!

Great progress so far.    Keep up the good work!

Edited January 3, 2017 by Cricket

[fragarock[TK]]

Looking good, Frank! Slicing and dicing all around!

 

I'm glad you posted the pic of your ab/cod before cutting. Just for fun, I checked how long mine is now that I've cut mine up; it's 16". Yours looks like it's about 18.5". I can't believe that I cut off about 2.5" of just my ab/cod.

 

Hey, something you may want to consider about when you bend your pieces to fit... when you bend things, you'll end up crimping the returns in some way or another. You might want to consider shaping things around you first before trying to finalize your returns. I noticed on your back piece that the brackets on the returns are visible now after shaping it.

 

Don't be afraid to try some spa time for your armor instead of the heat gun. A quick dip of those back piece corners into some boiling water will soften them up just enough to get the shape you want. You may even be able to flatten out those returns just with some boiling water (dip the corners, then gently push the returns on the counter so they flatten out). You may need a few consecutive tries of dip/shape/dip/shape, but you'll get there!

 

Great progress so far. Keep up the good work!

Thanks for the feedback and good call on the bolts being visible on the bottom of the back piece. I bent that bracket a bit when bending the side but hadn't looked at it carefully enough to to see that the bolt head is now flared out. I'll bend that return edge back to re-hide it.

 

Guess there's going to be a lot of little detail areas to review and fix once I get the torso assembled. Right now I'm trying to look at the big picture and get these pieces aligned and attached so that I can wear them without using tape to hold it all together. Then I'll know what else has to be fixed when I see it in the mirror.

 

ABS boil bath is something I haven't attempted yet. Guess I should. Don't know why I've been reluctant, can't be any harder than the heat gun and ABS goop.

 

I'm really enjoying the work. It's hard only being able to work in one hour spurts because you feel like not much is being accomplished. But if I can get the torso mostly fitted and assembled in the next week I'll feel good as its such a big portion of the armor set.

 

Sent from my SM-G935V using Tapatalk