Suspend's AP ANH Stunt Build

[Pretzel[TK]]

Here are some screen grabs from the movie. I think a little overhang on the knuckles will be fine. Hope these help. 

 

[Suspend]

Thanks for the hand guard info.  There seem to be a lot of different sizes of guards.  The ABS ones that came with my armor are quite big.  The silicon ones I bought from JustJoseph are smaller.  I guess I'll wait and see.  I may have placed mine a little further back.  Just a hair before the knuckles when you make a fist, so I don't have any overhang.  I'll see how it looks when everything comes together.  I can always move them if I have to.

 

Back to the forearms....

 

 

 

The first hot water bath definitely helped, but while gluing on the cover strips I noticed the two halves of the forearm actually don't fit together that well.  I let the outer cover strip dry for 24 hours but as I started to remove the camps, I could see the cover strip start to lift.  I put the clamp back on and gave it another TWO DAYS drying, then it held.  I've come to the conclusion that there is a lot of "pressure" on the forearms for them to spring apart.  The plastic is really being forced into shape by the cover strips.  I decided on another hot water bath.  I figured I could reshape the elbow area to make it better fit my arm and at the same time, maybe the hot water bath would "relax" the ABS a bit and relieve some of the pressure on the cover strips.

 

This time I was a lot less afraid about the hot water.  For me, 45 seconds works fairly well.  And I have the sink already filled with cold water to harden the ABS again.  Success.  Also, I read that someone had issues with a cover strip coming off in the hot water.  That didn't happen to me, but the forearms had dried for many days before I submerged them.

 

The biceps were much easier....

 

 

And with that, the forearms and biceps are assembled.  No strapping yet.

 

 

Mark

 

[Suspend]

I forgot to mention, I made a little modification to my clamps.  I cut small strips of wood and hot glued them to the end of my spring clamps.  This way the clamp pushes down on the cover strip with less chance of pressing on the sides of the armor.  The was especially useful for the forearms where the large surface area of the clamp would have hit the sides and not clamped down as well.

 

 

 

 

And now on to the thermal detonator....

 

This is the untrimmed TD from AP....

 

 

And here is after the initial trim...

 

 

As other people have mentioned, the end caps are a very tight fit.  I tried sanding down the main tube a little but that didn't really work.  The material that the pipe is made of doesn't really take well to sanding.  I found it almost "soft" and difficult to sand.  Maybe that's just one of the properties of pipe?  It wasn't "hard" and wouldn't sand "smooth" after a course sanding.  Luckily I only did less than 1 cm from the edge of one end before giving up on the idea.  It turns out the caps DID fit OK, it's just a tight fit and any angle at all will cause them to not slide onto the pipe.

 

After a test fit I found the pipe a little long.  My understanding is that the entire TD should be 7.25 to 7.50 inches long with the end caps installed.  So I needed to chop a little off the pipe.  Luckily (again) my dad's old tools come into play.  He had this interesting mitre-box style contraption that holds the saw blade level.  Perfect for chopping down the pipe.

 

 

I followed Ukswrath's build for masking off the areas that will be glued before painting.

 

 

Then I did the final sanding of the end caps and panel to get everything the right size.  As I mentioned in my E11 build....I picked up a (fairly) cheap airbrush off of Amazon.  One that hooks up to a tool compressor with a pressure reducing valve.  It was only my second time using it but after some tweaking with adjustment screws, I managed to get a reasonably nice flow.  Much better than the first time I tried.  I was getting a lot of "spitting" of larger drops previously.  This time after adjusting the needle I wasn't getting that anymore.  This air brush stuff is a lot more complicated than it seems.  WAY too many adjustment screws with pretty much no instructions.  :-)

 

I thinned down some Humbrol #5 Dark Admiralty Grey Gloss and sprayed on a few light coats.

 

 

Next I glued on the panel...

 

 

Then I glued on the end caps.  I purchased the TD Clips from Ukswrath.  I opted for his "version 2" clips.  I posted this on my local garrison and PandaTrooper pointed out that the clips look a bit tall.  I hadn't noticed that but now that he mentioned it, they do look a bit tall.  The "version 1" clips actually aren't as tall, but they also don't have the bend at the bottom for the belt.  I'm not sure what I'll do.  For now I'll assemble the rest of the armor and see how I feel about the clips.  I may end up replacing them if they still appear too tall once everything is complete.

 

 

 

 

Mark

 

[wook1138[TK]]

Everything is looking great!!  Keep up the awesome job!

[Suspend]

Continuing on....

 

Next up is the shins.  Here's what the untrimmed AP shins look like:

 

 

The shins were pretty easy to trim up.  I used lexan scissors to cut off the extra plastic and went back to the table top belt sander to sand down the curves.  Then finished up with a sanding block or dremel if I needed a rounded edge.

 

 

 

I did a rough trim first and then sized the shin to my leg.  Keeping room for the 20mm cover strip on the front and 25mm for the back.  I'll be using velco for the back.  I LOVE Cricket's magnet solution for the shins, but I think it's probably not a good idea for a "first-time-builder".

 

 

 

When it came to the strip on the rear of the shin piece, I used every clamp I had...

 

 

I made sure that the rear cover strip attached on the outer side of the shin half and used industrial Velcro with the loops on the cover strip and hooks on the shin portion.  I've heard this way the hooks won't grab your undersuit.

 

In this photo I've lifted the outer lip over top of the cover strip to give the adhesive time to dry.

 

 

Lastly I had to wrestle with the sniper knee plate.  I used the "offset" technique of gluing the right half of the shin slightly higher than the left half so that the knee plate isn't lopsided.  Then I gave the knee plate several hot water baths to shape the right side (when viewed from the front) so that it better fits the shape of the leg piece.  I think it's pretty good.  The bottom doesn't really fit snug against the shin but I think all AP kits have this little issue.  No one is going to see it anyway because they're never looking "up" at your knee plate.

 

 

I've started working on the thighs while I wait for the glue to dry.

 

Mark

 

[Frank75139[501st]]

Still going strong. Looks good.


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[CableGuy[Admin]]

Great work, Mark. Everything’s looking really neat and tidy. :-)


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[TheSwede[TK]]

Great work

[Suspend]

So I'm now working on the thighs.  Here's an untrimmed AP thigh:

 

 

And roughly trimmed...

 

 

On thing I noticed and I wanted to get an opinion on is that when you align the two thigh halves at the knee, then the top of the thighs don't line up very well.  The top-front is a little off but the top-rear is WAY off.  Here's a photo of the front...

 

 

So here I have a couple of questions.  First the return edge.....what do most people do with the upper return edge?  Do you keep it or remove it for comfort?  Looking at the RS reference photos, it looks like there is still some return edge on the upper-thigh, but it's subtle.  Reading posts it sounds like a lot of people remove the upper return edge to reduce chafing.  Is there a preference?  (I'm going for centurion, remember).

 

Pandatrooper is in what will be my local garrison and he's a proponent of building your own return edge using a heat sealing iron to make the pieces line up.  That certainly sounds like the best route but also the scariest for a first-time builder.  I don't want to end up destroying the thighs.

 

If the return edge was removed, then it would be fairly simple to hide the height difference with a cover strip and sand the cover strip down so that it curves to make the two pieces meet.

 

I haven't noticed this issue with other armor manufacturers.

 

Thoughts?

 

Thanks,

Mark

 

[Frank75139[501st]]

I personally got rid of my return except the chest/cod/back area where you can use it for strapping. As for what other people who will be in your garrison do I wouldn’t be too worried. I highly doubt (very highly) anyone especially Pandatrooper will be concerned with your return edge, it’s just great to have another trooper in the white armor flock. So don’t beat yourself up over it, do what makes you comfortable and if you don’t want to make return edges, don’t, personally I see your point of view. I didn’t do anything to my armor unless I was 100% I knew how to do it.


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[tydirium1[TK]]

Making the return edge fit with a iron is not that hard to do. Just take your time do a little then move on. Don't get the iron too hot. Test it on some scrap first.

[Pretzel[TK]]

Return Edges are really a preference thing. I know I have some on my upper thighs, but not much. It really depends on how it feels when you are wearing the armor. You will realize that making these adjustments will be an ongoing process. 

 

If you are worried about it being approvable or not, either way will be approvable. I will say that having a return edge on parts of your armor gives the illusion of thickness, and generally will make the look of your armor more authentic. 

 

Again, it is preference and up to you. Hope that helps. 

 

You are moving right a long! You will be a TK in no time. 

[hollowbodies[TK]]

That's looking great, keep up the good work! And that sniper knee plate is looking good on the pic you posted above - really nice!

[CableGuy[Admin]]

Hi Mark,

Regarding return edge, I’d probably just have a look through some screen reference pics and see what you prefer. Certain areas look a little better for it, such as the chest, whereas others are not so noticeable, such as the elbow or the biceps.
Personally, I left a little on most parts of mine for that appearance of thickness and that worked well for my kit and my body shape.

Keep up the good work,

Dan :-)


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[Suspend]

So I've made some more advancements:

 

After several hot water baths and the offset mentioned above, I finished the shins by finally gluing on the sniper knee plate.  I'm pretty happy with how it turned out.

 

 

Next I set my sights on the thighs.  I decided to leave the slight height mismatch on the front (top) of the thighs (it will be mostly hidden by the cover strip) but the back was a different story.  On the right thigh I wound up with about 2.5 cm height difference.  The knees lined up well but the tops were way off.  I cut this down to about 1.5 cm but any more would have required losing a huge portion of the top return edge to maintain the "swoop" of the leg hole.  I settled for cutting off 1 cm because that didn't require that much reconstruction and in the end, I rebuilt the return edge for about 1 inch.

 

I didn't have a heat sealing iron and I didn't want to order one and wait weeks, so I experimented with a clothes iron.    And you know what?  It worked ok.  I played with the heat and finally settled on the "silk" setting.  I was able to melt the ABS and roll over a new return edge without making a mess of everything.  I had a couple of minor "flat" spots where the iron melted a little much, but after sanding, wet sanding and Novus plastic polish, it looks great.  Unfortunately I forgot to take a "before" picture but here is after melting but before sanding.

 

 

I continued gluing on cover strips...

 

 

And then again I ran into an issue with the right thigh.  This time the bottom (at the back of the knee) didn't line up that well.  It had a height difference.  It's a little hard to see in this photo but the halves meet well horizontally, but vertically there is a difference.

 

 

I gave this piece a hot water bath to ease it down to a similar height and then glued a strip of ABS behind to hold it in place.

 

 

Next I worked on the knee ammo pack.  I cut it out (it was untrimmed) and sanded it to square edges.

 

 

Then used a pipe piece similar to the TD to draw a pencil line to round off the lower edge.

 

(View from back)

 

 

 

 

Then a hot water bath to get it to curve to the knee...

 

 

I centered the piece around the knee portion of the thigh.  That means I have equal space on the left and right halves of the knee but the center ammo rectangle does not line up perfectly with the center of the front cover strip.  From what I understand, this is expected with the AP kit and similar to the film.

 

I used two of the included split rivets to hold the knee belt in place.

 

 

 

 

I put a few dabs of E6000 on the inside to hold the belt in place.  I still have clamps holding the knee ammo belt in place while the glue dries.

 

Mark

 

 

[TheSwede[TK]]

Nice work

[wook1138[TK]]

14 hours ago, Suspend said:

That means I have equal space on the left and right halves of the knee but the center ammo rectangle does not line up perfectly with the center of the front cover strip.  From what I understand, this is expected with the AP kit and similar to the film.

 

I used two of the included split rivets to hold the knee belt in place.

Yes, from what I've seen it is more important to have the spacing at the back equal.

 

For the rivets, there was some rumblings about the knee ammo pack needing to be a single cap rivet for L2 or L3.  You are still good to use the split rivet at this time as far as I can tell from the CRL.  It is still one of those "screen accurate" things at this point.

 

The build is looking amazing!  The attention to detail is impressive.  I think I might try the iron trick as well.  Good job!

[Pretzel[TK]]

I wish I had something to add, but all I can say is that you are moving right along at a great pace. Well done. 

[Suspend]

Thanks for the encouraging comments everyone!!  They are much appreciated.

 

I've got a question about the biceps.  I'm just mocking up the biceps/shoulder bells and something struck me as odd.  Normally, you attach the elastic to the bottom of the should bell and that elastic goes through a little clip that is fastened to the underarm portion of the bicep.  Something like this photo...

 

 

Now, I'm fairly tall (6'1") with long arms.  I'm going to want those biceps to be almost as low as possible without coming out from under the shoulder bell so minimize black showing at the elbow.  If I drop the bicep down, that means the plastic bicep clip is going to need to be longer....and that doesn't look right.  See this photo...

 

 

Notice how long (tall) the elastic clip is on the bicep.  That doesn't seem right.  How would one handle this?  Leave the clip off completely and just attach snaps at the other side of the bicep/shoulder bell?  Am I thinking about this the wrong way?  I can't see how to drop the bicep without lengthening this clip.

 

Thanks,

Mark

 

[CableGuy[Admin]]

Hi Mark

Unless you’re really keen on the hooks idea, a much easier way is to use poppers and elastic inside the shoulder bells and biceps. As (crudely) illustrated here:






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[wook1138[TK]]

Like Dan says, the snaps with an elastic works well and will likely work just fine. 

 

I needed to use both methods  - the snaps to keep the bicep from popping out and the bell elastic to keep the bells from flaring out.

[Suspend]

So, the consensus seems to be to keep the bell elastic, use snaps on the inside and to not use the elastic clip that comes up from the armpit area?  Will I still be OK for Centurion if I leave off that clip?

 

Mark

 

[CableGuy[Admin]]

Yes mate. I think the bicep clip is pretty rare in these parts. Many have passed Centurion without so you’ll be fine.
I’ve seen some added in the past for those following the hero look (as the ref pics show that Han had them), but they’re not that common with most builds. Nice touch if you wanted to add it though. :-)


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[hollowbodies[TK]]

3 hours ago, Suspend said:

So, the consensus seems to be to keep the bell elastic, use snaps on the inside and to not use the elastic clip that comes up from the armpit area?  Will I still be OK for Centurion if I leave off that clip?

 

Mark

 

Yes, you should be perfectly fine. Nothing is mentioned about the biceps hooks in the CRL. Plus, I think most stunt suits used in the movie didn't have any biceps hooks. So as long as you stuff lines up right and is positioned correctly using the shoulder bells elastic (required) and the snap connecting the bicep and the bell, you should not have to worry at all. ^^

[Pretzel[TK]]

Nothing to add. My fellow TK's have offered great advice for your bicep/hook question. Keep up the great work!