Darth Aloha

Nerd alert! -Eric

Thx Gazman. I've got an assortment of pop rivets here for securing the holster to the belt that would fit through all the layers.... I just couldnt decide which to use. That's exactly what I needed to know. Muchos mahalos,, -Eric

First post edited.... duh... no rivets on the thigh battery for centurion. The thigh tutorial is just out of date. More searching makes me think I'll use 3/16 rivets for the holster Aloha, -Eric

All, I've been searching for a definitive answer on pop rivet sizes for the last 45 min to an hour (its e-600 procrastination.) I'm hoping to get a more definitive answer on how big a pop rivet to use for the following items: Thigh battery - I'm assuming 1/8" according to the tutorial but I've seen other sizes in various threads. Holster (I decided not to use my chicago screws) - 3/16? 5/32? 1/8? Aloha and thanks, -Eric

Ah velcro... good tip. That should stop the thing from sliding around back there. I think if I added shims to the sides, butt wouldn't jut out so much. Or, god forbid, stopped drinking beer for a few months. I measured my shins and thighs for RT before I ordered the kit. His legs are about the same size so I figure once I get the thigh ammo and that stupid knee plate on it should look even better. And yeah the left one is the slightly smaller one. The smaller one feels better I think. I'ts pretty tough to tell walking around when everything is held together with tape. I might close the thighs with velcro for the time being before I decide to trim anything. Thanks for your help. Aloha, -Eric

If you're buying that Henderson from house of scuba you can find-----------

I have a handful of 1/4" chicago screws I may attach my holster with. Removable but won't come unsnapped. Do a quick search for chicago screws on FISD and you'll find more info and suppliers. Aloha, -Eric

Hey Hey, Thigh Thigh I finally got the front of a thigh glued tonight. Really in the home stretch now. Belt stuff, thigh ammo, knee plate, thighs... then I'm all pau. But before gluing I spent some time wearing my legs for the first time. I have mightytank's garters to help but they're taped to the sides of my thighs for ease of adjustment. One thigh is taped up smaller than the other. I'm contemplating trimming my thighs. Can you even tell which looks trimmed? Back in Black Does it look like there's a crapload of black showing between my belt and thigh? Even if I pull the thigh up as I can there's still lots of black. TK Got back In all of my photos so far I go out of my way to get the belt around so that the top of my butt plate is covered by the belt. The reality is that as soon as I walk anywhere the belt slides up and then my butt plate juts out... following the natural contours of my posterior. The majority of the stunts I've seen in the screen caps have their belts up around their kidneys. Does anyone know of a good way to prevent this? The elastic could be maybe 1/4" shorter but that won't make much of a difference. I've tried pulling up the abs but that didn't help much either. Thanks Joe. Whew! Thanks Brian. It took a long long time to get to that point. Longer than I expected for sure. Aloha all, -Eric

Hmmmm 6'4" in a TM.... time for me to lose a few pounds... because that suit looks even better on you now I know you're also a tall dude. Aloha, -Eric

How the hell did I miss your EIB pass... nicely done sir. Congrats your HWT is inspirational Aloha, -Eric

To paraphrase Indiana Jones: "Snaps... why did it have to be snaps?!" My solution to everything is McMaster Carr. I wish I had thought about this earlier this year but they sell 1 or 10 for $5.30. Just be careful about shipping costs... they almost always use UPS overnight. Or if you live somewhere close to a major mcmaster hub you can always pick them up will call. I have no idea if they're line 24 sized...but the catalog page says they're 9/16 in diameter which sounds about right. McMaster also sell snap tools and other presses too. If I lived in an area with other troopers that didn't require a boat or a plane to visit... I would think about collecting money within the garrison/outpost to buy a press for the group. If someone orders these let me know how they are. Aloha, -Eric

Torso Fitting I have been playing with my shoulder bells and biceps off and on for a couple days. My upper arm and forearms are long. I can't seem to physically get the biceps up high enough. I did trim them a bit but I do not think it would have much of a difference. I really do need slightly longer forearm armor. There no elastic between the ab and chest yet. I have blue tape holding the chest down in position. I have not glued on the shoulder bridges yet either. Given my size I thought it was a good idea to wait rather than count the requisite number of ridges. My rear end sticks out a little farther than a thin english dude. I keep trying to get the belt to go across the butt/kidney seam but like the stunts in ANH the belt wants to go across the kidney. More on that issue later once I get other things aligned. Bells Attached to The Shoulder Straps I first tried attaching the strap at the top of the bells to my shoulder straps. I need to make them tight to get the shoulder bell up over my shoulder. This makes the should strap elastic pull down. It is tough to see because my wife, who took the photos, is shorter than I am... but my shoulder elastic is being pulled down toward my arm. The shoulder bells just do not seem to fit my shoulders. Howzit? Bells Strapped Across The Back I forgot to put my neck seal on for these photos I have a few general questions: Should I shorten up the back/kidney straps a bit? Is the back at the right height on my body? Does the chest look right or is it too low? Do the shoulder bells seem rotated back away from the chest? (I just noticed this now) Any and all comments are welcome.... I have a thick skin so lemme have it. Aloha and thanks, -Eric

For now I'm going to use velcro for the back of the shins. I'm interested in the bra strap solution someday once the velcro wears out. My forearm velcro is already getting a little worn from the fittings The nylon snap plates have worked out well so far. I did have one start to peel off but I haven't looked to see if it was just a crappy glue job. The plate I had to peel off because of the dritz snap that failed took quite a bit of force. If I had to do it over again I would have ditched the extra thick webbing I found laying around at work and gone with the thinner material from ace hardware. So yeah... another shin today... then on to the thighs I really like the looks KW's phase 1 EPII armor. I'm pretty sure it won't fit me. If I do end up going TD I'm guessing I'll have to do mostly out of RT again but maybe take my time and butt join with cover strips. Aloha, -Eric

I'm going to go sit down and read the Rotj crl before I open my big trap again

Of course don't forget elastic and snaps if you're going that route... Rob sends boatloads of velcro with his kits. I didn't know that Rob did ROTJ specific armor... do you need the white edging too? If you're going for EIB or centurion you'll need stuff for your bucket like green lenses, s-shaped neck trim?. You can get all that stuff from Trooperbay. Aloha, -Eric (edited to remove ROTJ mistakes)

Never Enough Magnets Just when you think you have enough magnets... you end up doubling them up. I glue my shins like I put on my pants... one leg at a time. What amazing me is how E-6000 can still ooze out after vigorous wiping. I went back 20 minutes later and there was still more oozing. I clearly used too much. Once my snap plates from last night finish curing there will be a final fitting from the waist up. It doesn't look like I'll get my legs all done this weekend as planned but there is still lots of other stuff to do. My crappy RT TD tube got a coat of paint today in case there is a mailing snafu coming from Jesse's detonator factory. I spray painted some 8mm brass paper fasteners too. The belt, ill fitting sniper plate, and knee battery pack are the only major thing left after the thighs. Thanks Martin I'm having way too much fun.... and I'm already thinking about my next build. Sandy? Phase 1 clone? Hmmm. Aloha, -Eric

I wish Kidney/butt and ab/cod all arrived as separate parts on my RT-MOD kit. -Eric

LePaul.... take a moment and read some of the links above about snap plates. Again... check out my build where I used E-6000 with nylon webbing snap plates. No need to add another layer under the snap. Just be careful and don't get glue on the bottom of the snap when you're putting the snap plates in. I toyed with the idea of slathering clear nail polish on the underside of the snap but that seemed like overkill. I know you're super stoked. We all are during the build process... but maybe settle down... pop an adult beverage... and take a tour of the FISD forums... especially the getting started and howto section

Super clean and accurate build. Now let's see it on you Aloha, -Eric

Hey LePaul.... The first thing to suggest is that you read and search and read and search. There are more resources on the subject of snaps on this forum than any other subject. As Travis and Alex mentioned most people glue plastic snap plates to the inside of their armor. There are many many other links if you just poke around the getting started and howto sections. And use the search luke. ---------- I took Kevster's suggestion and used webbing as snap plates. I haven't trooped yet but it has worked out pretty well so far (see my build link in my signature below.) No matter what material you use just be careful when applying E-6000. I used it for every one of my webbing snap plates without deforming or melting my armor. I was just very very careful. If you're really in a hurry and can't wait for the E-6000 24 hour cure time, maybe velcro is your friend. You can always peel it off and put in snap plates after Halloween. Aloha and good luck this week. -Eric

I'm All Strapped Up (Mm mm oh, oh, yeah, yeah!) The past couple nights have been spent fitting and adjusting lengths of elastic. I am still not there yet, so no photos yet of the fittings. This part of the process been really fun. I will need help with chest and back placement at some point. The forearm armor is too short on me thanks to my monkey arms. I have spent most of my fitting time with those issues. My shoulder bells refuse to sit nicely. If I shortened the elastic on the top of the bell going to the shoulder strap, the shoulder strap contorts and moves down my shoulder. I decided to use a piece of elastic across my back behind my neck to keep them in place. I still have the option to add a snap and attach them to the shoulder straps at a later date. Today will be more fitting. I also need to stop avoiding the inevitable trimming of my shins to make the tops to line up nicely. Overlap construction has its pros and cons to be sure. Too many snaps.... You can see the funny placement of my center ab snap for the cod inside the divot. I could not have achieved this with a plastic snap plate. There would have been snap plates on either side or one long one in the center otherwise. Dritzkrieg Bop I had my first snap plate casualty thanks to my bent ditz vario pliers. Hooray for E-6000! I just peeled the webbing off, re-glued another plate, and moved on with my life without undue snap angst. (it was already peeled off in the photo) Aloha nui, -Eric

Rock'n good progress my RT brother! I've got my forearms velcro-ed on the inside but glued on the outside seam... I wouldn't get my forearms through them if it were glued on both sides. It does add a little bulk tho. Aloha, -Eric

I'm sure you're scrambling to answer all these questions... but I'll add mine to mix (oh btw multiquote reply is your friend) So... wait... you painted the copper and silver weathering OVER the black. Sonofa... that's brilliant. What sort of brush did you paint the humbrol satin black with? I'm guessing it's the same in the US... just with an e... turpentine. It's really a fine looking blaster and something to strive for someday. Aloha, -Eric

Oh Snap! Outside of the crotch snap and the tops of the thighs I am done with gluing snap plates. Placing the snaps at the bottom of the ab for the cod was somewhat tricky. The detail in the center mad it difficult to put a plate in but I the beauty of the close snaps is that they'll bend around corners. So I just stuffed a plate in the center box thing and put a clamp on it. If I didn't put one in the center I would have needed to on either side making 4 snaps just for the cod. Side Rivet Sizes I have two types of brass paper fasteners in front of me. One is 12 mm and the other is 8.1 mm. The lengths I went through to get them both is a bit comical. Maybe I'll just skip the rivets for now and focus on my build Caring is Creepy (The Shins... get it?) I had plans to glue up my shins tonight. Instead I stared at them for the better part of an hour. The tops of the shins are bumming me out a little and I'm thinking of trimming them. The perils of pre-trimmed armor are upon me in a small way. The oddities of overlapped armor is also playing a factor. Fronts The tops of the shins are weird looking no? Of course one top will be under a sniper plate and the other might be covered by the thigh ammo. Bottom left needs a little bit of trimming. Backs Check out the one on the left (actually the right shin.) It looks like Rob went a little trim happy. Tomorrow I'm going to trim to the red line but I've had too much wine tonight and its late There's no reason to wield lexan scissors in this state. Hopefully my shins won't be two different heights when I'm done. Overlap I am also considering trimming the return on the tops to make them line up a little better.... once I'm more sober of course. Finding a clear shot of the top of a trooper's right shin in the screen captures is tough. Either way they should line up better on the top. More about the ill fitting sniper knee tomorrow. Aloha, -Eric

I don't see a need to make it removable but I think a mechanical fastener would be more robust. Brilliant... I would never have thought to just put covers over the existing integrated ones. I'll start asking around. Thanks! -Eric