TheLorelei

iiiiit's HERE!! Here are the obligatory contents pics. The bucket is reverie-inducing-ly beautiful. And it has one tiny, tiny spot on the nose. I love it. This kit's name is now Smudge, I think. I'm beyond thrilled, but it does all look so, so big for small me... this is gonna take some serious work. But I got it.

Oh hey, Andrew (or do you go by a different name?)! It's fun finding out who's on the detachment boards. Thanks! Just received my snap press today so am not quite beyond plates yet but am thinking ABS so far. Haven't ordered my nylon for strapping... probably tonight...

Thanks, ShaSha and Pretzel! My latest exploits have centered around a (largely) not sewn neck seal actually, but that has been eclipsed by the news that MY KIT SHOULD BE ARRIVING IN THE NEXT FEW WEEKS! I just received word that mine is the next to be done, maybe this weekend, and I have no clue how long shipping will take but it can't take THAT long, RIGHT?? so I'm small scale panicking, making sure I have everything I need for its arrival, updating my reference notebook, chilling the celebratory champagne (more likely beer), and being generally thrilled and terrified at the same time. *takes deep breaths* Real update to follow once I get some needed pics.

Well, you were missed. Glad you were having fun, though! But seriously, I think I'm going to invest in a nice snap press, and then I will most definitely be the garrison snap girl. So let me know if you run into snags or want an easier way to do things when you get to the strapping stage, AJ!

Wait a second - that was ME hammering away at snaps!! I didn't know you were there! I've been following your build thread, too! Ha. The more you know. Glad you had fun. It was a great Bash. *coughPretzel* *coughFrank*

That's an idea, thanks Frank. And good call, I will need somewhere to put them!

Thanks Jeff! It's all about the details that make you smile, in my opinion. Let me know if you post pics of yours when it's done! Why thank you, Shane. So it doesn't look like pulling teeth, eh? Cause it was. It can only go up from here, I'm convinced.

Thanks, @ukswrath ! I assumed Tandy was in the "immune" category due to how much it gets pushed on here, like you said, but I had seen enough unsatisfactory things about them that I turned to Dot. They ended up being even cheaper than Tandy, purchased online through a sailmaking company. Anyway that sets my mind at rest. You're a peach.

*grabs mic* It's time again, folks, for -- Concerns of the Overthinker! (lights flash) Thank you for joining us. Tonight's topic is Snap Plates, Your Armor, and You. Have any of you folks had any run-ins with the definitely-not-urban-legend warping that can happen with ABS snap plates, as seen in this [recent] nightmare thread? With ATA being among the thicker ABS kits out there I imagine I'll be fine, but I was planning on making most of my snap plates ahead of time and it's positively terrifying to think they could warp my armor like that and I'd have to scrap them all. Despite the words of its proponents, nylon webbing just doesn't seem as secure to me. If it offered a warp-free guarantee I'd set my snaps in it anyway but it just doesn't. SO. Nylon? ABS? Worry more? Thoughts welcome, and thank you all in advance. On a happier note, I've been customizing my armor storage tote. Cart before the horse, my eye. WIP pic below. Those are tiny Imperial cogs, yes. My first neck seal attempt has proven to be an excellent learning experience. The biggest lesson is that you need to build in much more width than you thought you'd need because you're essentially accounting for the outer circumference, not the inner, and when it's this thick it can get pretty tight. However it looks incredible, if I do say so myself, and I will now be pursuing a similar rib style with entirely different and hopefully less nightmarish construction and closure techniques. Let's leave it at that.

Thanks, Dan! Now I just have to put them to use... but yes, everyone should have happy little Sith magnets. Ooh, that's quite a good option. I've now been in contact with them and will likely be going that route. Much obliged, Daniel! @Pretzel , that is *very* good to hear. I'll need all the help I can get, so thank you in advance.

Alright. Prep work trundles slowly along. One thing I need people to weigh in on first though, please. BLASTER I have discovered that I have zero interest in building an E-11 from scratch/kit. Frank (thanks!) suggested a Hyperfirm B-grade as a combination of reasonable price and low work needed for approvability. Just confirming, though, that you really don't need to do much beyond attaching a D ring to prep a Hyperfirm. No painting? Is a B-grade likely to make it to Centurion? MAGNETS Neodymium magnets arrived from AliExpress. $16.52 for 50 20mmx3mm N52 magnets is my cup of tea. I got two sets. (Link here, but if it's down, browse around if you have a month or so to spare for shipping time. Prices can't be beat! http://s.aliexpress.com/NFn2AvYv) I covered the magnets for ease of use, using (fun fact) scrap fabric from the lining of my Seventh Sister jacket. I found a pretty nifty method for securing the magnets in their pouches... Start with a pile of fabric squares in two colors. Different colors for opposing pairs make it easy to grab one of each magnet that will stick together. I eyeballed the size, was horrifically inconsistent, convinced myself it didn't matter, and ended up with 4"x4"ish squares. I used tiny 4" zip ties because there was a bag of 1,000 around. They worked fine. I highly recommend securing them all into loose loops (just a few clicks) before you begin. It's much easier to not have to wrangle zip tie ends into their slots while bunching fabric together. So here's the fun part. My bestie's coffee table is an old ship's hatch, which has large metal bands around either end. After a couple frustratingly inefficient tries at wrapping the magnets resting on wood, I realized the magnets wanted to be on the metal bands anyway, so why not make use of it? After determining polarity (the really tricky "does this want to stick to one of the opposite color that I've already wrapped?" test), I *carefully* laid each magnet in the middle of the appropriate colored square on the metal surface. I picked up each corner and pulled them through a zip tie circle. With the magnet happily held down, it was super easy to pull up on the fabric as I tightened the zip tie and got nice tight pouches every time. I'm betting you could achieve the same ease of wrapping with any metal surface - the top of your filing cabinet, a piece of steel clamped to a tabletop, hey, you could even use your fridge if you got really desperate. Tadaa! I wrapped some magnets in pairs (bottom of picture) due to concerns about holding strength. Those will be my "big guns" for any real warped cover strips. They also make for nice medium holding strengths when I use one of those doubles with a single on the other side. I tripled the zip ties on the doubles to differentiate them easier. 10 pairs of doubles, 30 pairs of singles. I am now really sick of zip ties. UNDERSUIT After trying half a dozen options, I found that a dance unitard was the best fit for me. For price, fabric thickness, and comfort, the Capezio tb114 won hands down. It's a 90nylon/10spandex blend so it'll hold its shape well. The unitard has a wide scoop neck, so I'll be doing something ingenious to connect my neck seal to the edge so I don't have any accidental skin showing by my shoulders. Stay tuned. Also it was way long on short me, so I put it on, measured the extra length on wrists and ankles, took it off, rolled the cuffs in on themselves by that length, and ran a zig-zag stitch around the middle of the rolled bit. The cuffs are now a bit loose so I'll sew them tighter to keep them from creeping up and call it a day. NECK SEAL Muahahahaha... after many excellent discoveries of bad ways to achieve deep, rubbery neck seal ridges, I have found a good one. And boy, is it good. Still a work in progress but if it turns out as well as I expect, I'll make a separate tutorial thread. Sneak peek: AND I'm going to my first armor (or lack thereof) party in a few weeks. Totally stoked. That's all for now, folks!

...you've probably already contacted them, but if you haven't, I got a pair of 7s from them about a month ago. They were their "less than perfect" ones, you have to ask about them specifically, but they're really *hardly* less than perfect and are pretty great.

Thanks, Frank! And hey, cool beans, Detachment staff in my very own Garrison! Thanks, Preston. I hope to attend some Garrison Carida events over the summer. Watch away - I hear Ronnie is a stickler for details so I'll need all the critiques I can get! I'm a wool hiking sock person in general, so that doesn't sound like a bad idea, Cricket. I've been thinking of lifts, too, but already bought my boots... if the lifts fit, they fit, if they don't, I'll survive! @darthkenny - Definitely the best option! but my lovely double bladed saber was at home at the time. In other news, I'm wondering if it's far too early to get the enamel paints for my helmet and buttons. I found a hobby shop in the area that has both Testors and Humbrol. Think I'll stop by in the morning. How bad is it to use Humbrol French blue, but Testors for the other two? I'd like to use Testors for all three, but can't find a local source for Testors French blue (and would much prefer to purchase locally).

I think that'll be my policy, too, though I see your point about uniformity, Frank! Ugh. So many decisions. Gotcha. Hm. Duly noted. Glam gloves! That's what they were called! I thought you said it in your thread but hadn't dug back through it yet to check. Silk liners seem like the way to go, too. Hey do you wear silk socks in your boots? I saw that recommended. Hooray! You don't know how good that is to hear. When I first started looking into this, I wasn't sure I could be a TK at all due to my height (or lack thereof), let alone a Centurion! Thanks for the other recommendations, as well. I'm all set up on my garrison's boards. I now feel *super* bad for not having any real progress for y'all to follow... I've ordered a couple more things and will doubtless appreciate a second (third, fourth, twelfth) set of eyes on them so stand by! Thanks again!

My goodness, y'all, you don't even know how far beyond me all these terms are. I think I'm reaching critical knowledge saturation over here! I'll have to jettison some of those unimportant things like birthdays and algebra to make room for a ton of blaster research. I'll figure it all out! Also, I've seen that people have different "grades" of items for approval v. trooping, sometimes. Like how you just said, Cricket (thanks for the link to Shasha's build, btw), you have a Hyperfirm for approval and a H/D conversion for pewpew appeal. Or rubber gloves v. Nomex. I take it it's allowed because I've seen it mentioned so much, but why/how/in what circumstances are you allowed to troop with the "lesser" item? Just wondering for sanity and legality's sake. Thanks again for the info, all! DLT-19 it is. Assuming one of these other schnazzy weapons mentioned doesn't catch my eye... or wait, will ANY weapon do, or is there a special list I have to pick from?

Gotcha! It was all the Centurion submissions with the blaster pics that got me to thinking they were mandatory in the first place. So would I have to have an E-11 as well as a DLT-19, or will a weapon of either type suffice?

It totally is. AND I'M TOTALLY NOT! But hey, I've still got a lot to prep. Once I'm all ready, then the real nail biting can begin. Thanks! I'm the last person on earth not on fb, but I'll borrow somebody's account and look you guys up. I haven't seen Shasha's build - thanks for all the info, Joseph! Good to know about the blaster, too. I second that, Greg. It's not just the language barrier. Alright, you all win, amazon it is. I'll start digging around there. I've been afraid of the dye transferring, too, but I think I could set it with some stuff I have left over from a dyeing project. Maybe. ...but really, I can just get a DLT-19?! Be still my heart!

I got a brown box yesterday. Not THE Brown Box, but A brown box, it had my boots in it, and my heart fluttered when I saw it. I can hardly imagine how I'm going to feel when I see *the* BBB if just this little one made me feel so many feelings. I can't wait even more now. (Grubby work bench didn't seem worthy of holding it - but such is work) As seen in the title, I'm Lorelei, and Cricket's build thread has left me quite confident that I can attain Centurion as an ANH stunt TK despite being 5'4", 120lbs (thank you, Cricket!). I hope to make this an inspirational thread... or maybe it will all go to pot, and we can have a jolly good laugh while I order replacement parts. I can see it going either way. Regardless, I'm not going to quit until it's up to snuff. Join me! Joseph's list of required build items seems quite daunting, but I'm working on it. My build notes are getting longer and longer... but here's what's what with anything that's anything. Starting with the easy one: BOOTS Totally Killer Boots. Got my small female foot sized in a large men's Brannock device at a shoe store to have the best shot at a good fit despite the men's-only custom-ish nature of TK Boots' boots. They fit perfectly! I got some of their "less than perfect" ones, available upon request, and they're *hardly* less than perfect. So I'd say if they're out of your size, definitely investigate the "less than perfect" option. ARMOR On the ATA wait list as of 5/25. I read good things about ATA and the price was pretty good, too. Since I'm still working on my Seventh Sister garb, I'm fine with the longer wait time. I'm fine with it. I'm fine with it. Maybe if I repeat it enough, it'll be true... SOFT GOODS I'm going to make my own neck seal. Once I draft the pattern, I'll start the fabric hunt. I've read a couple posts with recommendations on fabric types - think I have a good idea of the desired effect. I'll also make my own belt. I need small rubber gloves. Heard there were some at Walmart a couple years ago. May add nomex later, but need rubber for sure. I have had the worst time finding an undersuit! I don't want to spend a small fortune on UnderArmour, and the EastBay shirt I got was baggy around the elbows. I think my best bet will be getting a dancewear catsuit. I have these tiny little stick figure arms and I'm petrified of having baggy elbows showing between my armor... I've also heard good things about Lycra dive skins, but I'm sick of paying return shipping charges and am, sadly, not in surf shop country. Recommendations from other skinny-armed folks greatly appreciated! BLASTER What's the deal with the blaster, anyway? The 501st doesn't require them for admission, but do the EIB and Centurion qualifications require them? If they ARE a must then I'll pour more research into options and all. Frankly, I really like the DLT-19s, but are they only for heavy weapons troopers or something? I'm having a tough time finding info on that. Lorelei out.