troopermaster

Glue everything but the backs of the calves. If your armour fits you properly there is no need to use velcro. I mean, your arms and legs just slide into them anyway so why bother with the hassle of velrco? If you cannot get your hands through the arms or your feet through the thighs then you have not assembled your armour correctly. When I glue each half together, I start by gluing the joining strips with E6000 to the outer halves only and leave them to dry for 24 hours. Next, I glue to front seams only and leave then to dry, again for 24 hours. Then it's time for the back seams, but I leave the calves so that my foot can slip through. If you want to add velcro to the backs of the calves then that's entirely up to you That is just how I do it, others members may do it differently. I think it's best to do one seam at a time so you don't make any mistakes. Make sure you leave some room when trimming the parts too. You don't want to make them tight on your body, slightly loose is better.

Hobbycraft is expensive for everything. All your supplies can be found on ebay for much less, plus, it gets delivered straight to your door which is a bonus

I'll echo what Nate said. E6000 is a really great glue for armour. Whenever I get any overflow seeping out of the seems (which is quite often ) I just wait until it has dried, then gently run a razor blade down the edge of the strip wherever the glue is, then peel off the offending glue. I usually use the razor blade to make a start and it usually peels off pretty easily. If you get any E6000 on any areas where you don't want it, don't panic. Just wait until it dries then pull it off. Buff up the spot with a bit of Novus and you'll never even know there was a problem

Nice helmets Thayne, but don't forget about the ESB decals

FON had some for sale HERE -------

Thanks for the kind words Far from it actually. One eye is smaller and the other has the 'stye'. The vocoder is 'off set' and the teeth/frown is lop sided. These are very minor asymetrical differences, but there all the same. I have tried very hard to get this helmet close to the shape of the original ANH helmets, but you have to remember that a child is not physically just a small person, their body shapes are not in proportion to adults so some artistic creativity has to be applied here. Once I have the whole suit completed, maybe you will notice the asymetricity.

Well, it's been nearly a year since I posted anything in this thread, and I'm pleased to say that I have almost finished a completely new suit for my son. He turned 5 a couple of weeks ago and has grown quite a bit since I made him his last suit, so I've gone a made a larger, more accurate version. I don't have any full body pics as of yet because I had to remake some of the parts again that didn't quite fit properly, but I do have this of the helmet which is now finished. Once I have everything completely finished, I'll probably start a new thread. Here is a sneak peak at the new V3 mini helmet

Yeah I've seen those foam knee pads in B&Q, but never E6000. I'll be down there at the weekend to have a look for it.

I never wore them. They were just for display and I don't see any reasons for them to come off.

I used regular black cotton to sew the hand plates to the gloves. Be warned, it is more tricky than you think to sew them on. It took me longer than I thought it would getting the plates lined up on the gloves and you cannot sew them on with your hands in gloves (for obvious reasons )

They all look like decent gloves, but the original ESB gloves were very short at the wrist. I used to have a pair that were very similar to what may have been used, but I sold them with the hand plates sewn on. Here is a diagram showing the sewing pattern.

Nice one Steve

Fantastic

If you cut off the lip then there is really no point using 'S' profile trim. Test fit it by trying both slots and see which fits better. Make sure that you filp it over so the majority of the rubber is inside the helmet, making the trim look thinner from the outside. This does make the opening slightly smaller, but that's just how it is. I like to cut the trim slightly longer than needed so I have to force the ends together, making a nice tight joint. When you are happy with whichever slot you choose, run a thin bead of glue (I use E6000) inside the slot and fix to the helmet. You can use tape or clips to keep it in place while it dries. If you have any kinks on the trim, just glue then shut

Looking forward to seeing that pic Joe. I still doubt Gino will accept the fact that the tubes have the kink and that his face plate mould was altered before he got his hands on it. The proof is there in the photos I showed and will be shown again when Joe finds the pic.

So stop spreading your misinformation

I strongly believe that is how the shape of the tube is and it shows on all the original helmets. The bulge may not look so prominent on some helmets because the face plate is sat further inside the helmet on the right side so the tube looks shorter and you cannot see the bulge because the ear cap is covering it or is on it. I will gladly hold my hands up if I am wrong, but I don't think so. The only way this can be proven is for someone with an original helmet to show us the face plate when it is removed from the helmet. Just out of interest Gino, is the surface of your face plate mould smooth or leathergrain?

Good answers, but wrong. That is the natural shape of the tubes and all original helmets are the same. Even the ANH Hero and ROTJ helmets have the same shape and they are made from more rigid ABS material. If it was pinching it would simply make the tube look tapered. I have shown the difference why the original helmets differ from the replicas you produce, so I will leave it at that.

I thought you would say that but they are part of the mould. If they were not, then how do you account for this detail to be on the ABS hero and ROTJ helmets? The opposite side would have the same shape if this was the case and it doesn't.

This area is what differs from your helmet compared to any original. I believe you when you say no modifications were made to your face plate, but your moulds did not come directly from the inside of a screen used helmet. You took a copy of the mould from a screen used helmet and who's to say for sure what was done to that mould before you got your hands on it or, if that was the actual mould that was taken or a modified version that you recieved?

Here's a comparison between Gino's helmet and original LFL helmets. You can see that the original tubes flares out just after the ear cap into a bulbous shape towards the middle of the tube, and almost looks to have a dent on the underside where the flare starts. You can see this is missing on Gino's helmet and this is the area where it has been tweaked. All ANH, ESB, Hero and even ROTJ has the same bulbous shape on the right hand side tube but is not present on Gino's helmets......Why is that Gino?

I'll show you tomorrow, and it's not BS.

I'm not saying there was any clean up on yours. I'm saying the clean up was done before you copied the faceplate mould because this feature is not on any of the helmets you have shown on the forums, but clearly visible on all original helmets.

It has nothing to do with sharpness or softness of the pull, but the shape of a certain part. I don't know how many moulds were made originally, but I have seen three different faceplate moulds from TE2, one of which Matt shown to me (black one) and none have them match up in this area which clearly indicates the moulds were touched up for some reason?

Yes it can. I dare say most of it remains untouched from the original casting, but there is something that has been touched up. I haven't seen any of Matts early helmets have this feature and your mould is a copy of Matts (2nd gen) and none of your helmets have it eaither, so someone has made changes to the faceplate before you copied it.