troopermaster

Something not right there. The ANH forearms are oval shaped - not round.

Trimming the return edges won't make the biceps any bigger, unfortunately. RS uses superglue to assemble their armour so I don't think you will have much luck taking them apart successfully and even if you did, the superglue will need major cleanup and work that shouldn't be necessary if you gave them your measurements to work from. Get in touch for replacements, making sure they are bigger than the ones you have.

Here's a vocoder on an original ANH helmet. Judge for yourself.

And vocoder.

Here is a replica holster by Gino who had access to a complete original ANH suit to cast, and it's a perfect example to show. I might be able to show the details on screen used armour but I don;t have a dead on shot like this. Notice how the mounting straps are on the front of the holster? There are two ways the straps were mounted to the belt but the way they were attached to the holster are the same. Let me explain. It's my belief that the holsters were originally made using loops to hang the holster from the belt - just as they did in ESB. But for whatever reason they changed their mind and decided to rivet the holster directly to the belt, so the loops were cut. The cuts were made either to the front of the strap, leaving a small black tab commonly seen on the front of the holster and the tan colour of the inside of the strap showing going under the belt, and some were cut at the back of the strap so you see black straps attached to front of the holster (as in the photo above) and the tabs would be on the back of the holster. This is why you will see some troopers with black straps and tan straps, but the main retaining straps and the shape of the holsters were always the same as far as I have seen during my research over the years. So, while it's acceptable to have the straps mounted from the front of the holster, the way Darman has done it shouldn't have the tab on the front but on the backside of the holster and the straps should be black with the tan to the inside.

The Anovos holster is more screen accurate than both of those from Darman. Problems with Darmans are: 1. V cut-outs are wrong shape 2. Retaining straps should not slot through the holster 3. Mounting straps attached to the front

You might want to reposition your brackets on the abdomen more towards the end of the armour. The first screw should be much closer to the very end of the armour and the chest brackets should be 10-15mm from the end of the chest plate. The way you have them fitted now will mean your chest brackets will be way too central on the chest and look odd. There seems to be a trend with RS armour, be it RS commissions or RS owners putting the brackets in the wrong places.

The armour isn't round. Here are a couple of photos of an original ANH forearm I took.

Incorrect. You have the inner left as your outer right but the inner right is the correct part. Your left shin is made up of the outer right and outer left.

Just so you know, the shins are not assembled correctly. You have put both outer halves together and both inner halves together. It doesn't really any difference but they are not assembled as intended.

The gaps can happen when you make the mistake of measuring in from the flat edge. The edges are not usually straight so the best way to cut any butt joint is to lay your joining strip onto the edge of the armour where you want it to go and mark the middle of the strip on the top and bottom of the armour and draw a straight line. Now you know the two parts will join up perfectly. If you have some of the flat edge showing from under the joining trips, that's totally fine.

Close! Don't have the strips longer than the armour.

Not a great reference photo. These are ESB MKII shins assembled using the overlap method and they are two outer parts together and two inner parts together.

ANH armour would typically be finished like this.

You're good up to 25mm on the strips - front and rear. Squared off or angular trimmed ends on the strips. Pop rivets are optional

I'm guessing he's trying to make the knee plate ridge line up with top of the shin which is what I believe is an FISD requirement? They most definitely do not line up with the shin ridge - no Stormtrooper armour does. Since the ROTJ knee plates are held on with single cap rivets, the front plate angles away from the shin - opposite to how this is angled.

Is your choice of going TD because of the result of your shimming work?

Looking at your helmet at this stage, I would have been tempted to build it as is and glue a strip of ABS inside the tubes to close the gaps. Then position the ears strategically to hide the joint.

Haha indeed. The ears are not fitted to the correct sides.

I see a lot of people sewing the snap in the wrong place as you have. They should be sewn toward the inner edge of the strap,

You can reduce your return edge to at least half of what you have now and totally remove the sharp pointed part. I would trim them like this.

There is someone on the MEPD who started to build an SE Sandtrooper but now might be keeping it ROTJ. I will ask him if he wants to help with photos of individual armour parts photos. The holsters are essentially the same throughout the original trilogy, with only the way they were attached to the belt being different. ROTJ are riveted to the belt on the right hip.

I'm basically asking for evidence to see why anyone would think there are rivets on the kidney plate. Only ANH and ESB armour had rivets on the sides of the kidney and abdomen plates. I'll be the first to admit that I don't keep up to date with the CRL's as they are irrelevant to me, but I find it fascinating that certain requirements are presented that don't exist on the original armour. I also fully understand that screen accuracy isn't a high priority of the 501st but I believe that's the whole point of achieving EIB and Centurion, isn't it? Again, photo evidence is what I'm looking for as I know for a fact no rivets were used on the kidney plate and I'm baffled as to why this is suddenly a requirement for a higher level certification.

I have just been made aware of this really strange ROTJ requirement. Can someone enlighten me please? OPTIONAL Level three certification (if applicable): Two rivets shall be present on each side of the kidney plate, approximately 4mm from the inside edge of the U shaped gasket or molded lip that is adjacent to the ab plate. There will be one rivet near the top and one near the bottom on each side. They may be painted white, or not. There shall be one visible snap on the crotch tab of the posterior plate, painted white.