Now the newbie starts building!

[KaitoTrooper[TK]]

I hope you had a great Christmas and I wish you a happy new year!

 

I've been a bit lazy (or call it scared from starting), but I have ideed tried to trim some pieces.

 

 

 

I think the right handguard needs some more trimming, but it isn't too bad for a first try, is it?

 

 

But I think I kinda messed up a dropbox.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

What do you think?

 

Cheers,

Felix

[The5thHorseman[501st]]

There should be very minimal return edge on the handguards:

 

 

And for the drop boxes, just lay it flat on a piece of sandpaper (100-150 grit) and start making circles until it evens nicely .

[KaitoTrooper[TK]]

Oh ok

 

First and last time I used this huge scissors.

Cutting with a sharp knife is a bit tricky but it seems to work.

I am gonna try some medical scissors tomorrow. Maybe they are useful for the lower parts of the body armour.

 

Sent from the shield generator on Endor

[Clamps[TK]]

Lexan curved plastic scissors are fantastic. Available via eBay or your local RC shop.

[Darth Aloha[Admin]]

Lexan curved plastic scissors are fantastic. Available via eBay or your local RC shop.

Amazon sells a set with straight and curved pair for pretty cheap too.

 

-Eric

 

 

Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk

[KaitoTrooper[TK]]

I don't know, where you found these on Amazon, Eric

I just ordered a curved one for 5€, coming here tomorrow.

 

... whoops, I still need a holster and a neckseal... *runs to Darman*

[KaitoTrooper[TK]]

Some updates incoming (warning, a bit heavy of pics)!

 

I tried to cut down the return edge on the handguards.

Not quite satisfying, I will have an eye on that later.

 

 

In addition I trimmed one of the shoulder bells.

(straight lines do not seem to like me)

 

 

 

And here are some other trimmed parts.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

The chest, the back-plate and the ab-plate are not entirely finished yet.

 

Regards,

Felix

[Colin1138[TK]]

Great progress so far mate! Remember, you don't have to worry about being super neat and tidy when trimming the torso pieces-the rubber edging hides all that anyway. Mine looked shocking!

 

Look forward to seeing another ROTJ TK....it's quite the exclusive club!

[KaitoTrooper[TK]]

Thank you!

 

Yes exclusive. Has a good and a not-so-good side

 

Sent from the shield generator on Endor

[K@nne[TK]]

Good job so far - I want to see more :-)

 

Cheers from Ewok village

[K@nne[TK]]

Lexan curved plastic scissors are fantastic. Available via eBay or your local RC shop.

 

For the german guys you can get curved an straight scissors at conrad electronics I bought both for 10€

 

http://www.conrad.de/ce/de/product/207261/Reely-Karosserie-Schere-Mini?ref=list

 

http://www.conrad.de/ce/de/product/236896/Reely-FS511096-Karosserie-Schere?ref=list

 

Cheers

Chris

[tigresa[TK]]

Looks nice and nice job by the moment. But you don't need to have return edge on chest, the back-plate and the ab-plate. Handguards has only a little little little return edge

[KaitoTrooper[TK]]

I did not do any

Ok, the handguards. But i kinda messed with that one.

 

Sent from the shield generator on Endor

[KaitoTrooper[TK]]

Did some work yesterday.

 

The Ab-plate is now fully trimmed.

 

 

 

And some other trimmed parts (I think, I did a better job with the shoulder this time ):

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

But I have a couple of questions now:

 

1) I am not 100% concerned how to trim the sides on the chest.

Is this correct?

 

 

2) There is some trim left on the back and the chest. I am afraid that if I trim it down, it will be too short.

An ideas?

 

 

3) As I know now, the shoulder straps are secured with velcro on the chest (and I suppose they have to be heatbent).

Is this enough to hold the full thorso in place?

 

4) Does the white trim have to be glued or is it enough if I use a hairdryer once it is fitted on the edges?

 

 

Some progress, a lot of questions.

Please do not call the angry mob, I do what I can

[The5thHorseman[501st]]

1. It seems correct to me.

2. Keep it like that until your strapping is done and then take a decision if you fear they could become too short. However, i would trim the ABS that flares up on the right/hand side and then even the opposite side.

3. The shoulder bridges are riveted on the chest plate and yes they'll need some heat bending. Boiling water is hot enough for this job normally. On the back, i really don't know how they're secured. You can see duct tape on a ref pic but i doubt this is the way they did it, maybe velcro or free floating? 

However, i'm pretty sure ROTJ armors have no elastic shoulder bridges and that the chest/back plates rests on the wearer's shoulders directly via the ABS bridges. One way would be to use suspenders for the Ab section and the Kydney/butt plate, to prevent to put too much weight on the ABS bridges. You can see it done on the ESb MkII armor which is close to the ROTJ.

 

4. I really don't know for that but i'd drop few glue dots here an there just to be sure.

Edited January 16, 2015 by The5thHorseman

[KaitoTrooper[TK]]

2 this is exactly where I drew the lines, even tough i may not seem so.

 

3. The bridges should be secured for Centurion (I believe so, but secured for sure)

I will add some elastic beneath it.

 

4. The trim is quite stubborn as I saw today there is no way that this will stay secure without glue.

 

Oh and it seems the armour does fit me quite well, as far as I could se in a test fit with tape today.

 

Sent from the shield generator on Endor

[The5thHorseman[501st]]

Just be careful, the ROTJ CRL is kind of messed-up regarding what was actually done on the film.

And i agree, the shoulder bridges are very unlikely free floating in the back so they should be secured in a way or another.

[Colin1138[TK]]

Regards the shoulder bridges,..i myself am still unconvinced they were rivetted on. i know the tour suit has rivets,..but I haven't been convinced yet about the on set ones. I myself glued mine to the chest, and put a little velcro on the backplate to hold them in place.

 

The armour trim, I measured,cut to length and then glued down as I put it on. The butt piece in particular is a pain!

 

You are flying through this so far. great work!

[KaitoTrooper[TK]]

Looking through some old pictures Mark has posted, I know now how and where the bridges are connected with the velcro (they also look like they were glued and since i am dumb in riveting, I am going to glue them, too. Rivets can ve added later ).

 

Yeah, I almost raged yesterday when I was starting with the butt! Should start with someting easy.

 

Can you give me some advice on a good liner for the helmet?

Mine is, nicely said, garbage.

 

Anyway, more progress soon, only on this cannel

 

Sent from the shield generator on Endor

[Colin1138[TK]]

I just have my lid padded with foam. Had a large square of it,..only needed a small amount to pad the shoulder bells, so used some of the excess in my helmet. Been meaning to replace it with a proper hardhat liner for ages now(because sweaty foam is stanky!!lol) so can't help you there sorry. 

[K@nne[TK]]

Looks good so far - This will help me a a lot doing my build

[JSmails[501st]]

The shoulder bridges weren't riveted on.  Not on any actual suit I've seen pics of.  Or any closeup during the film.  Or John's original suit that is stickied at the top of the forum.  White velcro.  Tour suits all had rivets from what I've observed. 

 

Also, when you get to it, make sure to cover the bottom two buttons with the top of the belt when you rivet it on.  In almost no screen caps can you see the bottom two buttons, that is, the bottom one on the straight line, and the bottom, offset button.  I guess a simpler way of saying it is you should only see one blue button, the second one from the bottom on the middle plate.

 

I see so many ROTJ's where you can see all the buttons and it's simply not correct.  There are exceptions, of course, but I'd say well over 90% of the TK's in ROTJ you can't see the bottom two buttons, and probably a higher percentage than that where you can't see the bottom, offset, middle button. 

 

Great start BTW.

[Colin1138[TK]]

I agree with that point on covering the bottom buttons,..however...I would check with your GML just to be sure. I rivetted my belt on like at(as it appeared like that in most ref material I could find at the time) but when it came to clearance,the LMO at the time(we were a new Outpost then,with all cossie submissions being passed up the ladder) requested the belt be lowered and not to obscure them.Luckily there was some give in my belt,so it could be twisted down ever so slightly to show the buttons.

 

As an aside, I would also like to point out that many ROTJ troopers had unpainted buttons,which is something that I think should be part of the crl. Along with an 'optional' status for the thermal det. Lots of those missing too!

[The5thHorseman[501st]]

The shoulder bridges weren't riveted on.  Not on any actual suit I've seen pics of.  Or any closeup during the film.  Or John's original suit that is stickied at the top of the forum.  White velcro.  Tour suits all had rivets from what I've observed. 

 

 

 

 

...

[troopermaster]

The shoulder bridges weren't riveted on.  Not on any actual suit I've seen pics of.  Or any closeup during the film.  Or John's original suit that is stickied at the top of the forum.

The shoulder bridges were riveted to the chest only and Velcro on the back. John's suit is not ROTJ. It's an ESB MKII made prior to ROTJ.