Mysterious helmet renovation

[JunesBanunes]

I've long been craving a stormtrooper helmet for display so when I found a cheap one on ebay I couldn't resist. The seller said it was vacuum formed over an original prop mold and it had the wonky shape to back it up.

 

However when I recieved the helmet I found a very poor budget job on it. The paint was runny and flaking, the decals were illfitting and poorly placed, the trim was inaccurate and the lenses were barely seethrough.

 

Actually rather clever, the mic tips were faucet ends wrapped in electrical tape.

 

So looking at the helmet I decided I could make a better job and decided to go for an ESB trooper.

[JunesBanunes]

The paint prooved much more difficult to remove than the flaking indicated. After much research and testing I found that a coat of breakfluid setting over night in a closed plastic bag loosened the paint up enough to scrape it off with tooth pics. After many painstaking hours I found I hade discovered a ghost trooper! The mysterious clear plastic is another sign of a homemade copy, possibly of an original mold as claimed. 

 

I was almost tempted to keep the helmet like this.

Edited December 16, 2015 by JunesBanunes

[JunesBanunes]

I painted the inside of the helmet in the closest colour I could find to the orginal plastic of the props. Any future flaking would just look authentic.

 

Then I coated the inside with black rubber paint and as the edges were a bit flimsy I reinforced it with some glas fiber.

 

I have future plans to put in a speaker system so I made mic tip attachments with wide openings. I found a juice cart cap fitted nicely.

 

Which put some structure on the outside to secure the hovi tips.

 

Then it was time for the white coat on the outside.

 

I almost wanted to keep the helmet like this as well, a marble trooper.

[JunesBanunes]

And then some trim and decals and here's the finished project!

 

And as it sits in my display piece "Evolution of helmets", past, present, future.

 

And now I'm ready for the epVII premiere 

[Griffin-X[TK]]

Great work on this helmet "redo".

[T-Jay[TK]]

That must have been some real hard work to remove all the old paint! You did a good job on this one and the way your helmet is displayed looks very nice.

[Buttons[TK]]

Very nice work and looks great! 

[JunesBanunes]

Thanks for the appreciation guys! Any theories about the helmets origin would be welcome, I can't find a similarity to any "brand" ones so the claim of it being an amateur copy seems reasonable, and as far as I can tell it has accurate shapes so the possibility of an orignial prop mold isn't too unlikely.

[goblinslayer]

I think you did an excellent job in turning a less than desirable copy into a great looking helmet.  The ghost trooper concept has a nice ring to it.  Could this be an amateur copy of the FX helmet?  The faucet tips are identical to what is provided in the FX helmet.

[JunesBanunes]

But does it really look like an FX? It's not that big and doesn't have the squareness or the exaggerated features:

 

[martin_john88]

Brill

 

Sent from my SM-N910F using Tapatalk

[Pyrates[TK]]

Stellar work!