ImperialBrewer’s first TK ANH stunt build WIP

[imperialbrewer[TK]]

Day two: starting on the wrist pieces

 

I've started out on the wrist pieces and trimming them up, and trying to figure out sizing.

 

QUESTION: Do any of you have a rule of thumb that you use when considering the spacing between your arm and the armor itself? 

I thought I heard somewhere one "finger space" all the way around, but wondering what everyone here has done when sizing your arm pieces?

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Day two photos here: https://photos.app.goo.gl/o6Esd6XUTcQOkbsI3 

[ukswrath[Staff]]

Spacing, put on your under suit, finger width or 1/2 is a good rule yes. Looking good btw 

[themaninthesuitcase[Admin]]

I ended up slightly larger than the suggested as I needed more room for my hand to fit through. So make sure you check that too.

[gmrhodes13[Staff]]

Also have a look with coverstrips attached, I had to go a little bigger on the forearms because I wanted accurate coverstrip sizing so I just added some foam on the inside of the forearms so they don't wobble about  

[imperialbrewer[TK]]

A few days have passed and have made more progress with trimming and fitting.  I've got the arm pieces all trimmed and fitted and have started onto the thighs and shins and have those mostly trimmed and are prepped for fitting later today.  You can see galleries of the build process below with commentary:

 

Day three: wrist trimming and fitting

Day four: bicep and shoulder bell trimming and fitting

Day five: thigh and shin trimming

 

But what SCARES ME HALF TO DEATH are these damn legs.  I don't know if it's just the plastic or if it's just the case for all builds — but it feels likes the leg pieces (especially the thighs) are a little warped.  Trying to line up the two halves was SUPER stressful and frustrating.  Even after trimming off the excess on the back (the remnants of the exterior portion of the pull) and the 10mm cut on the front halves, there feels like there's this little raised lip on both sides AND like the legs are warped and don't quite line up right.

 

After a lot of futzing with it, I secured the fronts with masking tape on the interior to hold them together.  But I really worry about this, especially when it comes to gluing the coverstrips.  There's a really subtle ︿ raised edge where the  come together (not THAT extreme but enough that I am paranoid about getting a thorough bond).  

 

QUESTIONS:  

Did you guys struggle with the legs, too (particularly pairing them up together)? 

Did your leg pieces feel a little warped?

Any advice for the fitting portion for the thighs and shins?

 

 

You can sort of see the curled lip on the ridge on the right:

 

 

Edited December 19, 2017 by imperialbrewer

[imperialbrewer[TK]]

Continuing on with my build, The E6000 dried on the first wrist piece and it turned out pretty good. But I decided to face my fear or Zap a Gap and do the remaining three arm pieces with Zap a Gap and Zip Kicker



I had a few minor screwups but nothing I think is irredeemable:

• accidentally used 5/8” cover strips instead of 7/8” on the first bicep I did, which forced my hand to do the same with the other.
• because of that I decided to put in some supporting cover strips on the inside for a little more strength
• a couple of the strips had small cuts into them (didn’t see them until after gluing and then pulling the film off), but they sanded out. Will polish them later.
• one of the forearms has a slight mishap with the zip kicker and my yellow shop cloth — I think it sucked some of the yellow pigment into the armor. But I might be able to fix that later with some light sanding/polishing...or as a last resort airbrushing it with some matching white paint.

Could you guys just take a look and let me know if I’m headed in the right direction or if you have tips for considering — I’d appreciate it!






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[magni[TK]]

Looking good so far!

Go back to E-6000. It's a marathon not a sprint. And when mistakes are made you don't need to live with it or come up with a get me by remedy. 

Not preaching, just suggesting

Save the CA for your third suit.

[TheSwede[TK]]

5 hours ago, imperialbrewer said:

tips for considering

Looks like some cover strips have sharp angles, might want to sand them out a but - if you didn`t already plan for it that is - all in all great work

[imperialbrewer[TK]]

Looking good so far!
Go back to E-6000. It's a marathon not a sprint. And when mistakes are made you don't need to live with it or come up with a get me by remedy. 
Not preaching, just suggesting
Save the CA for your third suit.

Thanks! I should’ve probably clarified, I’m not totally abandoning E6000, but plan on using it for some of the difficult pieces that I’m less confident about: namely the thighs and shins. For the most part I was really confident about the wrist and bicep pieces, so it was more an exercise of overcoming my fear of using zip kicker and zap a gap.

I think some of the other pieces I might use the zip kicker, but for the items that I want to be a lot more careful about I intend to continue to use the E6000.


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[imperialbrewer[TK]]

Looks like some cover strips have sharp angles, might want to sand them out a but - if you didn`t already plan for it that is - all in all great work:duim:

Yeah, I still need to go back through and sand things down once I’m done with all the cover strips. I will take a second look at the cover strip angles. Thank you!


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[imperialbrewer[TK]]

A few days pass since last posting and more build progress. I didn’t get any responses on my questions here so sought out help on RWA Creations’ Facebook group — people seemed to be eager to help and responded much more quickly.

One issue I had was the sizing of the thigh pieces with a 30-40mm gap in the back tops. Some folks shared with me how they essentially built up a back support and bondo’d the front. I may take a hybrid approach: support inner strip and fill in the outer gap with as much ABS as I can and then fill in the gaps. After it’s sanded and painted, put on a 25mm cover strip on back. Currently:



I also have the arms done and strapped up — for the most part they’re feeling good:




Also have much of the strapping done save for the sides:


But I am in the same struggle now with the torso sides with a sizable gap (I’m not exactly a thin dude):


Thoughts? Suggestions?




Progress photos and time lapse videos:

Day six:
https://photos.app.goo.gl/Ft38VzYMVOoUSAlZ2

Day seven:
https://photos.app.goo.gl/FMyH5AVTGVepN73U2

Day eight:
https://photos.app.goo.gl/zWQIhliYcI3g66mq1

Day nine:
https://photos.app.goo.gl/FRCNWXJuxMUMS1UJ3

Day ten:
https://photos.app.goo.gl/mZfB0DtaahlA2Wrh1

Day eleven:
https://photos.app.goo.gl/bck4zwyAPVBS1J8b2




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[CableGuy[TK]]

Hi Michael,
I believe the side gap is perfectly acceptable for basic clearance, possibly even EIB; however, if your aiming for Centurion, you would have to add shims. Check out some of the other builds on here where shims have been added. As you’ve already added the fittings to the ab and kidney plates, it might be a little more involved at this point.

By the way, it looks like you’re doing a cracking job on your build! Looking good. :-)


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[Frank75139[501st]]

Love the time lapse videos and very interested in how your thighs turn out.


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[magni[TK]]

You can get basic approval with those gaps Michael. For EIB the gap would need to be 1/2" or less. Add shims to kidney and fill in with abs paste. Same with your thighs. Then no need for paint.

 

Arms are looking good btw. Keep up the great work!

[imperialbrewer[TK]]

You can get basic approval with those gaps Michael. For EIB the gap would need to be 1/2" or less. Add shims to kidney and fill in with abs paste. Same with your thighs. Then no need for paint.
 
Arms are looking good btw. Keep up the great work!

Thank you for the feedback!! I’ll give that a go.


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[imperialbrewer[TK]]

So I have been absolutely TERRIFIED about painting anything on my kit — I have mild to moderate essential tremors (my hands shake when engaged in action). But I conquered my fears and tackled the torso blue and gray “buttons” ...and I have to say, they came out pretty good for shaky hands.

I used blue painters tape, made 1mm sized circles with a circle template on the tape, and carefully cut the circle out leaving me a template to paint with.

I’m pretty proud of the job despite my condition.



I also finished shimming the thighs and am just waiting on the acetone to arrive so I can make ABS paste and fill in all the gaps. I think this is going to work!



I am a little concerned about the fitting, but that’ll come with time. I also am waiting on more 15mm poppers to arrive — held up on strapping until I can get those delivered. I may start working on the helmet soon.

Progress galleries:

Day 12:
https://photos.app.goo.gl/15w5p5IcY4CESm573

Day 13:
https://photos.app.goo.gl/T7nlIfourchBP76W2




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[TheSwede[TK]]

Great work

[imperialbrewer[TK]]

So I've made a ton of progress and haven't really been posting many updates here — however I have kept a complete log of all my work over at my TK Facebook page with links to all the galleries of photos and summaries of the build days.  Some of the more notable updates and things completed as of late:

 

The helmet build-out is "complete" (save for non-required internal components that I plan on installing, including fans, switches, and a few other items).  The paint job was extremely difficult because of my tremor condition, but I persevered through it and am pretty happy with the results.

 

 

I've also completed the belt assembly with FUNCTIONAL DROP BOXES.  WHAT THE WHAT? 

 

 

The drop boxes are secured together using white industrial strength velcro — the soft half on the outside of the interior boxes and the coarse half on the inside of the exterior boxes.  Just that little bit of velcro (probably 3mm wide?) is enough to securely hold the two ends together yet still make it easy enough to pull apart with TK gloves on.  The added bonus is that it's the perfect size for my driver's license, a few credit cards, and some folded up cash.

 

 

And the last bit that I thought I'd share is the extensive shimming that I had to do to the thighs to get them to fit right.  It look a VERY long time to go through the filling -> sanding -> buffing process — essentially repeating that process for several days until I got it to a point that I was content with.  Towards the end I had a number of issues with discoloration of the ABS paste and some small bubble pockets as well. But with enough time and patience managed to see it through.

 

 

The photo doesn't really do it justice — sooooo much sanding. But in the end I've got a result I'm pretty proud of.  A few things I might have done differently and learned along the way:  

 

• I read somewhere to make the ABS paste a mayonnaise consistency, hind sight I'd go even a lot thinner.  Not so much that it's a runny mess, but enough so that it's super easy to spread.  My experience with ABS paste has taught me that it starts to dry VERY QUICKLY, and that doesn't give you much time to go back over it with a popsicle stick or scrap ABS to smooth things out.

 

• Straight up acetone painted on with a brush works great for blending minor ABS issues.  I found it effective in blending edges.

 

• My shimming job was kinda half-assed.  I wish I would have just put in a rectangular piece in back instead of trying to be clever and making a triangular shaped one.  Oh well.  It all worked out in the end.

 

Going through this whole shimming process with the thighs will make it much easier to shim the kidney armor now that I've got this knowledge and experience in the bag.

 

 

If you're curious here's all the recent photo/timelapse galleries:

 

Day 14 (helmet trimming and fitting):
https://photos.app.goo.gl/5G9phGDh4osam83a2

 

Day 15 (helmet and ear cover fitting):
https://photos.app.goo.gl/Yiax6QbC3gQKKSoo1

 

Day 16 (screwing up my helmet - trimming):
https://photos.app.goo.gl/6Mt2Nm8NVuqSQPzI3

 

Day 17 (ABS pasting and sanding the thighs):
https://photos.app.goo.gl/OSsa3DztKnaeUcTt2

 

Day 18 (more pasting/sanding the thighs, thermal detonator fitting/fixing):
https://photos.app.goo.gl/FxQqzHSVC6txuLK12

 

Day 19 (finishing the thermal detonator, more pasting/sanding the thighs):
https://photos.app.goo.gl/qiMSsTNGWOnTXNcu1

 

Day 20 (shin strapping/clips):
https://photos.app.goo.gl/fPW41kfEw6Z7sFbP2

 

Day 21 (checking torso/arm fitting, more filling/sanding the torsos):
https://photos.app.goo.gl/xA3FvwqtMVbsFe693

 

Day 22 (more filling/sanding the torsos, dry-fitting the sniper knee):
https://photos.app.goo.gl/zny66lelmOLV9mM73

 

Day 23 (torso sanding, sniper knee, helmet painting):
https://photos.app.goo.gl/cXfoz5A38MT7Khyi2

 

Day 24 (more helmet painting - trapezoids and blue striping):
https://photos.app.goo.gl/sdvhgcwS8fXKixts2

 

Day 25 (cleaning up helmet line painting, prepping thighs for cover strips):
https://photos.app.goo.gl/0katM4aWw1g9BASA2

 

Day 26 (cleaning up strapping issues, belt assembly, painting exposed rivets):
https://photos.app.goo.gl/AemkgfZS5zmm7CRx2

 

 

 

[imperialbrewer[TK]]

Just a few strapping issues to resolve and I think I’ll be ready for Pre-Approval! The chest and ab seems to come apart too easily and the thighs need a better belt solution — they tend to slide inward and throw off the vertical alignment. Bugger.




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[gmrhodes13[Staff]]

Looking good, as you say just some fitting issues, hope to see you in the pre approval area soon, good luck.

[imperialbrewer[TK]]

I want to thank everyone in this thread who helped me out in one way or another. I finally got approval today and given my TK designation — TK-27072. Thank you so much for your advice, feedback, and encouragement!!

Now onto small refinements and making things more comfortable on troops!




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[TheSwede[TK]]

Congratulations Trooper

[gmrhodes13[Staff]]

Great news congratulations and welcome to the ranks trooper

[imperialbrewer[TK]]

Now that I’ve had a few troops under my belt with basic clearance, I am ready to finish tackling journey towards centurion builder. This evening I’ve started the process of shimming up my kidney armor. So far so good.

In the process of measuring out my shimming, I did discover a strapping issue that has had my armor out of a little bit of misalignment. I think after I get my armor shimmed up I’ll be able to get a better sense of where I need to fix the strapping. But for now I’m not quite sure.

Tomorrow I will get started on filling the seam with a touch of ABS paste, blending it in, and then sanding/buffing.













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[CableGuy[TK]]

Looks like good progress so far, Michael. I'm sure you'll be knocking on the Centurion door very soon.