RS Propmasters ESB TK slow and steady build in Portland, OR

[Infern0[TK]]

Thanks guys! Haven't gotten back to it yet. Ended up being a busy weekend and now the garage is under renovation so my workbench has been stuffed into the corner for the moment

[Jeffnmar[TK]]

52 minutes ago, 1nfern0 said:

Thanks guys! Haven't gotten back to it yet. Ended up being a busy weekend and now the garage is under renovation so my workbench has been stuffed into the corner for the moment

Garret, just throwing out a quick shout out. I live outside Oregon City and should be receiving my commission build this week. Joined cloud city garrison right before Covid hit and have been lurking on the boards there. a well. 

 

Good  to see another PNW TK on here:-) ...  Looking forward too trooping soon I hope!

[MoSc0ut[TK]]

Garret, just throwing out a quick shout out. I live outside Oregon City and should be receiving my commission build this week. Joined cloud city garrison right before Covid hit and have been lurking on the boards there. a well. 
 
Good  to see another PNW TK on here:-) ...  Looking forward too trooping soon I hope!

There’s more of us here in CCG we’ve just been quiet lately

TK-50899

[Infern0[TK]]

On 10/25/2020 at 7:54 PM, Jeffnmar said:

Garret, just throwing out a quick shout out. I live outside Oregon City and should be receiving my commission build this week. Joined cloud city garrison right before Covid hit and have been lurking on the boards there. a well. 

 

Good  to see another PNW TK on here:-) ...  Looking forward too trooping soon I hope!

Nice to meet you Jeff! Hope to meet in person at a troop someday
As Jim said, there are a bunch of PNW TKs, just haven't been many trooping most of this year. We can change that though
 

[Infern0[TK]]

So, I've come to a bit of a standstill with my bucket.

The right ear ended up giving me a lot of grief over several days, and even though I was careful - so I thought - and read the excellent posts that @gmrhodes13 shared with me, as well as watched the RS youtube tutorial a bunch of times, I still ended up cutting it enough that it's too small now...

 

The rest of the bucket has come together pretty well though!

After drilling holes for the ears, I took the screws out holding the two halves together, and glued some scrap abs into where the gap above the left ear was:

 

I know it looks a bit dodgy, but it'll barely be seen and is more there to hold the ear screws and patch up the swiss cheese drill holes.

Next, I gave the helmet pieces a nice bath with dish detergent and water, and started on the eyes.
 

I decided to go for something more sturdy than the screen accurate thin film that RS provides in the kit, so I purchased a thicker lens material from Trooperbay.

First I traced the eyes onto some paper, and then cut out the lenses with an extra 1cm or so allowance around the edges.

 

I opted to use Joseph's method of attaching the lenses with Sugru, which I bought from the man himself, and following his excellent tutorial it should have been pretty simple and straightforward - and with the left eye it was - but for some reason it wouldn't stick to the right lens and I had to redo it several times. In the end it came out pretty well, although didn't stick quite as well as I had hoped it would have.

 

Finally, I riveted the two halves together and screwed in the left ear and hovi tips that I'd finished a few days prior.

At this point, I'll have to do an order for another right ear and another ammo belt before I can do much more, so I tried on the rest of my armor to see if there was anythong else I'd need to fix that I could order at the same time.
 

@Rat, @justjoseph63, @gmrhodes13, Please ignore: 

- The ANH bucket 

- Lack of holster 

- Loose right shoulder bridge

 

But, do you see any other issues with the armor that might require replacement, or might get in the way of me getting Centurion at this point?

 

Thanks!

Thanks guys!

Edited November 3, 2020 by 1nfern0

[justjoseph63[Staff]]

Overall a good looking build, Garrett!  I see a few items that may affect you at different levels, but nothing that can't be pretty easily remedied.

 

1.  It may be the lighting but the teeth look to be gray instead of black as required for all levels of approval.

 

   

 

2.  Your bucket is sitting pretty high, and it may be due to padding inside the top.  Padding is not required at any level and removing it may actually help you see better by dropping it down more level with your eyes.  This will not affect approval at any level, but is just a strong suggestion. 

 

            

 

3.  You are good to go for Basic and even Level 2, but the gap between the shoulder bells/shoulder strap will need to be be reduced for Level 3.

 

   

 

4.   A tiny bit of overlap is fine and dandy, but for higher levels we prefer none.  It may be the photo, but it appears as if your "Han snap" (if that's what it is.. hard to tell) is painted white and is sitting way to close to the corner of the ab.

 

          

 

4.  Just a simple strapping fix here..  The left thigh is riding up pretty high and cold stand to come down a bit to match the right one.

 

[Infern0[TK]]

3 hours ago, justjoseph63 said:

 

3.  You are good to go for Basic and even Level 2, but the gap between the shoulder bells/shoulder strap will need to be be reduced for Level 3.

 

   

 

4.   A tiny bit of overlap is fine and dandy, but for higher levels we prefer none.  It may be the photo, but it appears as if your "Han snap" (if that's what it is.. hard to tell) is painted white and is sitting way to close to the corner of the ab.

 

          

 

Thank you so much @justjoseph63! I’ll get the bells closer in to my shoulder bridges. Any tips for getting a nice snug fit?

 

The Han rivet is unpainted but it’s hidden under my chest plate in these photos. I’ll have a play with it today to see if I can fix the massive overlap though... maybe I need to trim down the edges of the abdominal plate more?

Thanks again sir!

 

[justjoseph63[Staff]]

Can you add a few close-up pics of the left side of the ab/kidney showing the rivets and one of the Han snap placement??  No need to get suited up. 

[gmrhodes13[Staff]]

You may want to try some padding behind your ab as the ab/kidney are overlapping on the sides. When you are skinny a little padding can make a lot of difference 

[Infern0[TK]]

19 hours ago, justjoseph63 said:

Can you add a few close-up pics of the left side of the ab/kidney showing the rivets and one of the Han snap placement??  No need to get suited up. .

Here ya go:

[Infern0[TK]]

On 11/4/2020 at 9:12 PM, 1nfern0 said:

Here ya go:

Anything I should change @justjoseph63, or does it look ok to you? Hoping to order my replacement ammo belt and ear bits on Monday so I can get this build approved and trooping!

[gmrhodes13[Staff]]

Looks like your side rivet placement is a little low on the top rivets.

 

Also your Han snap is a little far away from the corner.

 

In saying that these are higher level issues and you may be ok for basic approval (depending on your GML)

 

 

[tat2trooper[TK]]

On 11/2/2020 at 8:37 PM, 1nfern0 said:

So, I've come to a bit of a standstill with my bucket.

The right ear ended up giving me a lot of grief over several days, and even though I was careful - so I thought - and read the excellent posts that @gmrhodes13 shared with me, as well as watched the RS youtube tutorial a bunch of times, I still ended up cutting it enough that it's too small now...

 

The rest of the bucket has come together pretty well though!

After drilling holes for the ears, I took the screws out holding the two halves together, and glued some scrap abs into where the gap above the left ear was:

 

I know it looks a bit dodgy, but it'll barely be seen and is more there to hold the ear screws and patch up the swiss cheese drill holes.

Next, I gave the helmet pieces a nice bath with dish detergent and water, and started on the eyes.
 

I decided to go for something more sturdy than the screen accurate thin film that RS provides in the kit, so I purchased a thicker lens material from Trooperbay.

First I traced the eyes onto some paper, and then cut out the lenses with an extra 1cm or so allowance around the edges.

 

I opted to use Joseph's method of attaching the lenses with Sugru, which I bought from the man himself, and following his excellent tutorial it should have been pretty simple and straightforward - and with the left eye it was - but for some reason it wouldn't stick to the right lens and I had to redo it several times. In the end it came out pretty well, although didn't stick quite as well as I had hoped it would have.

 

Finally, I riveted the two halves together and screwed in the left ear and hovi tips that I'd finished a few days prior.

At this point, I'll have to do an order for another right ear and another ammo belt before I can do much more, so I tried on the rest of my armor to see if there was anythong else I'd need to fix that I could order at the same time.
 

@Rat, @justjoseph63, @gmrhodes13, Please ignore: 

- The ANH bucket 

- Lack of holster 

- Loose right shoulder bridge

 

But, do you see any other issues with the armor that might require replacement, or might get in the way of me getting Centurion at this point?

 

Thanks!

Thanks guys!

 I was just trying to figure out how I could cut the eyes and this helped.

[Infern0[TK]]

6 hours ago, gmrhodes13 said:

Looks like your side rivet placement is a little low on the top rivets.

 

Also your Han snap is a little far away from the corner.

 

In saying that these are higher level issues and you may be ok for basic approval (depending on your GML)

 

 

Thank you Glen!
 

My main takeaway from this is that I have too much return edge on my abdominal plate. Once I get basic approval, I’ll plan on cutting the sides and top here, filling the holes and redoing my riveting/strapping. 

[Infern0[TK]]

1 hour ago, Dolladolla916 said:

 I was just trying to figure out how I could cut the eyes and this helped.

Cool, glad to hear it! Good luck with your  build

[gmrhodes13[Staff]]

It's more the alignment of the rivets to the top which is a little off, the distance to the end of the sides looks ok. Again this is more for higher level clearance and shouldn't affect basic approval.

 

 

 

[Infern0[TK]]

Not much to update yet. Waiting on an order of spare parts from RS so fingers crossed it'll get here soonish. Here's the list of everything left to do on my armor as I see it now (not including helmet):

To do now:
- Adjust padding that I added in shins (it was pushing the shin into the back of my calf)
- Trim back tops of thighs to match the shape of butt plate better
- Add little bits of padding to fronts of thighs to make them sit nicer

- Replace thigh ammo belt with new ammo belt with corrected corners, paint new rivets
- Add padding to abdominal plate to make it sit nicer
- Loosen strapping holding butt plate to kidney

- Glue pouch for phone and cable management system to chest plate (or maybe abdominal plate) for sound system

- Shorten shoulder bell to shoulder bridge strapping

To do after basic approval:

- Remove top two rivets on ab and kidney plates, patch hole with ABS paste, sand and polish, correctly place rivets ~20mm from top, and midway between bottom and top rivetsas per reference, and paint rivets (most urgent)

- Replace current left abdominal strapping with less screen accurate but more handy webbing and velcro

- Remove ammo belt rivets and replace with snaps
- Add snap to left shoulder bridge strapping to make it removable

Not a ton to do, but I definitely want to do it right! I'm going to step back for a week or two and finish up some other projects first and then get back to it and get this thing done!

Edited November 20, 2020 by 1nfern0

[TKSpartan[Staff]]

20 hours ago, 1nfern0 said:

Remove top rivet on ab and kidney plates, patch hole with ABS paste, sand and polish, correctly place rivet ~20mm from top as per reference and paint rivet (most urgent)

Hi Garret, just another detail.

 

for Centurion Level,  You will need to reposition de rivet located in the meddle as well.

 

Crl: Rivets are equally spaced along the depth of the armor and about 10mm from the edge.

 

 

 

 

[Infern0[TK]]

1 hour ago, TKSpartan said:

Hi Garret, just another detail.

 

for Centurion Level,  You will need to reposition de rivet located in the meddle as well.

 

Crl: Rivets are equally spaced along the depth of the armor and about 10mm from the edge.

 

 

 

 

Roger that. Updated my todo list to reflect this. Thanks!

[Infern0[TK]]

Get the replacement bits from RS about a month ago, but ended up just slowly addressing the notes on my armor to-do list, and just opened up the package from RS to start on replacing the thigh ammo pack and work on the right ear on my bucket, and to my surprise, the plastic on the replacement bit is a noticeably different shade of white to the rest of my armor 

 

 

I had a mini freak out... and then wrote RS to see what they say, so fingers crossed they’ll have an answer.

 

Otherwise, what... will I need to paint the armor/bucket to make everything match (don’t mind painting the bucket, but don’t want to have to paint the armor)? See if I can order the bits from another vendor who uses plastic that is closer to the rest of my suit? I could always try the old peroxide trick to lighten the plastic I suppose. Not sure it’ll work on this case though. 
 

Ok need to go take some deep breaths now

[gmrhodes13[Staff]]

I've not seen issues of color differences from the same supplier before unless perhaps there was a mix up between ABS and PVC?

 

You find this a lot between different armor makes hence we recommend going through the same supplier for extra pieces, in this case it definitely hasn't worked. 

 

Looking forward to hearing the reply from RS

[Infern0[TK]]

22 minutes ago, gmrhodes13 said:

I've not seen issues of color differences from the same supplier before unless perhaps there was a mix up between ABS and PVC?

 

You find this a lot between different armor makes hence we recommend going through the same supplier for extra pieces, in this case it definitely hasn't worked. 

 

Looking forward to hearing the reply from RS

I didn’t even think about it being PVC...  that would explain the slight difference in translucence and thickness too. We’ll see I guess!

[Infern0[TK]]

Well, I sent the pictures to RS and the response was simply:
 

“Unfortunately we don't have any control over the ABS we receive what our suppliers send, this is from 3 years ago. The batches can change.”
 

Which I understand, and yes, my kit is from 2017, but this still seems like a pretty darn big change in color.

I had ordered some spare hand guards from them back in September (so I could do both glove options - poly and rubber), so I pulled those out and while closer, they are also lighter coloured than the plastic used for the ammo belt and ears.
 

I sent this picture to RS on Friday and asked about it maybe being PVC, but have yet to hear back...

I also compared the parts to an Anovos suit and a clone suit from Imperial Surplus, and both were closer in color to my original armor than the replacement pieces.
 

Any advice on what to do next? I'm assuming that the ear and ammo pack will never get approved without painting, and while I'm not opposed to painting my bucket, I'm definitely not going to paint my whole suit of armor just to match the ammo pack. I'll probably ask to return the bits, but not sure where to go from there. Maybe someone else who makes lineage armor is using plastic that is closer in color?

[Infern0[TK]]

Here's what the ammo pack would look like on the thigh (in my crappy garage lighting):

[gmrhodes13[Staff]]

It is quite a difference, almost like 2 completely different armors BUT suppliers can change and there can be a big difference over time as you have found.

 

Color matching may work but it can be a lot of messing around. I recently found some U trim I wanted to add to armor was way too white so I played with some water based acrylic paint and luckily was able to get a pretty good match, but it's not the type of paint you want to on your pieces as you want them to be nice and smooth.

 

Before paint (note armor is RS and very cream)

 

After paint

 

Some automotive paint suppliers will color match paint and supply in aerosol so you may be able to get a pretty good match, not sure what price.

 

The only other thing I would think could happen is trying to match with a different armor make, you may have more luck there but still it would mean purchasing new pieces.

 

I think paint may be the cheaper option