revlimiter's AP TK Stunt build

[revlimiter[Staff]]

My build thread needed to be updated with the excellent electrobinoculars from @justjoseph63 because OMG are they awesome!

 

I ordered these with "light weathering for a cleaner TK" and Joseph really came through.

 

The weathering matches and complements the weathering on my armor case so closely, I just had to photograph them together. I know white on white isn't the best, but well... TK.

 

Note the TK number on my strap.

 

Out of all the ones posted in the Binoc Sale Thread, I think mine are the finest by far.

 

Must troop soon.

 

 

Get your own here:

 

[revlimiter[Staff]]

My build thread deserved to be updated with my Blaster thread.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Power Cylinders:

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

I finally get to troop with the new blaster and armor upgrades tomorrow. Am excite.

[TKSpartan[Staff]]

awesome looking blaster, Enjoy Trooping  

[revlimiter[Staff]]

 

I signed up for a Star Wars Reads troop at a local library next week. They want us to read to the kids, which sounds like a ton of fun! I loved reading to my daughter when she was itsy. 

 

Since I have a week to repair things, I decided to be brave, kit up, and try to SIT DOWN. And I did! No breakage, snappage, or crackage. My butt is still 1 piece and shiny.  Or maybe I just got lucky. But I did it! I had to post a proof pic.

 

Now to practice reading and turning pages in my bucket and gloves.

[MaskedVengeance[Staff]]

Wow, a seated TK! I’m still waiting for somebody to create a silicone or similar posterior piece, similar to some of the flexible should bridges you see for some other costumes, like Shoretroopers.


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[TKSpartan[Staff]]

[Harbinger[IPM]]

Nicely done. Jealous of your sitting.

[revlimiter[Staff]]

Every time I get to update something in here I keep thinking it'll be the final build thread update. And then I get to do another small something to my armor.

 

One of the four TD screws came free by itself... amazingly in my storage bin! So I didn't need to find a new screw, but I did have a very rattly Thermal Detonator due to the loose nut inside.

 

No matter what I did, I could not get one of the end caps off to fix the screw. I boiled. I pried. I twisted. I spent two days not getting anywhere... so I sliced off the white plate and cut an access hole.  And I made the hole big and pretty, because why not? 

 

I got the screw re-installed and applied some E6000 to all four of the inner nuts and threads. Should have used loctite in the beginning...

 

I sent the above pic to @Scimitar and he was replied "close that up with some magnets and turn it into storage."

 

BRILLIANT.

 

Two days later, amazon brought me magnets. These are 60x10x3 mm bar magnets from FINDMAG. 12 came in the pack.  Really nice quality! Pleasantly strong and they came with some foam double sided tape.

 

They are almost precisely the size of my AP TD cover plate. A little too precisely. A little less wide seemed best to keep all modifications hidden.  Fortunately, they are easy to trim with some wire snips.

 

I hollowed out the magnet recess with a dremel sanding drum. Inner magnets are held on with the foam tape. There's about 1 mm or less wall thickness left in this hollowed area to separate the magnets. I just sanded till the magnet was flush with the top surface.

 

E6000 applied. Cover plate carefully aligned. Rubber bands added. And a day later I got to take this photo! The magnets were indeed flush enough with the surface to glue to the cover plate.

 

I added an elastic retainer and E6000'd that in place for the next day. This provides a sort of hinge for the cover plate and also keeps it from being able to get knocked off while trooping. And it doesn't keep the lid from closing. WIN!

 

I also brushed on a little grey paint in the recess. Because why not?

 

FINISHED! The cover plate actually fits more snugly than before with the magnets. No gap anywhere.  There's no way to tell this got modified at all.

 

The magnets are STRONG. It's probably possible to knock the cover off by backing into something hard, but the elastic will keep it from going anywhere. You basically can't pull the cover straight off, but it hinges nicely.

 

And inside? STUFF!!!  I'm calling this the Thermal Detonator of Happiness.

 

A 2" wide sticker fits perfect. I drew up and printed about 100 of these little chibi troopers. I guess it was originally a silver coin from New Zealand? I drew up something close to the original with a little nicer helmet and blaster proportions. I thought it would make a fun sticker to hand out at events with little ones.

 

There's also room for a couple tiny toys to give to upset younglings. And a  challenge coin, complete with protector wedges nicely into the end.

 

Honestly, I could fit twice this amount in there, but I can easily retrieve any of these with gloves on. With the TD packed more tightly it gets hard to fish out what I want.

 

Maybe that's the final update on my TK build?

 

 

[TKSpartan[Staff]]

Awesome job !  It looks great 

[Chemi[Staff]]

I love it!!! 

 

[MaskedVengeance[Staff]]

Very cool idea! I'm a little bit obsessed with thermal detonators (see here and here), and I may need to try this storage idea out someday. 

[revlimiter[Staff]]

6 hours ago, MaskedVengeance said:

Very cool idea! I'm a little bit obsessed with thermal detonators (see here and here), and I may need to try this storage idea out someday. 

 

Good lord, that 2nd link. ALL THOSE PHOTOS! I had no idea I wanted a 68mm TD until now.

 

Will pour over those tomorrow in my downtime. Thanks!!!

[MaskedVengeance[Staff]]

 
Good lord, that 2nd link. ALL THOSE PHOTOS! I had no idea I wanted a 68mm TD until now.
 
Will pour over those tomorrow in my downtime. Thanks!!!

Yup yup. I further messed up my ATA 2” one trying to pry the control panel off the tube (so much E-6000 used) anyway, so I’m all in on a 68mm one. Only two groups that supply them outside of the UK are AM and MonCal (Far Away Creations). And previously Anovos. Of course, paint-color matching and spraying might be in order to match the rest of armor.

I definitely went overboard with those photos. Part #3 of my TD construction will feature detonators I have from five different makers (two 2-inch, and three 68mm that have in-hand now), and hopefully a sprayed and completed one to use for my armor build. I had an AM one that is possibly a perfect color match for my ATA armor, but the end caps came trimmed shorter than the standard, so I’m hoping Dave is able to send me a new kit when he finally gets more ABS.


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[revlimiter[Staff]]

Though I haven't trooped that long, I'm now on my third iCOMM battery. Since they're hard to get, hard to change, and a general bummer of a power source, I decided to change it out using Andrew's excellent tutorial.

 

 

There won't be any new information or techiques in this post. I'm copying exactly. This post is mostly for me so I can remember what I did in the future.

 

My iCOMM board complete with a nearly-new TL-2450 battery. Note that it shows polarity. The center post is positive and the outer (right side in this view) post is negative.

 

My new battery showing 3.537 volts. My dead battery showed 3.63 volts before I tossed it. These things don't vary in voltage very much. It's just the lost mAh.

 

I drilled a couple tiny holes in the back case and ran the wires through. Since my iCOMM was already covered in loop velcro, I stuck some hook velcro to the battery holder for attachment.

 

I've also removed the stock battery. Probably needless to say, but the shot above doesn't show that. It just pulls out of the board, even though it appears soldered in place at first glance.

 

 

I used the same 3.6V battery that @Sly11 did on his mod. Bought it directly from UltraFire for about $23 shipped per pair. I have a spare to put in my helmet bag in case of emergency power failure... which is what prompted this mod.

 

It's a bummer to do a troop without the fancy speakers. I could have wired around it on my last power failure, but would have needed to shift all my padding around. With this rechargeable, replaceable battery I'll never have that problem again.

 

4.1V with a fully charged battery. Popular belief is that the iCOMM is very picky about voltage and really likes to have the 3.6V power source, but Andrew and others have had this mod working for many years.  That track record made me feel confident in doing this to my own unit.

 

Installed back in my bucket. Hardly any extra space is taken up at all, and it's still comfy sitting just above my right headphone pad.

 

I downloaded a free decibel measuring app (Sound Meter on Google Play) to see if there was much or any change in volume in a before and after.  In my own experience, the iCOMM amplification decreases quite a bit as the battery ages. It's pretty quiet before it starts the click of death indicating it needs a new one again.  Anyways, having some test data seemed important. The app also allowed pausing between sample sessions to compare data on the screen.

 

Before: I saw between 53 and 70 dB while saying my test phrase (kitty kitty kitty kitty kitty kitty). 

After: I saw between 55 and 73 dB while saying the same phrase.

 

I didn't expect much of an increase in volume and was hoping to not see a decrease (or magic smoke come out) after the mod. A tiny increase is very welcome.

 

Fingers crossed that this is my final iCOMM battery change and case opening. Just a recharge once in a while to keep the battery topped up should be enough.

 

[TKSpartan[Staff]]

nice work. 

[revlimiter[Staff]]

This fix was prompted by an FISD facebook post.

 

Note my shoulder. The elastic is pulling away a little. It's not bad, but not ideal. I don't mind the gap so much, but I do mind the white elastic peeking out.

 

Trooper A.T. Nguyen posted a fix involving some velcro sewn into the elastic shoulder bridge on the inboard side. So I replicated it.

 

Look at this result!! I could not even dream of this shoulder alignment previously.

 

You can see the elastic, but it's not pulling out.

 

Just epic alignment.

 

This is what I did. Note the new strapping on the inboard edges of the shoulder elastic.

 

It's completely hidden by the ABS bridges, so no black to be seen.

 

Very noobishly sewn in by hand. I also E6000'd the void areas.  It's STRONG.

 

The enforcement on this elastic gives enough strength for the shoulder to be up where it's supposed to be all by itself. No armor adjustment needed. It just stays magically in the ideal spot and always looks Centurion-quality. I'm super chuffed about this upgrade.

 

 

I also upgraded my top shoulder bell straps. Now it's held onto the bells by FOUR snaps each. I made some L shaped straps and redid the snap plates glued to the bells. The new snaps live on the front edge to resist coming free when I reach across my body.

 

Why would I do this? I was pulling the shoulder bell straps off while suiting up. Attaching the right side would make the left come unsnapped due to how I contort my shoulders. With the 4 snaps, nothing moves or unsnaps at all. I'm on 3 troops with this mega-snap setup and have had zero problems kitting up by myself. It's fantastic.

 

Also... I may have more snaps than shoulder bell now.

 

 

[MaskedVengeance[Staff]]

Very cool mod to your shoulder elastic! Did you actually use velcro, or is it actually just a piece of nylon strapping? Either way, basically it's simply providing structure, correct? But the rest of the white elastic still maintains some flex. When I first started reading I thought you were going to employ something similar to the metal pieces that ROTK and Shoretroopers use in their shoulder connections.

 

Additionally, that's an insane amount of snaps in your bells; definitely a record of some sort. So you have your snaps and I have my thermal detonators.  (By the way, did you get your 68mm TD yet?)

[gmrhodes13[Staff]]

Note there is tighter/thicker elastic available which reduces the amount the elastic is pulled, some double over the standard elastic for a little more strength. Also if you have your center snaps further towards the front it does help the shoulder bells rotate in towards the front after moving your arms

[Scimitar[TK]]

1 hour ago, gmrhodes13 said:

Not here is tighter/thicker elastic available which reduces the amount the elastic is pulled, some double over the standard elastic for a little more strength. Also if you have your center snaps further towards the front it does help the shoulder bells rotate in towards the front after moving your arms

Adam's straps are made from lower stretch, non-knit elastic. They were also doubled over & have ABS panels sandwiched in between the straps where the snaps were installed for reinforcement. The snaps are inset toward the neck and slightly forward to keep the bells pulled "up" as far as possible and for natural frontward rotation (as much as is possible anyway with the small AP shoulder bells). This is a great solution for off the shelf, readily available elastic strapping that has some slight pull away from the shoulders.

Edited August 4, 2022 by Scimitar

[revlimiter[Staff]]

3 hours ago, MaskedVengeance said:

Very cool mod to your shoulder elastic! Did you actually use velcro, or is it actually just a piece of nylon strapping? Either way, basically it's simply providing structure, correct? But the rest of the white elastic still maintains some flex. When I first started reading I thought you were going to employ something similar to the metal pieces that ROTK and Shoretroopers use in their shoulder connections.

 

Additionally, that's an insane amount of snaps in your bells; definitely a record of some sort. So you have your snaps and I have my thermal detonators.  (By the way, did you get your 68mm TD yet?)

 

It's a piece of nylon strapping. I *know* I have some non-sticky velcro around here somewhere but couldn't find it. Still, basically anything that doesn't stretch is what's needed for this mod. It's just shoring up half the elastic to keep it from stretching, yet still allowing flex. 

 

And I didn't get the TD. None of the vendors I reached out to replied... alas.  But I'm happy with my magnet hinged one.

 

1 hour ago, gmrhodes13 said:

Not here is tighter/thicker elastic available which reduces the amount the elastic is pulled, some double over the standard elastic for a little more strength. Also if you have your center snaps further towards the front it does help the shoulder bells rotate in towards the front after moving your arms

 

My elastic is indeed doubled over and the center snaps are already front-justified. They could probably be more toward the front, but I've never been unhappy with how my shoulder bells hung. This mod was only about keeping the elastic from peeking out under the shoulder bridge.

 

 

12 minutes ago, Scimitar said:

Adam's straps are made from lower stretch, non-knit elastic. They were also doubled over & have ABS panels sandwiched in between the straps where the snaps were installed for reinforcement. The snaps are inset toward the neck and slightly forward to keep the bells pulled "up" as far as possible and for natural frontward rotation (as much as is possible anyway with the small AP shoulder bells). This is a great solution for off the shelf, readily available elastic strapping that has some slight pull away from the shoulders.

And they're comfortable, hold their position, and have performed flawlessly for almost 20 troops now. You built good straps.

 

Now they're just ever so slightly improved.