Day 17

Today I found out that my armor fits in my 60L luggage!

At first I put the bracers and shins in the thighs and place them at the bottom. Boots on the other side with the shoulder bells containing the biceps. The holster and SE-14r rest on the side opposite from the belt armor. The canvas belt is rolled up with the thigh boxes. The undersuit, neckseal and gloves+handguards are with the thigh armor. In fact there's a lot of storage space in the armor pieces. Use them!

And on top of it all I place the ab plate, kidney plate, chest and back plates over the smaller things. Easy peasy.

Day 16

Belt completed with snaps, inner boxed velcro'ed and everything can be disassembled in order to fit snuggly in a transport bin/luggage.

Using a heatgun and/or a hair dryer to obtain a curve on these bad boys.

Still undecided about using velcro or snaps to secure them on the chest plate.

This inside of my helmet. The green sheet is doubled with solar film for cars. I only used double-sided sticky tape to have it hang up. The screens are glued, taped, masked, etc... Not sure how long they're going to stay there.

The padding is called MICH helmet padding, military-grade. I use a different configuration now and I think I need to change them soon.

Day 15 - Suiting up!

While I was waiting for my next shipment of press fasteners (snaps) to complete the belt, I couldn't resist this.

Attempting to sit down.

Thanks to this silly tryout I was able to come up with adjustments:

• Trimming the bottom openings of the thighs and the tops of the shins
• Tightening the straps from the shoulder bridges
• Tightening the straps on either sides of the ab plate
• Adding straps from the biceps to the bracers
• Glueing velcro to the shoulder bell elastic straps
• Shortening the butt plate
• Adding straps from the chest plate to the front ab plate
• Curving the ribbed shoulder straps

Day 14

Yes I skipped a day because honestly I got a little distracted and lost track of this.

Some work is done to create the belt. I ran out of snaps so it wasn't easy to get decided on those rivets because I knew I wouldn't have the luxury to  fit the entire belt in a luggage that way, it had to be completely disassembled and reassembled.

The inner boxes are attached by means of velcro.

A second coat of acrylic paint in the helmet, and screwing the mic tips in...

The problem is that the screws on the inside are a little too long. So to avoid poking hazard I need to find shorter screws.

A helmet that looks complete.

Day 12

The accessories on the thighs are attached!

The ammo packs on the right thigh is riveted on. The knee guard on the left shin is glued on.

The shoulder bells being ready to get attached to the biceps via straps and snaps.

My snaps: Press Fasteners!

Buy this box once, and then like a dozen refill boxes! No, just kidding.... Buy 6 refills. 

That's approx. 70 snaps. You will enjoy having spares in case you mess up.

Again, I strongly suggest using this tutorial.

Day 11

Attaching elastic straps to the shoulder bells.

I used scrap pieces of ABS to secure them to the armor.

Biceps being glued and curing in a makeshift squeezing machine.

Day 10

Here is some work on the shins. Adjusted the gap in the inside of the knee area, and glued some white velcro loops for the back opening.

For the back of the thighs, though, I glued them shut since I won't need to open them in order to suit up.

A scary picture now: for safety reasons I decided to use acrylic paint to make the inside of the helmet black. I don't want anyone to be able to see my eyes in there. Sadly, my water-painting method is a little flawed :P

This is only the first coat!

Day 9

Glue job on biceps and bracers. The difficulty here was to get a good fit on the bracers while still being able to glue both parts securely. Since I have small arms, I had to cut away lots from the shims which made the tightening difficult.

First side curing.

Fast forward a few days later, this is what my finished left bracer looks like... I used acetone to dissolve scraps of ABS to make a finishing putty because the gap here was huge.

But they fit me okay. The wobbling is minimal!

Day 8

I haven't done much lately but here are some pictures of the beginning of my strapping/snapping system.

The ab plates.

For the one side, I made a rivet-snap row to add some screen-accuracy. The rivets are completely decorative, the snap strip is held to the plate with E6000.

The back, front, abs and butt plates, with the suspenders.

Also be careful when making straps, the fasteners need to be facing the same direction.

Day 7

After doing what was assumed to be the hardest and most difficult part of the kit, aka. the helmet, here I move to the gluing session. It's the assembling of the shins.

I had heard interesting things about the shin armor and how the two parts wouldn't align properly when put together, but mine seemed okay when I trimmed the front joints to form a 22 mm strip. This strip would be covered by one of the provided ABS strips that I had to divide in two, of course with the Score'n'Snap technique.

Covering strips cut to 22mm in width, sanded down slightly to allow for the E6000 glue to stick better. Sanding should be done prior to gluing on all surfaces.

Reference picture to show the cover strips

I normally clamp the edges but for the purpose of this picture I removed them to show, after 12 hours, that there is the covering strip on the outside, and a slightly slimmer strip on the inside, called a "shim", to help compensate for bending or moving of the larger elements glued together. The round thingy that you see there is a Rare Earth neodymium magnet.

Day 6

Today I spent my day off in front of the TV... and finishing some helmet building.

Having applied the fit-trim-fit-trim-sand method for the ear pieces for a couple of hours (or more, time flew by so fast), I eventually pierced holes and fixed them in with the screws provided in the AP kit. This was just to try out the fitting and it turned out looking great! The gaps were closing nicely so I didn't need to take them apart for adjustments.

Decals and paint were applied following this technique making sure that no air bubbles were trapped and no smudging appeared around the frown "mouth" thingy. The black brow trim isn't glued so I just lifted that up to stick the trapezoid decal underneath.

Tip: Humbrol paint takes a long time to dry and acetone will not be of any help. Use White Spirit solvent to clean your brushes. If you can get acrylic paint instead, use that. Acrylic paint is far more indulgent and mistake-friendly, if you make a smudge you can just wait for it to dry and scratch it off. It's decal-paint.

Days 4 & 5

Continuing the helmet!

Clamps hold the brow trim at the desired level (going for a more "Hero" look) while I plan to rivet the cap and faceplate together.

The second rivet on the "tube" section is slightly smaller. Rivet washers were used on the inside for security and prevent tearing.

Looking all slim and closed up there, Stormtrooper.

Trying to fit the ear pieces, but they were not even close to the same shape as the helmet. More X-acto trimming was in order, and also some sanding to stay on the safe side.