activation email

[RC-3141]

*UPDATE*
Because I have now hit two pages for this, I'm adding a table of contents here for new readers. Also adding a status list for my kit to help summarize what's going on

Table of Contents:

First Page:
Introduction to Kit
Modelling of Gauntlet Designs
Concepts and Ideas


Second Page:
Reworking of gauntlets to actually fit
Work on J2P helmet and collarplate repair
Continued work on the helmet, and I get back to working on the gauntlet 3D models
Sanding helmet, adding flashlight


Third Page
First gauntlet printed, working on soft goods

*END UPDATE*

When I was 15, I bought some plates off the internet as well as the Rubie's Jango helmet for a Halloween costume.

I've been intending to go back and get this costume up to standards for a while now, but 'The Mandalorian' is what gave me the impetus to start back up on this project.

This is what I have right now:
I am thinking of basing my kit off of the idea of being someone who scavenged the Clone Wars battlefields for equipment and goods, but I'm not certain where I want to take that idea.


I do not have any soft goods ready to go, I will most likely be purchasing a flight vest and sewing my own flak vest.

Pro-tip: don't put your armor in a place where somebody could sit on it


I need to Bondo a lot of the helmet probably, and if I understand correctly I'll probably be straightening out the cheeks. I am also thinking of printing my own earcaps and mounting lights inside of them (I rewatched the relevant portion of the Mandalorian and it looks like his light is mounted externally but as soon as he turns it off it's only his earcaps)
If I do lights and fans, I will either be looking at putting both in parallel on one power source or using two power sources. I will be running these wires out of the helmet, through the flight suit/under the flak vest, and into the gauntlets. I will probably put connectors at the helmet and at the gauntlet so that I can leave the wires permanently routed through the flight suit.


I'm thinking I want to go for shknees, I'll probably have to use sintra for those


I need to make better gauntlets, I will probably be 3D printing those so that I can include the correct dimensions for my electronics


It looks to be 3mm, and I would assume it's sintra.


I want to include pouches of some kind similar to the ARC trooper/Captain Rex pouches from Clone Wars somewhere in the shoulder/chest region.

To-Dos (in no particular order):
General:
-Decide if I want to keep my kit the same color. If yes, find matching paint. If no, decide colors and paint it
-Buy flight suit
-Sew flak vest
-Buy velcro and/or strapping for mounting
-Weathering

Helmet:
-Bondo
-Sand
-Paint
-Replace Visor
-Print earcaps
-Install fans/lights

Gauntlets:
-Design and Print
-Paint and weather
-Mount electronics

Shknees
-Acquire material, cut and shape

Collar and codpiece
-Repair with bondo, and then probably sand and repaint

[RC-3141]

Got started on modeling the gauntlet. Once I get top and bottom modeled I will print a test before I go all in designing the greebles and electronics section.

[Kerricane]

i think with the lights on mandos helmets, they're clip on/magnetically attached, so you could always go that route. also, gotta say, i appreciate your color scheme

[Anansi]

I envy your ability to 3D model. I'm going to keep an eye on this and maybe I'll learn a thing or two.

[RC-3141]

i think with the lights on mandos helmets, they're clip on/magnetically attached, so you could always go that route. also, gotta say, i appreciate your color scheme

Thanks! I'm going to have to match the colors for my new pieces (and probably need to repaint/weather some of my old ones) so hopefully I can find something close enough.
It looked kinda like the helmet light in the Mandalorian was in his earcap, but it was really hard to tell. Either way, I don't know why they wouldn't just integrate the flashlights because that's what seems to make the most sense.

I envy your ability to 3D model. I'm going to keep an eye on this and maybe I'll learn a thing or two.

I'm working from stale knowledge from a CAD class I took 2 years ago in a different system (I learned Solidworks and basic engineering drawing, the program I'm using now is Fusion 360), so I'm re-learning stuff as it comes up.
I am planning on making the files available once I settle on something I like.

In terms of attachment systems on the gauntlets, I am planning on having the pictured hinge being a functional hinge and then putting something like a piano style hinge on the other side with a removable pin so that I can lock it closed. As far as I know this is an acceptable method of attaching the gauntlets, but if it doesn't turn out to be I can redesign or look into disguising the primary hinge as a weapons system.

[Anansi]

That closure method is fairly common so you're ok to proceed. My only advice there is to try and open the eyes of the hinge a little so that the pin can be pulled and inserted more easily. It's pretty snug as is but when you're trying to attach it while it's on your arm, it can get challenging fast.

[Awall]

When I printed mine I modified my gauntlets to have the two hinges printed on both sides then added a plate printed over the hinge to hide them.  I don't have full range of movement but it is enough to get my arm into them.  One hinge is permanently pinned with a carbon fiber rod and the other has a carbon fiber rod with a pull tab on it for easy removal. 




Don't you love 3D printing?

[RC-3141]

That closure method is fairly common so you're ok to proceed. My only advice there is to try and open the eyes of the hinge a little so that the pin can be pulled and inserted more easily. It's pretty snug as is but when you're trying to attach it while it's on your arm, it can get challenging fast.

Thanks for the advice, opening it up a bit around the edges might also make it easier to print if I can get the angle right.

When I printed mine I modified my gauntlets to have the two hinges printed on both sides then added a plate printed over the hinge to hide them.  I don't have full range of movement but it is enough to get my arm into them.  One hinge is permanently pinned with a carbon fiber rod and the other has a carbon fiber rod with a pull tab on it for easy removal. 

Thanks for the advice, I might borrow that method.

[RC-3141]

Decided to just mirror both sides rather than deal with making a piano hinge that fits inside both (I could do it, but to do it efficiently would probably require redesigning from the ground up).

I am planning on adding a cover to one or both sides to of each hinge to make it less visible, as well as chamfering the inside of each pin-hole to aid in seating the hinge-piece.

[Awall]

Nice work.  You will like that design in the long run. 

[RC-3141]

Have not worked on the gauntlets since last posting, but I was watching TCW and realized that this method of mounting flashlights existed:







The 501st lists this as a spotlight. Since I was already planning on doing a visor, I may try to mount a flashlight this way (seems significantly easier than earcaps in terms of finding a flashlight to fit).




Edit: Completely forgot to say something


I think I'm going to try to add trauma plates to my plates somehow, and I would like to make it look like my Mando welded them on himself. One idea I saw involved soldering with PLA and a Dremel, which sounds incredibly risky but I also really wanna try it. An alternative would be to use hot glue to give the "welded on" effect. Either way, they would not be my primary attachment methods, just decorative, and I'd probably ask my friend who's almost finished in the welding program at my college if he had any advice on making something that looked like a weld.

[Anansi]

I would go with the simulated weld over trying to actually plastic weld.

[Kerricane]

Ive "welded" PLA using a soldering iron and scrap filament, melting it into the seamlines of two printed pieces. If you go this route, ventilation is key. Burning PLA smells nasty, like burnt sugar...probably not good to breathe in.

[RC-3141]

The method I was reading about suggested putting the filament in the head of the dremel and spinning it up so that the friction was enough to melt it when brought in contact with the seam.

[Catika]

I love TCW, and I love when people incorporate Clone Wars stuff with their kits. I've been thinking about having some Clone Wars era weapons for my kit. Excited to see more of your build!!

[RC-3141]

I printed out test versions of the front and end of my gauntlets, and realized that I had significantly oversized them. If you know anyone who needs partially biodegradable rib augmentations, let me know



I have since redone my gauntlets, and was able to do it significantly faster thanks to the experience offered by my first failure. These were sized correctly for my arm dimensions, as measured with the digital caliper I recently acquired.



I also got my hands on some latching buttons and some USB flashlights, so I will be designing the compartment that I will have on-off switches for my helmet electronics in.


Another edit because I forgot something:


My family does these wooden swords and shields as kids toys, and this is one of the designs that we put on our shields, I believe it was designed by my mom's best friend. I may use/adapt this for use in my kit, not sure how swarzy it looks

[Awall]

Nice!  When I did my gauntlets I made a cylinder in the 3D modeling program that matched my proportions and forearm length ... then imported it into my gauntlet file to check the fit before printing.   Because of doing this my gauntlets fit perfectly with batteries and don’t move around or pinch.  If you go this route don’t forget to take your measurements with sleeves and gloves on.  Keep up the good work!

[RC-3141]

Edit: I've added a table of contents to my first page to make it easier for anyone just hopping in, can someone confirm that the links work?

I'm back! I've been plugging away at projects for the last couple weeks, and am just now getting around to posting about my progress on the armor.


I used Dynalite resin (not Bondo but it seems to be working) to join the seam on my Jango 2 Piece and to repair my collarplate sometime last week:




I then sanded these down and added another layer, and then sanded that today. I do not have a picture of the collarplate but I think it turned out well




I have not been working on my gauntlets, I need to get back on that sometime. I also need to design some earcaps for my helmet, I am considering going for a hexagonal design similar to the special operations clone trooper helmet. I like the look of these, and they would also allow me to disguise earholes/microphones in my helmet to help with hearing the environment:



This is the way

[RC-3141]

Apologies if the post sizing/formatting is weird, the text editor is a little odd.

I've been continuing to work on the helmet and got a visor cut out based on Kol Var'Das's Sun Visor Template. I am currently waiting on my 3D Printer to become available, because I have been printing face shields with pretty much all of my printer time.


I added some fiberglass cloth across the inside of the seam of the helmet, as well as some Sintra reinforcement.



I experimented with Droodles curved visor template, but I decided to not use it





Test fit of my first visor cut-out:



My final visor. I cut along the top-side fold lines so that it would be easier to fold, and added some Bondo to fill in said cuts.



I got a USB male to female cable that I'm disassembling right now so that I can implement a helmet flashlight, accidentally got a significantly better constructed cable than I intended to so I had some fun taking that apart.


I've also been working on designing some earcaps, waiting on some feedback before I go about implementing those.

[RC-3141]

Got some work done on my kit today:


First, I added some weapons to my right hand gauntlet, going for dual blasters, darts, and unidentified weapons that are probably gonna be flamethrowers (I'm gonna try to add char marks, etc to the area around them). Apologies for taking pictures in the slicer and not the modelling program, I forgot about my WIP




Also worked on installing my earcaps onto my helmet, CA glued them into place and will be bondoing and sanding, also ripped out the visor (quite literally, I pulled it off the posts) and cut some holes for hearing that I will be backing with mesh once I get my kit painted







This is the way, still quite a bit to go but I'm happy I made progress.

[Mirran]

I love your ear caps! For whatever reason I had a hard time wrapping my head around them until they were on but I think they're neat.

[RC-3141]

I love your ear caps! For whatever reason I had a hard time wrapping my head around them until they were on but I think they're neat.

Thanks! It's going to be really annoying to get that mesh inside of them, but I really like how they look and the functionality that they add.

[Slade Kel]

You've clearly put a lot of thought into planning here, and I think this is going to be a solid kit when you get it done. No real input as of yet, but I look forward to watching as this progresses!

[RC-3141]

Did some more filling and sanding working on integrating the earcaps this week













After this first layer of filler, I added spot putty






Also did some filling on the visor






Progress from the (virtual) armor party today:


Got my flashlight 3D printed, the flashlight/lens is separate from the barrel, I will be drilling a hole into my helmet and popping the flashlight in there, painting everything, then putting all of the more sensitive flashlight parts in there




The soldering isn't pretty, but it's functional






And some light sanding happened as well

[Slade Kel]

Looking good . You're definitely getting there!