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[Thel Ihveen]

That's some fine work right there! Wish my soft parts were that good!! But alas, i'm still learning how to sow a piece of nylon and elastic together I definitely like the look you've got going on, and the method of building the soft parts before adding the plates! I'll have to keep that in mind when I do my next kit.

Thanks for the encouragement! The good thing about soft goods is that (assuming you use a removable attachment method) you can always have multiple sets and make new pieces as you gain sewing ability. So keep at it, vod! Doing them first (and making a dummy) also really helps with spacing/sizing plates.

Okay, update time!

On Sunday I bought some buckets ($8) to cut up for my helmet, and shelled out the extra $2 to get them in black so that they'd match the base plastic of my dome and I won't have to paint the inside of the helmet... However, I didn't end up cutting them at the armor party.

When I showed up, I realized that I had to cut out and tweak the new (by which i mean old) torso templates, and use those instead of the narrower ones. The narrow shape... is a bit too V-shaped when the shoulders are on. It reads "1950's dress bodice" instead of "suit jacket"... Plus, I shortened the shoulder plates by like 1" so I looked less like a member of KISS. They were a little over twice the width of my bucket before, so they're closer to "correct" now, and less likely to take someone's eye out.

The host of the armor party actually lives within walking distance of a sintra source, so after paying in $20 to the plastic fund, I had free reign of the sintra pile. I marked all my bits (and I do mean ALL) on some black 3mil. Unfortunately for me... I have a lot of bits...



When I was finally done marking them all... Everyone was startled by the amount of plates I actually have. I've made crazier costumes before, so I guess it didn't occur to me that I have lots of stuff going on. I guess that's what happens when your boot armor, your shoulders, AND your back plate are segmented...

People were shooed out due to a developing snowstorm, but the coordinator of the party did lend me a PVC-cutting saw he hadn't even opened, yet, so I may end up taking the next week few days to cut my plates by hand...

I haven't touched my bucket yet, but that's okay - I'll be doing my plates first! (sorry to those of you following that thread...)

Armor total: $140

[AndySanchez]

This kit is so beatiful, I'm really looking forward to seeing it completed!

[Yolah Hyperion]

Good find on the sintra!!

One things for sure..you will need a few cans of paint 

Keep it coming Vod your thread is awesome!

[Thel Ihveen]

Good find on the sintra!!

One things for sure..you will need a few cans of paint 

Keep it coming Vod your thread is awesome!

Thank you to everyone for encouraging me! I'm glad you guys like it!

Also, you bet I'll need paint... There are a total of 29 plates on this thing (not including the buy'ce), so I'll probably need at least 2 cans of silver, one can of black (a "primer" between silver and purple, plus knees/elbows and cheeks...) and then two cans of the purple I end up using. Add on whatever weathering/wash, plus the brush-on can o' glowy nonsense for stripes... Yeah, I'm gonna spend more on paint than I have on the plates themselves!

Speaking of plates... Five hours, one sawblade, one band-aid, an x-acto knife, and a whole lotta black PVC dust later:



I've cut out all the plates by hand. I was originally gonna wait until after Christmas (the hinted-at arrival date of a hypothetical dremel... Shoutout to my wonderful dad!) but I got impatient and would rather have the things in my hot fists than wait a whole four days to start cutting. I'll wait to cut up bucket pieces (the saw won't touch that plastic due to the angles going on) but I'm too stoked to see this thing finished not to put in the hard work with the rudimentary tools I have on hand. They will definitely be getting cleaned up and beveled when I do have the tools to do it... The saw's pretty rough on them! Rough enough that I managed to crack a shoulder plate, and put some smaller cracks in a few weird places on other plates...

What do you guys use to fix cracks in sintra? Bondo? And should I form them before I sand them, or after?

The ab plate and inside the chest pieces will still need cutting down, hence the extra material. I don't trust the ~mysterious curves~ of my torso at all, and I know that once I form the chest pieces I may end up with a different gap than the one I got when I tested them in paper. I'm also... not sure if I want a chest display or not? Some kinda working lights would look amazing, but I'll have to go digging to find out what kind of usable electronics I have.

Last night, I tried ironing the interfacing into my spats... Yeah, not happening. I wasn't thinking when I got the stuff, and I'll have to glue it in. The suede backing on the leather resists the adhesive, and the leather might burn if I heat it high enough to melt the glue. I'll throw some fabri-tac at it sometime...

I also put in an order for my over-gloves! I stumbled upon the perfect ones on ebay for a total of $15, and hopefully they show up before I have to pack up and head back south again... I'll keep you posted!

Cost tally: $155

[AndySanchez]

You should wait for it to be formed to sand, since you could get imperfections in the molding process you'll have to sand anyways.
Whenever any material has cracked on me I tend to only use some bondo, but if the crack gets worse with the heat, which it might, I like to do a little bit of fiberglass in the back after it's formed to stunt any breaking!
Hope that helps!

[Yolah Hyperion]

"Five hours, one sawblade, one band-aid, an x-acto knife, and a whole lotta black PVC dust later"

I hear its tradition to bleed whilst crafting armor. You've got amazing progress and for under 200$ still!!

O.O so uhh wanna cut out my plates for me to? please 

Seriously though those cut lines are top grade IMO. Will you be using a color change paint for the purple or just keeping it simple?

[Svik Katora]

The best methods to fix armor and cracks usually involve resin, epoxy, or bondo. None of which will heat form properly. Heat forming the plates first will be your best option. Then fix the cracks once they have the right shape. As far as the method for cutting the plates, jigsaws and exacto knives are pretty good for it actually. Though usually metal blades and a slow speed is the best bit. Wood blades tend to be a bit chewwy for plastic, take off too much material on a go. Dremels are great but the cutting wheels do have a tendency to explode, so wear your safety glasses. And lastly, patience young padawan. Especially since you'll be at the painting stage soon, and rushing that stage can only lead to sadness. As a mando who has more layers than an onion, I can say that painting will test the impatient. Pray the fickle paint gods find you worthy, lest your layers get all runny, and bubble up and crack for like no reason.

[Yolah Hyperion]

She speaks the truth!
Lest ye none believers do not offer tribute to the paint gods, for their wrath is a horrible one.

Speaking from having to remove paint on my bucket four times now...

[Thel Ihveen]

You should wait for it to be formed to sand, since you could get imperfections in the molding process you'll have to sand anyways.
Whenever any material has cracked on me I tend to only use some bondo, but if the crack gets worse with the heat, which it might, I like to do a little bit of fiberglass in the back after it's formed to stunt any breaking!
Hope that helps!

Thank you! Looks like it's heat-forming time... Let's see if I'm allowed to use the stovetop instead of getting banished to the garage with the heat gun. My local build crew informs me that the stovetop is the way to go, but my mother thinks otherwise... Also thanks for posting pics of the new bucket - it's good to see someone else doing an angular "jawline" on a scratchbuild!

"Five hours, one sawblade, one band-aid, an x-acto knife, and a whole lotta black PVC dust later"

I hear its tradition to bleed whilst crafting armor. You've got amazing progress and for under 200$ still!!

O.O so uhh wanna cut out my plates for me to? please 

Seriously though those cut lines are top grade IMO. Will you be using a color change paint for the purple or just keeping it simple?

After taking said bandage off, I discovered two small flecks of black plastic embedded under my healing skin, which obviously means that my body has accepted my beskar'gam as an extension of my physical form and I must be doing something right. Hopefully bleeding on my armor counts as an offering to the Paint Gods, and I beg Them to smile upon me and assure the successful application of my many coats of spraypaint.

Unfortunately, I think my sawblade is too dull to do any more cutting. If you want, though, I can post a tutorial of some kind. Using the saw certainly had a learning curve to it, and it took a while to figure out how to work with sintra. But the speed I had to go at certainly allowed me to get the lines straight and the curves right - I've used bandsaws before and find them harder to control than a handsaw. I kinda wish I'd had a jeweler's saw instead of a PVC saw (they're great for getting into tight corners and scary sharp) but it's saved me loads of sanding later...

Thanks for the compliment on the cut lines! I'm... kinda proud of em, honestly Thank you, high school metalworking class; you've made me a horrible perfectionist who hates belt sanders! As for paint; As much as I love color-change paint, I won't be using it on this kit. I've already got my heart set on the phosphorescent green, and adding the (awesome) purple would be overkill... i do love how it looks, though, so at some point I... may try it? Eventually..?

Okay actually who am I kidding - something on my kit's gonna be color-shifting, even if it's a prop. I love that stuff. Another member of my local armor-making group/clan-to-be has already decided on a purple-and-green kit with color-shift violet... I don't wanna match too much! And, after a quick scouting mission to my local craft store, I think this is the color I'll be using...



They also have a lighter, brighter, pinker purple, but I don't think it'll weather as nicely. It would be great to be able to mix my own color, but I think the deep blue-purple will be okay, especially after a good fading or a spritz with something dirty-looking.

The best methods to fix armor and cracks usually involve resin, epoxy, or bondo. None of which will heat form properly. Heat forming the plates first will be your best option. Then fix the cracks once they have the right shape. As far as the method for cutting the plates, jigsaws and exacto knives are pretty good for it actually. Though usually metal blades and a slow speed is the best bit. Wood blades tend to be a bit chewwy for plastic, take off too much material on a go. Dremels are great but the cutting wheels do have a tendency to explode, so wear your safety glasses. And lastly, patience young padawan. Especially since you'll be at the painting stage soon, and rushing that stage can only lead to sadness. As a mando who has more layers than an onion, I can say that painting will test the impatient. Pray the fickle paint gods find you worthy, lest your layers get all runny, and bubble up and crack for like no reason.

Thanks for the warning about the dremels! I'll definitely have to find my glasses... Hopefully I brought them north with me!

I'll do my best to be patient, too... At the rate I'm going, I'll have to try not to go nuts watching paint layers dry!

Thanks for all the help, ner vode! It's great to have you all egging me on and making sure I don't do anything stupid. It makes me super excited to join all you OM's when I'm finally done. Looking forward to it!

 - Thel

[Kris Jasra]

If you can find them - diamond cutting disks are the way to go with dremels. I've had a diamond saw attachment for near five years and its outlived three dremels. They cost a fair bit but they're well worth it.

[Shar Dagger]

This is a nice WIP vod! Keep it up! (Commenting to follow )

[Thel Ihveen]

Hello, vode! After taking a couple days for family holiday celebrations, I'm stubbornly back at it, again. As I was forewarned; a brand new rotary tool appeared on the 25th, courtesy my lovely supportive dad, and today I even ended up with a set of extra attachments from my uncle (special thanks to him, too!) so I've got the whole rotary tool thing pretty covered.

If you can find them - diamond cutting disks are the way to go with dremels. I've had a diamond saw attachment for near five years and its outlived three dremels. They cost a fair bit but they're well worth it.

Ooh! I'll see if I can find one for cheap online. It would be a lot easier to cut things if I wasn't saddled with the constant fear of my wheel exploding violently in my face...

As it stands, though; my garage is full of cars and whatever my family is storing for the winter (motorcycle, lawnmower, a fleet of bicycles, etc.) so I've been told to do all my art stuff in my room. I have a little booth set up with cardboard and everything! The problem is; I'm cutting a bucket. With a dremel running at like, a bazillion RPM. The bucket is clamped to my heavy worktable, which sits right above my sister's room, which is downstairs. Running the thing turns the bucket into a giant drum and, as my sister tells me, "sounds like a dying whale" from the basement. So I may have to venture out into the arctic air and cut stuff on the patio outside... And get some earplugs, probably.

This is a nice WIP vod! Keep it up! (Commenting to follow )

Thank you! All the nice comments and help from everyone are really making me excited to finish this thing. Like I cannot express my gratefulness properly, except maybe in the form of making more things...? I will be very glad to make more things.

Also; unforeseen complication of the whole "keep track of how much you spend on this kit because you're cheap" plan... My wonderful and supportive mother gave me a gift card to the local craft store (in addition to letting me get plastic shavings all over the living room carpet yet again) so I can make a larger mess not worry about having to pay for paints and sandpaper. I am super stoked because this means I don't have to worry about shelling out a whole lot for the absurd amounts of spraypaint I'm gonna be using, but it also means... do I not count the giftcard money towards the total if I'm not the one paying for the stuff...? Do I keep track of what someone paid for the kit, not what I paid for it? Should I forget about the cash tally and just focus on my kit?

Whatever I decide, I'll be real happy when this thing is done... Or, at least, approvable. It's never gonna be Done done, that's for sure.

 - Thel

[jett drexel]

stuff an old t-shirt in the bucket before cutting, this will dull down the noise some.

[Echo Darklighter]

stuff an old t-shirt in the bucket before cutting, this will dull down the noise some.

Or go outside and wear a jacket.  Cutting the helmet inside is kind of a bad idea, what with resin dust in enclosed spaces.

[Bowfanny]

Or whip out the razor knife and start scoring the visor area. Each pass go a little deeper and it's indoor safe just don't slice fingers.

[sithluke]

Commenting to follow. Holy crap, I love the design and everything you've done so far looks amazing! I can't wait to see more!

[Dar'manda]

Great work so far vod! Keep up the great work!

[Thel Ihveen]

stuff an old t-shirt in the bucket before cutting, this will dull down the noise some.

Thanks for the tip! I was super excited last night when you posted this, since noise is Problem #1, and this morning I grabbed a ripped shirt from my fabric pile and... discovered I was gonna need more shirt. Like, way too much shirt. Even after shoving half my scrap-pile in the thing, it... didn't really help the noise. And just now; I realized that when you say "bucket" you mean "buy'ce", and when I say "bucket", I mean this thing:


(Feat. Christmas Debris and That One Bag The Cat Likes To Sleep On)

Which explains why I was so confused as to how one could put a shirt in a 5-gallon bucket to silence its cries... A completed resin helmet, though, would certainly hold a shirt well! It took me reading Cin Vhe'rang's warning about resin to realize my critical communication error. (Thanks for the resin tip, though! I went plastic instead of cast because I knew I'd just mod the heck out of it and get toxic dust everywhere. You're right - that stuff's scary!)

I have a whole separate thread for my helmet build, actually - you can check out the mess I've made here or just follow the link in my description. There's so much happening on this thread already that I figured leaving the helmet build to its own thread would save you guys some text walls to slog through. Here's what I have so far, though!



Aaand here's the cardboard patterns all assembled, showing what the thing will hopefully look like when completed...



(That's the hope, anyway...)

Also thanks again for all the encouragement! I'm really glad to see this thing moving forward.

 - Thel

[AndySanchez]

I have been following this thread since you started and by god your energy is so refreshing! Keep it up, I think we're all excited to see this kit xome to life!

[Thel Ihveen]

I have been following this thread since you started and by god your energy is so refreshing! Keep it up, I think we're all excited to see this kit xome to life!

Thank you! I'm really excited to finish it, hopefully as soon as possible - honestly half of the energy is due to the fact that I'm home till the middle of January with pretty much nothing else to do. My college-break job had to cut hours, and I'd be back south by the time I interviewed and got hours anywhere else, so I'm not working over break. I already paid all my school bills before break, so I guess I that leaves pretty much all day, every day for beskar'gam!

Today, I ground and beveled my body plates with my dremel, and just glued and clamped my cod and chest diamond (the two pieces that need to be glued flat). I did run into a snag when I beveled the wrong side of one of my gauntlet pieces, but otherwise, all of the dremel work is done (save for the ab plate). I look and feel like a chimney sweep, my room is full of dust, and my desk looks like someone set it on fire... But I'm happy!

My process for sanding my plates is basically: Rough saw cut -> Grinding and rough bevel with 80-grit drum sander -> Shaping with 80-grit sandpaper by hand (this gets the edges smoother than the dremel) -> Smoothing with 220-grit and a nail buffing block -> Go take a shower to get the dust out of my everything.

Yesterday I spent six hours doing the same thing to my helmet parts and then drilling and riveting. The rivet tool died on me, though, so I'll have to grind off the metal stems in the garage when it's not freezing because I have a sneaking suspicion that my cutting wheel might throw sparks if I use it on metal. I accidentally hit the edge of a pair of long pliers I was using and it scared the osik out of me - I really don't wanna set my room on fire.

I'll heat-form my plates on Tuesday, probably, and then give them the rest of their sanding. The chest diamond still needs grinding along the edges once it's dry. Hopefully the E-6000 I'm using won't get weird when I heat up the edges of the cod... Then, I gotta go find some bondo.

Pictures to come later!

[Svik Katora]

I'm with the others on doing things outside if possible. The frigid winter air is bitter, but it makes you strong. Unlike plastic dust in the lungs. That tends to do the opposite. The biggest things with plastics and fiberglass is usually exposure time. If you're not around it for very long, and not too often, you're probably fine. So sleeping in it is probably the last thing you want. Plus you will be finding plastic dust everywhere. and in everything.
Aside from the obvious lung problem I actually got eye irritation from cutting PVC so I switched to wearing swimming goggles. I found an old pair that was impact rated, so it should be more than enough to stop an exploding dremmel wheel (Which by the way usually only results in minor cuts or bruising so the only real danger is your eyes.) It looks a little silly, but it works.
As for working outside, you can probably hold the bucket between your knees or and rotate it as you cut. Be careful of course, but dremmels don't have a lot of torque, and tend not to pull workpieces around much. The last thing I can think to mention is that for 99 percent of your cuts you should be able to keep your face out of line with the spinning wheel, which will only really explode out radially. So if you aren't lined up with it you should be fairly safe. Still wear safety goggles though. Safety goggles are like umbrellas. The one time you don't bring one it rains.

[Thel Ihveen]

I'm with the others on doing things outside if possible. The frigid winter air is bitter, but it makes you strong. Unlike plastic dust in the lungs. That tends to do the opposite. The biggest things with plastics and fiberglass is usually exposure time. If you're not around it for very long, and not too often, you're probably fine. So sleeping in it is probably the last thing you want. Plus you will be finding plastic dust everywhere. and in everything.

You're definitely right on that one! Shortly after I finished grinding and switched to hand-sanding, my mother complained about the noise and the apparent smell from using the dremel (the friction warms the plastic - I won't be doing the heat-forming inside for this reason...) and has strongly discouraged me from running power tools indoors. And thankfully, after finding plastic in my snot the first day I tried the thing out, I borrowed a dust mask from my dad, as well as some ear protection. Today, I even vacuumed my room and desk, so hopefully I'm no longer at risk for black lung...

Thank you for the dremel info, too! That certainly gives me more confidence in using the thing. Knowing that it's not going to seriously cut into me if I get tagged in the face or something is great. It has occurred to me that I'm totally fine wielding the hand saw, even though I've cut myself on it twice, but the dremel is still intimidating. Honestly it's probably because the dremel is loud, and I read the whole book of scary safety warnings when I got it.

As for armoring; both my laminated pieces came out great, and I bought sanding blocks! I'm gonna try to get away with shaping and beveling the outer edge of the chest diamond with my files and paper, and then do the two pieces of foot armor I forgot to do and/or beveled on the wrong side... The next local armor party is this coming Sunday, so if I have everything ready to go by then, I can form things while everyone else does grinding and cutting.

I also got my amp in the mail, and am very excited to start playing with it and taking it apart, but will have to wait until I have my helmet done... If I can show up with a mostly-done bucket at the armor party, I'll be happy!

 - Thel

[Briks]

I wouldn't sauté my sphagetti with it.

In general, if you do feel a little bad, take a break (couple days), clean up and air it out the space. Outside is by far the best place to do work (minus windy conditions)

WEAR GOGGLES - I had a dremel bit get to hot, it broke off and flung directly into my face, luckily I was wearing goggles. I literally saw it smack of the glasses (I then put down the dremel and said "thats enough for today" lol).

[Thel Ihveen]

I wouldn't sauté my sphagetti with it.

In general, if you do feel a little bad, take a break (couple days), clean up and air it out the space. Outside is by far the best place to do work (minus windy conditions)

WEAR GOGGLES - I had a dremel bit get to hot, it broke off and flung directly into my face, luckily I was wearing goggles. I literally saw it smack of the glasses (I then put down the dremel and said "thats enough for today" lol).

Oh man I am so wearing goggles! I wear my safety glasses (and work gloves if I'm doing carpentry) whenever possible - I've been hit in the face with bits of polymer clay before, back when I used to do miniatures, and I like having working eyes. Getting hit with any kind of flying dremel part would definitely scare me away for a few days at least. Thank you for the advice, too - I have cleaned the work corner of my room pretty well and have suffered no ill effects, thankfully. I'll certainly be taking more frequent breaks, even when using my little files. And as soon as it's no longer below freezing or  super windy (thank you, North Country winter...) I'm moving outside so I won't have to vacuum anymore.

I am, however, too impatient to put off painting till spring, so I'll be making good use of that spraypainting booth my school has.

[Xandicus]

Really looking forward to seeing your progress Sunday! It has been lots of fun watching this build unfold! You do amazing work, the pictures don't do it justice!