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[mrfred]

Hello All.

So I'm finally starting  my WIP  DW kit. I'm working on the Airborne Version A season 5 from the Clone Wars.
I have the KW Designs kit —had it for the past couple of years actually, and just casually working on and off until I've made a bit more recent significant progress— so that's it a bit more worth my time to start this WIP...and hopefully this will continue the momentum.

I have based alot of the work process by following Kade's build thread, and a few references from eqdizzle (if photobucket is not blocking his images)...LOL
I am also one of the two members in the forums that had commissioned Cruzer to build the DW jetpack for us over a year ago...pictures of  putting that together will come later, but here is Cruzer's build thread if you're curious: https://www.thedentedhelmet.com/forums/threads/deathwatch-jetpack-project.30359/

So on with the WIP...
These are my reference images:

 
KW Deathwatch kit (roughly cut out), palladium boots, and leather gloves:


These are some of the paints I picked up...


---DW Airborne boots



Black Palladium boots acquired size 9.5


Trimming the boot armor


Then I set off to making a template for the horizontal disc shooter for the boots...


And then cut out the pattern on sintra.


And then glued it on the armor toe...


The heel armor and armor over the lacing are being held by velcro which I have painstakingly hand sewed on to the boots.

Toe armor may need to be glued... maybe shoegoo or E6000 may work...

[Kryamla Redalur]

I used glue (leather glue since my toe cap isn’t quite like the palladium boots) to glue on my toe armor, it’s worked really well so far!

[mrfred]

Thank you clan sister 

Now for the shin armor:
Shin darts acquired some time ago...


A little too narrow, so i'll have to widen the shin armor a bit...it was too narrow for my legs anyways...


The widening process...added about another inch width; used styrene for extra material...


The gluing process...


Fits fairly well...but will need to do some detailing, bondo to cover up screws, and sanding out the wrinkle effects of the gluing...

[Kryamla Redalur]

Looks good to me

[mrfred]

Now for the knee armor...
KW's kit is vac-formed into two halves and has a pattern on the front of the knees, which will have to be smoothed out for the  airborne grunt...here's the reference:


The two halves will have to be trimmed out...


Now trimmed and positioned for a rough fitting.


Then I used sintra to make the shape of the front of the knees, this will be smooth and put over the flimsy vac formed abs...


Placed over and a crude taped up mockup...I have also cut out sintra fillers for the left and right side of the knees for reinforcement...those abs knees by itself won't last one troop!


Clamps and magnets to pin down the gluing process.


Knees after the gluing and some bondo applied, and some sanding....painting to come later...

 

[Mi'ix]

I love tuning in here to see some awesome builds, especially with assistance from Kryamla!

Scrolling through your build, it looks like your hitting the details on the head with the weird little toe plates, and shin dart launchers.

Excellent progress here.

[mrfred]

OK....next is the thigh armor and holsters...just like the knee armor, this work method is emulated from Kade's build...it's much appreciated, as it shaves off all the problem solving time out of the way...

And so, again, these holsters are also flimsy vacuumed formed ABS , so sinta reinforcements  are added around the inside of the holsters...they will also act as a puzzle piece to insert and secure into the thigh armor...
Here we have the left, botttom and right inside sintra pieces measured out and then taped into  place temporarily to check fitting...

The tabs sticking out will come to play into the thigh armor.

Measuring the placement of the tabs to the thigh armor and then cutting slots so the tabs can slide right in...


The gluing process of the sintra to the holster....this makes for a more durable holster...


After the gluing is set, the holster is attached on via the slots cut out on the thigh armor...


And then the tabs are heat bend to secure the holster on...here is a look on the back side.


Bondo is used to smooth out the cracks, open edges, uneven surfaces, etc.


Final sanding and cleanup....priming and painting to be done later...

[Vexos]

Following!

[Kryamla Redalur]

Looking good Fred!

[mrfred]

---Now for the belt and girth...

ABS belt trimmed out...it seems that there is more than enough belt there...so most likely i'll be trimming off the excess, but that won't be till later, during the assembly of this thing...


Got myself some 7-8oz. leather hide for the girth, and trimmed it to about 6in. wide...


And measured out the width of the belt on the hide.


The belt was designed for the earlier TCW season 2 DW grunts, but the S5 airborne grunts have additional parts of the belt segmented, so I penciled those in based on some visual references and Kade's build. I'll also be using velcro for this belt also...


The belt will have to be cut out at each segment, so I marked all the segments so I won't lose the place for them...


The backside of this belt...i'm estimating that i won't need at least one segment of it...


Total of 3 pieces of the belt...two for the outer layer and one (the back piece), that will be overlapped by the outer backside of the belt.


Backside of the belt that will be overlapped...I've "X" off the segments I don't anticipate using...


A crude mockup assembly of the belt, the leather girth and the velcro to be used...


Segmenting the belt and adding snaps at key points...


Then I glued (E6000) a strip of velcro (hook side), to the inner side of the segmented belt. Snaps are cut through the velcro also. This velcro piece is what will be holding the segmented belt together...


Adding some magnets at key weak points of the belt.


Here I have contact cemented and hand sewn the loop side of velcro to the girth.


This is where the belt (hook side), will meet with the girth (loop side).
 

In addition, I've velcroed the whole inner side of the girth. This not only will give a sturdy thickness to the girth but will also keep the girth in position when velcroed at key spots around the waist-side of  the flight suit. I've seen kits with just the leather girth by itself, and when worn it has a flexed and wrinkled look which looks kinda sloppy to me...


And this is what it looks like put together...It holds up nice and firm on its own...


In addition, I've created a 1"in leather spacer to increase the size of the girth if needed...if God forbids I need to expand my waist-side a bit more at times...

[Kryamla Redalur]

Very detailed

[mrfred]

---The Helmet

I started the cleanup of the bucket during a big build party with my local garrison...I began dremeling away the flash and then the cutout of the visor area...


One thing about the cleanup, be sure to check the surface area of the interior, especially where your visor will be sitting on...there were a few spots that were uneven that i had to smooth out with the dremel...


Nice and clean now...


One of the things that eqdizzle mentioned about the helmet was that at the bottom of the ears are protrusions where they're suppose to flare out. I failed to heed this advice and ended up dremeling them out by accident...fortunately I patched it up using JB Weld epoxy...


For the Visor....
I went for the Chicago screws approach where I would glue the screws to the inside of the helmet, along the edge of the visor opening, and be able to put on and take off the helmet visor when I needed to...
 Made a paper  template of my visor and laid it to the inside for placement and traced around it with a red marker...


Marked off the spots where the screws will be placed...


And then applied the visor on...I will also be placing left over material from the visor to place a couple of horizontal bridges across the visor for stability (those will be glued in).


Unscrewed the visor and Plastidip the interior—


I also made a cardboard visor to mask the interior when I'll be ready to prime and paint later down the road.



---The Range Finder
The Range Finder is an Eternal Armory RF...RIP


Drilled a countersink hole on the base of the RF where I'll be fitting an aluminum 1.5" post...also used some material from the visor and decided to re-purpose them as spacers...


Having one hole wasn't enough...I did a second hole to keep the RF from swinging down...


Have to cover up those screw posts! JB Weld epoxy will do the job...once dried, I sanded and carved a horizontal line across as part of this kit's design...


All set for now...

[Mi'ix]

Wow, I blink and this thing is moving in leaps and bounds.

I have a number of kits at my place that need some attention like this. 

Really great WIP so far.  The attention to detail is outstanding.

[mrfred]

---Gloves
Initially I proceeded to go with these leather gloves...they were standard blue, but I went through the process of dying them to a darker blue...


Then I later found out  that aviation nomex flight  gloves were available in navy blue, so I decided to go with them instead. They're made with a much more low profile fabric.


And then proceeded to dye the leather areas of the gloves to the navy blue color...


ABS Handplates and 3d printed darts placed into position...


Painted darts and then proceeded to create out of sintra, four mini ridges aligned behind each dart for both hand plates.


Glued hooksided velcro to the back side of the handplates...


Everything painted and glued...filled in open gaps with green sculpting putty...


Based primer paint done...weathering to come later...


Sewn loop sided velcro in navy blue to the gloves...


All set...

[Kryamla Redalur]

That looks great - always did like the look of those hand plates

[mrfred]

--Gauntlets

I already knew the Gauntlets were too small for me to fit my forearms, so I set out to expand them at least by another inch or two... They initially came in two halves which you have to glue together. I glued the top ends where they were suppose to, and the bottom ends are where I will expand the diameter of the gauntlets. I used cardboard emplacements to measure out as a template before transferring that pattern on to some styrene material. I did templates for the external and internal.


Then glued them in....


I know flexing of the gauntlets will happen as I take them on and off, so reinforcements are needed...ABS cement used as well as E6000 and bondo...open and closure of the gauntlets will be a magnetic seal...


3D printed parts for the right gauntlet...


If it weren't for Kade's WIP, it probably would take me a while to figure out which pieces go where...all the main components are put together...


Components for the left and right gauntlets...


Banded the right gauntlet's components together to get a rough idea before gluing... I'm using JB Weld for gluing.


There was going to be some weak spots and stress points so I screwed those areas in...


Area under the rocket launcher...


Initial priming...


Initial fitting over the right gauntlet...
 

Hose attachment for this component was going to be a problem...the contact points where the hose meeting the hose port was a weak 3D printed part and would easily snap...so an underlying support of  a thick gauge wire connecting the entry port and to the inside of the hose was needed.


Preparing LED lights and plexiglass for this unit...


Wiring up and testing the gauntlet blasters...


Buttons installed and wiring laid out, and into the gauntlet itself...


Component now JB Weld into place...


Prepped and primed as a whole...


Initially the charcoal priimer turned out much darker than I had liked....but as it is just primer, I'll dust an overlay of a slightly lighter shade as part of the weathering and shading paint process later on...


The connecting inner support wiring for the hose connection continues to be a problem for me...I tried JB Weld, E6000, thermoplastic...until i finally settled for an acrylic tube to keep the support...


Finding the right outer tubing was a challenge too...after two or three attempts, I finally derived to using a latex hose.


All set for now!

Assembly of the right gauntlet was a bit easier...
Dremeled out a couple of holes from the comlink component...


JB Weld on to the right gauntlet...the red plexiglass for rectangular hole for LEDs...


Filled the gap under the comlink with green sculpting putty. The rectangular piece on the side—I had screwed and epoxy the piece on.


Prepping the left gauntlet for priming...I placed a 1/2" circular metal plate over that hole in the comlink.


Initial priming done and LED wiring installed. (You can see my wiring in the video link below.)


All set for now!

[Vexos]

Great job vod! Those look awesome

[Kryamla Redalur]

Very detailed! Good work

[Mi'ix]

Wow.

Absolutely outstanding.

[mrfred]

Due to a wrist injury, I've been out of commission for over a month...but I've made a little bit more headway in the last couple of weeks...

---The Rocket

These are my image references...


As mentioned before, I had commissioned Cruzer to build me the TCW S5 DW rocket pack...here is his build thread again for your reference:  https://www.thedentedhelmet.com/forums/threads/deathwatch-jetpack-project.30359/

So pulling out his kit again after it's been in storage for about a year, I did a quick soap and water wash to clean away any remaining residue from the cast...(Cruzer's work is excellent, little to no sanding needed!) These are the parts...


Notice that I had included parts for a long rocket, which I acquire awhile ago...I plan to switch out between a short rocket and a long rocket just for the sake of novelty...

I plan on using countersunk ring neodymium magnets for the middle rocket, so that i can swap out the short to a long rocket in a matter of seconds...Taking measurements for the sizing of the rocket slot...
 

Measurements for the rocket...


The long rocket required some dowel screws to hold the pieces together...


Assembly of the two rockets...for the long rocket I sanded a wooden spacer so it would sit perfectly for the rocket port...magnets are glued and screwed in at the very bottom.


Another fun feature I plan on adding to this rocket pack are LED lights and a fog machine to simulate smoke...here is my working prototype...(fog machine can be activated remotely...)


All these add-ons, cause new problems to solve...the area where the rocket exhaust port sit was meant to be fitted and screwed in with one tiny hole...so I had to find a workaround to get LED lights and the fog tube to fit in there... commencing with measurements...

I always resort to magnets as a solution...


I drilled a 1/2"in hole into the exhaust port part so my bling can funnel through it...


Rocket port fitting nicely as  planned...


Next task was to fit in the LED lights...

(From the inside...) Magnets present again to hold the other magnet that's attached to the exhaust part from the outside.

And finally got the tube for the fogger to fit through...the whole process took some doing...but then again, no pain, no gain...


And as planned...use of magnets and then some epoxy to hold the exhaust port to the main rocket body will do it well...


I used some thermoplastic to hold the fog tube and LED lights together and to keep the wires in place...


Here is the final wire works for the LEDs and fog machine from the backside of the rocket opening...


And preliminary testing...it's working well!!!


Priming of the rockets...


Base primer layer for the rocket done!


Added the blue color on the main body...same color as the blue stripes on the left and right rockets...somehow it's not matching to the color reference pics...something is not right...the Rustoleum Wildflower Blue is not working out...


Even the painter's masking tape color is closer...also swapped out to the longer rocket to see how it would look...


So with the recommendation of fellow Merc, Kryamla Redalur. I went and got some Montana Gold spray paint and got a few different blues that seemed closer to the reference...


After stripping the previous color out...I went with using the Montana Gold Ultramarine and Nautilus colors...looks good now!


Masked out the blue strips and started second and third layers of weathering for the main grey body....mid-grays, dark grays, charcoal gray dusting...


A layer of light gray dry brushing and wash...and then sealed with a flat matte...


These following images are taken during the day with natural lighting...


These are taken in the evening with indoor lights...
 

And finally the rocket testing was successful...


Here is the video link of the rocket in action...

All set and done!

[Vexos]

That looks awesome! Great job vod

[Kryamla Redalur]

Wow that looks really good!

[Mi'ix]

I have many jetpacks, of many styles, but I have some serious JP envy right now.

I think the paint, weathering and overall styling are just perfect for this character, imo.

[mrfred]

---The Harness

It was mentioned to me from another clan-mate that their harness system digs into their backside and becomes uncomfortable after awhile. So considering the weight of the rocket pack, I set off to research for a proper and comfortable harness design, tolerable for long troops...

So I decided to go with a double layer harness system, 1.5" width bottom strapping for larger surface area for stress distribution and a standard 1" strapping for the top strapping for the hardware.
(Don't mind the different color buckles...LOL... I'm just using what I already have available at hand.)




The configuration will be a "X" harness system...I also ended up going with milspec webbing for the top strapping, since light and medium weight webbing didn't work out with my buckles very well...



Hooked up to the inside of the pack and all set!

[Kryamla Redalur]

Looks good! Just be sure to leave enough space on the straps with the buckles to slide through your back plate

I haven’t done it yet, but Kai suggested adding a bit of craft foam or thin Eva foam under the shoulder part to help it not dig in. It won’t be visible since it’ll be under the vest/flightsuit so it shouldn’t violate any CRLs