Art Andrews

That is indeed me. Sadly, I have never officially been a member of the 501st although I have been around here since nearly the beginning. I wish I could help you guys, but I don't know if this was the first detachment or not. I only know it was an awesome group of passionate costumers back in the day and still appears to be awesome today. Wish I could be of more help. Keep doing your thing.

Well, that is just completely disappointing. Thanks for the clarification guys!

I swear I thought I had seen that at least one person, possibly two had managed to snag an original Sonix radio. I was just told that isn't the case and that no one here actually has one. Is that correct and have I been mistaken all this time?

Wow, Kudos to whoever put these together. I always wanted to do this breakdown for looksirdroids, but never got past breaking down the packs due to responsibilities at the RPF. I LOVE THIS!

Just as a point of clarity, it is my understanding that the price was $500...

Nathan, that is definitely an issue for those who troop, especially in a group. For me, it is all about accuracy and if I ever do troop again mine will be weathered as close as I can get it to what I see in photos like the one above. I might stick out like a sore thumb but for me, accuracy is everything. For those who troop on a more regular basis, that might not be as reasonable but whenever I do get another suit together... it will be sitting on a manny 99.9% of the time and if I weathered it to look good in person, I know I would be annoyed with it 99.9% of the time.

Don't know how many of you saw it, but Official Pix recently made this photo available and it really helps me see all the more that my past attempts at weathering were just completely off. While I think the weathering I achieved LOOKED fairly good, the accuracy was WAY off. I think many of us are really missing the boat, adding dark splotches but missing out on the overall completely dirty/smeared weathering. Here is a scan of the pic. Hope it helps. I know when I start my next helmet I am going to be really taking a very different approach. Davin Helmet Detail

Good call. I wish we had a better photo, but the poster is the only pic I have ever seen of that piece. In regard to the coiled wire and the piece on top, that is actually the same piece as seen on the Merr Sonn blasters. It is believed to be a plug and cord from an old flash unit but I don't think anyone has 100% IDed it. In regard to the two other greeblies you pointed out, I don't think we will ever have good enough ref to know for sure, and I am SURE they aren't pieces from the revel kit but they look so close to me, that I am using the same revel pieces found on the boba fett blaster. Here is a quick and dirty mockup.

So, we all know about the Stormtrooper pistol (Rexim Favor) but probably fewer know that there is also a sandtrooper pistol. It was never seen on film, but there is a famous promotional shot of Dath Vader, standing on a Mylar background with three cleaned up sandtroopers. The two in the back are holding the RT-97C Heavy Blaster Rifles (MG-15) and the one in the front is holding a weird pistol. I can't remember now who figured it out, but the pistol is actually a Japanese Type 99 Light Machine gun. These guns are very rare and very expensive. I recently had the opportunity to acquire a copy thanks to postmortem1 and the sci-fire group. I have begun the conversion but just couldn't wait to share this with you as it is such a rare and obscure piece! From what I can tell in the poster, I need to add a couple of greeblies, paint the grip and make a few other alterations and this baby will be done!

I don't know if we will get detailed enough to be able to use these as a weathering pattern, but hopefully it will be useful enough to allow people to identify who is who in the various scenes. It seems people usually identify or fall in love with a particular trooper and end up replicating that one. I want to help them be able to pick their trooper out in as many scenes as possible.

haha! I am lucky to just get jb on the phone!!! But Corrose might be a very good call!!!

I am currently reworking my website and want to create some rough templates identifying the chest weathering on each trooper. My efforts at doing this have been.... embarrassing to say the least. Is there anyone who could photoshop some rough weathering patterns over a background image of a chest plate to be used to help others ID the weathering patterns?

I have to agree with others that the paint job on the FG helmet REALLY makes it stand out!

Gotcha... Sounds like I need to do some more research on this!

I want to make sure we are on the same page... From what I have seen, there are more or less two Boy Scout pack frames. One has 3 horizontal crossbars, and one has two. I am in agreement that no matter what, the top crossbar gets left alone. My issue is, I swear there is a second crossbar still in place between the two boxes.... but on the scout pack frame with three cross bars, there is no way this would work because the crossbars won't line up right... I would have to look at the other pack frame to see if it would ever work at all... That is where I am having issues. Additionally, this is the first I have heard of the tube connecting to the boxes... Is this just a convenience thing or is there any indications that the originals were mounted this way?