Lozzer86

They are cut 1" above the top cross bar. This seemed in keeping with the reference. Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk

I think big congratulations are in order, buddy This is a glimpse into the future of realistic weaponry for us Sandies. Tremendous Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk

This is why my T21 'Power Coil' looks like it Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk

If you look at this image taken from a behind the scenes shot, you can see that the tubing is a bit larger in diameter than the Lewis barrel. If you compare this to a boiler heating pipe.... You can see some real similarities It's highly likely that this piece of 'set decoration' was in fact a heating coil or similar. Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk

Not sure if anyone has actually done this ? But this is the approach I took. 16 Reference points taken in daylight on various pack parts / Troopers in scenes of ANH and ANH SE. Grouped into a grid then colour averaged in Photoshop. Taking any more than 16 reference points just made the average more 'average' and the results were the same. Seems pretty definitive to me. Happy to be challenged but that's how I came to the same conclusion as Strider

Buddy, before you spend any more time on this build, please consider the comments already made. We are here to help you, but starting with this kit could be a mistake. As IGGYDAN said, if you are aiming at any level of accuracy, I'd sell it on and do some research into a more accurate kit. Please don't take any of this personally. But I think your skills would be better used on a more accurate kit to start with

Brothers, After spending some time with a real 1914 Lewis, photographing, measuring every detail, understanding how the mechanisms work..... I realised within a few feet of it that my T21 was so far off it was going to drive me crazy ! So my advice is.... if you've made a T21 and you ever get a chance to handle a real Lewis... DON'T !!! You'll lose sleep So there was only 1 thing I could do... Make a new one from scratch Only this time, I wanted to make it millimetre perfect, reproduce all of the glorious details in the firing mechanism, have an open breach, a see through cocking mechanism, reproduce the barrel engraving, the hand engraving, the tiny makers symbols.... every scratch, every imperfection, every detail from the base of the stock to the tip of the barrel. Oh, and just to add some spice to an already spicy adventure.... It had to weigh under 2.5 kilos and it had to come in 2 parts for ease of transport !!! So here is my photo journey. A journey which took 4 solid weeks and is still going. Here's a picture showing the real Lewis (TOP) against my nearly finished T21 (BOTTOM). Bear in mind that the 2 are at slightly different angles. It's still not fully complete. there are a couple of bits missing and some changes to the greeblies, so i'll keep this thread going as I amend the bits. Now.... you guys know how to use a Dremel and basic tools, so I won't be boring you. But I'll show you a selection of the build photo's taken from the start.... The first thing you'll notice is that this is NOT a PandaTrooper build. It's not going to work for the level of accuracy I need. It's a pipe build which gives me a chamber for mounting the front barrel inside. To make absolutely sure that this build was exactly the right dimensions and shape, I took all the reference photographs and enlarged them to 100% scale using photoshop. Then I spent a long time tracing the outlines of all the parts to use as templates. The stock, receiver, top plate and even the barrel was done this way. By using the trace outlines, I was able to reproduce all of the parts with ultimate accuracy. It's worth mentioning that when I overlaid the tracings with the 'publicly available' shape and dimensions, it was quite different. But unless the existing drawings and templates were reproduced from a real Lewis, that's to be expected. To be fair, the available ones are a good representation of a Lewis, but they don't measure up correctly in many of the dimensions. Once you have all of the information, measurements and trace outlines, the actual process was not far off a conventional build. The difficulty was substituting materials from the original steel on the real Lewis. Plastic will never be as strong at steel in any thickness, and given that I wanted this to be as light as possible I needed to be smart with the materials used. The entire weapon was eventually made from light wooden stock, aluminium, ABS and lots of Milliput for shaping. The basic shape... Made from a light wood and using the traced outlines, I marked up the main body. The trigger guard has to be so thin, it needs to be made from aluminium. Wood won't be strong enough at this thickness. You can see the areas that I needed to cut out for realism. It doesn't leave a lot of wood left for strength. The pipe that will receive the barrel extension, making it a 2 piece weapon. The receiver is fully open from the feed plate to the ejection port. Once the barrel slides into the receiver, the holes close up. Both sides were faced with 2mm ABS sheet to give twisting strength. These we bonded to the wooden form and allowed me to shape the curves of the grip and underbody correctly. The Lewis doesn't have any square surfaces, which you only see on the actual gun on inspection. There are also many strange undercuts and shapes on the underside which need to be included. None of this is visible from any screen shot from the film. You only see these on the actual Lewis. It's a complicated design :/ Full Barrel made from 3 parts of TIG Welded Aluminium. The welds were ground off to make it smooth, then the reduction was gradually filled to mimic the reduction in the actual Lewis. It's a very gradual reduction as you'll see in the end photos. Lathing Guide and Receiver Outline. Initial mockup of Receiver assembly, made from ABS and Architect Craft Board. Internal Barrel Pipe with some 3D printed Spacers that are bonded to the inside of the larger front barrel housing. Lots of Filler Primer on the base form. At this point all of the subtle curves and shaping has been completed. I use filler primer to give me a thick base to sand from. This removes any tooling marks on the receiver, allowing me to get the shine needed on the body. Again, this is only seen on the real Lewis. 3D printed Front Sight. I used a bit of 3D printed parts for this, firstly to keep the weight down and secondly to save hours of painstaking part building. I print in PLA as ABS doesn't have the same strength for the size part. But it gives me another problem. Sanding PLA is almost impossible, so each part has been coated with resin and filler primer, then sanded. Once painted, it's close to any resin cast you can get. Hand engraved (By Me) symbols and lettering present on the original. There are many different symbols, including a 'Masonic' symbol on the receiver tray base. My TD ID is the Serial Number (33751) Laying down the base colours. There a many different colours here, from grey to silver to blue. And many different tones and blending. Front Barrel Vents for the inside of the hot end. Initial Weathering of the Receiver Mechanism. Notice the latching mechanism for the Ammunition Drum. This is the first of many layers of weathering, using the reference photos to try and accurately represent the colours and areas. Plastic is starting to look a lot like metal now One of the most difficult aspects of the real Lewis to replicate, the Barrel Engraving !!! So far we have discovered 2 types of Lewis barrel engraving and knurling. I'm not sure if that's a date driven thing or a use driven thing (Field use vs Aircraft use). Mine has the concentric barrel engraving from top to receiver. On the scales ... It's good A little over 2.3 kilos, which is 5 lbs. Comparison against my Old T21 and my new T21. At first, there doesn't look like much difference. But there are lots of subtle differences and once they all add up, it's like black and white. There's still a few bits to do and I'll update as we go, but so far it's a fairly realistic Lewis It also weighs in at only 2.3kg.

Well done, Buddy !! Congrats

Enough E6000 will stick an elephant to the ceiling (so long as the elephant stands still for 24hours ) The tool box and air filter are plastic enclosures, both had the backs removed but enough lip left to apply adhesive. The seed trays also had the same areas removed on the bits you can't see. The radio is a block of high density foam with a pleather wrap and cast faceplate. Hope that helps

Hi Buddy, It's nylon bolts and screws for the Syphon and trays to the frame cross bars, E6000 everything else. EVERYTHING ELSE !!!!

Fellow Troopers, After a lot of research and negotiation, we (Me and Nick) managed to secure some hands on time with a real Lewis Gun in the UK. This was all down to the efforts of Nick Black (TD 5884) and he asked me to come along. Of course I can't miss an opportunity like that ! So we took the Canon 7D, tape measures, rulers and even the Vernier Callipers to get as many detailed reference photographs and measurements as we could. We were lucky with a break in the weather, so we took it outside to a bench for further inspection. The first thing I can tell you is that this bad boy is HEAVY ! It weighs in at 23lbs (Just over 10 1/2 kilos). It's not the sort of thing you'd want to drop. And that's without the magazine or ammunition.

Hi Buddy, Is probably not use illuminated switches in your kid for two reasons; 1. You're adding unnecessary current draw for no real benefit 2. They might be noticeable by the public I'd also not bother with using 9v batteries. They don't really have the legs to keep it all going for long and that will cost you money in the long run. Use 18650 lithium batteries. It's what I've changed over to and they will last a whole weekend without needing a charge. I'm doing a fan install tutorial soon, so I'll post that up if it helps ?

*** Admin, please move this to another area if you think it would sit better elsewhere *** Never want to run out of charge on a troop ? Want to recharge anywhere, anytime ? Of course you do ! Here’s a great mod for your trooping case that will give you hours and hours of USB charging goodness. You can make this as easy and complex as you like. For the purpose of this example, I’m using 2 x Dual USB charging sockets, giving a total of 4 powered USB charging sockets that can be used for phones, Battery chargers… pretty much anything. It has an integrated Voltage display and can be accessed from the outside of your Trooping Case. Here is the link to the PDF tutorial with all the info you need Portable Trooping Power station Tutorial

My one was definitely unused vintage stock. The Syphon internals had deteriorated over time, but it had never been fitted. It's not a recast, it's an original classic design. As to its age ? No idea, but it's quite a few years old

Please take a look at my T21 alternate build. I started with a vac formed receiver and added details.

Yes. That is a 4" Tupperware lid with a sanding disc backing pad. Just popped it up so you can see how it should look when it's assembled.

The backing pad should overlap the radar dish by 1/8th inch

Thank you, Brother !

Thanks guys !!!

Thank you, Felix

Hi Felix, Here are some detailed photos to cover points A and K For Point A..... A photo of me stretching the elastic on the shoulder straps; For Point K..... Here are a number of shots showing that the external bolts heads of the original strapping system have been retained Back Plate; Front Chest Plate; Cod and Butt Plate; Left Side AB Plate and Shim; Top of AB Plate; Right Side AB Plate; Top of Kidney Plate; I hope that these photo's demonstrate the points your require for your assessment.

Hi Felix, Thanks for your time and effort doing the reviews and congrats to your new role Regarding 'K' above, my armour does not have the original strapping anymore, but I have retained the external visible strapping points as per the requirement. Would you like some photos of the cod and ab plate rivets from the outside ? Thanks, Lee

Happy New Year to all my Sandy Brothers and Sisters !!! 2016 will be an interesting year for new builds with TFA now among us A lot of people are leaning towards the Heavy Gunner as a next move. Let's see what happens All the best to you all

Thanks buddy. The Syphon was a real find. It's 'new vintage stock' from a specialist company in the UK. They had me on the list for months and finally one came up. Been saving it for this pack