GilFran007

You look very comfortable in it and it looks tip top! I find the armor quite awkward in the first five minutes that it's on.... Then you adjust and it's manageable.... So strange. Sent from my Pixel XL using Tapatalk

Well done.... I'm glad to see you've found the 'less is more' technique. Hitting your bucket with the hose must have been a little scary to say the least. Sent from my Pixel XL using Tapatalk

Looks great! Now get her dirty! Weathering is very personal imo... Unless you want to go swat.... Then you are at the mercy of what was done over 40 years ago

Looking good . I'm a proponent of less is more with respect to the weathering.... If you want to look like the screen Sandy's....I really don't think they had much done to them imo. If you want to be your own dirty trooper, i say go nuts! Make it look like you took a bath in Bantha do do...lol... If you want to emulate an onscreen guy... Less is more for sure. For the tube stripes, I redid mine five times on the right side I used masking tape and superimposed a printout of the helmet stripes onto it, marked the bottom end locations by a dot on the masking tape, then free handed the puppies in... Stripes 6 and 7 are tight remember Sent from my Pixel XL using Tapatalk

My RS bucket is complete. I must say that the RS feels like a 70's kit.....it's far from perfect and at the level of quality that would be expected for a 70's sci-fi film budget........ I've gone as old skool as I could with the guts and the only thing new that I have on the docket for her is a cooling kit....I even got a bit of masking tape tacking down some of the edges of the acetate film as it is almost like candy wrapper, it's so thin... Here is a comparison with my AP bucket (which may go up for sale :O)......in my RS build, I've got all the paint runs, cracks, tweaked hovi mics, ear gaps.....all of the ugliness that makes it beautiful.....LOL. Such a fun kit to put together.

a quick question to those in the know. I want to emulate the old school construction as much as possible. I'm using the star foam inside for the padding. Preliminary test fittings find it quite comfortable actually....moreso than my bump helmet padding that I installed in the AP bucket. Has anyone found any issues taking the star foam route when padding their helmet?

I didn't. I just used masking tape to give me the clean terminations at the tops and bottoms.....the rest is all me. LOL I'm pretty happy with the results. I'm sure I can get it marginally better by using templates, but the means don't justify the ends

Thanks for all your inputs. I 'm okay with the shoulder bells for now......for now I just wanted to post an update on my RS bucket. I've had lots of fun with this so far......until the tube stripes.....whoever decided that tube stripes need to be hand painted was evil. Though I'm not shooting for PO or SWAT just yet, I want to ensure that I can do as much as I can with what I have. Tube stripes were redone twice. This time I used a superimposed side shot of the helmet to map the stripe placements.....I think I was slightly off scale on the right side , maybe by 1/4".....but I'm not painting a 14th stripe in. I'm happy with it thus far

As a bonus, today was LBB day......my RS helmet from their May the 4th sale arrived today. After being spoiled by Mark's perfectly trimmed and flawless AP bucket, I now have my work cut out for me with this offering: The RS helmet is quite 'primitive' and visceral......the pieces do not fit together seamlessly, there's lots of blemishes and bumps from molding off of a screen used helmet.....I love it!!! I think she'll make for a beautiful sandy helmet.....if putting it together doesn't kill me

Thank you Jason, The pouches for now are just the large French pouches. I have an MP40 pouch and small Spanish pouch inbound from Blaster. I will be looking to emulate the infamous Tuck & Roll Captain I'm studying that weathering as we speak. Closing the gap in the shoulders is tough. I'm probably putting it into the redline for getting AP shoulders to fit. I saw the tutorial where another trooper steamed his bells and applied pressure to the top of the shoulder, allowing them to "squish and sprawl" out. I wasn't sure how cured e6000 would react to steam so I haven't tried that yet.

Hey troopers, I did a test fitting of my armour last night and snapped some pics. LOL.....it was my first time putting everything on and had to get my wife to help. I realized that I should have put the bucket on before the forearms so I just left it off. I did get some pics of me in my BS helmet as that was easy to slip on.....but I didn't include those (plus I was goofing off in the pictures....lol). I believe I have everything fitted and aligned properly. I've since thrown the suit onto my mannequin and will commence the weathering (....after I do up my new RS bucket to SWAT requirements ). Any constructive comments would be appreciated. At this point, I'm shooting for the entry level basic approval.....but will be following several SWAT level initiatives in some areas. As I can't pick and choose on CRL specs, I'm just looking to clear basic with flying colours!

Great stuff! I'm looking to shoot some test fitting pics of my build soon (pre-weathering)....I would appreciate some comments from the community would be going for basic approval first.

Greetings folks, I wanted to share with you my T-21 Blaster, 3D printed parts from TK421 Propstop (Ollie's store). **** of a nice guy and a fun project over the past month. Future upgrades involve better sling hardware and real surplus Enfield slings. If anyone has details on the greeblies, I wouldn't mind having a look see. I'm on the fence at the moment on whether or not to add them.

Looks fantastic! Other than the bells, my suggestion would be to place foam in strategic areas so that your sniper plate doesn't hide behind the thigh piece. The sniper plate distinguishes us from the TK's...........and the fact that we hit whatever we aim at.... :O

You still beat me by about 3" in height..... Which is about how much taller your shin armour is Keep up the great work

Greetings community, There are very good images of the weathering and costume attributes of the Garindan Captain, but not many images of the DB94 Captain (Tuck & Roll). I saw one that almost looked like a different set of armour as the Garindan Captain (because it looked a lot cleaner). The DB94 Captain is only on for a couple of seconds so it's hard to come away with anything conclusive. Is the consensus here that we weather the DB94 Captain's armour in the same manner as the Garndan Captain because of the lack of clear pics? If there is another source, I would love to see some pictures.

Congratulations! Good to hear that your hard work paid off.

Is it weird that I can see how much taller you are than I am by the height of your shin armour? LOL Looks great so far. Please be sure to capture your weathering adventures. I feel like Indiana Jones needing to take that leap of faith from the lions head......but within a perpetual pause.....

He missed the announcement about putting all your folding trays in the upright position....lol

lots of serious armour gap in the R1 and Solo troopers......maybe by the time they get to ANH, the Empire ran out of insurance for "loss of limbs in the workplace" and upped the armour tolerances? LOL....

Great work so far. One thing that I noticed is that your belt snaps are on your cod instead of the ab plate. You make it work by lowering the snap location on the belt. I'm not sure if that is an issue at PO or SWAT levels.....but should be good to go for standard approval still.

Man....I think I'm nervous for the both of us....LOL Awesome results though. Keep up the fantastic work. Every time I leave your thread, I have to talk myself down from ordering a second bucket from AP. LOL

I'm getting mine from Geeky Pink's Phantastic Gaskets on FB....she's knows as Soulart on FISD, a member of my Garrison (Badlands), and a wonderful lady as well I'm getting mine in a week so I can let you know then. There are a lot of happy troopers with her product though.