Genestealer Update 18: Getting The Ball Rolling Again

 After a bit of a hiatus, we're finally back to work on the 'stealer. 

There's been a few bits of progress here and there, but at least its progress.  First off, we dusted off the forming bucks for the lower leg parts:



Jeff spent some quality time doing final smoothing on the surface:

Then we went ahead and vacformed two sets of each of the parts, but I didn't take any photos of that process.  In any case, here's the vacformed leg parts rough trimmed and fitted to the stilts, laying on the floor:


It looks like it'll probably work out:


Sometime in the next week or two, we'll strap them all together again and do a bit more tweaking to make sure everything still works while walking.

We also made progress on the bottom rib section of the chest.  Last time I posted an update on the chest, it looked like so:

You may have noticed the last section on the bottom of the chest that closes off the area under the arms is not in the picture.  We separated that to make it easier for the wearer to get in and out of the chest section.  The missing piece has been kicking around the shop looking like so:

In order to make sure it would fit snugly into the bottom of the chest (hopefully without the aid of any fasteners) we started by masking off the areas were it would make contact and gooping them up with a bunch of bondo, then we fitted the lower rib into place:


Then we went through and did a bit more bodyshop work on the outside to make the seam less noticeable:


Once it was all smoothed out and gloss coated, we did a quick test fit to make sure it would slot into place without anything cracking or breaking:


Then the whole thing was mounted to some cardboard and wrapped with plastic wrap:


Then we went through and built up a clay matrix over the top of the plastic:




After applying a release agent, we laid up the fiberglass mothermold in two separate halves.  Once that was all cured, we removed all of the clay, re-placed the mothermold, and sealed up the edges.  Then we went ahead and poured in some Mold Star 30 silicone rubber to fill in the void left behind by the clay:


Once the master was removed and the mothermold was bolted together, the riblet mold was ready to go:


First it got a coat of blue tinted gelcoat:


NOTE: Normally I would just use grey gelcoat since the parts will end up being painted.  But since this piece will get knocked around a bit, I figured it would be good to start with a blue part so any scratches in the paint will be less visible.

I applied the gelcoat in two layers with plenty of time to set up in between.  Then the next morning I laid up the fiberglass layers on the inside:

It was an insanely complex shape with a lot of tight corners and compound curves.  Fortunately, I've gotten pretty good at fiberglass layup at this point:


In short order, I had a nice, strong, bubble-free part curing in the mold:


A few hours later, it popped right out of the mold:


Once we get the edges trimmed up, it should slot right back into place in the chest:


So those are the biggest parts we've made progress on.  We also went ahead and made some new lifecasts so I can sculpt the big 3-fingered hands next.

Now that I've got a new spurt of enthusiasm for this project, I should be making the first of the rubber parts pretty soon here.

Stay tuned...

Starship Troopers Mobile Infantry Armor Part Two: Painting and Assembly

When I last posted about this project, I'd just done my first test fitting.  But something was off:

It was just a quick and dirty gaff tape test fit, but it proved the parts would work together as designed.  Which was good, becase by that point, we had a lot of parts starting to pile up:


And before too long there were even more parts:


I also went ahead and had some laser cut and folded brackets made to go with the foam cast armor:

The first step in making the armor wearable was to paint all of the brackets with satin black spraypaint.  

The next step was to trim all of the excess flashing and fabric backing off of the foam cast armor.  This was slated to be a huge pain in the ass that was going to take me all damned day.  Fortunately for me, I have the perfect tool to make this easy.

That tool is Jeff:

Once the excess was cut off, the next step was to use an old soldering iron to poke holes into the foam to make it easier to fit the rivets into place:  

The holes were poked everywhere we'd need one of the steel bracket pieces riveted on.  We used the brackets themselves as a template and marked the hole locations by poking a Sharpie through the bracket's holes, but I didn't take pictures of that step.  You get it.

In the end, we had all these holes:


Most notably, we also used a sharp knife to cut these slots for the straps to pass through:


Then the parts got painted with the same custom-mixed shade of greay paint (color matched to Pantone 425c) that we used for the helmets:

Then each hole got a dab of CA glue*, the metal strap keepers were placed, and a rivets were installed:

NOTE: On the screen-used armor the rivets passed all the way through and had a square washer on the inside for a better hold.  We tried this a few times, but each time the rivet would pull the metal plate down into the foam, compressing the surface details and making it too tight to pass the straps underneath.  After experimenting with a few different options, we ultimately decided that the rivets glued into the foam before popping them gave more than enough holding power.  These plates are basically just belt loops that keep the straps in place, so it's not like they'll need to take any real strain.

The straps for the waist section were a little bit interesting.  The upper horizontal strap passes through a cutout on either side of the belly:

Then the vertical straps go into a cutout on the lower end of the belly:

These vertical straps get glued down to the inside of the waist armor.  This would be perfectly clear if Jeff hadn't strategically placed a bunch of stuff directly in the camera's line of sight:


Dammit, Jeff.

OK, here's the glued bit inside the belly:

Once he had all of the keepers riveted in place and the waist straps installed, he went ahead and added the upper straps to the back plates.  These also went through a cutout:

And both ends were glued into the inside of the armor, capturing the female end of the parachute buckles:

The horizontal straps were cast into the back piece so they were captured in the foam from the get-go.

So at this point, we had the straps installed on the backs and waists and strap keepers riveted onto the Shoulders:

To make the shoulders werable, we start by gluing the left shoulder seam:


NOTE: only the outer 2/3rds of the seam gets glued.  The inner third is left unglued in order to make it easier to get the armor on and off over the wearer's head.

Here's the shoulder seam stucked:


Since this seam will take some strain and I'm not willing to trust the glue holding a foam-on-foam seam, the backside gets reinforced with a scrap of 2" nylon webbing:


Easy peasy:


Lemon squeezy:


For the little ration pouch that goes on the front left side of the chest, we bought these little guys LINK.

They're not perfectly accurate, but they fill the hole where they go:


Problem is, these are set up with MOLLE system straps and the Starship Troopers gear was originally made before MOLLE gear was really in use.  So the backside has this strap arrangement:


Since it won't line up with the straps on the shoulder, we simply remove the vertical strap:


Then, after we rip the stitches that hold down the horizontal straps, the pouch is good to go:


To rig the chest, we thread the nylon webbing under the keepers and through the pouch straps:


Then under the rest of the keepers:


Before we thread through the last pair of keepers on the back, we slip on one of these tri-glide strap adjusters:


Then thread it the rest of the way:


There's no tri-glides on the front side of the chest straps.  No idea why, but that's the way they were in the movie:


With the straps fed through, we install the male end of the parachute buckles on each end of the straps:


Then feed the leftover tails back under the strap keepers:


In the back, they get threaded through the tri-glides again:


but in the front they just get tucked back into the keepers:




Then everything is all neat and tidy:


With that done, it was just a matter of buckling everything together and adjusting the straps for fit.   Here I am trying on a set of the armor before we'd trimmed excess length off of the vertical waist straps:

Aside from still needing to tuck in the strap ends, everything looked pretty good:


  Here's a set on a mannequin while the rest were being rigged:

The neck ring was purchased from Katarra8 on ebay: LINK

For the helmets, the edges were trimmed off of the raw casts, the mold flashing was sanded off, and they were primed and painted.  Then we glued in the cheek parts: 


And the ear bits:


Forgot to mention, I drilled a hole through the rubber cheek bit and installed a snap using a rivet since they don't make snaps with shafts long enough to go all the way through this chunk of rubber:


The only really tricky part of the helmet to put together is the chin strap.  It comes in two laser cut pieces, a leather outer part and a foam inner pad:


Since we were cutting things on the laser cutter, we maked a bunch of them:

To build a chin strap, we start by gluing together the ends of the foam bit with a tiny bit of CA glue like so:

Then butt the vertical part up against the edge like so:


And then we have us a foam chin cup:

Then, we use contact cement to cover it with the leather like so:

Finally, the center piece is glued in place on top to finish it off:

And that there is a chin strap:


All that's left to do is thread the ends onto the snaps like these: LINK


And just like that, the thing is done:


We got three of these kits together in time for Rose City Comic Con in Portland, Oregon earlier this month:


Folks seemed to like them:


The best part about this costume is it's versatility for comfort's sake.  We ended up wearing the armor with and without the jackets, and also the uniform without the armor.  The whole thing is lightweight and reasonably comfortable and everybody we ran into seemed to get a kick out of it.

Naturally, we didn't get enough pictures, so we'll have to put together a bigger squad for another outing.  But we did get this winner:

Stay tuned for more and better photos whenever I get around to that.

*"CA glue" is CyanoAcrylate glue, or basically superglue.  I once had someone who read one of my writeups ask me where to buy "California glue" and all I could tell him was "go West, young man."  It wasn't until days later that it occurred to me I was being kind of a jerk and no kind of help.  You can get youself a nifty taste tester** kit of the brand of CA glue I use here: LINK

**It's not actually a taste tester.  Don't taste the glue.  Don't sniff it either.  You won't like it.