Mattman1138's ESB Boba Helmet Build

Hello All,

I'm a huge Boba Fan and when I decided to join the 501st, he was the only costume I wanted to do. I just started working on my budget helmet recently received from Animefan. I've never actually done ANY costuming so this is slow going for me. It also doesn't help that I am quite the perfectionist LOL. Luckily I bought a 96 Don Post Helmet back when they were still making them. It's the lowest end Vinyl version but it serves me well by allowing me to test out my techniques for visor installation and painting before I move on to the real deal. So far I've installed a visor in the Post helmet by cutting out the vinyl and using binding posts to anchor the visor down. I wanted it to be replaceable if need be. I also had to glue a piece of the vinyl inside the helmet to help try and keep the helmets shape as best I could. I've now moved on to the Budget bucket. It's been meticulous sanding and filling, but I'm ready to now start working on the visor and installing it. Can't wait to get to painting lol. Just wanted to keep a record here of my progress. Comments and questions are most welcome. Thanks all!

Mattman1138

So I've started work on my actual visor. I bought a welding shield as all of the visor's i've seen have been see through when direct light has been put on them. The faceshield seems pretty thick. I just have to figure out how to cut it. I've heard people say a dremel is too much and that it might melt the plastic. Unfortunately the razor blade/knife I got from Michael's isn't cutting it. I did manage to etch in the shape I need though. I've tried scissors on piece of it and it would just be too difficult to cut through. I'm leaning towards the dremel but any suggestions are much appreciated!

Welding shields can be a pain to cut with a dremel, the material tends to form some very thin web-like strings when cut.
I think you will get the best result if you just cut on a low speed setting and take your time.
If you want the "bridge" between the cheeks on your helmet like in the picture above i would suggest getting a piece of clear Acrylic/Plexiglas, that way you wouldn't notice the "bridge" from the outside.

So I ended up going with the dremel. I tried it on a low speed first and it was extremely difficult to get it to cut through the face shield, especially in a straight line. I ended up going with a medium-high speed and it worked perfectly. I've read on other forums that high speeds will melt the plastic. I didn't really experience too much of that. Perhaps it was the dremel attachment that I used. I did get some of the web-like strings that Jigglenomicon was referring to, however, it wasn't bad and I was able to cut them off of the edges with an exacto knife without damaging the face of the shield. One thing I think really helped the process was putting masking tape on the front and back, within the etched shape I had made from my cereal box template. This kept it from cracking and from being damaged. All in all I'd say this was pretty successful. It fits perfectly. Now I just have to bore some recesses on the inside of the helmet and get to installing the binding posts. More updates to come!

Had some time to get some more work done on the helmet the last few days. 2 days ago I dremeled out the recesses inside the helmet where the binding posts would go. I got some epoxy putty from Home Depot and putty'd them into the recesses, as you can see from the pics below. I let that dry for a few days and started work on the visor today. I cut out an extra cardboard template and used them, like I did with my Don Post test helmet, to figure out where the holes would go for the corresponding binding posts inside the helmet. Took both templates to get the spotting right for the holes. I then taped up the visor except for where the holes would go and used a powerdrill (carefully lol) to drill the holes in the visor. Looks like I have some minor sanding and filling to do to make sure everything is flush between the mandibles and the visor face, but other than that it fits perfectly! The only thing I need to do now is trim the bottom of the visor and I'm finished with the visor install. Woot! lol

So I had some time today to finish up installing the visor. I had to sand down some of the areas on the inside of the mandibles so that one mandible wasn't sticking out farther than the other. It was only slight but bothers me nonetheless (Kills my OCD lol). After I finished that bit of sanding I ended up dremeling off the bottom extra portion of the visor. I didn't want to dremel it as it leaves a rough edge that doesn't look very clean. The only problem is that the face shield is pretty thick and nothing else I have would cut it. Ended up looking great though. Finally finished with the visor install and I'm so happy I had the test helmet and took my time with this. Also, the one thing I am incredibly happy with is that the face shield is thick enough that no one will be able to see in...AT ALL. Yet I can still see out quite well. Very happy I went with the face shield. Next stop is to make some very minor cosmetic fixes to the helmet and get to painting!