sintra

Does anyone know anything about Versacel or Cel-Tec as an alternative to using Sintra for armor? I was told by the sales person at Min Plastics that these two plastics are the same as Sintra. Both were also about $9.00 cheaper than Sintra for 1/8" thick 4'x8' sheet.

Aloha, Gregg

Yea, Sintra I think is just a brand name. The other two plastics are probably the same, just cheaper because of the brand name thing. You shouldn't have any problems going with the cheaper plastic. Good Luck!

Mahalo Spidey.

Gregg.

Greg,
You kno' da kind Bra!

When working with sintra, you can use hot water, or a hair dryer on the highest setting, or a heat gun/paint stripper on lower setting. The sintra bends only one way, up/down or side to side...it's just the characteristics of the material.

Good luck,

Neil

Yeah, Sintra is just the brand name for PVC foam board. Just like Coke is the brand name for Cola.

Thanks guys. It's always good when you can save a few bucks.

Bruddah Neil, where were you stationed?

Mahalo again, Gregg.

I'm currently looking at two sources of Mandalorian armor plates and I was certain which I was going to buy from until I thought to pose a question to one of the sources. It hadn't occured to me until some time last week that the diff armor sets might be made of diff materials (big DUH now that I think of it). Anyway, it turns out that one set (going for $235) is styrene and the other (going for $300) is sintra. Both sets contain the same parts: chest/back plates, cod piece, and leg/boot armor. I have essentially 0 experiece when it comes to both of these materials, so I'm not sure which of the two is stronger. Any help would be appreciated. Thnx.

Honestly, you could save yourself a lot of $ to use somewhere else on your costume and make your own armor like a lot of us are doing. Just a thought.

Actually, I was just thinking the same thing. Thnx to Secol, I now have the Mandalorian Blueprints, so I have the opportunity to attempt my own.

Build your own.
I used styrene as well.I had 0 problems.I have never worked
with any plastic before.It's very easy.You can get A full sheet for around $50.00.If you mess up the first time around,
hell you hae A whole sheet.Buy the sheet.Save the extra money
you will need it down the road.GOOD LUCK

I have used both, I used sintra for my chest armor, and knees, and i have vaccuformed styrene for the rest. I definatley like styrene, just cause vaccuformin is just so fun. THANKS FOR TEACHIN ME RICHIE!!!

$50 a sheet? Whoa....when I bought my styrene a 1/8" thick sheet 4'x8' was only $25. I ended up buying three sheets of 1/8", 2 sheets of 1/16", and 1 sheet of 1/32" for all the different parts. I think my total was around $100. Oh yeah, the styrene was great fun to vacuform! Woo-Hoo! What a kick in the butt watching the plastic get sucked down around the molds!

YUP!!! HEHE...he? We have to much free time, don't we?

What can I buy at Home Depot to glue sintra to sintra?
Thanks,
Mike

GOOP!

Seriously Bear?
Does it bond tightly? I am using it to attach my dart thingies to my knee armor.
Thanks,
Mike

I would recommend screwing your knee darts on to your knee armor. As for glue, any that works on plastics. Go to your nearest hobby store and they can help you.

I was serious. it holds very tight. let it set for 24hours like the tube says an it bonds perfectly.

I've used crazy glue on all my sintra parts so far, but I havent done my knee guards yet. It holds SUPER tight and there isn't any excess glue comming out. Do tests first. Try it on scrap pieces of sintra.

Gino

I second Dieter in that you should definitely screw those darts on if you have the means. Mine are wood so it's much easier than say, metal.

For sintra I might try a two part epoxy. There's this seriously nice stuff you can get at home depot in the adhesive section. It's a contraption with two tube and one push plunge. One tube is creamy white the other is more clear. They come out together and they don't come apart. I glued metal magnets to my sintra with this stuff and it's awesome.

Phil

Thanks all for the info!
Mike

I've tried the 2 part epoxy.. messy, lots of waste and not that impressive to me... SUper glue worked wonders for me... I have to break the sintra to seperate 2 pieces i've glued together. just sand both ends b4 gluing for extra hold... 10 seconds and bam, you dont have to hold it any longer and can keep working on the next part.

Brett

Yeah, I will concede that point to Brett. It is messy and it's difficult to get small amounts. But it worked great for me

Goop is still a great stand by though

Phil

Anyone know if sintra can be worked with after it has been cut shaped and painted? I would like to reform the armor to get that perfect fit. I heard of using hair dryers, hot water, etc., but what would work best. thanks

Oh yes you CAN! The shape of the chest armor is really hard to get, and I didn't get it till after my armor was painted and glued to my vest. I reshaped it on my vest with a heat gun, the glue held and the paint job was unchanged.

I boiled mine after it was painted and it came out fine. It even had the industrial velcro on it. I did not keep it in the water too long.

BOBA PHAT: Would a blow dryer work?

mgr: If i do boil it, how long would you reccomend dipping each piece in. I take it you just took it right out of the hot water and shaped it to each body part? Did you place it in cold water when shaped? thanks guys

Gater-A hair dryer would work OK, but it never seems to get hot enough. I've also gotten good results with my gas stove, but it's easy to burn the edges. I say invest $20 in a heat gun, but BEWARE the high setting b/c it will turn your sintra into taffy.

I used a heat gun too. It made working with the sintra so easy. A word of advise: apply the heat in a back & forth motion and heat the sintra on the BACKSIDE. Wear gloves too unless you don't want fingerprints anymore!

I tried the heat gun and it worked great for the bigger stuff and boiled the little stuff. boil it for as long as it takes for it to become flexible, maybe 15-30 seconds. I guess it depends on what thickness you are using. Mine was the 1/4 '' Sintra so it took a bit longer than the 1/8''. By the way, I am currently redoin my stuff in 1/8'' because the other is too thick.
As far as cold water after shaping that is a definate yes. That is freezes the ions and sets the sintra(at least I think it freezes the ions)
Hope that helps...

Yes, that helps alot guys. Time to get at it!

Hello again, everyone. I just got my new chest armor pieces made from Sintra from Jodo (which look awesome BTW). I was wondering the best way to add the chest stripes on the left chest piece and the rectangle cut in the chest diamond. I was thinking about using a dremel, but Sintra when heated emits toxic gasses or so I've heard. I was also thinking about using an X-acto knife, but got scared when it came to royally messing up the pieces. Anyone have a suggestion or two?

I've used my dremel, no problem with toxic gases (if you use a heat gun, then you can have problems). You will need the exacto for some of it however, as well as a small file to get the corners nice and squared off.

C'mon man! I cut my first 10 sets of armor in my basement using a dremmel. Come to think of it, that would explain the dizziness, memory loss and sore throat.

For the amount of cutting involved, I would use a dremmel. I stopped cutting the slots in my armor because I never knew if people needed a certain size for a certain set of LEDs.

On that note, how does it all fit? Your's was the XL and I'm always curious how it works out for people.

Well, I'm working on it as we speak, and it fits perfectly! Very nice work, Jodo. I'm glad you didn't cut out slots for me, because I'm working on my Jango upgrades. BTW, are they really slots or are they more of an indentation, not a total cut out?

Mister_Fett_1975 wrote:
...are they really slots or are they more of an indentation, not a total cut out?

Please correct me if I'm wrong, but I believe they're fully cut-out for Boba (chest display inserted) and only an indented detail for Jango.

I was thinking more of an indentation myself. As far as getting the details in, I just scored the Sintra with my exacto and carved it out, then filed the bottom and edges clean with my mini-files. After I cleaned up the edges, I used some Bondo glazing and spot putty to give the edge an even cleaner detail. I was too chicken to use my dremel because I didn't want to ruin my new armor.

I borrowed this pic from another post. Indented it is I guess.

I got my armor as well from the Jodo meister. I plan on completely cutting my slots out and using an extra, larger piece of sintra, and gluing it to the back side, covering up the slots. This will eliminate having to carve, chisel, plane, or otherwise weaken the already thin material to get the look I'm after, which is two smooth indented rectangles. I plan on using this same technique for the center diamond piece. I just need to get extra sintra, lol.

In the meantime, I am enjoying dremmeling my dwedd helmet one square millimeter at a time. Dremmels rock! I have the nose area done. Working on the eye areas now. Am taking pics of my progress, though I don't know if my "close-ups" are close enough to catch the detail. I'll continue to post on my "wish me luck" thread as I go.

what is the smallest/cheapest sheet i can buy of sintra that would be ebough to make a full set of armor and gauntlets?

OK, I work at a sign shop and we use Sintra all the time.
I would find a local sign shop, call 'em and ask if they have any
scrap sintra (sometimes called expanded PVC). I'd bet they would
give it to ya for nothing or charge you very little for it.

or

They would likely be able to order you a sheet. We would charge
around $35 to $50 for a 4' x 8' depending on the color, thickness, etc.

If I can help you out in any other way, just let me know!

Good luck!

darksidedesign

Here's a strange fact - white 3mm Sintra is cheaper and easier to cut than black 3mm Sintra. Go with white if you are buying. Strange but true.

I bought a 2' x 4' sheet and had enough to make all armor ecept the knees. I never did make the backplate, however, and will be using the extra section to make gauntlets. A sheet this size is about 22 bucks and you could always make armor, sell it, buy another sheet and you would then have enought to finish all the armor with gauntlets.

thanks for the info everyone!

so what is the majority of you all using on fett armor? how big of a sheet would i need to buy inorder to make a set of armor and gauntlets? and how thick?1/8 inch or 3mm?, or whatever thickness you used


thanks for any info on this, i searched around and i get many many different sizes and thicknesses.so i thought i would post it



Scott

Well, I use .120 witch is 1/8". You could use a little thicker if you wish but .120 works vary well. I wouldn't go to much thicker though. I usually get it at usplastics.com and buy item#42485 $8.14 White Expanded PVC 24" x 48" .120" Thick. If you want to make a full set of armor you should buy two sheets that size. That would be plenty for armor and gauntlets

I can make 4 sets of armor from a 4x8 with enough for Jango legs or an extra backplate.

oh, thats cheaper than i thought thanks! how much does shipping run over at USP though?



Scott

would it be ebough for a jet pack also?

oh and is that including leg and sholder and thigh armor?and back plate? and ever other jango armor piece?

Guys ..syntra can go a long long long way if you want.

Shipping depends on how much you buy. For two sheets it is around $7.00 I think. I have been thinking, if you are going to make a back plate you should get three sheets at that size. The reason I say get "at that size" is because USplastics can't ship any thing bigger than 4'x2' thru UPS. They have bigger sheets but you have to get your own currier service to pick it up. Like MB said sintra goes a long way if you are careful. To conserve I usually place the template on the sheet and cut around it. Or you could just cut right from the sheet. But I think three sheets should be enough but if you can afford it buy four. I know for a fact that is enough. Plus you can never have to much sintra. O, by the way I couldn't find that size last time I looked on there site but they have an option to do a quick buy on the left side of the page so I put in the item number and it came up. So if you do buy from them input the item # and you should be fine