Darktrooper Progress Thread 8MAR2011: Getting back to it

Well, just as a side note, you could actually make quite a bit of money selling these pieces to 501st guys looking to make a dark trooper. It looks like your pretty much just making all of your own vacu-molds, so you could just do tons of castings.

I am aware that I can make copies for others, but I want to make it clear that my intentions for making this armor is NOT for money or profit of any kind. I am merely creating another route for anyone with my general size.
Here's my new motto...

"When your over 6'5 tall, why in the world would you want to be a Vader or wear a hot and uncomfortable Wookie costume, when you could be a perfectly good DarkTrooper?"

-tubachris
 
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Thanks guys

I will be starting on the shoulder armor this week. I think this piece may be a bit difficult because the outer lip is more rounded off and already know is gonna be a pain in the butt. Im also working on getting an oven or several heating elements from waffle irons so that I can finish the vacu-former and not have to worry about it, and because I want to start practicing the casting and so I can cast the helmet piece and finish the helmet. Also, I was wondering if anyone could measure the areators on their FX, to see how far they stick out from the helmet. I have bought areators, but I need to know how far they should be poking outwards from the faceplate.

-tubachris
 
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I am currently trying to figure out something in the design of the shoulder armor. I cannot tell if on the insode piece, if it rounds off to a point, like the top of a stereotypical rain drop, or just cuts off. Below are 2 designs of what I mean. Please LMK what you guys think. Im leaning more towards the cut off look, but I prefer to be more accurate. Thanks!

shoulderdesign.jpg


shoulderdesign2.jpg


-tubachris
 
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Hey man here are some pics I found. I don't know if they'll help or not. I'm not sure which version you're doing so there are a couple of different ones.

dktrp1.JPG


dktrp12.jpg


dktrp14.jpg


dktrp15.JPG


dktrp5.jpg
 
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Thanks Tbone, those are alot more ref pics that I could have found for the dark forces darktrooper. Where did you find them though? I am actually doing the battlefront darktrooper, but I am planning on doing a dark forces darktrooper sometime after. Thanks!

-tubachris
 
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Oh okay, well I am going to still archive those pics for future reference. Thanks again t-bone.

Upon more review, the bottome one appears more accurate. I know this was really only a minor issue, but I'd prefer accuracy over looking like a dummy for asking questions like this.

Also, just want to mention, my collection of tools increased yesterday, I was finnally able to get a smaler sander, the one that looks like a iron. I needed this for more presicion sanding, like the tight and very hard to reach places, like where the gaunt boxes meet the main guant body, I have a rough area of durham's that Ive been eager to get rid of. I can now finnalize sanding once and for all. My bulky belt sander cannot do this.

-tubachris
 
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I have a dilema, waffle irons are hard to find as far as thrift stores are concerned. What would I need waffle irons for you ask? I need to use the heating elements for the oven in order to heat the plastic. I checked ebay, but they for some reason have a thing for vintage waffle irons, and I need something more modern. The cheapest ones brand new are like $15 each, and I need four of them. But I may have to re-design an oven. I can build one with nichrome wire, but the supplies needed are quite expensive. Any suggestions? This will make or break the project, at least for a while.

-tubachris
 
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Have you thought about the heating elements out of electric skillets? That might be a path you could take.
 
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Would the skillets have the same kind of heating elment like a waffle iron?

-tubachris

That I don't know. I'm really not even sure what the element on a waffle iron looks like. You might even be able to find a heating element out of an oven or range top. Do a search on ebay for heating elements I saw some on there starting around $1.00, maybe one of those could work.
 
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Not sure if you know about this site already, but http://www.studiocreations.com/howto/index.html has a lot of great tips on how to go about this under their "vaccuforming basics" thread. They seem to use a combination of a heat gun and an oven.

Yes, that site is what helped motivate me to go through with the project, as far as building the vacu-former. I went to walmart yesterday and was looking at what they had. I was only able to look at the displayed pieces, so I couldnt do a "thorough" inspection, but a few had removable grilling surfaces. The only issue, was that beneath the surface, was just a metal plate engraved "do not touch, hot surface." The thing is, I dont know if this is the actual heating element, or if there is a much more complex heating element under the plate. I couldnt find out unless I bought it, and started dissassembling it. Another question, is if this is the actual heating element, how could the plate release heat effective enough without needing to actually touch the surface. So I dont know yet.

Also, what I saw, was that they had single stove burners, like on top of an oven, but just one by itself. It would work out great if these would work, get 4 of those and switch them on, and there's my oven. The question is really how hot will it really get? Thanks for the help guys!

-tubachris
 
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The question is really how hot will it really get?

-tubachris

If you did decide to go with the range top burners, you could probably set them up on a switch just like on the stove and make the temp adjustable. Start off slow and then increase the temp until you get it where you need it.
 
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Put the plastic in the microwave and quickly drop it on the mold :)

Wow, I'll be done in no time!


WAIT A SECOND! I just remembered seeing a picture of someone's oven ahwile back, he had used two stove top burners that were already attached, and it worked! I think we have ourselves an oven guys :)

-tubachris
 
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