Today I worked on the belt pouches. Going to do these quick and economical. They'll be non-functioning with the hopes of buying a real leather setup down the road.
I'm making these out of foam board, 3 layers, so if I decide to wear this it will be nice and light.
I wrapped the foam board in the material I had, cut off the excess, and made a cover flap with a non-working snap.
I'm going to make a buckle out of styrene and then add a leg strap and a little weathering.
Did a little work today on the blaster. I drilled holes in the muzzle and removed the front cover so it was open. I also did the base coat of flat black. I'll paint the handle, weather, and then call it done.
I just about finished up the holster and belt, just need to weather it some. I added the thigh strap and then some snap greeblies to the left side pouch and belt. The buckle is a piece of styrene I cut and sprayed with a brushed satin nickel. The lightsaber hook is a cheap key chain holder I got from Wal-Mart.
All in all this entire belt cost me about $15.00, lots of trial and error, and quite a few hours of work. But until I can afford a nice leather setup, this will do and I'm happy with how it turned out.
This is shaping up to be one of my favorite builds, right up there with Boba Fett. I really love how this is turning out.
Well, it only took 3+ months but my chest box and helmet kit (which is for sale) finally arrived. Going to work on this tomorrow. I also went to Lowe's and bought some misc. pieces and the hose.
I wasn't really satisfied with the chest box switches that came with the kit so I decided to try and make my own. The ones that came with the kit needed to have the air bubbles filled and some smoothing and filling, I just didn't feel like doing that.
So I bought 3 of these rocker style light switches. The cheapest ones I found were about $2.00 each.
I used my mini cut-off saw I got from Harbor Freight. It's pretty small (notice the pen sitting next to it). If you have a one of these stores in your area, I suggest picking one of these up, they're great for small projects.
I had to cut off just under a 1/4" of an inch from each switch.
Although they aren't as thick as they should be, I'm fine with these. They came in a gloss white, so I only had to paint one. They are much smoother and more uniform than the ones that came in the kit.
Here's what I did for the hose system. I attached the grommet to the flight suit then added a piece of threaded PVC pipe to the end of the hose. This expanded the edges which makes it fit nice and snug into the grommet.
I had some minor issues with the chest box, mostly with spacing, but I can live with this. I used a hole punch and some painters tape for the small details on the switches. I also took a few liberties and added LEDs.
Finished chest box and hose system.
I put a switch on the bottom of the chest box which activates all the lights including the ones on the com pad.
With that, I can call this one 99% done. Boba Fett was the first life sized Star Wars project I ever completed, and it's may favorite, but this build is a very close second. I really love how this turned out.
Here's a quick video of the lights (sorry, it's not in focus).
