Rome's Sandtrooper Build

[Crimson]

After several, Several, SEVERAL months of sitting on the CAP armor, I'd decided to go TD with it. I was originally going to replace my TK with a more accurate TK that's actually built for my size, but the prospect of painting it was rather daunting in my head. Then, all the 501st melodrama eventually got to me and I wondered what the point of it all was for a long time and it sat, half-trimmed in the basement (along with every other SW costume that sat, needing repairs or upgrades).

It took a little while to get over that hump, obviously, but I've been making steady progress over the last few weeks. Talking with Terrell a couple of times has also helped, and I've been rather inspired lately with the backpack. Screen-accurate canon is all well and good, but I'd rather have a functional backpack, if not a FUNctional backpack

So if that includes lights and sound.... well, then hell, why not?

I was tempted to go take photos of where I'm at so far, but it's after midnight and I have to go to bed, so here's a placeholder to remind me to get some pics up.

5/13/09:

Armor, trimmed, sanded, and mostly glued/velcroed


Helmet, interior painted black. Lens was made with smoke-tinted dirt-bike visor and adhesive backed limo tinting (all from Meijer). Frown painted, decals from TK-4510 applied.


Lower half of backpack with cut-outs for various doohickeys. First coat of primer applied. The four squares on the lower right are adhesive-backed cable-management pieces (stick them to a flat surface, feed a zip-tie through the holes and keep cables and wires wrapped up and neat). Backpack boxes are $3.50 Sterilite containers.


Topper piece for backpack. LED clusters attached to the poles. Duct tapes used as a temporary for mock-up while I feed the wiring. Topper comes from two dollar-store plastic baseball bats that I hacked apart.


Epilogue: that little spot on the chest plate? Yeah, that's my blood. I'd cut my finger on the edge of a manila folder earlier in the day as I was filing my bills and other paperwork. Over a few handwashings, the bandage fell off so I just work without it. Except when I was sanding the shin pieces, the edge caught the cut and opened it back up again, so I got a little bit of blood on the shin piece. And then I looked at the little well-up of blood so I figured "what the hell," and wiped it on the chest place

5/26/09

Strap system installed, did a first test fit.

5/30/09

- Cut out backs of thighs and shins for more movement capability.
- Fixed up belt with more velcro
- Test-fit legs and lower torso, weathering checked out by Humper when he stopped by after his dentist appointment
- Tested battery pack & switch for tracking light/fan controller
- Completed power circuit for spotlights
- Installed mic, amp, and mic-tips in helmet, though still get crap feedback due to lousy Radio Shack system.
- Painted caps for spotlight T-bit

5/31/09

- Cut, assembled, and began painting backpack frame:



Now waiting for the bottom part to dry so I can paint the top part.

Armor notes

1. Cut out backs of thighs so I don't kill myself stepping up and down.
2. Tighten waist and chest velcro placement, maybe even trim sides of ab-plate.
3. Weatherstripping inside forearm pieces keep falling off due to crap adhesive that's not meant for curved plastic. Glue down with E-6000 so them biznatches ain't goin' nowhere.
4. Add belt attachment points to ab and kidney plates.
5. Attach right thigh detail.
6. Knee plate.
7. Hand guards.
8. Cut more out of backs of thighs and shins
9. Separate codpiece

Helmet to-do list

1. Install fans.
2. Add more padding.
3. Add another coat of paint to chin.
4. Install mic tips.
5. Integrate power into helmet instead of control from backpack

Accessory to-do list

1. Beat up MP-40 pouch and modify straps so that it fits onto backpack strap
2. Weather pauldrons
3. Finish the damn backpack
4. Replace backpack straps
5. Replace T-bit with something more solid. Fun concept, not quite so fun in execution

[Jaster]

Looks good so far

[Kal]

I will be at work today so... [place holder]


WOW Looks great Rome






Looking forward to MC3 now. Sooooo many new costumes people will have there!!!!

[Crimson]

I'm about 80% sure that it won't be done in time for this weekend, but we'll see.

[Thumper]

Yeah! Rome is going dirty! You'll love it!

[Ducktrooper]

If you want some help let me know.

[Terrell78]

If you need help getting it built or need to borrow tools let me know. I've got everything to get it cranked out.

[Crimson]

My funky electronics orders are supposed to come in today and tomorrow, and if I can get the sewing done for the belt & shoulder straps, as well as the weapon holder "under-belt" for Storm Shadow, I'll have a better idea of where it's heading.

Oh, and of course, I have to make the arm and leg wrappings for Stormy before the weekend, too.... And final paint touch-up on the bow. Backpack didn't quite turn out the way I hoped, but it'll do for the weekend (not like I have to submit hyper-accurate costume photos to join a group, or anything ).

Radio Shack doesn't have the LEDs that I need, so I'm going to hit Great Lakes Hobby & Train to see if they do. They do model trains like a sunnuvabuck there, so they'd HAVE to have some funky LEDs....

[Gator Fett]

It's great to see you getting reinvigoraed about costuming again Rome. I thought we almost lost you.

Radio Shack doesn't have the LEDs that I need, so I'm going to hit Great Lakes Hobby & Train to see if they do. They do model trains like a sunnuvabuck there, so they'd HAVE to have some funky LEDs....

If you are talking about the store on Van Dyke & 21 Mile, they went out of business over a year ago. If you are talking about another place, let me know where that one's at.

[Medve]

It's great to see you getting reinvigoraed about costuming again Rome. I thought we almost lost you.

Radio Shack doesn't have the LEDs that I need, so I'm going to hit Great Lakes Hobby & Train to see if they do. They do model trains like a sunnuvabuck there, so they'd HAVE to have some funky LEDs....

If you are talking about the store on Van Dyke & 21 Mile, they went out of business over a year ago. If you are talking about another place, let me know where that one's at.

They just moved.....down at VanDyke and 18 or 19 mile now. Right next to a smoke shop. (I get my 1/32 slot cars from there)

[Crimson]

Van Dyke @ Utica Rd., actually. North of the Van Dyke roundabout.

One of my electronics orders just came in:



Two square fan grills, a pair of 40mm fans, a 3.5" 4-channel rheobus panel, and a pair of 6-LED light clusters.



Non-canon? You better believe it!

[Crimson]

Pics added to first post.

[Terrell78]

Hey ,

Sandys don't use ribbed shoulder straps, they use canvas straps that mount under the chest and back plates. Keep up the progress and you'll be done in no time.

[Mr Fett]

Yep, they don't have ribbed shoulder straps, drop boxes, or thermal detonators (even the ones without backpacks in ANH did not have detonators on the back of their belts).

The ammo pouch on the left shoulder doesn't mount to the armor, it mounts to the shoulder strap of the backpack. That's why all the ones without backpacks in the movie only had ammo pouches on their belts, not at the left shoulder area.

[Crimson]

Yup, got all that. The straps were originally in place for spacing and before I decided on conversion. Ammo pouch is an SA and is upstairs, waiting for modding.

Tonight was weathering:









Tube stripes applied, chin painted. I have to touch up the frown right up front there where the tape was on too straight, and paint the ear caps.




The flash washed out the weathering, but it's subtle. I've never been a fan of the Filthy Trooper look where the sandie looks like he's been rolling around in the mud in a swamp (and in many cases, the pauldron remained pristine and clean.... go figure...). I used a combination of a thin, black wash for the base with regular ol' tempera paint and water. The resultant film after it dried doubled as a discount primer so subsequent coats applied much more unevenly (a good thing).

Then I took Jaster's idea and crushed a pastel chalk stick into a fine powder, but instead of brushing it on, I just "finger-painted" with the dust. I rubbed the dust into the armor and blended with the wash with a sponge brush ($0.39 ea.)

Definitely not going to finish in time for Saturday -- the pack isn't even remotely close, and if I can get that working the way it's supposed to in my head, it'll absolutely make the costume. But I'm confident I can get it done for the June events.

[Crimson]

The hobby shop doesn't carry individual LEDs, so I'm going to have to order on-line, unless there's another electronics shop in the metro Detroit area that isn't Radio Shack.

EDIT: just ordered LEDs. Flashing yellow, flashing green, steady blue for the panel, a flashing red for the spotlight topper, a 2xAA battery holder and resistor pack for the panel lights. $21 after shipping, but I at least got what I wanted. Now the kicker will be whether I can wire it correctly!

The red flashing light will piggy-back on a parallel circuit with the spotlights, and they're all 12v lights, so that's pretty straight-forward. The panel lights are all 5v and will be in parallel at 20mA, so if I did the math right...

6v power (4 x AAs) - 5v / 3 x 20mA (.06A) = 16.667 Ω which would mean an 18 Ω resistor.

[TK Wolf]

very curious to see your progress!...

[Crimson]

5/21/09

Got some more parts at Lowe's -- PVC bits to make a frame for the pack, upon which the boxes will hang. But today, I installed some electronics and put the two halves together:

The grey hose is just regular washer drain hose. I'm actually using that as conduit for wiring. The boxes are at a weird angle because it's not yet attached to the frame which will make them hang properly.



The three lenses on the front are caps to USB wireless adapters that I installed at one of the schools. Since they're going to be permanent wireless adapters, they didn't need the caps, so I took them.



Two standard Radio Shack rocker switches to control the lights, and a 4-port 3.5" rheobus panel to control fans in the helmet.

The interior:


Up top is the sound system, a basic 2-speaker system that uses flat-panel speakers. The clamp on the bottom is holding the 2xAA battery pack in place while the glue dries -- this powers the three lights in the top box. Turns out that I didn't need to use 6v after all. They're rated for 5v max, and they're running off of 3v.

[Crimson]

And the fun parts:


Full version on YouTube


Full version on YouTube

[Wags]

Uuuuggghhhhhhhh ... I want one.... thats cooool!!!