Silence of the Calves

I believe after these things testing me, I will have liver with some fava beans and a nice chianti.

The calves were about to go in the hole and get the hose again.

So I cut them.

And realized

THEY
WERE
INCORRECTLY
ASSEMBLED

All the pain and agony I went through was because of this!!!!!!

[url]https://youtu.be/wNFMPhKIZXg[/url]

I couldn't shim the back because they were too curvy and too wide for a strip.

Now I can resculpt the front and put a strip on the back and they will be fine.

In theory. I should say.

So far so good:
Stage 1:

I glued the strips to one side of each set. Magnets and clamps holding together.

when I get home I'll gluing the other sides and transferring clamps and magnets.

tomorrow morning I'm going to form the cover panels to resculpt the gap. 

I may do hook closures on the back but for now I'm using a cover strip with velcro.

Trimmed. Removing the super glue from both outside halves where the sniper plate was glued. 

Strips of sign inserted and white hot glue applied to fill gaps.

Next will be the finishing cover and crack filling.

I have a level playing field now:

Beginning acrylic sculpting:

More sculpting. 

Side note: acrylic liquid attracts flying insects. 

I have one more side to fill before sanding and shaping.

Every time I go to the door, I hear thunder, so I stopped.

I got my old Sony Smartwatch v.1 to work on my S5 so I can take my own remote pics!!

I walked around the house and up the stairs. I put on the thighs also--no pics: NSFW

(notsafeforworld, shorts had to come off LOL).

The calves fit. The velcro from past attempts, still on the back, will be removed later (before I paint). The part unseen will remain, it is the closure. I decided to not do hook elastic closures.

The fronts are formed and resculpted. I used clear acrylic to fill gaps and smooth the old raised center. I used white acrylic to reshape the top detail. 

Sally Beauty has a B2G1 sale on Beauty Secrets brand powder and liquid. 

Sanding, prepping, painting pics coming. Sniper plate mounting to follow.

Sanded more. Touched up (just like when you sand Bondo, you find dips and have to fill in.

Heated the sniper plate to resize, then gluing. Now I'm waiting on glue to dry, and acrylic to dry.

I have cover strips waiting in the wings.

Sanded, and as far as I can see...no craters. I'm going to primer them and see if I'm correct.

Currently, they are hanging to dry. I washed them after sanding.

Where is the sniper plate, you ask?

Why are there holes in one leg??

Shhhh. In time you will be told.

NO, rivets are NOT the answer.

Primer applied, now I see where I need to sand or fill.

Back to sanding once dry.

Primer has been sanded, only a few spots need fill. Will use a wire brush to remove primer from 'craters' then fill again, sand, primer...rinse repeat.

Wet primer...when this dries one more pass with 120 and 240, then primer again.

My back has thrown in the towel.

I can no longer grip my hands, stand, sit, or raise my arms to sand one more time without going into some twiching siezure.

These are the legs I'm going to paint. 

I'm sick of the sight of white.

Gloss white, 3rd light coat. Letting it set for a few days. Clear coat next.

For some reason, the ipad pictures disappear when I edit with the android.

here is the final paint and shine of the left leg.

After I returned from SWW, I tried to wear everything but I had a bit of a problem with the left leg sniper plate pinching my knee and going behind the thigh. I tried foam in the thigh and got no fix. Actually, I got a few blood blisters from the pinch.

I heated the plate while in place on the leg. It moved out far enough and I added some foam for my whacked kneecap.

No pinch...No stink...No sweat. 

Helmet delivered-COMPLETE

Helmet delivered Saturday. I ordered some decals from my personal "sticker guy". I began painting what I need to ... I may paint it all.

I don't like how the visor is mounted. OCD hates unevenness. lol

Took it all apart to paint, sanded some rough edges. 

Countersinking the ear screw holes.

Sanding rough edges a bit.

Prepping to paint.

Testors 1138

Elmer's glue is a perfect mask for odd shapes.

Paint the glue onto where you want the mask. Very hard to see on white, I use a HeadLight. I thought of adding some food coloring to the glue, but I was afraid of it staining the plastic.

The dried glue peels off.

Other work I've done:

I used threaded rivets in the visor using the same holes where it was mounted.

The other side of the visor only had one hole in it, so I matched it up to the other holes and duplicated the system on that side as well.

White slotted screws

Industrial Velcro mounted for the screen so it can be removed if needed.

Plus I'm tired of smelling E6000 glue.

Made a plate and mounted my fans. 

Final design pics soon. This below is the first try.

COMING SOON (to this post):

Final Paint.

Final Fan setup

Installation of padding or hard hat liner

(in debate)

Stencil Making:

Printed and cut out images. 

Cut out lines.

Wet with alcohol.

Blotted.  

Finished.

Back traps finished.

Vocoder finished.

Next up: Tube stripes.

The ones I printed are way too big and only 13, not 14 as the tutorial picture shows. <del> I downloaded Pandatrooper's and I'll see how his works out at 13/16" high. </del>

I had to go old-school because the printer server took a stink on me.

I retaped because the pencil I used was 3/8.

I did not take pictures because I was too tired.

I used a sponge to blot paint onto the stencil.

Final pic.

HA! I look like Riddick!!

Test fit #2

Test fit after thigh heating attempt and ankle trimming (the Son of Panda put my calves on and kept pulling them up to my knee. When attempts to explain "over the boot" went awry, I gave up. So, if you calculate the drop they should have, then they fit).

ALSO: when he put the TD on my belt, he asked me where the belt went and I said over the crack between the kidney and butt... he must have thought IN the crack. I didn't notice that until I saw the pictures. 

I walked around with just thighs and  calves on earlier and got very little interference.

I still need to shave a little off the inside of the wrists and inside of the bicep so the two parts stop whacking into each other, but I'm getting no pinch so it's probably because they are free flowing (no bicep to forearm connection). The forearms are tight on my arms so any more in there is gonna make it really tight.

We'll see what happens.

Holding pattern and update

I shaved a little more off the legs and tried to round the ovals of the church bell thighs.

Legs good.

Thighs went back to their shape.

Tried again with a heat gun but it got too hot to hold and went back to oval shape.

Tried to hold with a strap. I squeezed the oval into a round and tightened the strap. As soon as I let go, the oval shape came back. This was before I put in the hot water.  I tried just putting them in hot water then holding the shape with my hands and quickly putting in cold water and it held, after a few hours it went back to oval.

I'm done, it's not playing fair.

Squad leader says he will be done with the helmet soon. It is an ATA kit.