Merkava74's Muddie Build (Jim's Kit)

[merkava74[TX]]

FINISHED PHOTOS

So I'm calling this build complete, and here's sharing the photos of my finished parts. 

[xAlpha[TX]]

Looks amazing!

[RAIDER[COTG]]

Excellent photos!  Looks great!!!

[merkava74[TX]]

And I’m approved! First muddie in Singapore! Thanks to the Spec Ops team here (@Raider and gang) for your patience and time! 

Will try for Specialist once my bull denim material arrives. 

[RAIDER[COTG]]

1 hour ago, merkava74 said:

And I’m approved! First muddie in Singapore! Thanks to the Spec Ops team here (@Raider and gang) for your patience and time! 

Will try for Specialist once my bull denim material arrives. 

Congrats!  U look great!!!

If needed, would we have permission to use these photos in a CRL gallery (additional reference materials for GMLs to examine)?

Well done!

[merkava74[TX]]

1 hour ago, Raider said:

Congrats!  U look great!!!

If needed, would we have permission to use these photos in a CRL gallery (additional reference materials for GMLs to examine)?

Well done!

That would be my honour, David! Please feel free! 

[SpaceBandito[501st]]

I'll be using this thread for my build. Amazing work!

[crombieouch@yahoo.com]

On 4/15/2019 at 2:51 PM, merkava74 said:

SHIN ARMOUR AND BOOTS

My shin armour are from Jim, and he has corrected the top and shortened it. My shin straps are from Paul Prentice, but I ended up only using his rubber straps and not his buckles. I used Jim's buckles instead. The reason is that Paul's buckles come with a molded section of the straps, which I found to be stiff and doesn't sit around my calves nicely. Jim's was the buckle itself. What I did was cut the rubber strap, glued it to the front and back of the buckle to simulate it going through, while maintaining it's flatness relatively. I reinforced the strap-buckle-strap setup with a piece of strapping. Holds it very well. 

 

 

This is how they look on the other side. 

 

For the shins, the only work I did was to cut out the 4 slots where the straps will be.

 

Next, I attached the short end of the straps setup to the shins. I glued it down, and reinforced with a piece of strapping with a snap at the end for the other end of the strap to fasten to, and then added another long strip of strapping across it for added strength. 

 

I had originally wanted to fasten the other end of the strap to the snap on the shin armour, but after test fitting, I realised I do not have enough space to squeeze my fingers in there to fasten it. So I added a longer strip of strap with a snap at the end. This will go to a corresponding snap somewhere in the middle of the shin strap. 

 

On the other side of the shin armour, I glued a strap "loop" where the end of the rubber strap will slide through, and the snaps go on the rubber strap itself. This is how it looks completely rigged up. There is enough flex left right and up down, but also securely holding the rubber strap in the shin armour, and doesn't pop out. 

 

My boots are from Sovietboots.com, and to prevent the armour from sliding out of place, I attached 2 snaps on the boots, one for each strap. 

 

Next, I proceeded to weather the boots with acrylic browns, greys and blacks. Heavy weathering at the bottom, and lighting it out as I get higher. 

 

The shin armour setup was also painted and weathered. Usual raw umber, burnt sienna, black grey shading. 

 

Finally, they were put on the boots, and weathered together with grey misting to blend them both together. Here are the completed shin armour and boots. 

 

 

 

 

 

Awesome style for attaching the shin straps a  fantastic rig

[merkava74[TX]]

So Photobucket has once again screwed my photos up. I'm migrating over to imgur, and will be reuploading all my photos again as I see some broken links. Give me a little time, thanks!