DoggyDoc’s Jimmiroquai Imperial Death Trooper Build Thread

[TookBreaker[TX]]

1 hour ago, DoggyDoc said:

Magnets would hold them well, but I am having a hard time figuring out how you will rig them up.  The magnet would either need to be embedded in the strap and still be small enough to fit through the slot on the back piece.  Alternatively, you could glue a thin piece of metal onto the back of the strap and then mount the magnet inside of the back piece. 
 

Another option would be a piece of elastic attached to the end of the strap with a snap on it that can be snapped into the inside of the shoulder.  

Yes, you are right. Depending on the length I need, I thought maybe carving it out to fit a flat magnet into the strap, but a metal piece could work too as in both cases it has to fit through the opening.

Did not think about the elastic band as I would like be able to wear it by myself as much as I can.

[DoggyDoc[CMD-DCA]]

Just ordered my bubble lenses from OPLE props and EL panels from EL Wirecraft.

[DoggyDoc[CMD-DCA]]

Leather arrived today for the belt pouch and SE-14R holster.  Also picked up some canvas but could not find black, so I bought off white and dyed it.  Worried it may not be black enough as it is really dark charcoal grey.  
 

[Chaos[CMD-DCA]]

5 hours ago, DoggyDoc said:

Also picked up some canvas but could not find black, so I bought off white and dyed it.  Worried it may not be black enough as it is really dark charcoal grey.  

try this, its what I coated my  chest rig to cover over the white paint markings I used when I was sewing. It doesn;t wear off or smudge after its dry.

https://www.walmart.com/ip/Duplicolor-HVP106-Vinyl-Fabric-Spray-Paint-Flat-Black-11-oz/39154179

[productionsbykyle]

I am interested to see how you make your holster and leather pouch. I’ve got some black veg tan leather but haven’t been able to find anything. I have yet to search the forums, but will do so this weekend. 

[DoggyDoc[CMD-DCA]]

7 hours ago, productionsbykyle said:

 

I am interested to see how you make your holster and leather pouch. I’ve got some black veg tan leather but haven’t been able to find anything. I have yet to search the forums, but will do so this weekend. 

 

Hey Kyle. @nanotek has a good guide for these. 
 

Here is a link for the holster
 

 

Here is the link for the Pouch.  The dimensions are listed on the CRL.

 

Progress update: Leather leather leather!

 

Warning I am a first timer with leather!

 

So I went to Leffler Leather last Friday on my day off to spend $$$ on leather and leather crafting tools. I picked up some leather, hole punch, dye, conditioner, rivets, snaps, and various tools to begin the works. 

 

I had to create a woodblock mould for one of the belt pouches. Was a fairly simple exercise except I got my measurements wrong the first time. However. I progressed with my second mould and with a little love and attention I got my first pouch. 

 

First you thoroughly soak the leather in water and then basically stretch and mould to the block. You need to trim excess gathering and it's a bit random but it works. Once you have the leather shaped you clamp it or tack it. I chose clamping. 

 

Then it's just wait for it to dry. 

 

I also had a crack at the speed strap for the SE-14r. Testing out skills...

 

 

Last night I cut out the back/front flap and tried my hand at dyeing the leather:

 

 

I have plenty of leather left over so will continue making these until I have none left. If they're good enough I will sell some to recoup costs 

 

I happy to post more detailed pics of the build later if anyone is interested.

[DoggyDoc[CMD-DCA]]

Found these photos of a screen used E-11D blaster from Rogue One on Hero Props.  Figured that they would be good for reference. 
Then I found them in the death trooper reference photos but I will keep them here for my reference.  

 

 

 

 

[IcyTrooper[CMD-DL]]

On 3/5/2023 at 10:19 PM, DoggyDoc said:

Found these photos of a screen used E-11D blaster from Rogue One on Hero Props.  Figured that they would be good for reference. 
Then I found them in the death trooper reference photos but I will keep them here for my reference.  

 

 

 

 

Thanks! I had uploaded them the other day into our reference thread when that auction link dropped. It is great to have these!

[DoggyDoc[CMD-DCA]]

5 hours ago, IcyTrooper said:

Thanks! I had uploaded them the other day into our reference thread when that auction link dropped. It is great to have these!

Thanks for letting me know that they were just uploaded. I couldn’t figure out how I had missed it before as they are such good photos. 

[IcyTrooper[CMD-DL]]

Just now, DoggyDoc said:

Thanks for letting me know that they were just uploaded. I couldn’t figure out how I had missed it before as they are such good photos. 

Absolutely! Not too often we see pics like this.  

[DoggyDoc[CMD-DCA]]

With respect to the buckles on the shoulder and side straps;

what is the correct colouring for them.  It seems that for most of the photos I find, the buckle on the shoulder strap is black with some silver weathering and the d-ring is more silver with some black weathering.  For the side straps, the d ring looks to be silver with some black weathering. 
 

is this correct?

[DoggyDoc[CMD-DCA]]

Working on the brackets for the shoulders. I wanted to try and prevent the chest piece from dropping down with respect to the back piece at the shoulder, so I cut brackets from 3mm aluminum plates and slightly curved them to follow the arc of the shoulder.  I will set them into the back plate shoulder area with plastic weld and then run a nylon strap with snaps under it to join the front and back pieces.

 

I just have to show this next piece off a bit. I picked up a mini sabre from Hacksmith Industries when I was trooping at a recent con. I use it to seal my nylon and elastic cut edges and it makes my wife happy because I don’t steal her kitchen torch anymore. 
 

 

[Lt. Dan[501st]]

12 hours ago, DoggyDoc said:

I just have to show this next piece off a bit. I picked up a mini sabre from Hacksmith Industries when I was trooping at a recent con. I use it to seal my nylon and elastic cut edges and it makes my wife happy because I don’t steal her kitchen torch anymore. 
 

Haha, this is a Grogu-sized lightsaber😅

[Chaos[CMD-DCA]]

On 3/11/2023 at 6:57 AM, DoggyDoc said:

With respect to the buckles on the shoulder and side straps;

what is the correct colouring for them.  It seems that for most of the photos I find, the buckle on the shoulder strap is black with some silver weathering and the d-ring is more silver with some black weathering.  For the side straps, the d ring looks to be silver with some black weathering. 
 

is this correct?

Best way to color the shoulder buckles is to paint them silver. Then paint them black and knock down or "wear off" the black paint to reveal the silver  in areas that would normally show wear.  The D rings are done the same way but because they would receive more wear and tear, they appear to be more of a silver color. The side buckles are done the same way.

[DoggyDoc[CMD-DCA]]

The SE-14R is almost done.  I used a water slide decal to do the circuit pattern on the back of the gun.  The trick was that when you try to print silver on a clear surface, it is just very light grey because the white paper adds colour. This caused it to not be visible on the black background.  To fix this, I painted the area silver and made the decal the reverse pattern with the black, so it shows up well.   
I also very lightly weathered the blaster.  
Ready for the matte clear coat and it’s done. 
 

 

 

[Dexas]

Hey guys,

I'm almost done with my kit now, but I've decided I want to take the thighs in by an inch. When I stand up straight (wearing all the soft parts), I can fit my whole hand inside the thigh piece, so it looks a bit... tacky. The rest of the armour fits me snuggly, and having massive thigh pieces clonking about would be far too annoying.

Does anyone have some advice where to trim it down? Looking at the thigh piece there isn't an obvious point to cut without messing up some details.

Thanks!

[DoggyDoc[CMD-DCA]]

9 hours ago, Dexas said:

Does anyone have some advice where to trim it down? Looking at the thigh piece there isn't an obvious point to cut without messing up some details.

 

I have the opposite problem,  I have to expand mine by an inch or so. There is one area where only the groove cuts across the thigh and at one point it is almost horizontal, so it should match up well when I expand. I am not sure if it will line up perfectly though if you are reducing it as I will need to join the 2 cut ends with a new groove.  
‘Maybe for reducing, along the edge of the ribbed area might work?

[Dexas]

9 hours ago, DoggyDoc said:

I have the opposite problem,  I have to expand mine by an inch or so. There is one area where only the groove cuts across the thigh and at one point it is almost horizontal, so it should match up well when I expand. I am not sure if it will line up perfectly though if you are reducing it as I will need to join the 2 cut ends with a new groove.  
‘Maybe for reducing, along the edge of the ribbed area might work?

Hmm yeah, that's what I was thinking as well...

I actually have some rubber matting for the thigh parts left-over from another build, so I'll have a look and see if I can fashion something...

I'm pretty much the exact build/height/size as the R1 DT's, so I'm very used to clothes needing to be altered before they fit me haha.

Out of curiosity, how much space should there be between the thigh and the armour piece? I was going by the "thumb rule" (being able to fit my thumb inside the piece on all sides at the same time), but the CRL picture definitely looks more fitted than that.

[DoggyDoc[CMD-DCA]]

7 minutes ago, Dexas said:

Out of curiosity, how much space should there be between the thigh and the armour piece? I was going by the "thumb rule" (being able to fit my thumb inside the piece on all sides at the same time), but the CRL picture definitely looks more fitted than that.

Not sure if there is an exact amount. I think that it should be comfortable but not rattle around. My stormtrooper thighs are fairly snug at the top for me and looser at the knee but not so snug that they bite when walking. I have seen other troopers put some foam padding inside the thigh or arm pieces  to keep it from moving around.  On my stormtrooper, I needed the. Knee area on one thigh a bit tighter to keep it from rolling inward and misaligning the seams, so I put a piece of cushion foam under my undershot to keep the thigh pushed forward a bit to prevent it from rolling. 

[Dexas]

1 minute ago, DoggyDoc said:

Not sure if there is an exact amount. I think that it should be comfortable but not rattle around. My stormtrooper thighs are fairly snug at the top for me and looser at the knee but not so snug that they bite when walking. I have seen other troopers put some foam padding inside the thigh or arm pieces  to keep it from moving around.  On my stormtrooper, I needed the. Knee area on one thigh a bit tighter to keep it from rolling inward and misaligning the seams, so I put a piece of cushion foam under my undershot to keep the thigh pushed forward a bit to prevent it from rolling. 

Amazing. Thanks very much... I'm going to have a good look at them today, I don't think it's a big job, just a case of figuring out the best place to cut it. 

TBF, I just looked at a picture of them and they don't look too loose... I'm probably just being pedantic.

[HRivera7322]

How did you go about opening up the the slots for the shoulder strap on Jim's kit? I'm gonna be resuming work on my kit (finally! now that its getting warmer) and I want to secure the strap via magnets on the inside of the backplate.

[DoggyDoc[CMD-DCA]]

9 hours ago, HRivera7322 said:

How did you go about opening up the the slots for the shoulder strap on Jim's kit? I'm gonna be resuming work on my kit (finally! now that its getting warmer) and I want to secure the strap via magnets on the inside of the backplate.

I used a drill and carefully drilled holes along the length of the opening angled down to avoid coming out the back of the raised area that the strap goes into.  Once the pilot holes were drilled, I used needle files to file out the rest of the area. Go slow and take your time.  I accidentally drilled a hole through the back of the armour - easy fix with plastic weld but it did make my heart skip a beat or 2. 

[HRivera7322]

22 hours ago, DoggyDoc said:

I used a drill and carefully drilled holes along the length of the opening angled down to avoid coming out the back of the raised area that the strap goes into.  Once the pilot holes were drilled, I used needle files to file out the rest of the area. Go slow and take your time.  I accidentally drilled a hole through the back of the armour - easy fix with plastic weld but it did make my heart skip a beat or 2. 

Thanks for the advice! Took a few tools to it and it came out pretty well. Gonna look for a file to clean up the edges a bit better. Guess now that I'm finally getting back into my DT, I should probably update my WIP thread haha

 

[Lt. Dan[501st]]

On 3/18/2023 at 1:47 AM, DoggyDoc said:

Once the pilot holes were drilled, I used needle files to file out the rest of the area.

A Dremel with a small milling attachment is also great because it's just faster. But you have to be quite careful, because you quickly mill away too much!

[HRivera7322]

On 3/19/2023 at 6:12 AM, Lt. Dan said:

A Dremel with a small milling attachment is also great because it's just faster. But you have to be quite careful, because you quickly mill away too much!

Yea that's what I ended up deciding to do. I used a drill/cutter to outline what needed to be hollowed out. Now just gotta find my dremel to remove the rest. Thanks!