Fit, for Imperial Consumption

I've been working on this armor on and off since 31 January. I figured it was about time to throw it all on and see how everything fits together.

With some help from my wife, getting our older child to bed and then helping me with the thermal detonator and the right shoulder bell, I was able to get everything on.

Assembly happened in the following order:

• Socks and underwear
• Compression pants
• Neck seal
• Compression shirt
• Ab garter (for my gut, underneath shirt)
• Thigh garter belt (over shirt)
• Thigh armor
• TK Boots
• Shin armor
• Ab armor/ posterior plate/ kidney plate/ belt/ back plate (hanging from kidney plate))
• Chest plate (moving back plate into position)
• Fastened belt
• Arm armor (already connected to each other)
• Fastened shoulder bells to straps (assist from wife)
• Thermal detonator (assist from wife)
• Gloves
• Hand Guards
• Helmet

Here's the initial look:

My initial findings:

• I need some tape or low-temp hot glue over the split rivets, especially for the right knee. The rivet ends like to poke into my undersuit and skin (ouch).
• I need some white H&L tape to help cinch the TK boots to my legs to help with fitting the shin armor 
• My left kneecap was getting pinched between the thigh and front of the shin. I trimmed that part of the shin. I might also get some foam to put behind the front of the shins to add extra cushion.
• The back of my left knee was getting pinched between the thigh and shin armors. My thigh pieces are sitting too low, but especially my left thigh. I adjusted the loop tape in both thighs to be optimal and as symmetrical as possible (so the thighs are at the same height).
• The snap loops for the garter belt were twisting. I'll attempt to reinforce these with E6000 to help them keep their shape. I may also try using them inverted to help control torsion.
• I need to finish mounting my helmet fans; that bucket's like a sauna.
• Still need to paint some of those rivets white.
• Tighten that garter belt to keep the right side from popping out near the bottom (and do some crunches :P ).

After passing it into the FB ANOVOS group, they offered the following additional comments:

• Right shoulder strap seems off. If making the strap keepers doesn't adjust it properly, I may need to re-mount it. Bothersome, but doable.
• I need to trim my hand guards and adjust for fit. Making a hollow sand (curving in towards the middle) is my first thought, but I'll also probably trim the total thickness. I honestly haven't trimmed this since cutting them out of the blanks.
• The bucket seems a bit high. I did modify the fit for the stock ANOVOS helmet strap to sit farther back to accommodate my glasses inside the bucket. I'll have to ensure this ins't causing any issues, or else mount old glasses inside the bucket instead and re-mount the head strap.

My wife is impressed and posted a picture to FB. My stepmother asked, "Is it done done or does it still need final fitting and tweaking?" She owns a '68 Mustang (not the sport version, mind you) that's been restored a few times (the salt they use on Midwestern winter roads doesn't help classic cars), so I replied, "It's like your Mustang; it's never really done :-P But it's pretty close to being ready for trooping ;-)"

That being said, it seems that I only have some minor fixes to make before being ready for my approval photos, which I plan to do at my squad's next armor party on 17 April at the latest. That should give me plenty of time to buff out the scratches on my right shin due to the colloquially-named "Shin-gate," as well as working on the minor issues above.

In addition, my squad had a bulk buy-in from HyperFirm. I would love to have the time and patience to tweak my Disney blaster into something more screen-accurate, but ultimately it wouldn't be fit for Centurion, which I'd like to eventually get once I piecemeal more items together (like a Kittle belt and latex hand guards). All in all, I'm getting an Elite E-11 for the piece of a standard E-11. And once again, my wife supported me, thanks to us having a little extra money.

More blog posts will come as I continue these minor tweaks and personal touches, until I'm 501st certified :) Until the next post...