silverBoyd's RotJ Guard WIP

[silverBoyd]

Just received my RotJ Guard helmet (ABS kit) last week. Ordered it in late July and it arrived late September. So ready to get cutting on this. Currently I'm building an ATA TK helmet for a friend and will be finished by the end of the week. Then it's on to assembling this bad boy. This will be my 3rd 501st Legion build. Always wanted to do something from RotJ.



Of course I had to hold it up to my face when I took it out the box.


I have also started scouting my local fabric shops for the Velvet I'll need for making the Outer Robe


I have already built a Force Pike from scratch by smashing together a few builds on here along with some of my own techniques.

[Sascha_Wilsing]

Nice.
Go ahead.

[BloodRayne]

Awesome! seems you have quite a lot of materials now

Keep it up dude

[silverBoyd]

The helmet has been trimmed and sanded smooth around all edges of both halves. I even decided to keep a 1/4" return edge around the entire bottom of my helmet. I think the return edge gives it some more depth.

There isn't much of a tutorial on these forums for helmet assembly so I'm going to attempt to guide people through a build of my helmet as I go along.

Putting two halves of a kit together seems simple enough but there's some thinking involved. I decided to use really thick (but flexible) FOR SALE sign and cut it into 1"-2" wide tabs and roughly 3" long.



(The color side of the FOR SALE sign won't matter or be seen in the final finished product but I chose to keep the "colored" side of the plastic sign material towards the outside)

I have light sanded an inch inside the helmet edge to roughen the surface (as well as 1" of the FOR SALE sign) to help allow the E6000 to bond to the ABS shell. After holding the shim on their for a few hours with magnets and clamps, the E6000 created a strong enough bond of the plastic shims to the adhere to the helmet. With help from my wife, we secured and dry fit the rear of the helmet to the front utilizing tape. Lots of it.




I've seen some builders do just a few tabs to assemble the two halves but I couldn't figure how to keep the filler from seeping through once I get to that stage. The way I secured the two halves, the shims will act as a link to hold the 2 halves together and I will fill in the negative spaces in with more FOR SALE sign (in between the tabs) to close in the negative spaces all around the helmet to prevent seepage of the body filler when applied.



After everything was fastened together, this helmet really began taking shape. Once you have the pieces fastened together, there will most likely be a gap between the ABS halves. The width of the gap on your helmet will vary. I decided that before I would do any sort of Bondo filler work, I would "build up" these gaps around the sides and shoulder areas utilizing Loctite brand Epoxy Putty. So far I really like the results. Once it cures fuller (and I find more time to work on it), I will sand it and begin to fill over it with Bondo Auto Body filler to acquire the final finished smoothness.



I also noticed the top of my helmet, which doesn't have a gap at all, did have one side stick up slightly higher which would give the finished helmet an odd shape on the top. I gently used my Dremel to "flatten" this out and help make it much more even so that thing's will look better once I get to the sanding and filling stage of this helmet.

[Sascha_Wilsing]

Great Idea. Please keep us informed about the work on the helmet.

[silverBoyd]

After putting the helmet down for a week or two I finally got back to it.

I finished using the epoxy putty to finish filling in the gap between the two halves as best as possible. I even used it to help build up the part of the return edge on the sides I left when trimming the helmet. Some people don't do a return edge but I think it adds some depth to the helmet.





Next, I will continue the "filling process" by utilizing Bondo body filler to help fill in any uneven surfaces along the gap as well as use the Bondo to help "sculpt" in the side detail. To give it all a flawless finish when said and done. At one point I thought about creating an ABS paste to help fill in the gap of the helmet (mixing scrap ABS pieces & acetone) but I decided against that thought.





I absolutely hate sanding BUT this helmet requires it to pull of a great finished piece. I'm going to wet and dry sand the whole helmet using 150...220...400...800 & finally 2000 grit sandpaper.


After allowing 15-24 hours to pass for Bondo to fully cure...I began the first pass of sanding to knock down the Bondo and get it near a smooth enough finish to make way for the 2nd stage of sanding and the usage of spot putty. I'm pleased with the results so far.

[Sascha_Wilsing]

Good job so far.

[silverBoyd]

Thanks for the compliments.

Started to sculpt the side scoop on one side of helmet this morning due to the way things lined up when I was sizing it to my head. Pretty easy fix. I applied the Loctite brand Epoxy Putty and sculpted in the detail to make it the proper shape. This stuff cures quickly. After it set, I sanded it and will smooth it out in the next process of utilizing spot putty to fill in divets, pin holes, uneven areas, etc.



Although I'll be priming the entire helmet and spot filling any imperfections, I focused on the center "equator" of the helmet. I really want to focus on making the two halves as flawless as I can. Then I'll work on any other slight imperfections to the helmet. I used Grey Rustoleum Primer to help figure out where I needed to focus on working. Once the primer dried, I began sanding using 220 grit sandpaper.








Tomorrow I will focus on the same process as I did today: spot fill, sand, spot fill, sand....etc. Except this time, I will begin wet sanding between using the spot putty filler and I will move onto using 400 grit sandpaper.

[silverBoyd]

I did a 2nd pass over the entire helmet with more spot putty & 400-grit sandpaper. It's really getting smoothed out now. Last night I applied more spot filler over very small imperfections as well as a few slight "bumps" in the back of the helmet to try to smooth it out some. Now that's it's dry, I will begin utilizing 800-grit sandpaper all over to continue giving it a smooth finish. During this stage, I will also finally cut out the eye slit for the visor.





After the 800-grit sandpaper is finished with, this helmet is ready for its final white primer coat and then clear coating. After it is clear-coated, it will be sanded down with 2000-grit paper. and then the high-gloss automotive red paint (color-matched to the robes) will be applied.

[Sascha_Wilsing]

This turns out great.