Day 34 - Rough Mask

Still a rough, but looking much more like the final product now. It's only held together with tape right now, but when I get a final overall shape done, I'll attach the braided tubes permanently either with glue or by sewing them on.

Direct flash doesn't do the new mask any justice, but I usually can only work on this at night and available light is too dim. I took a closeup photo of just the new mask that will hopefully show some of the details a little better.

I still need to make the bridge of the nose that connects with the goggles. To prevent the goggles from fogging up (or at least minimize it), I'm going to glue on some strips of foam across the inside of the cheeks to act sort of like weather stripping. This should keep my breath from traveling up the mask and fogging up the lenses by forcing it to go either down or out through the vents in the front.

Day 28 - Custom Mannequin

To help facilitate fitting the armor (both the paper mockup and the real one), I'm making a custom mannequin of myself out of paper tape. I used the kind that they use for shipping boxes, so you have to wet the adhesive before it will stick. After you apply 3 or 4 layers of it, it gets pretty stiff once it's dry. Since it's impossible for me to cover myself with tape, I enlisted the help of my wife who did a great job so far on the torso. We started this somewhat late, so we'll have to finish the arms and legs another day.

On a side note, who knew this project would be such a multi-disciplinary endeavor? Sewing, shoemaking, vacuum forming, mold-making, and now mannequins...whew! Thankfully, the mannequin will be reuseable for anything else I decide to tackle (maybe not literally, since it takes so damn long to make one. Badum CHING).

Day 26 - More Armor

I've started doing a paper mockup of the arrangement for the muscle armor. (It's made from old reports and faxes from work, so I'm doing what I can to recycle.) I'll be making most if not all of the armor initially in paper so I don't waste any of the more expensive materials. You know what they say: measure twice, cut once. This version needs some tweaking of the proportions (as you can probably tell, I'm not quite as muscular as the Delta Force guys in the game), and the angles of the collarbone area are a little too steep I think, but it's a start. I think when it gets down to the actual materials, I'll have to make a flat paper pattern (like with normal sewing projects) in addition to this mockup so I can align all the pieces properly.

I haven't made much progress on the boots yet, because I still have to figure out how to cover it with the straps properly (glue or sew?) and how to make the back ankle area. I was thinking of either cannibalizing an old pair of inline skates or fabricating it from scratch with plastic or craft foam.

Day 18 - Putting on a New Face (Mask)

I made a negative mold of my face last night out of Sculpey and aluminum foil (with a plastic-wrapped bowl as support), but when I went to vacuum form with it, I realized that I ran out of craft foam to do it. Damn! And it was too late to pick up any more, so I had to wait until after work today to get some.

So after I vacuum formed the foam, I started trimming away the excess. (Sorry, forgot to take pictures of the process.) Next, I applied strips of 1" gaffer's tape to strengthen the foam. I knew breathing/fogging would be a problem, so I experimented with ever expanding holes for my nose and mouth. Finally, I decided to cut out the whole area and cover it with a sheet from the braided tubing (cut up the side). That seemed to work best in terms of maximum airflow. I'm waiting for my next batch of braided sleeving to arrive in the mail, so further progress on the helmet and armor will have to wait. I think I'll tackle the boots next since there's no muscle armor to create there.

Day 16 - Be Cool

I think I've decided on how to keep myself cool in this suit. I'm going to try installing small case fans in a few areas inside the suit.

At first, I experimented with the idea of taking apart my old mini travel fridge that stopped working for some reason. It plugged into the cigarette lighter in my car.

[A little backstory: I used this fridge when I moved and drove cross country in my Civic. It was tiny, but it kept a decent amount of food and water chilled during my 10 days across the US (I took my time). Even after I arrived in California, I still kept it as my main fridge since my apartment didn't come with a fridge, and I didn't have the money to buy one (my priorities were towards a new TV, dvd player, and 5.1 surround sound, lol). I used this fridge for SIX MONTHS before I broke down and got a bigger fridge (college dorm room size). Then I took it to work and plopped it on my desk and used it until it died mysteriously. Ah, the memories...]


Since I otherwise had no use for it, I took it apart. At first, I tried to do it neatly in case I managed to fix it and wanted to use it again, but the majority of the screws were set about 4 inches deep, and the holes were too narrow for any of my screwdrivers, so used brute force and pried and ripped it open with a pair of screwdrivers. [So sad...] What I managed to salvage from it was some kind of heat exchange plate/heatsink thingy, a case fan, and the plug/power switch. I plugged it in and, as expected, nothing. I took a closer look and couldn't find anything obviously wrong, so I clipped the wires and connected the heat exchanger directly to the 12v power. Worked like a charm. Did the same thing to the fan, and that also worked again. Yay! I still can't figure out what was wrong with the switch/circuitboard, but oh well. While I was tinkering with the heat exchanger, I left the fan blowing on my knee, since that was as convenient a place to put it as any while it was running. After discovering the heat exchanger was far too localized for cooling abilities and too big to be of practical use in my suit, I noticed that my knee was quite cool. I think that's when I decided to just use case fans instead of anything (more) elaborate. Now, I'm trying to find some that are as cheap, small, flat, and quiet as I can get. Anyone have any suggestions? I found a bunch of 80mm ones for $2 on Newegg. One of them even gets down to $1.29 with free shipping if you order in bulk (10+ fans). With that deal, it's oddly cheaper to buy 10 than to buy 3. Go figure. The only problem is its size. At 80mm x 80mm x 25mm (or approx. 3"x3"x1"), they're kinda big to try to incorporate into a somewhat skintight suit. I found another one that's 40mm x 40mm x 10mm that's $3 each. Not as good a deal, but much smaller. The other downside is that the reviews are saying they're pretty loud.

Day 15 - Vacuum Forming Part 2

So I finished my vacuum forming rig (less than $50 total for parts!). Since I didn't have any armor pieces ready to use as a mold, I used whatever was handy that had plenty of detail to test out. This happened to be my vise grips. On the first try, I ended up overheating the plastic (I used one of those cheap plastic "For Sale" signs), and it tore while getting vacuum formed.



A few tries later with various objects, I fell back on the vise grips again and ended up with the following results by cutting one of those cheap, flimsy 3-ring binders. This shows some promise, but I still need to perfect the combination of which type of plastic, how thick, what temperature to heat it up to, and for how long. In the meantime, I'll work on sculpting the molds with Sculpey clay.

Day 14 - Vacuum Forming

So yeah, I came across this website with plans on how to make a very inexpensive (less than $50), but good vacuum former. I was aware that a lot of people make their storm trooper armor by vacuum forming, but I had no idea what the process was exactly or any of its other uses. I thought it involved a giant, expensive industrial machine (which it can be), but at its core, it's actually pretty simple: a flat surface with a hole (or holes) to vacuum air out, a mold, and frame-mounted plastic sheet. This video can probably best illustrate what I'm talking about, and it just so happens that this is the vacuum former I'll be making.



And why am I making one, you ask? Since the silver pieces of the nanosuit are so organically shaped (the "skeletal" parts if you will), it would be hard to make them any other way I can think of that would be both hard and flexible. And plus, it'd be so freakin' cool to have one. ;) I'm also thinking it would be a great way to make the base layer of the face mask so it would have a perfect fit by using a mold of the lower half of my face. Plus, the mold would be useful for any other future headgear I'd want to make.

I spent the day cleaning the apartment under orders from my wife ( :P ), so I only had time to buy the parts from Home Depot today before we went to my friend's birthday party.

Okay, so it's pretty late now, so I'll update you all later. Hopefully, I'll have time to build it and show you all pictures of the rig and maybe something I vacuum formed. If not, hopefully Monday.

Day 9 - New Armor Sample

It's been a while since my last post, but I've spent that time designing how to do the muscle armor, and I think I've found a good balance of color, thickness, texture, and comfort. I threw together this sample tonight to see what one of the chest pieces might look like. Looks pretty promising so far. I cut 1/4" thick strips of white EVA foam (craft foam) and stuffed them into the braided sleeving. Then I sealed them tight inside by using a craft hot knife (basically a soldering iron with special tips) to cut/melt the ends. I temporarily laid them out on a 3" wide strip of tape on the back, then put two strips on the front to secure it to my t-shirt. I originally intended on using black foam, but as chance had it, there was a foam and fabric store (mostly for furniture) that only had white. I went for it just so I could get a sample of 1/4" thick foam. That thickness was tough to find in the craft stores in my area. They only carried the 2mm thicknesses, not 6mm. Anyways, long story short, the white worked to my benefit, because it added a sense of depth and texture to the braiding. It was no longer black on black. If you looked at it straight on, you could see the white mixing with the black to produce a fairly accurate gray color from a distance. Up close you can see the white a little better (still looks good up close). And at an angle, the white foam gets completely hidden underneath, revealing a solid shiny black.

I think I'll use a similar effect for the helmet, except use 2mm thick sheets instead so it doesn't get too big. The helmet is already a little on the large side. Don't want Nomad to end up with a giant head. :)