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 Post subject: Project: Screen Accurate Stormtrooper Belt
PostPosted: Sat Aug 20, 2011 3:19 am 
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One of the projects that I have recently been attempting has been to make a screen accurate ANH/ESB Stormtrooper belt for my set of armor. Though I am not close to being finished yet I have been able to make some headway so I thought I would share my progress here.

The current consensus seems to be that the belt was made out of some heavy canvas material. I did some scouring and was able to find some 32 oz. super heavy cotton canvas, the same kind that used to be used as conveyer belts on old machinery.

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I then took a plastic TM belt I have and measured its width which came out to 10 cm. Using that measurement I was able to rescale a section of a promotional image from ANH of a Stormtrooper and was able to calculate that the canvas belt was roughly 8cm wide with stitching that was 5mm from the edges.

I cut two 8cm strips from the canvas and on one of the strips drew a light pencil line 5mm from each edge to use as a guide for when I ran it through my sewing machine. Since I only have a standard Singer sewing machine which wasn’t really designed for such heavy duty sewing I had to make a few “special modifications” myself. After which I was able to run the two pieces of canvas through the machine and sew the two pieces together without much difficulty. I used white super duty nylon thread.


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 Post subject: Re: Project: Screen Accurate Stormtrooper Belt
PostPosted: Sat Aug 20, 2011 3:23 am 
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To achieve that right color I dyed the natural canvas using white shoe dye. Here are some pictures of what I ended up with. This is my second version as the first one I did ended up with a few kinks that I had to work out.

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I think it is getting close but it isn’t there yet. First new photographs of a screen used suit shows that there is some sort of satin like lining on the back of the belt that I will need to include. Also I have no idea how the belt actually secures in the back. I used Velcro for the meantime as it seems the most likely but if it was used I still don’t know what type is accurate, how much there was, how it was secured to the cloth, etc.

I would also like to take a moment and personally thank Troopermaster for his help and guidance. He put up with my incessant questions providing any answers and insights that he could. It was extremely kind of him to do so and I just wanted to say thank you and say how much I appreciated it!

I’ll try and update this thread as I attempt to get closer to a version 3.


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 Post subject: Re: Project: Screen Accurate Stormtrooper Belt
PostPosted: Sat Aug 20, 2011 10:21 am 
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That's a nice looking belt. Have no clue about accuracy, but it looks good. Any shots of how it looks with the whole armor, not so up close?

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 Post subject: Re: Project: Screen Accurate Stormtrooper Belt
PostPosted: Sun Aug 21, 2011 12:21 am 
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Unfortunately when I took these photos I put on only the torso armor to take a few quick shots. I’ll try to take some better pictures with the whole armor later today and post them up here.


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 Post subject: Re: Project: Screen Accurate Stormtrooper Belt
PostPosted: Sun Aug 21, 2011 11:32 am 
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Well... with torso armor alone is fine enough... just stand back a bit so we can get a fuller picture of how it looks at a distance. :thumbsup

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 Post subject: Re: Project: Screen Accurate Stormtrooper Belt
PostPosted: Sun Aug 21, 2011 11:12 pm 
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Okay, here are some of the torso shots I took. I did end up taking some new photos yesterday with the armor but I didn’t really care for how they came out.

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 Post subject: Re: Project: Screen Accurate Stormtrooper Belt
PostPosted: Mon Aug 22, 2011 2:49 pm 
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Cool. Easier to see now how it relates to everything else. Accurate or not... that belt is nicely done and looks good with that armor! :thumbsup

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 Post subject: Re: Project: Screen Accurate Stormtrooper Belt
PostPosted: Mon Aug 22, 2011 3:56 pm 
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Good effort!

I think you should try looking for denim canvas and cut it into strips of 75mm wide or just under. You want 4-5 layers sewn together along with a satin or silk layer for the inside.

The real belts are held closed with a piece of 2" wide velcro roughly 3" long. They are very rugged, heavy duty belts with no reinforcements inside, just built up of layers of canvas and either painted or dyed white (not sure).

Also, for attaching the plastic ammo section to the canvas, you want to use single cap rivets - not pop rivets :wink:


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 Post subject: Re: Project: Screen Accurate Stormtrooper Belt
PostPosted: Tue Aug 23, 2011 12:03 am 
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Thank you very much the compliments Too Much Garlic! :cheers I’ve really enjoyed working on this set of armor.

Troopermaster I am once again in your debt! :salut Thank you for that info! I will start looking into getting some denim canvas. It is nice to finally have some confirmation as to the use of Velcro to fasten the belts as well as the dimensions. I came pretty close, I used a piece that was 2” wide but had it 5” long. I will be sure to correct that with the new version!

I wanted to use more accurate rivets but the pop rivets were all I could really find unfortunately. I’m not very knowledgeable about rivets so I wasn’t really sure were to look and what tools I would need to fasten them. The small rivets that attach to the elastic are all pop rivets that I filled with apoxie sculpt and then painted. The bigger ones I used on the side of the torso are rivets I found normally used in leatherworking.


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 Post subject: Re: Project: Screen Accurate Stormtrooper Belt
PostPosted: Tue Aug 23, 2011 7:35 am 
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Your welcome :thumbsup

These are the kind of rivets you want to be using for the belt and drop boxes.
http://www.ebay.com/itm/100x7mm-SINGLE-CAP-Round-RIVETS-RAPID-STUD-Leathercraft-/250794282270?pt=LH_DefaultDomain_0&var=&hash=item801031a1e6


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 Post subject: Re: Project: Screen Accurate Stormtrooper Belt
PostPosted: Thu Aug 25, 2011 8:03 am 
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Many thanks for the link Troopermaster! :cheers

I used some rivets very similar to these when I put together the torso as well as some of the leg armor. Glad to see that I was headed somewhat in the right direction!


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 Post subject: Re: Project: Screen Accurate Stormtrooper Belt
PostPosted: Thu Aug 25, 2011 2:03 pm 
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These are the same kind of rivets used for the knee ammo strap but, for the torso, you should be using split rivets


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 Post subject: Re: Project: Screen Accurate Stormtrooper Belt
PostPosted: Sun Aug 28, 2011 6:52 am 
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Do you mean the ones that go down the left hand side of the torso on the ab and kidney plates?


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 Post subject: Re: Project: Screen Accurate Stormtrooper Belt
PostPosted: Sun Aug 28, 2011 7:49 pm 
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The ones that go down the side of the abdomen are brass split rivets. One of these is also used for the crotch strap too. I managed to find to correct brass rivets and the single cap rivets too. PM me if you want some.


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