I got my armour plates the other day and now I have pretty much my entire kit, minus a back apparatus for my helmet hose(s) to connect to.
I got a long belt for $6.50 at Wal-Mart in the women’s section. I cut it in half to use to connect my back plate with my chest plate. I weathered the belt and found out that they used faux leather, but it still weathered well with some light brown paint.
I used mostly flat black and dark brown spray paint to weather my “deer” skin gloves. I choose these gloves because they remind me of a trapper and would work well with my overall beast hunter approach to this kit.
I kept one glove untouched so you could see the comparison between fully weathered and brand new. After all my paint had been applied I used a little bit of acetone in a few years to make it look like a stain here and there.
Finished weathered gloves for my Late Crusader kit.
I’ll be running this flight suit through the wash once more. The greens were made with some paint, grass stains where I smeared it into the grass, or pine branches I rubbed it all over. The browns are from some paint, dirt, mud, and rubbing it over all the rocks outside. The greys are from doing an oil change in the flight suit, dust from my garage, and rubbing it across the asphalt outside.
My hard leather green gauntlets also got the same weathering effects with flat black, light brown, and dark brown paints. Also smeared in garage/shop dust. Buckles still need to be trimmed to my arm size with flight suit on.
My macrobinoculars are carried in this belt pouch. I removed excess pouches and loops. I used the pencil/screw driver parts for looping my cable snares through. I have yet to weather this pouch and cable snares.
Sort of the way my real leather ammo pouches, belt, and macrobinocular pouch will sit on me.
My flak vest is made from a leather jacket that used to have “earthy” frills down the backside. I cut the sleeves off and marked out approximately where the bottom abdominal plate would be to make the flak vest shorter.
I will be using straps instead of buttons to secure the back of my flak vest, so I can fasten it over my flight suit. The collar was also adjusted so it doesn’t press up against my neck.
Below is sort of how my armour will look when secured to the flack vest with velcro. What should the spacing be between the plates (i.e. the abdominal plate to the chest plate and the abdominal plates to the kidney plates)??
Update 11/24/2016: I had originally made this neck seal for my wife’s kit back in July 2016. She recently switched to a navy blue flight suit and no longer needed the yellow balaclava. When I had ordered her yellow one, I also ordered a tan one for my LC kit. Now I’m almost done with my LC kit and can’t find the balaclava anywhere. I heavily used tan, light brown, and dark brown spray paints on the neck portion of it and after a wash/dry it now is the correct colour of my flight suit.
The top part is still yellow, but no one will see that with my helmet on.
It now covers my neck with my helmet on making it a completely sealed suit. I also weathered it some more to match the rest of my kit.
The last soft part I am waiting for it my half chaps to protect my shins and cover up my boots. Since my boots are similar height to Boba’s shoes, I’ll need these half chaps to cover the tops of them.
Update 11/25/2016: My half chaps arrived today, I put them on immediately and wore them most of the day at work to break them in. I did however put them on backwards at first, not very comfortable. My co-worker joked that the horse wouldn’t want the zipper rubbing up against it all day. This meant that the zipper was on the outside leg, instead of the inside. Image below shows straight out of the box and weathered after work.
One of the big points you’ll notice from above is my boots were also weathered to match the rest of my kit. Brown and tan spray paints were sprayed into the crevices/treads of my boots to make it appear that I’ve been all over the planet searching for the predators I hunt. You’ll also see that I may have used the grinder on my leg in the mesh area while wearing the chaps.
The solution to hide the zipper was to over-lay a piece of leather type material scraped from the sleeves of my flak vest. I used heavy duty snaps with some leather straps to mount this material to the chaps. I then used left over Velcro to make a strip down the opposite side of the chaps from the snaps.
This works extremely well, as I’m able to quickly remove either the snaps or the Velcro to access the zipper on my half chaps.
Upgrade to Leather Gloves – Spring 2019
I haven’t worn my kit since the upgrade with my leather gloves. Still working on the knees to be replaced, as the paint has chipped off the knees. Anyways the upgrade is green gauntlet style gloves as the CRLs now say the gloves must be tucked under the gauntlets and not over them. These new ones will keep the gloves under my leather gauntlets.
Update 3/10-11/23
I got a new flightsuit to replace my too small one and this time I’m going with a two piece. I got Dickies 574 khaki work shirt and 874 khaki work pants.
I then proceeded to weather them to be consistent with my previous flightsuit. I used tan, brown, and green spray paints with a few drops of acetone in random places. The tan and brown represent dirt, mud, etc. for weathering. The green is for grass stains and brush camouflaged.
I then added additional weathering consistent with my armor by adding scratches with a flathead screwdriver.
I then washed with cold water in the washing machine and dried in the dryer.
Mandalorian Armour 