Once again Halloween snuck up on me without time to make a killer costume. I was watching in awe at Darkjedi1500's home made Apollo suit when it hit me.....I wanna be an astronaut. Two things were against me, My crushing work schedule and I dont know how to sew (rectified since then). I have always made my costumes and purchasing a costume was like cheating. I saw a youtube vid of Adam Savage wearing his Apollo suit and the upgrades he made. That was the last bit of inspiration I needed. If I could find a suit that is 70% workable for under $2k.....Ill figure out something.
In Dark Jedi's thread, another member linked a couple of Apollo suit makers on the web. A couple of problems, Either they were $10,000 or they were $2500 and grossly inaccurate or cheap, ugly and cheap. The $10k suits were out due to delivery times and, well, they were 10 grand. I found a suit on Ebay for $1,600 with a month lead time. They also sell a 'Museum' quality Apollo suit for $8,000. I emailed the seller and told them I wanted the museum quality fabric, metal ab fittings / neck ring, commander stripes and dual visors for the helmet. It was lacking the detail of the $8k suit but I felt I could make it work.
It came in last Friday. This is a shot of it out of the box. I was happy, not ecstatic and not disappointing.....just happy. The material is great and light weight. They included an under suit to bulk it up. I have to bulk it up more to get that puffy look. The patches were a faded color and printed on white denim (im assuming the same material the budget suit is made from). It lacked a ton of detail, but again, this isnt the $8k Museum suit.
Lets get to work. I started to add the abdomen Velcro. Between the Velcro strips are metal snaps on a Teflon disk on a fabric 1.25 inch square. The fabric square had me stumped....I couldnt continue.
Did I mention I cant sew? I bought the wife an industrial Singer sewing machine for her Bday last week. I busted it out, looked at the diagram printed on the machine, hand wound a bobbin (later I found out there is an auto winder on top........all sewing machines have them). An hour later, I had 8 1.25 inch squares!!!!!! The first one was a mess. 2-7 no problem.
I downloaded era correct NASA and Apollo 11 mission patches (originals were printed on 'Beta' cloth and hand sewn on). And printed them on inkjet printer white fabric.....and hand sewed them on.
The back pack or PLSS (Personal Life Support System) that came with the suit was......horrible. Two blocks of foam covered by fabric with some shoulder straps. Everything about it was wrong. Great for a costume party, not so good for the RPF. This is it straight out of the box:
So I picked up some 1/2 plumbing pipe, a million fittings, rivits and 5 yard signs made out of congregated sintra from Home Depot.
Wrote down some measurements from various space sites that listed the dimensions and went to town.
PVC frame, yard sign surfaces. Covered it with quilting batting to give it a soft puffy feel. Added a hand hold (?) in the center ( Im calling it a hand hold because the real ones have one. Its basically a cutout in the center like the place you put your soap in the shower. Maybe Ill put a bar of soap in it for Halloween). Once the spray on glue dried to keep the batting on, I covered the edges in reflective metal tape. Dont know why, but it made sense. I made patterns for the PLSS and used some spare fabric I ordered with the suit. I reused the back panel as it already had the shoulder straps attached. I made a correct PLSS checklist, NASA logo and Name plate on the computer and printed them out on fabric. Sewed the edges and hot glued them down. They look like they are sewn on. Finished with some more velcro. The PLSS cover slides on over the top and velcros up at the bottom, similar to the originals.
This is the finished product:
Picked up a replica Omega Speedmaster with a replica NASA strap made by some bloke in the UK.
The stock gloves used blue dishwashing gloves for the blue fingertips........no good. Went to Home Depot and picked up some gloves that had the fattest-roundest fingers I could find. Dipped the fingers in blue Plasti-dip and presto chango.....moon gloves. The silver material is Ironing board pad material.......its even heat resistant! Bonus.
This is where it is at tonight. I will start weathering it tomorrow. I need to add some more puffiness to it and a micro climate vest. I might add a tinkle hole or just do what the astronauts did, it all depends.
Stay tuned, more to follow. I have to go to Chicago Thurs-Sat so no costume progress but Ill try to pump out some more progress in the next two days.
In Dark Jedi's thread, another member linked a couple of Apollo suit makers on the web. A couple of problems, Either they were $10,000 or they were $2500 and grossly inaccurate or cheap, ugly and cheap. The $10k suits were out due to delivery times and, well, they were 10 grand. I found a suit on Ebay for $1,600 with a month lead time. They also sell a 'Museum' quality Apollo suit for $8,000. I emailed the seller and told them I wanted the museum quality fabric, metal ab fittings / neck ring, commander stripes and dual visors for the helmet. It was lacking the detail of the $8k suit but I felt I could make it work.
It came in last Friday. This is a shot of it out of the box. I was happy, not ecstatic and not disappointing.....just happy. The material is great and light weight. They included an under suit to bulk it up. I have to bulk it up more to get that puffy look. The patches were a faded color and printed on white denim (im assuming the same material the budget suit is made from). It lacked a ton of detail, but again, this isnt the $8k Museum suit.
Lets get to work. I started to add the abdomen Velcro. Between the Velcro strips are metal snaps on a Teflon disk on a fabric 1.25 inch square. The fabric square had me stumped....I couldnt continue.
Did I mention I cant sew? I bought the wife an industrial Singer sewing machine for her Bday last week. I busted it out, looked at the diagram printed on the machine, hand wound a bobbin (later I found out there is an auto winder on top........all sewing machines have them). An hour later, I had 8 1.25 inch squares!!!!!! The first one was a mess. 2-7 no problem.
I downloaded era correct NASA and Apollo 11 mission patches (originals were printed on 'Beta' cloth and hand sewn on). And printed them on inkjet printer white fabric.....and hand sewed them on.
The back pack or PLSS (Personal Life Support System) that came with the suit was......horrible. Two blocks of foam covered by fabric with some shoulder straps. Everything about it was wrong. Great for a costume party, not so good for the RPF. This is it straight out of the box:
So I picked up some 1/2 plumbing pipe, a million fittings, rivits and 5 yard signs made out of congregated sintra from Home Depot.
Wrote down some measurements from various space sites that listed the dimensions and went to town.
PVC frame, yard sign surfaces. Covered it with quilting batting to give it a soft puffy feel. Added a hand hold (?) in the center ( Im calling it a hand hold because the real ones have one. Its basically a cutout in the center like the place you put your soap in the shower. Maybe Ill put a bar of soap in it for Halloween). Once the spray on glue dried to keep the batting on, I covered the edges in reflective metal tape. Dont know why, but it made sense. I made patterns for the PLSS and used some spare fabric I ordered with the suit. I reused the back panel as it already had the shoulder straps attached. I made a correct PLSS checklist, NASA logo and Name plate on the computer and printed them out on fabric. Sewed the edges and hot glued them down. They look like they are sewn on. Finished with some more velcro. The PLSS cover slides on over the top and velcros up at the bottom, similar to the originals.
This is the finished product:
Picked up a replica Omega Speedmaster with a replica NASA strap made by some bloke in the UK.
The stock gloves used blue dishwashing gloves for the blue fingertips........no good. Went to Home Depot and picked up some gloves that had the fattest-roundest fingers I could find. Dipped the fingers in blue Plasti-dip and presto chango.....moon gloves. The silver material is Ironing board pad material.......its even heat resistant! Bonus.
This is where it is at tonight. I will start weathering it tomorrow. I need to add some more puffiness to it and a micro climate vest. I might add a tinkle hole or just do what the astronauts did, it all depends.
Stay tuned, more to follow. I have to go to Chicago Thurs-Sat so no costume progress but Ill try to pump out some more progress in the next two days.
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