MkIII Iron Man Armor durability

[Tiggerbozz]

Hey lovely folks,

My cousin works with a company that sends actors to kid's parties as various super heroes. Their Iron Man suit is getting a bit beat up and when she saw the Pepper Potts Rescue Armor (from JFCustoms thread) I was working on for myself, asked if I could make them a new set. I am still REALLY new to armor making so I told her I would certainly try, but couldn't make her any promises. The reason I am here this morning is because after seeing video of their old costume I realized I could definitely make one at least as good, but I worried about how many uses they would get out of it. I was originally going to go with foam using JFCustom's pepfiles of the MkIII, but from watching videos and reading here, it sounds like foam might not survive a bunch of college kids very long. Any suggestions on ways I can increase the life span on foam? Or a suggestion on a different material that can stand up to the kind of wear and tear this will likely see?

Cheers!
~Loeri

 

[George]

Hi Loeri,

usually foam builds are either treated with PlastiDip,which adds to their durability against cracking and tearing but keeps them flexible (very handy for the boots,knees and elbows),or you Plastic Coat them using Smooth-On 65D,in which case you would compromise the flexibility yet make the item tough as...well,plastic facepalm

Also,XRobots has great video tutorials on youtube and information on his website (XRobots.co.uk).I hope that helps !

 

[Tiggerbozz]

I had forgotten about the tutorial XRobots made for smooth on with foam. That would probably help a lot with my concerns. Unfortunately I haven't seen anyone else use it (or at least my google-fu sucked and I didn't find anything) for larger pieces. Thanks for reminding me about it though!

~Loeri

Edit: I have heard that sweat is rough on foam costumes (Evil Ted's youtube channel), would coating the inside in plastidip alleviate that issue?

 

[RiotJavelinDX]

If you wan't true durability you're going to want to do a sintra build or a cardstock papakura with fiberglass