It's Alclad II mirror gold for Lexan, sprayed light enough to be see-thru. It's sandwiched between two layers of vac-formed 0.040 PETG. The instructions say to back the paint with black or silver, but that dulls the finish significantly. So I sandwiched it between layers of plastic to protect it. Works perfectly and the finish is really quite nice.
Re: BUILD THREAD: My Apollo A7L Space Suit
A few small updates. I finally finished the helmet and neck ring assembly. This is actually NOT the spacetoys helmet that I spent a whopping $700 on. As it turns out, the bubble from that helmet was just WAY too heavy for costuming. I needed something much lighter weight, so I vac-formed this bubble from 0.25 inch PETG. I used a reverse vac-form process in an MDF box and actually sucked the bubble into a silicone mold. I had no idea if sucking a bubble this large was even possible. I had serious doubts, but after a few prayers and a couple of really uneven, wonky bubbles, I got one that was just perfect! The only thing left to do on the helmet is to sew the back pad, but I'll get into that when I break out my sewing machine.
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Re: BUILD THREAD: My Apollo A7L Space Suit
Unfortunately, I had to buy the whole thing, but I'm completely scrapping the helmet ring and back pad and fabricating my own. They aren't entirely accurate anyway. The bubble is pretty good (except for the extra height at the bottom).
Re: BUILD THREAD: My Apollo A7L Space Suit
Not a huge update, but I did work on my space suit a little more. I'm doing all the hard parts of the suit first. Finally cut channels for the o-rings on the chest connectors. Made my own custom cutting tool for this.
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I also made the plugs for the connectors worn during launch. These were done on the lathe and they'll eventually be outfitted with magnets so they'll stick inside:
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Made the electrical connector in three parts. The connector, the inner silver sleeve, and the retainer ring. I still have to make the insert with the matrix pins:
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Also made a little back plate system so I can mount the connectors to the suit:
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I started making the glove rings. They will connect with magnets (the little protrusion on the side of the ring is for a rare earth magnet). Not finished with these quite yet:
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And I scratch-built this little part for the neck ring:
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