X-Wing Chest Box Restoration

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While going through my attic, I came across my old X-Wing Chest box which has been in need of repair for at least the last 10 years, so I decided to take it out of storage and add it to my long list of personal projects. I'm hopeful that this will be a quick repair job, only needing to replace a few missing squares. As usual, it turns out to become more involved.
One thing interesting to note about this particular chest box is that it's seen some action. It's survived numerous trips to San Diego's Comicon and Star Wars Celebrations. A one day shoot for the film, Fan Boys. I even wore it to a commercial shoot for T-Mobile at Culver City Studios. After that event, I swore I'd try to make my new X-Wing costume as accurate as possible, so I wouldn't disappoint the fans.

While examining the box, I noticed my bad wiring job in the flip side:



I did this during my early days of soldering, having had far more experience sewing and designing costume patterns. After seeing someone light up an entire chest box (All of the squares were cut out and lit from behind as one piece), my original thought was to install push button light switches for each square, having found some nice, square switches at a local surplus store. Unfortunately, after installing the first switch, I realized that the amount of time involved just wasn't worth it, so I settled on just the one switch. After trooping a few events, it became apparent that the switch wasn't necessary, any way.

The biggest problem with the old, push button switch setup is that the electrical tape used left a sticky residue all over the wires. It would be too much work to clean them up, so I simply removed the entire wire assembly and replaced it with a new, 9 volt wire attachment. The masking tape was removed from the switch, along with the foil attached to one side of the switch. The foil was replaced with a single piece of wire, attaching both connectors. The other two connectors were soldered to the 9 volt battery wire. Two, large pieces of heat wrap were added for heating later:



The switch was tested with a new battery to make sure that the connections were good.

Two more large pieces of heat wrap were added to the other two connectors or terminals for some added protection to the wearer. I used a heat gun to shrink the wrap. The velcro near the bottom was starting to come off, so I used a small piece of 220 gritt to lightly sand the inside of the chest box and the inside of the velcro before applying a little connect cement and a clamp to hold the velcro in place:



I leave it to dry overnight.

Up next, installing the new squares.

 

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After leaving the chest box overnight, I'm able to remove the clamp from the velcro:



And re-attach the strap. I also trim the shrink wrap a bit:



Now on to the squares on the front of the box...

What I originally did with the chest box was to use some standard light panel for use with the light switch. Luckily, I was able to find the original light panel that I had used, so it has the same thickness and texture. I used the same plastic for a HIC Hero panel way back when.
Using a large X-Acto knife, I cut a 1" x 1" square to replace the missing one:



The blue squares are from the same material, just painted the blue. I couldn't find the original paint I used, but I'm thinking that it was probably some flat, model paint. Looking at the reference photos, the original squares appear to be color cast acrylic. I was able to verify this with Mara Jade's Father, so I had a local plastics place cut some 1" x 1" blue squares. I used some 220 grit on the box and the square before applying some contact cement to place the square:




Here's a side by side with the original reference photo (MoM) I used for a color reference:



At this point, I'm thinking that the color may be a little too light and may be more suited for the TIE pilot chest box.

 

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After trying another shade of blue acrylic, I realized that both colors were either too light or too dark, so I went back to my original idea of painting a light panel square. I was able to find a section of light panel that I had originally used and cut out a 1" x 1" square.

Now that we've got some good painting whether in Oregon, today I tested about four different spray paints, including Tamiya medium blue, but it was too dark. I settled on this one, which is Brilliant Blue from Rust-oleum:



Also pictured are one of my original blue squares and I think it's probably too dark.
Both squares were lightly sanded and cleaned up before painting them both Brilliant Blue.

 

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While waiting on the paint to dry, I move on to the knob. Here's a before picture:



The original knob or stylus part was installed off center. I think the reason why I kept it centered was simply because I didn't like the off-center look and thought a mistake had been made by the original costumers or that the X-Wing chest box had simply seen better days, but the reality is that it was installed off-center on all of the original chest boxes, so I decided to change the location of the knob.

It was really just a mater of drilling another hole through the large disk and then through the chest box. Because the holes overlapped, I used an end mill on the aluminum disk and a X-Acto knife with a file for the second hole or indentation on the chest box.
I used a little clear silicone to keep the disk in place and then bolted the knob. Here's an after shot with the references:



Up next, installing the two blue squares.

 

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Unfortunately, the Brilliant Blue from Rust-oleum went bad which wasn't a big surprise. Instead of getting a nice, smooth surface, I got a heavily gritted surface with air pockets. I've had numerous problems with Rust-oelum spray paints, so I picked up some Brilliant Blue by Testors at a local hobby store and sprayed both squares. Once dry, I used 220 gritt on the surface of the box and the under side of both squares, then applied a little contact cement. Here's the finished product:

Special thanks goes out to Mike Moore at HMS props for his wonderful vacuum forming work on the chest box, not to mention the great resin casting on the switches. Mike also gave me some great advice as where to find the remaining components to help finish off this wonderful costume piece.