Well during some initial excitement this morning I was planning to drive out to work try out the brass etching. Then I composed myself and decided to do first things first: finish the thigh armour. Besides, I already have everything needed to do it here at home other than a laser printer and the brass sheet. So I'll head down to the local hobby store for the sheet this afternoon and do the laser printing step at work tomorrow.
For the record I'll be using ferric chloride as my etchant. It's horrible stuff that stains everything it comes into contact with but works well for etching PCBs.
ANYWAY.....
Onto the latest leg progress. As you can see I've been detailing the area just below the ankle in order to ensure that the thigh armour is going to fit properly. The thigh armour is asymmetrical so that the two legs will mirror each other and have less plating on the inside. I also turned up an awesome little cylindrical piece with a fan in it (I was just extremely excited to finally be using a fan from my Koto option sprues!) that poked out on the rear of the shin, but I forgot to take a photo!
The shin armour will be laminated with another 1mm layer of styrene to bulk it up a bit.
Oh by the way, I don't think I've mentioned what the story is with the hip. I've got some Tamiya tape wrapped around it because the resin is actually quite fragile and I found I was accidentally nicking it while sanding other parts of the thigh. The tape gives a bit of protection
Edit: Paulson was asking about the hip. The upper leg armour is built around a piece I earlier scratchbuilt and then cast to get the two of them:
Oh yeah I can make that....