The bridge between the Chest & Back Armor is supposed to be covered with 1/2 to one inch wide cotton webbing…
I cut two short pieces, and sealed the ends with super glue…
I then used Shoe Goo to adhere them to the shoulder bridge area, taping them in place to dry…
The Shoulder Bells are supposed to be attached so that it appears they are held on by zip ties…
The first step is to feed zip ties through the holders…
These zip tie mounts will be used for the rest of the process…
Each Shoulder also gets a strip of 1/2 elastic to help keep the bell from flopping around…
Each strip is sewn into a loop…
And then zip tied to one of the mounts…
The excess zip tie is cut off…
And, the mounts are adhered to the center of each Shoulder Bell, a few inches up from the bottom edge…
Now, back to the main attachment area. The zip ties need to be cut off, leaving maybe four inches, or so…
Then, two more of the mounts need to have loop Velcro added to the adhesive side…
Here, both mounts have the loop Velcro added…
Those mounts are then slid onto the zip ties, with the loop Velcro facing UP…
Then, another zip tie is added to the end of the cut off zip ties, but only pressed on until they “click” into place. These will now act “stops” to keep the mounts from sliding off the end…
The excess zip tie is removed…
Leaving only the “stop”. The mount should freely slide on the piece of zip tie that remains…
Two short pieces of hook Velcro are then cut and mounted on the inside of the top of the shoulder strap area. This is where you attach the Shoulder Bell mounts…
The Chest & Back Armor are attached together with 1 1/2 cotton webbing…
I added some Velcro so the webbing can be looped around the front (Chest) piece, and then will connect to the Back through the slot in that piece…
I’ll be adding some loop Velcro to the Back to help with adjustments…
The hook Velcro added to the side straps…
Here, the side strap has been looped through the slot in the Chest Armor…
And here, the side strap has been pulled through the slot in the Back Armor…
Full shot of the Back Armor with the Velcro and straps disconnected…
Here, the straps are connected, and attached to the Velcro…
The last major thing I need to do is get the Chest & Back Armor fitted correctly. I first marked the location where the metal brackets end with painters tape…
Then tried to figure how much strap I need to leave in place and made a pencil line..
Here’s my mark. Let’s hope it’s right…
Here goes nothing…
One side has been cut…
Then, I marked the other side…
And cut it off…
I’ll be using these small metal plates to join the Chest & Back pieces…
After a light wet sanding with 500 grit sand paper, I’m gonna say the Chest piece is now ready for paint…
To keep the breast decal from getting any overspray, I’ll be using this masking fluid…
I used a toothpick to apply it over the decal…
One coat of masking fluid…
For good measure, I applied a second coat, just to make sure no areas were left uncovered…
Then, the Chest strap extensions got a coat of white paint. After the first coat was dry, I did a really light wet sanding with 1000 grit sand paper on both the Chest & Back pieces. And, they then both got another coat of white, which was blended into the existing paint…
After the paint was dry, I removed the masking fluid…
