Power Suit / Armour Project

I saw Iron Man, Batman Begins and The Dark Night Recently. As I’ve previously demonstrated with my R2-D2, C-3PO and Jabba the Hut projects, as well as my Star Wars House Party, when I get an idea in my head, I generally go ahead and do something about it.

However, for this project, I’m not attempting to make a movie replica. Instead, I decided to make my own ‘power suit’ style armour to my own design, just the way that the characters Tony Stark and Bruce Wayne did in the movies.

The design will be quite generic in that it could be painted a number of colours and used to dress as various characters, such as a knight in armour etc, or various non specific Sci-Fi characters. The finished armour will also be cheap enough that another person could modify it by cutting, painting, drilling, adding EL Wire or LEDs etc as well as their own logo to make their own character.

Note: the suit will not allow you to fly, give you superhuman strength, or protect you from bullets.

3rd August 2008

The first piece of armour is made. This will serve as both front and back of the upper body armour, which will be connected with shoulder and rib-cage pieces to make the upper torso. There is space for a ‘superhero logo’ in a recessed circle, which would also allow something like Iron Man’s Arc Reactor to be installed:

The shoulder pieces will be quite large to give it that ‘superhero’ look:

 

4th August 2008

I’ve made some shoulder pieces which link the back and front together. The next parts to be made will be the rib cage pieces which will fit at each side under the arms. I plan to have the whole thing attached to an adjustable webbing/strapping system and for the whole suit to be lined with blocks of black foam so the plastic isn’t resting directly against you.

 

5th August 2008

I have made the cod-piece and the rib cage pieces of the armour. There will be no ‘bum piece’ to this armour so you can still sit down comfortably whilst wearing it, although the cod-piece could be used again on the back of the pelvis if you so desired.

Next steps are to make some arm pieces, line all the pieces with foam and attach the strapping system which should all arrive in the next few days.

6th August 2008

Each piece has had various pieces of foam stuck to the back of it so the armour stands away from the body a little. I’ve also attached a 1″ / 25mm webbing/strapping system to all the pieces so they can be worn:

The shoulder pieces are not directly attached to the front and back of the armour, only with webbing straps that go over each shoulder so this allows quite a lot of flexibility. Also the shoulder, rib cage pieces and cod-piece are all on adjustable straps so it can be made to fit pretty much anyone. The rib cage pieces also un-buckle so you can get the rest over your head first and then attach them.

7th August 2008

I’ve completed the arms now, here are some picturess of all the pieces so far. At some point I will go back to add detail to the current pieces and also build some sort of leg pieces.