This is my armor as it arrived. It's 1/8" thick aluminum, made the same way medieval armor is done.

The first thing that needed doing was cutting the slots for the chest display. I put a sheet of paper over the display and rubbed it with a pencil. This gave me the exact outline of the LEDs. I cut this out with an exacto, and taped the template to the armor. I traced the template onto the armor with a pencil, then used a ruler to clean up the freehand lines.

On to the basement, where the dremel cutting disc came into play. I would have taken photos, but I didn't want my camera near the mess I was making.

I very carefully carved out the horizontal lines with the disc. If you aren't REALLY good with a dremel this could get messy. I slipped a couple of times, but thankfully it only results in minor scratches when cutting such thick metal.

Once I had the horizontals cut, I took the disc to the middle of the slots (the part I was cutting out). Staying a safe distance from the ends of the slots, I plunged the disc into the slot area a few times, gradually chewing away the middle part of the slot. When I was done, I was left with nice clean horizontal cuts and messy, jagged vertical lines about 1/8 of an inch in from where the nice square edge would be in the end.

Using various dremel bits and hobby files I squared up the corners and filed all of the edges nice and smooth.

After the filing came the sanding. 200 grit, 320, 400 and then 600 wet to smooth out the scratches I made with the dremel.

Phew... lots of text there!

Here are a couple more pictures to make up for it!

I got the LEDs from TK-409. Nice and bright, and really draws attention:

I have had 2 different sets of lights: TK-409 and Shackman. I prefer the Shackman lights. Having the two smaller boards, one on either side, lends balance. And since it doesn't have as much vertical space above the LEDs, it lets the vest and armor sit better on my chest.

The armor is secured to the vest by a LOT of very small bolts, expoxied to the inside of the armor:

And a shot of how it all goes together:

Marking the holes in the vest was a challenge. Before securing the screws to the armor I placed it on the vest and lightly traced it with pencil. Once the bolts were on, I put a small dot of Rub and Buff on the tips of each screw and VERY carefully placed it back where it belonged on the vest. The R&B gave me marks to punch my holes. I punched holes in the vest and then fed the armor through. You sort of have to just get it right the first time or your vest will suffer. The result is great though... it sits VERY close to the body.

The last mod to the armor was filling in the dent on the codpiece. I am replicating the Magic of Myth suit, and there's no dent there.

I started off by masking the silver areas with Windsor & Newton latex masking fluid and painting it yellow. I used Rustoleum Line Striping Yellow for this layer. It looks closer than any other rattlecan I've tried.

Next was masking the yellow. On the belly I did a layer of Rustoleum Spruce Green for the fine scratches on the right side.

I then did more masking (the above mentioned fine scratches) and painted it all with American Accents Hunt Club Green, misted with a bit of the Spruce and a bit of the black. I did the black extra heavy on some spots to better match the movie armor as seen at the Magic of Myth exhibit.

Here it is with the latex removed and test fitted onto the vest:

And this shot has the decal and the Testors Dullcote finish.

This final shot shows the black banding on the armor... If you look closely at the MoM suit, you'll see that the edges of the armor are darker, and there's almost a diagonal streak of black.

Colors Used: