Adam Savage's One Day Builds: EPIC Spacesuit! (Part 1)

hey guys adam savage here in  my cave and welcome to part one   of my spacesuit build this happened because  the gaming network g4 reached out to me in late   spring of 21 and asked would you be interested  in building something cool in celebration of our   relaunch and i said hell yes i want to build  a couple of space suits and they said okay   and it all began with a visit from kevin pereira  host of geforce attack of the show to the cave   there's a lot to love here there's a lot to  believe yeah and i have i have laid out some   of my spacesuit collection here for a little  spacesuit 101 for you oh yeah please well it's   like this one way of thinking about a spacesuit  is that it is an anthropomorphic spaceship   okay and i love like very few things make me  as happy as that definition because i love the   idea of a spaceship in the shape of our body  sure even down two fingers what are we looking   at timeline wise on this table how many years of  evolution a fairly wide swath um we start in the   50s with the mercury suits these started  out as what's called a mark iv navy uh   pressure suit these were the very first pressure  suits built and then nasa effectively borrowed the   design and repurposed it for the mercury program  the funny thing about these suits is that to call   them spacesuits is a little bit of a misnomer they  can be the thing that helps you survive in space   that's all they help you do because when  this thing inflates it is a bubble and then   while you're breathing you have to work against  this bubble in order to do stuff so there were   no space walks in the in the mercury suits  in the bubble is the air inside the suit   to pressurize it yeah so if you were to experience  an explosive decompression in this suit oxygen   would dump into this suit and at uh i think the  brute it's like about four pounds per square inch   which doesn't sound like a lot given  that your bicycle tire is like 60   but in a big suit like this four pounds is a  hell of a lot of pressure and in order to bend   your arm you're working against that pressure to  do it so you can actually see some pictures of the   mercury astronauts in seats with inflated suits  and they're like barely able to full michelin man   or full stay puff exactly okay so space tv dinners  mercury program so pressurized that's the come   at me bro when it's filled with air so that they  can intimidate aliens that's why yeah right swole so if you look at these two the first thing you  might notice is that the mercury suit lies really   flat yes and the apollo suit is more dimensional  correct now this is actually because of a really   cool reason so remember i told you that when this  inflates it it becomes stiff and so you can easily   picture in your mind like uh inflatable  raft like bending it in half is difficult   and the reason bending it in half is difficult  is because you are making the amount of space   that is holding the air smaller right and so the  structure inside of an apollo suit is a structure   geared towards making sure that when you bend the  arm it doesn't change the volume and if you don't   change the volume then it becomes much easier to  bend the arm because you're not forcing air into   less areas exactly so the apollo suits had uh  cages in the shoulders and in the forearms and   in some of the thighs in order to actually do  that with rubber convolutes like ribbed rubber   pieces and sliding bearing ropes and  stuff like that so as you move instead of   cutting off the area it's opening in other  places to create space i had no idea right   and it turns out so everybody thinks of we think  culturally of spacesuits as a solved problem   we've been looking at them for decades it is so  far from a solved problem it is still a really   vexing and difficult thing and it's mostly because  every human is a different size nasa and the   military have spent billions trying to figure out  a one-size-fits-all solution of any kind and they   keep on determining there is no such thing as an  average human being okay this is this is what nasa   is currently using on spacewalks or a version of  it called the emu the extra vehicular mobility   unit uh and you can see how much different this  is than this yeah in terms of structure it's now   far more extent and it uses here let's um this is  for actual spacewalks right this is for actually   this is a suit of armor to protect you from  anything that might be floating about precisely   and to be clear this is just a replica of course  so go ahead and stick your arms up and put your   arms out and through the yep arms did i do  that yeah okay it's a little uncomfortable   it's a lot uncomfortable already yeah you really  undersold it yeah okay coming down there we go oh   that is so pretty there you go yeah okay yeah  thank you yeah so this utilizes what's called   a hut a hard upper torso and that's creating a  whole shell around your body and then there are   these shoulder cages that go on that and this is  much closer to what our suit is going to be like   the backpack will be part of the hard upper torso  there will be shoulder cages to create that very   specific look you see of the big shoulders on the  spacewalking astronaut our suit's going to be even   bigger and with more hard parts to it however the  difference is instead of getting in it the way   you just did we'll be getting in it through the  backpack the backpack is the door to the new nasa   suits and it is my favorite feature of them and  i think it's going to end up being yours too   yeah i can't imagine even because this is  just the replica right and it weighs like   20 pounds but it's already uncomfortable on  your body very uncomfortable and you know   range of motion is an issue and as it still is for  astronauts specifically because when you change   a suit's dimensions from one astro to another  even in small ways one or two inches can make   the world of difference in terms of what one  body can do inside a structure and one another   awesome beautiful amazing how do we get our own  where do we even begin well step one begins with   me uh actually assembling some wooden forms for  what the hard upper torso actually looks like   that's the center piece and it encompasses holes  for the arms for the waist for the head and also   a backpack door and i have some measurements  from nasa as to what sizes they're currently   working with and i'm going to implement that but  for you and g4 one of the questions to ask is   how do you want the suit to look what i have in my  head is that i'm going to build two suits that are   really functionally identical but aesthetically  quite different i have a very specific look of   being really old and beat up i want to do a  kind of moon janitor suit from 10 years from   now because that idea has been kind of thrilling  me but what is g-force like when you're searching   g4 spacesuit what do you want what's what's the  beacon yeah i mean our iconic orange color i know   the orange that they were using on those suits was  in case of takeoff or landing there was an issue findable yes yeah is that okay that our suit isn't  necessarily going to be used in that scenario   absolutely we can make it whatever we want you've  got a lot of work ahead of you it also sounds   like you have a plan that you're confident  in a rough plan okay i know not what that's   like but i'm going to let you get to it what a  pleasure man thank you adam see you next time   all right brett um this is day one so just a kind  of a of a download you've looked at this stuff   yeah yep so this is sort of our holy grail this  is the you see the hard upper torso the briefs   there's a bearing here and actually this  is the thing that i'm doing with this suit   that is the most complex part which is i'm  using the bearings if i can and i have found these cheap chinese lazy susan  bearings okay so go ahead and spin that   oh that's a high quality lazy season then it's it  but that's like 40 bucks as opposed to i mean a k   don of that is like probably five grand right oh  yeah yeah or or more or whatever they're using is   oh yeah well they i know they're actually  water air proof so here's what i've determined   i've determined that for the mo first of all this  works as the waste joint without any modification   it is actually like my waist fits in here nicely  what i'm working on here is a sort of a mechanical   progression so this waste joint mounts to the  hard upper torso but i've left the inner race   accessible so you can actually screw the torso to  the to the briefs okay so this is the kind of like   progression that we have to be thinking about  each time we're dealing with this is how do   these go together and can they be mechanically  taken apart so for the shoulders i've got these   these bearings these 12 inches i don't think they  need any modification um to be useful but out here   out here there's this bearing which  is like the elbow bearing and i guess   that could be this this starts to get a little  big but it's a little big so now i'm thinking   of something like this but this is actually  a little small and this is eight and this is   six is this six yeah this is six so this is the  main entrance this is how you get into the suit   this will have to be adjusted but uh i  have i have the interior that i cut out   and i'm actually planning to use this as the as  the interior door okay i'll cut this frame out   we'll probably put a piece of like panel material  in there a piece of aluminum to get some strength   okay and then all of the air and calms and stuff  will be here and like basically interface with the   wearer through through here okay so i'll have some  air blowing in i'll have speakers so you can hear   outside the costume yeah it's going to be really  neat so this is going to be the base of the waist   and these just sit there like that on a 45. i mean  the one thing i'm worried about is how heavy this   thing gets at the end with with all the bearings  yeah it it's going to add up but you know i've   also worn a 40 pound camping pack yeah where's the  main weight bearing i mean is it on your shoulder   it is so the way this here i'll show you um when  you step into this that is it come in like this   um there are two straps right here so yeah  the whole thing sort of hangs off of these   heavily padded straps and i have some neoprene  strap extenders i plan to make some really nice   big padding okay i think what i'd like  to do is have you start to work on this   which is the most busy work in this suit is  those shoulder cages okay and what these are   is a really simple structure each ring is  widest at the join point and narrows out up here   and then goes wide again so the other side of this  is identical okay what i was thinking of doing was   was making a set of strips that tapered out and  then back and tapered out and then back and then   these pieces which are basically it's like  it's like a pair of standoffs with a pair of   clamping plates and it just hits a stop each one  just gets a stop and extends a little further okay   yeah and so basically there's this uh ribbon  of material this ribbon of webbing runs through   these two plates and gets held in place yeah i  really feel like this is the this is a reasonable   relationship between the shoulder shoulder bearing  and the bicep bearing okay okay yeah this is   yeah this is what this whole job has been for me  is holding things up like this yeah it looks so   easy when yeah when it's float when it's floating  in air um to to our benefit i did already reverse   the jaws on the sixth jaw okay which should make  this operation at least for the interior a little   easier sound good sounds good all right sir yeah  and i'll try and get chewing through it well   brett is working on the shoulders i am working  on i thought this would be faster i thought   this would be a little faster and i embarked on  yesterday getting the pieces right so this is   the rear backpack hole that one enters the  suit through this is the neck ring these   are the two arm bearing holes and i've been  basically i have to get this geometry correct   it's more important than anything else  so i may end up spending like a full day   on this just adjusting the relationships between  this angle this angle the belly the waist   what do you call it the equatorial bearing  um yeah this is one of those parts where i   was like oh yeah i'll just get these all the  right size and they'll just find the right   orientation and it's not as simple as that  and i'm i i there's a very specific kind of   nasa explorer look i want this thing to evoke what  does nasa explore look look like i'm not exactly   sure but i'll know it when i'm close so that's my  goal today is to get at least close if not on it okay all right we're doing really well   i must say i started out after having spent all  day yesterday cutting out all of these shapes   and trying to get a form that worked for me  and not quite succeeding i came in this morning   well i think the best way to put it is  i'm just not used to having a deadline   like seriously i forgot that there's a certain  amount of commensurate stress with any deadline   and i'm certainly feeling it for the first time  in a long time so i came in this morning and i was   a little bit like chasing by the arrangement here  and i'm pleased to say that i i feel like i really   got it to something that i like so here's where we  are this oh hold on just have to to keep this from   it's a delicate arrangement until it's not  i just have to tape this in there we go   so this is the mold for my hard upper  torso of my spacesuit i enter the suit   like this this is the back hatch i'm going  through and my arms come out like this yep   so the whole goal with the geometry is  clearance for my head clearance for my face   that my shoulders are centered in these bearings  because that's where they are the most um comfortable to use i'm not going to  space in this but that is definitely   a consideration for the astronauts  and now i need to work out the crotch   and once i figured out the geometry on that  then i'm going to cover this with spandex to get my form and then once i have it covered  with spandex i'm going to hit it with a little   more fiberglass and then my forms are done except  for the cutting and the sanding i'm not pulling   the plywood out the plywood that you see is always  going to be part of my space suit and it will   provide me like some meat to actually attach stuff  to so there will be an aluminum neck ring here   for this there will be bearings here on the  shoulders for the arms and there will be this   big 18 inch bearing here and so what i need to do  right now is i need to work out here come with me   i need to work out how the crotch works  i don't know if i have to say crotch i   can say briefs i think that's what nasa  calls it maybe i don't have to use oh yeah you see this is the arrangement that i'm  talking about i have some choices to make here and   this lots bears on the decision i make here see  there's bearings here there's bearing here and all   of my movement is about the proper relationship  of all those bearings to each other and to my body   so the actual distance of this business yeah  right here to the crotch is really important and nope here's what i'm going to do this suit  floats on some shoulder straps that will sit   here and keep it sort of floating exactly  at the right orientation that i want it   that orientation of these bears directly on where  this part contacts my legs and allows me to move now i could just measure this height to there and  make the form but to be honest i think i'm going   to make the form more like this and i'm going to  bridge this gap i'm going to bridge that with some   wood and cloth like i don't have to get fancy on  that in fact you can see in nasa suits they have   all sorts of spacers here for different sized  astronauts not that i'm making this suit to   handle different size astronauts but it allows  me to defer the problem solving of the exact   correct orientation and arrangement between this  frame and this frame which like like i'm saying i   could go one way which is like i put all my eggs  in the basket of getting this relationship right   or i give myself some adjustability later and  reader yes you guessed it i'm always up for a   little more later it looks like as long as i stand  this up about four inches not about four inches   dude my forearm has never been more useful  than this exact moment in time yeah four inches   and this sits higher so it'll be yup yup yup  four inches four inches i think it's four   inches i'm really happy with how this looks  this like this arrangement it's all feeling   right and proper which i'm psyched about there's something really beautiful and elegant  about this form i'm very i'm very happy with it   yeah okay the thing about fiberglasses it's more about the  glass than the fiber part and what i've got here   is some spandex that'll that gives me the rough  form i need for my fiberglass but this will not   provide the strength what i'll do is i'll  glass over this with epoxy uh resin and then   i will go over it with uh actual fiberglass two  layers of uh i think i've got like a three ounce   fiberglass nice and thin and that should give  these exactly the structure that i want and uh   yeah hopefully by the end of the week i'm  popping these off their moorings and starting   to actually mechanically attach stuff to  them well wonders never cease i'm really it's starting to you know me i always like  that moment when it starts to feel like a thing   this is that moment it's quite  nice all right let's see here ow i didn't staple myself it was just  the actual concussion of the staple this is a momentous occasion because  this thing of fiberglass i bought   as a roll this big around about 20 years ago and  i'm about to finish it two three four five six seven here comes number seven and eight hey look at that that's incredible  i never thought i'd get to the end of that uh epoxy compound is uh it doesn't smell very bad  and that's not great because it leads you to a   false sense of security it's a cumulative toxin  where your body doesn't shed it as easily as it   does polyester which is weird because polyester  smells like crap and much more like chemical but   your body can actually process it so epoxy is a  cumulative toxin you want to wear a respirator   the fact that you can't smell it is not the bonus  because it makes you feel too safe around it i have uh i'm using this epoxy  which has a longer pot life   that means i'll have more time to  work with it before it heats up i forgot i forgot the specific  thing about fiberglass   i hate fiberglass it takes a long time  and it can be an unforgiving process the thing about fiberglass is  it always feels like you're   for me it always feels like i'm right on the edge  of total disaster right like oh it might be going   great but if i left it here i'd lose days of work  i don't like those kind of stakes often you're   choosing fiberglass because you want a certain  strength to weight ratio which means that it   going that that it laying down without any bubbles  is paramount oh it's so stressful and then it's   also one of those processes that looks like [ __ ]  until it looks perfect it looks awful it literally   looks like you know you're pranking someone  until you get it right and then it looks amazing all right end of day one and it has been  a little bit of a roller coaster today the plan was that i was going to put these two  forms together stretch spandex over them and use   the spandex as a base matrix for the form that  i would fiberglass over and that's exactly what   i did for this form except that i found getting  the fiberglass to lay against the spandex while it   was still soft to be a real pain in the ass uh and  frankly halfway through glassiness i was convinced   it was all gonna go to [ __ ] luckily it didn't  and i'm actually really happy with how it came out   but i didn't like the process so i did the second  form a little bit differently uh i painted the   spandex first with resin just to make it a little  more dimensionally stable then i let that set   for a couple of hours and then i went over it  with two layers of fiberglass and that worked   much better this is how i'm going to tackle the  briefs tomorrow it was a much more straightforward   and less confusing and vexing process but the  fact is i always find fiberglassing to be a   vexing process it is always like in the middle of  it i'm always convinced it's going to go to hell   so i am very pleased with how these look  right now i cannot wait to actually start   cutting them out uh and really feeling how they  feel on my body the plywood rings have settled   in perfectly and these will be the bases for  the bearing so the bearings are going to screw   right to those pieces of wood there are  so many steps but this was a good day day two checking in uh the briefs i keep wanting  to call them shorts but that doesn't really track   the briefs were done in the way that i learned  the first way to do it which is to build the forms   stretch the spandex over that and then hit  that with resin it is now drawing in a couple   of hours i'll be able to glass over these but  i'm really really happy with how these look   there's a little bit of space between the  briefs and my hard upper torso that space   will be bridged with soft goods later um and  that should give us a lot of extra comfort   that should give us the ability to add  some more comfort to the suit in case   i feel like i need a little bit of flexibility in  the torso but yeah it's really nice to see these   on the bench for the first time when i've just  been conceptualizing this for so long the hardest   part of figuring out how to design these forms was  figuring out how to make something strong enough   that i could stretch spandex over and still remove  much of that framework from it once it was set so   once this sets what i'll be  doing is i'll be removing   these three pieces of plywood and all that will  remain will be the fiberglass form around these   it will be glued to the plywood so that will be a  permanent marriage and it will then screw to the   bearing the waist bearing which will be connecting  to the hard upper torso this allows me to have   both some structural elements but also as much  open space inside as possible which i need it is this is by far the most ambitious   spacesuit thing i have ever attempted and after  thinking about it for weeks and looking at   thousands of pictures of nasa and nasa vendors  work on the next generation of exploration suits   um it's very gratifying to see them i i this  angle here turns out to be a simple 45 degree   angle and to be honest when i put this form on  it actually felt like i had all the movement i   wanted i was a little afraid of this gap here  if that would feel strange and it doesn't   there's so many i am anticipating so many ways  this could turn into a disaster um oh yeah   so right there's a problem okay so i  just noticed a problem which is that uh   the bottom of this is level but the  bottom of this is not um you see this   that now when you look at it i think  you can see there's an actual bow here i'm going to have to take care of that right now  this is still setting so i have time i think what   i'm going to do is i'm going to get a piece of i  think i might have a piece of mdf or scrap plywood   i'll put it underneath this and screw up into it  to pull it down that should get me close enough   that the final pull will happen from the bearing  itself the bow the bow is here yeah ah nailed it wonderful great this is a part of this whole equation that  i am the least certain about and the most excited   about and have put in the most amount of like  mental energy trying to end run around screw-ups   and i feel pretty confident that uh well i feel  pretty confident about these they've set up nicely   it's still a tiny bit soft but i can trim   i can trim i can trim trimming is  what's about to happen very excited so i'm really pleased um it feels funny being  me because seriously in the middle of every   build i'm just convinced it's going to be an  unmitigated disaster and then when i'm like   i've reached a substantive milestone i'm  always so excited i'm going to take pictures   of this and moon over it all night just as i am  thinking about the steps for tomorrow but this is this is a nasa design xemu or artemis  generation suit hard upper torso   and since it's a rear entry suit this is the  backpack and this is how one gets in it like this right so there's pants attached to this and  this is actually sitting at this level and   you like crawl up a step ladder and crawl  in and then you you get in here to the pants   you get your arms out into the arms and then you   like this and then somebody presumably  connects your shoulder straps here yeah dude this is this is going to be so awesome my  biggest i have one fear right now and my fear is   that the overall sheer weight of bearings is going  to make this a super unpleasant thing to wear   not much i can do about that i mean i  it's not a lot i could do about that but   we'll see i don't think it's going  to happen but again i don't know future of spacesuits it's very exciting it is a new day and with some of the mechanical  problem solving out of the way and some of the   hard parts underway to my satisfaction it's  time to start cladding this thing and that is   the way to think about it that the space spacesuit  itself is an anthropomorphic spaceship and it is   coated in layers of fabric that provide  many different functions for the astronaut   obviously one of them is insulation and protection  from the harsh environment of space another one is   air tightness so that they can breathe pressurized  pressurized oxygen but another lesser known   feature is well it's hidden not hidden it's in the  name it's called a micrometeoroid garden garment   it is literally like uh the number of layers  help to catch little tiny bits of debris that   are flying around up there in space at you  know 18 000 miles per hour if you're clocking   it i am bringing in a cosplayer and sewing  teacher christine noble to work with us on   patterning out and sewing up the  cladding for these two suits and i'm   i am super excited about this i've talked in the  past about the difference between replication and   uh imitation and in this most of what i  do in terms of prop work is replication   uh in this case i'm not replicating a specific  suit i am replicating a kind of an er suit to   my preference from all of the different artemis  and z2s 2.5 designs that are out there to make   a kind of a hybrid perfect model that's the  goal uh and so now that i got some hard parts   christine can start to figure out how they  fit together okay so this is the this is the   centerpiece of the suit it's called the hard upper  torso uh it's got let's see here's the topography   of it that's the waist bearing for turning there's  a bearing on each shoulder here and then a static   helmet that just bolts in here it's actually  going to be two nested pieces of acrylic   i can't wait to see those i live in terror that i  got this profile wrong and that when they show up   they won't be right oh no i'm sure they're right  yeah yeah i worked with the same drawing the   people i hired did but you know things could go  wrong um so everything here is relatively modular   right there's a piece of cloth that covers this  piece almost on a one-to-one basis and i figure   will uh barge glue down velcro on the edge here  i'll have um there'll be some more details to this   uh and this is a later piece but so there's a  piece of fabric that covers this there's a piece   of fabric inside the shoulder that goes inside  this guy and that's like a tube and then there's   like a shoulder bell that covers over that there's  a secondary bearing here and then that goes to the   forearm which is also a like a multi-section thing  and that ends in the glove you'll be able to this   fabric covering will go inside a aluminum  bolt-on piece so it'll terminate in there   there'll be an aluminum frame that goes around  here so anything that velcros can will get covered   you know it's there's a lot of places in which  we'll be able to hide the details i think for the this is an interesting transition here because  the shorts are under here and it needs to both   spin but also be covered so we'll probably  have like over the bearing a lip of fabric okay   so the fabric is covering the joint in  between exactly okay but i'm not sure   whether this joint is going to occur here  or down here there's like a four inch gap   between here and the shorts and i'm making a  spacer piece that fills that gap but i'm not   i still haven't determined whether actually and  i don't necessarily have to i can i can kind of   change the bearing to be on the top or the bottom  of the equation depending on which feels better   yeah but that will change how we drape this we  can still just do a flat drape over this and   then if we're adding a lip at the bottom we just  add a lip at the bottom absolutely yeah and you   can see it in a lot of nasa's test suits there's  like i mean especially in the waist there's like   multiple pieces they add in and it's all about  adjusting the suit to each astronaut the whole   reason this cage exists is to achieve a joint  whose volume doesn't change even when it moves   if you take a pool noodle that's inflatable and  try and bend it you you're increasing the pressure   because you're making the space inside the pool  noodle smaller yes and so astronauts since time   and memorial when they put on a pressurized suit  they're working against the bubble of the suit   and it's a tremendous amount of physical labor  so all of this engineering the hard upper torso   and the cage is such that when this moves the  volume inside this does not shift at all oh   and when the volume doesn't change it makes it  much easier for the astronaut to move it around   isn't that fascinating oh that's so cool it's  really satisfying to see this thing moving we   only finished this yesterday but to watch it move  around after looking at pictures for years it's   really neat it is it is really cool and it i i'm  still kind of like i i kept thinking about how you   shared with me this is how you move your arm right  yeah challanger was telling me in order to raise   your arm you don't just do this you literally do  this changes the whole sleeve cap yeah because i   i will tell my students i'm like think about how  your arm moves when you're patterning something   where do you need that ease and it's like well  if we're only moving our arm up like here so do   we need to have so much here by the end of the day  i should have these guys mounted in here yeah i'm   just working out the elbow bearings right now so  that you can start patterning off of a full elbow   bearing as well as a shoulder bearing perfect a  key aspect of the suit that i'm building is that   it's going to have working bearings and i want  to talk about working bearings for a few minutes   first off nasa does have airtight bearings and i  kind of understand how they're built and i still   really have no idea how they achieve an airtight  free-moving bearing like that is a kind of black   magic to me um i have not seen many replicas of  space suits like not real spacesuits that actually   utilize bearings except for fbfx's incredible  yellow hard suit they made for alien covenant   it's a masterpiece um but when andrew dao of  fbfx was first figuring out how to make a fully   hard bearing suit he was looking at these little  thin bearings kaydon makes some um and they're   available six inch eight inch uh really thin  bearings but they're like they can be up to a   thousand dollars a piece and in fact i think the  very first price he came up with for bearing out a   suit was like over 20 000 british pounds which  is crazy in contrast this right here is like   a i don't know it's 20 or 20 lazy susan bearing  this is an 8 inch bearing this is nearly ideal for   my elbow bearing except for the fact that it's too  fat but the bearings are really small they're like   three millimeters four millimeters i can remove  a bunch of this meat here and make this bearing   both lighter and smaller so i'm kind of just using  my labor to get myself that thin bearing that i   can't afford for this suit i hope it works  i'm not sure that it will i've got a jig   set up on my lathe to cut down four of  these for the two suits elbow bearings whoo-hoo-hoo that's my bearing race   that's the new internal bearing race and  here's my plywood jig i cut to hold on to it   three more of those and i'm good i am grateful  that this part of the equation is done that is my last outer bearing race i'm going to  let it cool down clean them up put some bearings   back together the difficulty here is that i have  an imperfect knowledge of bearings there's a lot   that can go wrong with bearings as i have as i  took down all four of these bearings to thinner   i'm running into the issues about having aluminum  races which is that they are out of round so the   bearings go through a hole and they get spread  around and then you plug that hole with a set   screw which you have to lock because the depth  of that set screw that keeps the ball bearings   in there is super important if it's too low  they bang into it if it's too high they get   caught up in there all of this is stuff i have  learned uh the hard way in the last two hours   um so i'm attempting to just make all  the fine adjustments in these pieces that's good enough in order to finish them out so once i once i shortened it i can no longer i don't  have a set screw short enough because it's like   literally maybe 80 thou um but i'm putting it in  locking it with a little bit of super glue and   then i'm surrounding it with this right with this  surround i'm going to put on as a pressure fit   that's the theory and then hopefully look i mean  i i i part of me is like i get nervous when i   hear like a rattle in here and i don't need  to because this is going here it's literally   enduring the least amount of stress  of any bearing in the suit it's just   i hear a rattle and i want to take care of it when absolute positionality of a of a hole like  this is super important just go really really   slow let like the weight of the drill make the  hole at first and then just slowly add pressure oh yeah got it that really is the best sound  effect we have in the shop   okay so now this should be a press fit  on here if i got it right and it is that is just about as okay good so you see  this see that that little that what i want   to do with that is i want to straighten it  out just a little bit and add a second rivet and that will give me the press fit of my dreams that's it okay oh it's that  is really good i'm very happy   again none of this gets seen this all  happens behind the scenes as it were   and again i'm just holding it in i figure with  such a positive surface to surface contact   that thin crazy glue thin ca glue is  totally reasonable for marrying these two okay i'll let that set and here we go baby this this super exciting to me that is a it's making these things feel like real things  so i'm going to get i'm going to clear away these   tools and get my hut up here and start attaching  the shoulder bearings to them this is the shoulder   bearing this will be the elbow bearing brett  foxwell is making the mechanical interface between   the two of these and christine is making starting  on the fabric interface between all of that i got   to tell you just putting this up here gives me a  thrill um so i'm going to need let's see right i'm   going to need to do several things one i'm going  to need to screw through these mounting holes and am i going to thread them i think i am going to  thread them yeah i'll thread through the wood   with quarter inch so there's a few steps one is  i have to drill these all out uh one quarter inch   holes then i have to make those holes line  up with this and in order to do that i've   got a little bit of a lip here i was unable to  eliminate and that'll mean that i have to cut away   some of the aluminum here just a little bit  just like from here to here yeah it's like that   if i basically cut that away on the bandsaw  that should allow this to sit nicely in there   still have a circular profile and then i  can screw it together it's all happening what i've been doing is uh patterning a piece to  go inside of this a piece of cloth and then so   that it will be able to be worn and be comfortable  because um as i was saying this is not going to   necessarily move because the rotation is here for  the shoulder and so then the first thing i did was   i made a muslin drape where i just put a piece of  fabric inside of it pinned it down a few places   made a couple lines cut into it drew out what i  liked brought it out put it on my pattern paper   trued some of my lines then went back to  the form took measurements from the form   brought the measurements over here to see  like how i can make this fit properly made   a few adjustments a few times and this is my  fourth that i'm trying so i wanted to just sit   absolutely perfect and again there's just a few  adjustments that i'm making right now uh so i   i initially thought that it could just sit in it  but then like just have velcro at these points but   then as i put the muslin in here it really needs  to be at each rib it's going to need some kind of   some way for it to attach so that we get  that same effect that we see in the spacesuit   where even when the fabric is folded on itself  it's still attached you still see the ribbing   you still see like the shape of the rib  so i need air circulation inside this suit   i'm also going to have a cool  suit so i don't overheat but   that doesn't keep my visor from fogging what  keeps my visor from fogging is a constant airflow   this is always a problem inside a costume  because you've got to route the air and when   you're routing the air you're inhibiting it like  i know it doesn't seem like air is going to slow   down making a bend but it is and every time you  put in a band if you put in a really hard right   angle one you're losing you're losing air flow so  i'm thinking about these right now in the backpack   so all of the electronics sit in the backpack none  of them sit inside here and they all connect to it   so in the backpack these fans will be out towards  the back there'll be there'll be an angle down   so that their intake is the underside of the  backpack so no one will see it and i'll have like   some buckram or you know a lightweight  screen in there so the air comes in here   and then it'll come up through these and i  think i'm actually going to use some sintra to make a pair of custom ducts that  come up and make the gentle curve   to exit out here this here's  where i am in the suit   which means the air is going to come up  about here and they'll be i'm thinking of uh i guess it's a register a blowhole i was going to  say yeah a hole here and on either side of my head   to push the air this way because it wants to  come out here it wants to come across the top   and the apollo helmets the bubble helmets the  air came through a manifold at the base back   of the neck and then spread out and went around  the helmet that's how they kept it from fogging   and this one like i said i'll have one air hole  here one air hole there i'm also gonna have i'm also gonna have the ability to hear out of  this so i'll have a microphone out in front that   i'll have some speakers here i'm toying around  with the idea of buying a point of purchase uh   a little amplifier like my coffee shop uses  just because it's like a turnkey system but   this is how nasa does it like all of  their speakers and electronics are in   the backpack itself it's really really neat  and it's actually it's hard to overstate how   much that makes the kitting out of the spacesuit  much more efficient um when you start to look   at the you know as far back as the mercury  program where the astronauts were like hey   i was up there in space and i couldn't see  the cockpit when i wasn't facing the sun and   they're like oh i guess we're going to solve  that problem so they made a little flashlight   for john glenn's finger that worked great except  it cut circulation off to his finger apparently   you know the nasa space suits have com systems  they have electronics they have warmers they   have cooling systems etc all built in and wrapped  around the body and it's um possessing myself a   you know an imitation apollo soup just fitting  stuff in and around that is is a pain in the   ass this makes it so much easier and i'm pretty  sure it's the same institutionally for for nasa i'm so psyched about this so these would live  back here in the backpack which would live about   there it's going to be aluminum lip here and a  pair of big old clevis hinges then these will   come up and i'll make a nice gentle whoop like  that yeah that really ought to do um actually yeah that's a nice amount of wind coming out  of those i definitely want the pair of them   it's not that noisy i mean i know that people who  have a problem with that would be the cameraman   but inside here i'm going to be mite i'm going  to have a you know a calm right by my mouth   also this will be in the backpack  so it'll be separated from me by   a couple of layers it would be like this all right yeah i ought to be able to  reduce the volume of that noise the the two most major components of this  suit are the hard engineering parts like   this shoulder structure and this fiberglass  hut and then the soft parts that cover them   um it used to be that it was that the nasa suits  were primarily soft part suits with some hard   parts in them and it feels like there's a big  shift happening where it's a lot of hard part   engineering with soft parts cladding the hard  parts and so that's what we'll be doing for this   one of the nice things about covering  this as opposed to building an apollo suit   is that it's completely modular there's like one  piece that covers this but it doesn't continue to   the arms because they rotate so there's a second  piece that covers over this then there's another   piece on the forearm same thing with the briefs  there is a piece that covers the briefs there are   two pieces that cover the thighs that continue  down to the calves after the knee bearings so   uh one of the graces of this as a construction  project is that each piece can be patterned   now while we're working out the engineering and  built uh later in time rather if you're doing   something where the suit itself is monolithic then  you kind of have to answer all of your questions   before you get started on it this allows us to  sort of work through this piece by piece bit by   bit solving problems as we go uh and it also gives  us more room to move on the back end i actually   this might be one of the uh more straightforward  i want to say straightforward i don't think it's   more straightforward but i like the modularity the  modularity is like a relaxing thing in my brain   because it means these problems are discrete  problems to solve and their long tails don't   affect every other set of problems to work on was  that a reasonable way to put it i am working right   now on a piece that will make this costume put  honorable because it's a rear-entry suit and it's   monolithic it's going to be the suit itself is one  piece getting into it is way more than just like   somehow pulling it on like a pair of pants no no  no it actually has to sit on a stand right at the   waist bearing with stairs that go up so you like  crawl up the stairs and get in and there's a chin   up bar up here and you like lower yourself into  the suit i have to make that whole stand as well   because it's a key part of the suit it's part of  putting it on as such i have come up with a system   and nasa has several different systems  for locking their suits into the   what do you call it the donning stand as i guess  as it were i am choosing to do uh four holes that   will be half inch holes placed uh like this so  you kind of basically walk into a trapezoid and   you can't go any further and then you lower down  and now the suit is sitting on the thing and   you can open the backpack and crawl out again  i'm making that interface the piece that sits   there and holds it a lot of strength this piece  needs to be strong so i'm using my really good   uh like 11 ply arctic birch ply um baltic birch  ply i don't know why i keep saying arctic sorry   baltic birch ply for these pieces specifically   after this i need to make a spacer which is a kind  of a flexion ring in the real suit that actually   has a bladder i don't know exactly how that works  but it is the interface between the briefs and   the hut and uh so it's all circles for the next  for the next couple of hours uh and hopefully   by the end of today we should have much of this  suit mocked up and connected to itself i am uh   about to cut out these forms and i'm just  i want nice clean edges so i'm doing all   this with the router on both of these  then i'll cut these out on the band saws   it's a it's a whole process but it's going  to look like a great part when we're all done do hi you're watching the video and in the very  roughly first part of the video about making these   spacesuits i might have said oh i haven't seen  many other people use bearings in their cosplay   spacesuits and i just want to stop right here  and give the caveat that it's now later in the   build and i have since discovered that many many  people have in fact used these bearings in their   spacesuits and it is a nice lesson which is every  time you think that you're breaking new ground   you might want to check yourself because  i frequently find that i'm not breaking   the ground many other people have trodden the  ground i am standing and walking on uh and this   is one of those cases tom sacks used bearings  like this in his suits the risdy people used   a bunch of bearings in their suits and they  look great so just giving this caveat up front   so we know all where we stand thanks okay  back to the regular scheduled program so i'm just making sure that each step i'm taking  i'm taking the right step and not the wrong step   it's pretty technical i don't mean to  get overly you know scientific on you i was successful in turning these bearings  down and i'm still concerned about the weight   of the combined total of the rest  of the bearings in each of the suits   but i don't want to do any more of this this  extremely this bearing as small as it is   when i machined it it went slightly out of round  and it took me a while to kind of dial these back   in i don't want to get into that kind of mess with  this but i have this loose idea that i could set   up a and this can be done after the fact it  could be done after i've built the suit even   making a router jig and using a carbide router  blade to come in and just pull out little chunks   out of each one on the outside i think i've  calculated that i could remove as much as   three pounds from each suit just by doing that  that might not be the difference between like   wearability and non-wearability but you know it's  it's in the it's in the roster just in case uh   now it's time to actually install the first waste  bearing there's so many parts and pieces of this so what i'm working on right now is a  ring that will transition from the hut   to the waist bearing but it also  needs to be the stand and this is   it's not a suit you can just put on if it's on  the ground it needs to actually be standing up   on something so you can get up on steps and then  get into it so these holes here on this flange   they are part of the system of the rack that  will hold this thing up which will be this   trapezoidal rack you'll step into it that  will align in a notch here and then these   four holes will rest on four little quarter  inch dowel pins and that should provide a nice   amount of positive grab to hold this thing up and  it's going to sit just below there right so you   can get in it and stand up and now you're free and  freedom tastes of reality you go explore the moon not all spray paints are created equal this is  a primer i put on this morning and it's still   actually tacky which is frankly tacky the  geometry of my shorts is a little bit wrong   it's fine for my suit the real suits they're  briefs that's what these are called this hard part   the brief's geometry tilts a little forward and  favors the wearer because our butts don't work   the way we think they do in  cartoons then we're actually like   anyway sorry you didn't need to know all this the  geometry is a little different so that goes there i have to tell you just the fact that i can do all  that by myself feels a little bit like a triumph look at that that is awesome looking  okay so now again i'm remember a while back i got a measurement yeah okay so   now the question is what is the  average of this measurement here three and a half plus the sixteenth all right   and a quarter all right so i still feel like  three and five eighths sounds like a reasonable   i can add spacers should i need to  okay three and five eighths thank you all right so this is definitely the front i like  that for the front i'm going to codify it front so i'm not sure if the space or fabric with the  staples will be enough to hold up the bottom   of this suit if it doesn't i could simply add  some uh cordura canvas in here to augment it   but i'm also going off the theory that  using hundreds of staples as i have i'm   kind of operating like sewing right sewing is a  distributed force lots of little tiny twists of a   easily breakable thread can make  something that'll save your life   i don't know whether this will save  my life but um maybe it'll save my ass   i know i'm sorry this is how this oh right  so this goes in here like this and then this comes back here   so the question is do these line up the way i  want them to the answer is mostly mostly they do   great great great all right oh yeah that can't  go there can it no i gotta yeah we'll do that   i don't know if you're detecting it but i'm  starting to get a little giddy as like the   these pieces are going  together i must i must admit   i have been thinking about this construction  of this suit for years actually okay yeah so that holds up the whole suit  from the underside that's not a problem okay yeah that's all aligned right it is front thank god i labeled it on the inside hold these old knees there we go dude okay let's try it out front front in right foot left foot okay so there's one issue is that  i can't even get my body in it aha that's the problem oh ow okay yeah so yeah lots has changed here right it's forcing me  so far down yeah no so i made these way too proud   i gotta cut them back which was always part of  the problem part of the however they make this   far more comfortable so i just  need to add a little more room   it looks like another inch up and that'll make  it easier to get my arms in i think i might have   sprayed myself and to be honest the  way it's distributing it's not that bad to be fair my issue with backpack straps would be  how much this would move on them and right now the   way these things are sitting they're kind of great  so i'm going to play a little more with this idea   i'm going to make a second set of these i  don't think they need to be any farther in   i definitely need more padding but this is a great place to start really really happy with how this yeah right now it's pushing my arms  so far down they're like sticking out   like i worked out too much  dude i didn't skip bicep day i don't mind you but i'm pretty happy oh  you're not working on this i am i'm happy

Channel: Adam Savage’s Tested

Views: 307,302

Keywords: tested, adam savage, adam savage one day build, adam savages one day builds, one day builds, one day builds tested, space suit, adam savage space suit, tested one day builds, adam savage g4, g4tv, kevin pereira, kevin pereira g4, kevin pereira attack of the show, adam savage space suit build, xemu space suit, space suit replica, adam savage costume build, adam savage tested space suit, adam savage tested costumes, adam savage one day build costume, nasa space suit replica

Id: 0FKxM-zNZBk

Length: 70min 32sec (4232 seconds)

Published: Wed Nov 17 2021