Ok, figured like everyone else, i should document our GB work journey.
I’m shooting for something a cross between movie accurate, and what I can locate available, and within a reasonable price. Also, since my wife will be wearing one, a 35-50 pound pack was just out of the question. Our packs so far (without the alice frames, or the insulating foam synchronous generator parts are abut 5 pounds or so tops. I don’t know how much the alice frames weight, but I’m guessing with the proton guns, we’ll be around 10-12 pounds tops, and fully geared up, we’ll have maybe a 18 pound total load.
We are doing two uniforms, two goggles, two packs, 1 ghost trap, 1 cobbled PKe meter, one turkey bulb squeeze thing, ghost bombs, and probably something else I’m forgetting.
So far, we’ve spent about $230 or so, and have aquired everything (I think) for the packs and wands, including lighting, 2 flight suits, 2 pistol belts, 2 alice frames, and everything for the goggles.
Total shopping time is probably 14 hours total.. and that’s a lot of getting things, looking at them, taking them back and getting other parts instead.
For completeness, here are our goggles.. note they still need stickers, wider band replacements, top bands, and some additional knobs.. I have them all, but we wanted to really start the packs.
Here are the wip for the proton packs. We’ve cut some corners, and substituted some items, but I think they are coming out FAR better then anticipated.
This is our initial test layout for the packs: (This changed a LOT.. we found we kept buying things far too large.. guess the movie makes them look larger then life? But this is what we finally settled on.
And this is after about 5 hours of work:
Thing of note:
Ion rods are not brass, but are far cheaper steel painted brass.. 
Blue electrical boxes are all from Lowe’s, but Home depot also carries the same brand and parts.
Power light is a lanyard jogging stick from walmart.. it’ll be inside the power box, and can either flash, or light steadily. ($3.50 or so) (At some point, I’d LOVE a source for blue chasers, if someone has a cheap resource.)
Light inside the cyclotron are fading leds. the power box for them is on the lower left, and will easily be accessible for turning on or off, and also for battery swaps. One we have red lenses of the hols, I think even though colored, they’ll look fine. (They were $7.99 each, from target and had easy to pull off clear skeletons on them.)
Another diversion we’ve made, is for wire couplings that are not elbows, and for various brass nut additions, they will just be standard cheap bots, with nuts attached, painted brass color. Looks good, and about 1/10th the price!
We started with Norm’s plans, but quickly diverted, since many of the parts just aren’t available around here, and Halloween is just around the corner. We specifically did not cut the motherboard since placement and parts was an initial work in progress, and changed often.
The caution striped thing in the middle is our take on Bradster’s ghost bombs. Cheap easy, and look decent.
Not shown, was our solution to the expensive ribbon cable.. simple rainbow ribbon from Michael’s, that actually looks pretty decent! Also, we are using insulation foam for the synchronous generator, and to raise the booster away from the motherboard.
We’re also going to try something unique for the gun hand grips: 3/4 inch pvc insulation, with wrapped black zip ties tightly attached, to give it that “handgrip” kind of look.
Military gear should arrive later this week, as well as blue spinning battery powered police lights that will sit on the top left of the pack for entry “impact”.
Any comments, feedback, criticisms, improvements would be greatly appreciated!
