EVA Foam: the First Armor Build

Build guide 🛡️ · Workshop crew · Nov 2026

The foam

EVA foam comes in thicknesses; the build's vocabulary is millimeters: 2 mm for fine detail and straps, 5 mm for the main plates, 10 mm for bulky forms. Yoga-mat "floor foam" works for practice; craft-store "foamies" are thin craft foam — the pro-grade sheets are denser, hold bevels, and take heat without melting into pancakes.

Cutting & bevels

• Sharp blades only — dull blades chew foam; change the blade per session.
• A bevel is a cut at an angle: two pieces whose edges are beveled opposite directions glue flat into a smooth curve — the seam trick of the whole craft.
• Templates printed at true size (the build sheets) trace with a white marker; cut once, not twice.

Heat forming

Heat gun, moving the whole time: the foam softens, you hold the curve, it remembers. Ventilate, wear gloves, and never heat an assembled piece with glue inside before reading the glue's temp rating.

Glue & primer

• Contact cement: coat both faces, wait tacky, join once — do not reposition. Outdoors or ventilated.
• Primer: Plasti Dip or gesso makes the foam paintable and seals pores; 2–3 light coats beat one heavy one.

Paint, briefly

Flexible paints or flexible-primer systems (a rigid paint cracks at every bend). Washes in recesses, dry-brush on edges, masking for hard lines — and photograph before the con: the paint looks different in hall light.

Fixes