Where can I buy an inflation suit? Stuffing is fun but I want to feel the pressure, if you know what I mean. ;)
Where to buy suits
I had a Cocoon suit, the old B70 model. It has since been discontinued, and for good reason--you could feel no pressure at all! It just expanded outward because the inner and outer layers were the same thickness. In trying to increase the sense of pressure, I damaged the suit, and the person I sent the suit to for repair eventually stole it from me.
The moral--besides the obvious--is that if you get a suit, get the outer layer a thicker gauge of latex than the inner. :) Darkside Creations seems very accomodating and has done several custom pieces; I would start there.
You can buy full inflation suits, right? A la Violet from Willy Wonka, y'know, whole body inflating and not just belly inflation?
You can buy full inflation suits, right? A la Violet from Willy Wonka, y'know, whole body inflating and not just belly inflation?
Yes, you can buy full body inflatable suits. However, the "look" they inflate to probably isn't what you have in mind. I have never seen a suit that's for sale which inflates like the one violet did (or that clown from the Sunny D comercial ;) ). Besides, I beleive those suits you saw were single layered. So no pressure would be felt.
Mr.Blowup had a lot of full body suits, they all inflated to something sorta like this (maybe a bit bigger I recall)
http://www.darksidecreations.com/product.asp?productid=175
Hmm, if it's a sense of pressure you're after there is the home build option as well.
Hmm, if it's a sense of pressure you're after there is the home build option as well.
Trust this man's advice! Sievert knows about home-built inflation suits!
how easy/hard is it to make one? Can you give me some directions?
I have seen some pics of outfits that end up in a ball, though I'm not sure how they start out.
Some of them lean a little more towards the shape in the scene from 'The Time Bandits', which is fairly similar but just taken a bit further.
Take a look at-
http://www.latex-kontor.de/
The links section (a lot dead) at-
http://groups.yahoo.com/group/inflatable/links
Also take a look around at -
http://groups.yahoo.com/group/inflated/
http://groups.yahoo.com/group/Inflated2/
You'll have to dig around a bit at these last two, but there are some good shapes among all the other stuff (plus links etc).
The Germans seem to like inflatable stuff a lot. Maybe just as well - the suits need to be well engineered....
There are a some places to buy suits. Darkside Creations and Cocoon to name a few. But I've heard some places are to be avoided. Which ones, I don't know.
The ultimate person to talk to about this sort of thing would probably be Mr.Blowup. He had a huge inflatable suit collection. But his site went down a long time ago and I haven't heard or seen him since.