This essay will outline the basic procedures of assembling a brace using parts from the Brace Shop. Although these are preformed and partially assembled, the whole procedure will probably take you about fifty hours. The work is not difficult but does require some manual dexterity and the access to a workshop with the most common hand and machine tools. After reading this description, you should know whether the work involved is within your means. If you need more help, do not hesitate to contact the author at milwaukee@unforgettable.com.
Start by taking some measurements. Mark the waistline with a thin belt. Place the patient on a hard stool and note the distance from the waist to the seat. The back of the girdle should reach to within 2 to 3 inches of the chair. In the front, notice the distance from the waist to the top of the thighs and to the chin when sitting erect.
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Put the module on the patient and
transfer the waistline to the plastic. Use a whiteboard pen or a crayon to
simplify the removal of the markings later. Using the measurements and images
of finished braces, draw rough outlines at the top and bottom of the part that
will become the girdle. The form of the abdominal apron is not critical. I
choose a circular one because it looked nice and used the plate of a tea cup as
a pattern. 
Start by cutting off the top part of the unnecessary plastic with a jig saw. Try the module on again to check if the waistline has moved and adjust the markings if required. Then remove the lower surplus too.
Make another fitting and note where the plastic cuts into the soft tissue of the legs (it probably will). Trim the edges if necessary.
Now is the
time to reshape the girdle if it is meant for a male pelvis. Heat a small strip
of the circumference with a hot air gun and hold the plastic in the required
position for a few minutes. Repeat as required. This is a bit tricky and will
take a fair amount of work until the girdle has the required shape and is
symmetrical. You need a pair of thick gloves to protect your hands from the hot
plastic. Avoid touching the softened parts of the plastic as these easily
becomes uneven and dirty. The image shows how the left half has been flattened
and widened. Verify that the back opening still corresponds to the front
midline. Put the girdle on and tighten it firmly with a wide belt. If there is a gap in the back, make a note of its width. If there is no gap, or in the unlikely case where the sides overlap, remove some of the plastic on both sides. See if you can sit down comfortably, you will probably need to remove more of the plastic in the front. Use a paper pattern to get a smooth and symmetrical curve over the groins.
Clean the plastic with a solvent and smooth the edges with a sanding wheel. Then polish the edges and rough areas with a sisal cord brush. Be careful, too much pressure will heat and soften the plastic and produce the opposite result. It is a good idea to try this and other tasks on some of the superfluous material.
With the
girdle in its final form, it is time to assemble the superstructure. Although
this comes preshaped with the rear uprights riveted to the neck ring, you will
probably have to adjust the shape of most parts. First assemble the neck ring,
adjusting the front to back size to fit the patient (the neck ring in the image
is size M, it would be too small for a large male). Place the whole assembly
flat on a table. When viewed through the neck ring, the back of the rear bars
should be level, the neck ring itself nicely rounded and symmetrical with the
tip of the throat mold right in front of the lock that should close easily. All
three uprights should be parallel with the front one in the middle. Judging
from my own experience, a good deal of bending is required to get things
properly aligned. Before putting to much effort in this, adjust the length of
the uprights to the needs of the patient. This also calls for some bending to
fit the upper and lower parts together. 
The top of
the throat mold should be two fingers width from the chin. The front upright
connects to the girdle about four inches below the waistline. This is not
critical, use the photos as a guide. Adjust the length of the bar and bend it
as required. It should go well clear of the chest and place the neck ring
roughly in the middle of the girdle when seen from below. 
Now attach
the front bar to the girdle with the supplied bracket. Then adjust the length
and shape of the rear uprights too. They may need some bending at the top
depending on the curvature of the patients back. The bottom parts should lie
close to the surface of the girdle, of course. Now you will probably find that
girdle and superstructure don't fit together all that well. The rear uprights
should fall nicely on both sides of the back opening of the girdle when this is
held open to the gap noted before. A fine brace requires that the parts fits
well together without tension. So this is where you probably will have to make
a good deal of final adjustments to the metal parts and to the plastic under
the bars. 
When all parts of the three-dimensional puzzle align perfectly, it is time to attach the rear bars to the girdle. Spread the gap to the required width and tape the parallel bars on each side of the gap. When the brace is standing up on a level surface, the three uprights should be vertical when viewed from the rear. Realign the parts if not. If all is well, fasten the screws at the bottom of the bars and then attach the brackets.
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A proper brace should have some pads too. To prevent it from
swaying from side to side while walking, it is practical to have at least one
pad on each side. My brace has the common right thoracic L-pad and an axillary
sling on the other side. The pad is cut from the pattern on the part of the
plastic module that corresponds to its position. That way, it needs no
reshaping at all. The sling bit is made in the same fashion. The pads are
connected to the bars with nylon webbing or leather straps. In the front, an
outrigger prevents the strap from pressing on the chest (the corrective force
should work from the back and the side). The outrigger bar is not part of the
hardware kit but can be ordered separately.The final step is to make some covers that will protect your clothing from the rough parts of the brace. For these, I used PVC with a thick and soft lining and Velcro closures.
