Like a suburban Tony Stark, the do-it-yourself master and Australian Army veteran has spent 12 months painstakingly putting together a replica suit, complete with glowing eyes and 'Arc Reactor' in his chest.

But what's most incredible is the 43-year-old Canberran's suit is built using paper thinner than a Valentine's Day card.

Made in the pepakura style, a Japanese word for paper craft, once the fibreglass resin and matte and car body filler is added, the suit can in fact take a punch.

“It would hurt your knuckles,” Mr Armstead said.

“[But] it's brittle.

“If I was to fall over I would be like a turtle on my back and probably do a lot of damage to the suit.”

Reality puts some other constraints on the suit fantasy. There's no rocket power, obviously, and instead of summoning the parts to wrap around him, Mr Armstead needs an extra set of hands, an allen key and spanner – not to mention 20 to 30 minutes – to put his suit on.

But to all appearances it is the same suit, with a nine-volt battery powering the LED light in the centre of his chest.

“I've got a cable that runs down under my abdominal armour and into the leg where [the battery] sits in my pocket,” he said.

Iron Man Armstead's dazzling eyes are each powered by three triple-A batteries, stored in the handyman's breastpocket.

Being a shining-red action hero – or at least dressed as one – does have its disadvantages though.

The wearer of the suit can see from behind those bright white eyes, but vision is impaired, which combined with inflexible arms makes movement a chore.

“At night time it becomes a lot harder, because there's no peripheral vision – if you've got some stairs you need to have someone lead you,” the science fiction fan said.

“You feel like an old granny in a superman suit.”

And while the suit drew a crowd at its sole party outing to date – “I got a lot of people wanting photos beside me” – the aluminium struts in the arms meant lifting food or drink to one's lips was impossible.

The resourceful hobbyist has spent no more than $400 on his self-confessed “toy".

But despite appearances it is only half finished, with an estimated 12 months before a likely completion.

“There's another whole leg to do, both boots, all the fingers and gloves,” he said.

It all adds up to further time in his shed, and while his wife has embraced his other hobby – a two-storey observatory he built on his front lawn – time spent on the suit has not been so welcomed.

“She says, 'get out of that shed and stop working on that stupid Iron Man suit,' ...words to that effect,” Mr Armstead said.

Building an Iron Man style suit has been far more serious business for the US military, which is reportedly close to revealing protoypes of a Tactical Assault Light Operator Suit (TALOS), a full body suit of armour that would give its soldiers much better protection on the battlefield.

While the details of that project are a closely kept secret, the good news for anyone wanting a DIY project is that the plans Mr Armstead used are freely available on the internet.

A word of warning, however, from the man who harbours a distant vision to build a steel model.

“Be prepared to finish what you start,” Mr Armstead said.

“It's a big job, and a lot harder than you might imagine.”