after many hours of tinkering and reading the whole internet several times I just can\'t figure out how to sign requests for use with the Product Advertising API.
So
Try this afer you create the service
service.setHandlerResolver(new AwsHandlerResolver(my_AWS_SECRET_KEY));
You'll need this class and this jar file to add as a reference to your project as AwsHandlerResolver uses Base64 encoding.
You'll need to rename the AwsHandlerResolver file to the name of the class as the file name is all lower case.
I think the rest of the code you have is fine.
The WSDL is http://webservices.amazon.com/AWSECommerceService/AWSECommerceService.wsdl