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Moving Time

It is almost that time. This blog will be moving to it's new home soon. The new domain is up, and the blog engine is running. just need to import\export and the transition will be complete. More to come.

Gwinnett Gladiators Game 3/26/2011 More Pics

The puck drop:

Troopers on ice!The Turner\Cartoon Network folks:

Victory!

R2 got his sweater!

Gwinnett Gladiators Game

R2 and the Ga501st had an event sponsored by Turner and the Cartoon Network for the season finale of Star Wars the Clone Wars.

Ceremonial first puck drop:

Working with Lexan

While working on my electronics panel, I needed to add a bunch of hole that were close together and a few large holes. Lexan likes to chip if you drill it and break if it is near other holes. To get the holes I needed I used a spade hole bit for drilling holes in wood. Set to low speed it made short work of the Ledxan without any ninding or chipping. I could get the holes as close as i wanted.

Star Wars Charity Event

Pictures from the Lucas Film Charity event held in Atlanta.

I can see the light...

Well a lot has been going on. The electronics work is about 80% done. The dome is about 90% done since I just have to finish cutting the dome panels and the front logic displays. The Rear logics are mounted, but they still need the fiber optic conversion. The logib displays on are hold until I can get more bezels for them. PSIs are now done. The outside of the droid only needs the battery harnesses, flat side plate, side vents, and a mounting system for the center vent surrounds to be complete. He is now pushing 175-200lbs fully loaded. I have to figure out hwo get him in a weigh in.

Lots going on, no pictures...

R2 was taken completely apart and pieces were ground down and adjusted to make way for electronics. The feet now have the NPC motors mounted and new wires pulled up the through the new holes in the feet and legs. The wires currently are just pulled into the body. The new electronics panel was cut out of 1/4" Lexan and mounting brackets were made to fit it to the frame. Some of the vertical rods on the frame were moved back to allow room for the hinges for the doors on the skins. All this done in a weekend. I now jsut have to positions the motor controllers and fuse blocks wire them up and R2 should be moving. Then I need to finish cutting the inner dome for the hinges and the dome can go back together.

R2 is almost talking

I just finished the setup of the sound system. The system consists of a VMusic2, Arduino, and speakers. I formatted a USB drive and updated the firmware on the VMusic2. I then created sound files for each sound and put them on the USB drive and created a little sketch to play all the sounds on the drive. I jsut have to write a little more logic to control the sounds through my Wii nunchucks and then install all the wiring in the droid

Kitty Litter PSI lenses and Dome moutning plates

I finished one PSI and started work on the other one. I used the large 40 pound litter containers for material. They make great PSI lenses.

The starting container


The rear plate being fitted. The holes are drilled in the dome and the plastic is clamped in place. 1 hole is drilled through the plastic and then a screw is inserted through the dome and the plastic. A T-nut is screwed to hold the plastic in place. The clamps are moved to a new location and a heat gun heats the plastic while slowly screwing the clamps down. Once the plastic is mostly in place, I used crushed ice in a baggie to cool and the plastic to form. Repeat the drilling process until the whole plate is in place.


The completed product (front). The holoprojector still needs to be cut out.

Back side of the front plate. The PSI LED holder will be changed out and the cone will have a new holder mounted soon.

PSI setup

I have been toying with some materials to use for my PSI lenses. The main concern has been that they need to hold up against poking fingers. The next thing is the space needed to diffuse the hotspots, and since I am using a multicolored LED to create any color I want it also needs to help mix the colors. After many trials and errors I think I may have found a cheap solution.

If you have or know someone who has cats, the litter can come in huge white plastic buckets. These buckets need to be able to hold 20lb-40lb, so the plastic is nice and string. I cut one of the buckets up and did a few tests and they work great with one layer of material and even better with 2 sandwiched together. The setup consists of 1 or 2 layers of litter bin material and a LED source. The barrel to contain the light source is the smaller cup of a bar tenders jigger with the bottom cut out of it. Since the jigger is metal, it reflects the light just fine.

Even More Update Pics

Been busy around here. First there was DragonCon then we had to get ready to leave for Hawaii. A week in Hawaii... so there has not been much time to work on R2.

Here are some update pictures of what he looks like now.

More Updated pictures

He is missing his bottom ring and\or skirt because I am still working on the rear door and the rear Power Coupler mounting.

Front ViewSide View
3/4 View
Shoulder

DragonCon

Even Cookie Monster showed up, though we didn't get a great picture of him

Update Pics

Just a couple update pictures:

Status Update

Well DragonCon is over. I only spent a day there, but I did get some R2 building done. I made a major push to get some things complete. Over the weekend I shaved the center ankle mounting block down adn now the center foot is mounted. I finished painting all the feet, ankles, and legs. This includes all the blue parts too. The Radar Eye is also painted blue too. I then moved to the dome where I cut the large hole for the 1 piece Front Logic Port (FLP). I then drilled and counter sunk screws for the FLP, Rear Logic Port, and all Holoprojectors. He is now looking more like a complete R2 droid.

Photos coming soon....

Leg to Ankle Upgrade

Well the leg to ankle upgrade is complete, well sort of. I plan on adding a 1/8" plate that will run all the way down the ankle to the axle, but for now there are just some nuts JB Welded to the ankle. i used Grade 8 bolts to ensure that they would not shear and drilled out the ankles and legs to fit the new bolts.

I JB Welded nuts to the plate inside the ankle to give the bolts something to screw into. As mention before, one set of nuts is there until I create the 1/8" plate. Right now they only keep the leg in place.

I got some 1/4" aluminum plates and drilled them so they will fit between the leg and ankle and keep the correct spacing on the bracelet.



All Assembled

Painting 102

No real pictures of this... not very interesting. All leg pieces have been masked and primed.

Painting 101

Not much done physically to R2 over the weekend. The Olympics were on and while watching and listening to the stupid comments from the commentators I took apart R2... again. I was hoping to get the new plates to update the leg to ankle joint and have him up on his feet and assembled for a progress picture. Now he is in pieces again, but they are now all masked off and ready to be primed and painted. I hop to have the primer coats on by the end of Tuesday. The final layers may have to wait as they are calling for some major rain here.

Shoulder Hub Update

As promised here are the pictures. I mounted the hubs using rare earth magnets.





Here is is an update photo on what the feet currently look like.