Flashback Friday: 4-10-2010, Day 36 of building R2-TD

This is a few weeks behind. I went to a convention and got the "geek gunk", "con crud" or nerd flu"... what ever you want to call it. It kicked my butt. Been over 2 weeks and still sick but I am finally starting to feel better and a follower of the blog pointed out I havent been here forever. So here I am. I'm back! R2 now walks and talks. My friend Steve helped me finish up the last bit of wiring after I attempted to get things going. Turns out there was a lose connection so we had to go though somethings to find it. Heres some pictures of the wire mess. LOL! 







As I mentioned earlier... Ive been very sick. Before that, I managed to get some events in with R2.

We Celebrated R2's Central Anniversary. We had a BBQ and got some sun in. It was good to hang out with all the builders and see whats alls going on. 




R2 attended his first event. The VEX Robotic Championships in Omaha. The kids there were smarter than I was and knew more about Robotics than I did so they asked a ton of questions. They also loved they could see "inside" R2 and really see what he was made of. Heres some photos from the event.







And R2 made his first Road Trip. We went to Kansas City to Planet Comicon to see Matthew Wood, Ashley Eckstein and Tom Kane. They are voice talent behind the Star Wars Clone Wars cartoon on Cartoon network. The trip was a good one but this is where I got sick.






Today R2 makes his second road trip to Willy Con in Wayne NE. He is the only droid going today so I'm sure he'll get some attention.

Flashback Friday: 3-31-10, Day 35 of building R2-TD

R2 is finally standing on his own feet! I had to sand the third leg a little to get it to fit. One it did, I was able to bolt it on. Than I put the motors on the legs. Than Brad and I inserted the omni balls to the third foot. There you go! A standing, rolling R2! I also found out the hard way R2 rolls around. I was almost in a car accident on my way home. I made a sudden stop and R2 went flying. Only thing I see wrong is one of the rocker bearing bolts is bent. Should be an easy fix. Anyways, heres the photos of the work.

Flashback Friday: 3-5-2010, Day 34 of building R2-TD

With the warmer weather continuing today, I took full advantage of it and painted the last coat on the dome. Than I took the pie panels and glued them on after everything was dry. Also, I got a primer coat on my legs. 

Flashback Friday: 3-2,4-2010, Day 32 and 33 of building R2-TD

Well, this weekend will be the third time I've attempted to paint R2's dome. After the last attempt, we had crackling again in the paint. This time, I've sanded way down to the primer of the previous owners and will add my own primer on top of it. Some spots are all the way down to the original dome. I still have a little more sanding to do but heres my progress so far. 



R2 took a big step today. 1 Motor holder complete. I started the night widening the hole for the motors. Than Moose showed me how everything went together. We did a test run to make sure the motor worked. Things are looking good. We will finish up the motors next time than start wiring. 







No pictures but Motor holder number 2 is assembled. Now I begin work on getting the third leg finished. Hopefully the next photo you see of R2 will be one of him standing on his own with wheels and casters! 

Also, I hope to be able to get the dome all painted with the warmer, above freezing weather here. I'm also going to start painting the legs if everything goes right. More to come later!


Chance of rain this weekend and with the sun out and the temps finally above freezing, I thought I had better get moving. I had a chance to paint a little today so I did! I'm letting the paint cure over night and still have a coat or two left but things are finally starting to come into place for the dome.

Flashback Friday: 2-27-10, Day 31 of building R2-TD

Now I've used many glues before but today I used something and was absolutely amazed. I went to work on R2's dome today. I slipped on a patch of ice and the dome slipped out of my hand. When it was all said and done, there were 5 cracks. Brad had some tech bond handy so I thought I give it a shot. Worked like a charm. With the accelerator it made a perfect "weld" in seconds. With a little sanding and a coat of paint, you can't even tell anything was wrong. Check it out. 




Anyways, I went to work on R2's dome today with Brad. I sanded everything smooth from the mishap last week with the crackling and than we were ready to begin. We put several layers of primer on to make sure no 'foreign' substance was reacting to the paint. Things looked good so we moved to the white. After 3 light coats things were looking good. The forth, something happened and the paint began to crackle again. Not near as bad as last week but still a little there. We stopped for the night and made sure we had the dome in a warm place and will take another shot at it Sunday. 

Flashback Friday: 2-22-2010, Day 30 of building R2-TD

R2 got lots of love this weekend. Saturday, the gang got together at Mooses and worked on our parts. I started to assemble my motor holders only to find out the hole is cut too small. I have to now file it out to make it fit. It's going to take forever!! 




Than Sunday, Brad heated up his garage so we could all paint. I finished off my pie pieces and started on the dome. Something weird happened and my dome paint crackled on me. I'm now sanding it off and will try again with a coat of primer.