Flashback Friday: 5-23-2010, Day 40 of building R2-TD

R2 and I are heading to Lincoln NE today for a fund raising event. Also, I have a cousin graduating today in Lincoln so my whole family will be around today. None of them have seen R2 in person yet and I wanted to make the best impression I could. That meant lots of little detail work even if its just temporary. One of the things that bothered me about my last event was all the "holes". I got what parts in and covered the rest up with spare pieces of styrene. Its not perfect but looks better than a gaping hole for the photos today. Dawn and I also worked on getting my front vents built from the A&A kit. It wasn't as difficult as I thought it would be but the end result did not fit into my vent surrounds. I'll have to do some fine sanding but for now, just taped the vents in without the surrounds. I also got my short shaft struts painted and in place. It took a second try to paint as the weather was windy and I got in a hurry. You think I would of learned my leason after my dome painting troubles. LOL! 

I also did some temp work on the dome. I got the Front Logic and Rear logic displays in. For now I just taped the LEDs in so I wouldnt have a hole. I got my duel LED blinkers installed. For now I velcro'd a 9 volt battery inside the dome to run them. For a Flasher housing, I used a toilet paper roll and just taped it all into place. Its not pretty but has worked really well. We'll see how it holds up after todays events. I hope to have some of these temp things out by next weeks SAC event.

Heres some photos of how things turned out.

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: 3-9-2010, Day 27 of building R2-TD

Tonight we worked on my sound system. Moose helped me wire up all the connections I soldered back in December to my 12 button remote. Than we found out my THINK GEEK system does not work. We hooked my only 12 button remote up to Moose's black box and it worked. Lucky I have a spare THINK GEEK system so I will bring it over next time and start over again. We also found out my remote is the same frequency as Moose's R2 so I will have to change that also. Here are a few shots of the frustration.

Flashback Friday: 1-24-2009, Day 25 of building R2-TD

Today, Moose needed to borrow one of my saws to finish the work bench in his basement. Since I was there, I helped him finish the table and get it all together. Once we had it all done, we had to break it in and work on droids! The table is big enough we both were able to set out droids on it and work side by side and not be in each others way. We both finished adding our 3rd legs so both are standing. Than we both began wiring the legs. I also got a lesson in soldering. It was a very productive day!

The finished workbench


R2 standing on his own


A different angle showing the third leg installed


The wiring of the legs has begun


Moose gave me a lesson in soldering

He Moves!

R2-TD moves again! Last Saturday, the guys and gals at Midwest Robots spent much of the day going through Touchdowns wiring to find why literally everything quit working.  What we found was the main motor controller had 3 breaks in a wire and it caused the entire system to shut down.  All wires were pulled, inspected and than re-directed and organized to prevent any further problems.We also replaced the dome motor controller which had quit working months ago, added a spring to give the dome wheel more tension and made it so everything works on 1 battery instead of 2.  It literally was a complete over haul on the system.  At the end of the day, we made a new wiring diagram so we can make it easier to trouble shoot if anther problem does creep up.

The before photos








Here are the after photos