Lego my Eggo

Caught the coveted Lego R2-D2 set on sale at Walmart.com a few weeks back. Plus I had a sizable gift card that paid for the majority of it so I had to grab this set. I played with Legos as a kid, assembling the sets and then cannibalizing them for my own creations. I'm sure my decent collection of bricks lies somewhere in my parents attic, along with my Transformers and G.I Joes. I really need to get those out of there!

This set is 2127 pieces, has 3 different manuals, is divided into 10 numbered bags and took me over 12 hours to assemble (spread out over two weekends). But here it is now in a tiny 2.5 minute package for all to enjoy.

Lego R2-D2 time lapse from Darren Lindsay on Vimeo.

It all started with a mouse.

The internet exploded this afternoon, not with more Hurricane Sandy news, but with the release of Lucasfilm being aquired by Disney. It didn't stop there, Star Wars Episode VII was announced for a 2015 release with Eps 8 & 9 to follow, and the Saga will continue even beyond with movies every two - three years.

I'd always wondered what would happen to Star Wars as George got older. Would he leave the company to his adopted children, or eventually sell it to a larger entity? Disney seems like the most logical choice. They've done an admirable job with Marvel, creating a film universe eclipsed only by Star Wars itself.

Now the Star Wars universe will be handed to a new generation of filmmakers - ones that grew up on the original trilogy. This is exactly what the franchise needs and with very good timing.

My only reservation is hopefully Disney will not quash the fan base and halt things like the 501st, Rebel Legion and R2 builders. These entities exist because George allowed the fans to create his fiction in the real world. Disney is known for keeping their properties clenched tight with an iron fist, and with a $4 billion price tag I would't blame them for guarding their new IP. However, these clubs have worked tirelessly, spent millions of dollars and given back to hundreds of communities and charities. Just remember that these people are the most ardent of fans, and what we do is not an attempt to steal intelectual property, but pay homage to something we all believe in.

Double Boost

Painted the other Booster Cover today. Used the same method as before and this one came out even better.

String Drive

George showing his appreciation of the advancements that the R2 builders have made over the movie droids.

You so Crazy Glue

Since we were having an unusually mild August weekend, I decided to tackle painting one of the Booster Covers this weekend. This was attempt number three. The first two times the masking failed miserably and I ended up having to strip the paint off, which is not a very fun task. Learning from my previous mistakes, I altered my plan to hopefully make the third time a charm. This go round I'm doing them one at a time as well, so here was the first one.

I used good old Elmer's glue in the bottom inset channels and the two top notched out areas. I cut a thin strip of regular masking tape for the horizontal striped areas near the bottom of the covers.

I put the glue in over a series of a few hours letting it dry a little and added more until each area that needed masking was completely covered. The glue will shrink a little which I especially wanted in the four vertical channels near the bottom. Here they are after drying overnight.

You don't want to let the glue get too dry or it will cause you major problems. I'd suggest only applying glue 16 - 20 hours before you're ready to paint. I applied on Saturday afternoon and painted Sunday morning. The top two holes will not dry to the core, which causes a bit of mess, but trust me, its better than letting it dry all the way.

These things are the hardest piece to paint in my opinion. There are so many angles and sides to them and the gloss always has some spots thats are a little rough from overspray on an adjacent side.

But once I had all the paint applied I let it set for an hour and then began peeling off the masking . The two masking taped stripes came off easily, especially after I scored them with an exacto knife. The four bottom vertical channels were a little tougher to get. I scored each side of the channel a little on small side and pealed out the glue. It came out fairly easily leaving a just a little trace in each channel. The real hard part here was using an exacto knife to remove the excess paint along each ridge. You can tell wich direction the paint will want you to trim based on trial and error. Then its just taking it nice and easy along the perimeter of the channel. Mine came out ok, one channel messed up a little along one side but it almost looks like weathering chips so I was ok with it.

The top two deep cutouts went about the same way. I scored the paint with the exacto and pulled out the dry portion of the glue. Then I used paper towels and q-tips to remove the still wet glue at the bottom of each hole. There will be some mess here, but if you go slow it will be minimal. Once that was done I used the exacto to carefully cut the excess paint along the edge of the hole. A slow steady hand is definitely key.

Once I had removed all the masking, cleaning everything up as best I could, I did some light wet sanding on a few blemished areas of the covers, Then I rinsed the whole thing off and let it dry for about 15 minutes. Next I applied 2-3 more clear coats over the whole piece. I've found this helps cement the edges of the paint where the masked areas were. Without it the paint there would chip away pretty quick. I did the same thing on my coin slots. You can't even tell there's clear over the bare aluminum areas. The only reason I did 2-3 coast was because of the aforementioned inclination of these particular parts being hard to get an even clear coat on. One would be enough, if you can get it in one. Even with all that process the top of my cover has a bit of a rough patch in the clear coat. I'm not sure I'm going to be able to get it any better though. I may decide to rig up some sort of card board mask to help me shoot only the top with clear. One thing I've learned through all my painting is that it will never be perfect. These parts almost tell you where you're going to have to weather them. Once you do, these little imperfections will just add to the character.

Wish I could be there. See you at CVII.

You don’t need to see his identification

Just took this for the upcoming Celebration VI Artoo builders yearbook. A few dome panels are stuck on with gravity. Seeing this guy strung about in parts on my office floor, you often forget how stinking cool it is. Until that is, you throw a few of those pieces together and start seeing it come to life.

I Come From a Land Down Under

Received the final piece to the puzzle today. The long awaited Aluminum Radar Eye from David Shaw in Australia. Had to show how it was packed. David has the coolest packing out of any of the parts, he even etches a serial number into each part.

I just wish the weather would cool down some so I could get back to work on everything.

Level Headed

Weekend warrior time. Decided to go ahead and cut the Com8-B frame for the ankle adapter. As you can see in earlier posts, the center foot wasn't sitting level, something a few other builders were experiencing with this frame. So James in Texas made an adapter plate that required a little sawing on the bottom ring of the frame.

So, I started by attaching the center ankle and marking its outline in red sharpie. I also marked the skirt's outline in blue just so I'd see placement of things.

Next, I proceeded to drill 4 holes in each corner of the ankle marking. I checked the jigsaw blades I have to determine what size drill bit to use. Didn't want to go too small or too large, but just big enough to fit the blade in.

Then I used the jigsaw to cut along the perimeter from hole to hole. The key here was to take it fairly slow, taking breaks in between each cut to rest the hands. That vibrating jigsaw can do a number on you.

Once that was done there was a nice big hole in the bottom of the frame. Always a little scary cutting something you've spent a good chunk of change on. I used the dremel to sand the rough edge and file a couple spots where the blade floated a little.

After all that I spent a good deal of time staring at and trying to figure out the process for attaching the new ankle adapter to the frame. James really hadn't given much instruction at the time these came out last year. The plate was made to attach to the frame with the same bolts that attach the skirt. He'd released a few photos of the adapter plate but not with it attached to the frame with the skirt on as well. Nothing seemed like it made much sense when it came right down to it. I perused the boards but no one had mentioned how they assembled everything, only that they had experienced the same default and one builder had said the adapter plate fixed the situation.

So after many attempts at installing it how James had displayed the nuts in the photos, I decided to give it another go a different way. I put a lock washer, then two bolts then another lock washer on the plate itself, screwing the first nut/lock washer tight. Then I pulled the bolts through the upside down bottom ring of the frame. It stayed in place from the tension of the bolts.

Now came the really hard part of trying to connect the skirt to these bolts. The only way I could get around it was to hold the skirt in position, while trying to look up into the gap between frame and skirt and getting the bolt and standoff/coupler inside the skirt to line up. One at a time I lined each of the four bolts up and turned them just enough to get a bite on the skirt standoffs. You can see below just how hard that really is.

Once all four were barely attached, I turned the whole frame right side up and let gravity do some work for me. I proceeded to use my handy right angle ratchet to screw the bolts down more. The key here was to do a little on each at a time to keep the whole thing level. I really wasn't sure how far up into the frame the ankle needed to go so I stopped around 5/8ths of an inch, which was the apparent thickness of the ankle connectors. Then I used a open ended wrench to tighten the now bottom nuts/lock washers down. I was able to do fine tweaking by tightening the bottom nut or the screw itself to level the whole plate out.

Next I reattached the center ankle which now sits up inside the frame itself.

The now arduous task of attaching the legs by oneself began. This time I tried keeping the frame upside down and attaching the legs, which seemed slightly easier but still quite a task. So much of one, in fact I decided to start a thread asking how other builders went about this phase of assembly. Hopefully I'll get some good feedback and someone will have an easier method.

After all that was done I flipped the whole thing back to right side up to see how it faired. There was definite improvement. The outer feet still dont seem to be in the extreme position against the ankles. But the center foot is slightly more level. Before it was about a half inch higher in the front. Now its only about 3/16ths higher. I think that can be fixed by pushing the center ankle a little farther up into the frame. But that will have to wait for another day. Once I establish the correct height of the adapter plate I may look at getting standoffs of that length to make the whole thing a little easier.

One more task of Artoo building down. Quite a few more to go.

Rolling Chassis

Been working the last few weeks on figuring out the center casters. None of the previous 2.5 - 3 inch casters seemed to be working for me. A couple builders, mainly the R2.0 guys, had mentioned trying a beefy 3.25 inch Gladiator Caster from McMaster. After a lot of staring at the issues with every two wheel combo I could find, I finally decided to go ahead and get the Gladiator. 

I'd hoped that the holes in the Gladiator Caster would line up with the JAG mounting plate, it was a little hard to tell based off the CAD drawing alone. Once I got it in hand, it was obvious it would be way off the mark. So the next phase of deciding how to mount the thing began. I didn't really want to modify the bottom flat JAG plate, which I would have to since the taller caster would need to sit higher up in the foot that the standard plate allowed. So I went looking at Lowe's and found a 4x12 inch piece of 1/4 inch steel. It was a little thicker than the JAG plate, but I figured its better to try cutting an off the shelf $10 piece than a hard to replace custom part.

I tried a couple methods to cutting this thing, but once I got a hard metal Jigsaw blade, it went pretty smooth, and cutting it exactly in half would be just the right size. I laid the JAG plate over the now 4x6 inch piece, centered it and marked hole locations. Then used a drill press to both drill and counter sink the holes where the plate would attach to the angled half of the JAG mounting system. I had figured out earlier that mounting the Gladiator Caster flush with one side of the new plate would put it almost exactly centered in the foot when moving forward, perhaps just dumb luck. So I marked the holes of the Caster and drilled those out next.

The biggest problem was that the caster would sit on top of the screws that mounted the plate to the angled piece via standoff couplers. I'd originally thought I'd just lock the caster screws in with nuts on the bottom side, screw in the plate, then place the caster over the caster screw nuts and get them to fit inside the rather large mounting holes of the caster itself. But, my Dad has a neighbor that can do Tig welding, so we gave him the plate to weld nuts onto the top side of the plate, thereby allowing a rather easy install of the caster itself.

Once I got the piece back, it was time to see if this plan was going to work out. I found some 7/8th inch standoffs at Lowe's, thinking that I'd try it with those first and then order whatever length I'd really need later. They ended up being the exact length I needed, another stroke of dumb luck. I also found a handy right angle ratchet driver set for $20 bucks that worked perfectly for attaching the JAG angled piece to the Center Foot.

The new custom plate went on with ease, and then the Gladiator Caster screwed in tight with some washers helping to span the rather wide holes it has. The great thing about this caster, other than being nice and heavy duty, is that it perfectly swivels 360º without hitting the side of the Foot. Its like it was made for this exact use.

So once I got the Center Foot all together, it was time to get R2 somewhat back together again. I put the Outer Feet complete with JAG Drive System installed back onto the legs. The now quite heavy legs went back on the frame, and the pretty hefty Center Foot went on as well. I immediately realized I'll have to lock the Center Ankle before I'll be able to see the whole thing in action, but holding the Center Foot down I moved R2 around with relative ease.

The other thing that became apparent was that I will have to cut a hole in the bottom of the frame and use the COM-8B adapter plate for the center leg. The Center Foot is still not sitting level, just like before I had the wheels installed. But all-in-all, I think the Gladiator Caster will work out well. It really makes me want to get the motors, batteries and RC elements in ASAP and get R2 rolling around on his own power.

Chrome Dome

Well, the long, long effort to shine the dome is complete. I've been working on and off at sanding the outer dome over the last year. With so much elbow grease involved, it's not something I cared to do all in one shot, but rather whenever I got an itch to. My goal was to get out the spin lines and have a nice dull shine, similar to the medal ceremony scene at the end of Episode 4.

I initially attempted to get the spin lines out by hand, but soon realized that it was probably too big an undertaking without getting carpal tunnel. So I broke down and bought a Black & Decker Mouse Sander at Lowe's. The reviews were mediocre, and had many reports of breaking rather fast. I can vouch that within a few minutes, my first one broke while using the attachment piece. Luckily Lowe's took it back no questions asked and I got a second. I didn't bother with the attachments and it ended up doing a great job. Over the period of a few weeks I used the 80 grit to get out all the spin lines in both the Inner and Outer Dome. Then I used 120 & 220 grits to get the dome to the point you see here:

From that point I resorted to hand sanding using two 3M sponge sanding blocks at 100 and 180 grit. These can be found in the painting department at any Lowe's Walmart, etc. I really liked these since they were able to bend to the shape of the dome and made it a little easier on the hands. I went over the whole dome using vertical motions from top to bottom several times with the 100 grit until I was satisfied that most of the pitting from the mouse sander was gone. Then I used the 180 grit sponge several times as well.

From there I used 400 grit paper dry, and then started a round with it wet. Being single has its advantages in that I just sat the dome hanging over the kitchen sink without anyone complaining. Plus, I was able to watch the living room TV during this phase. I spent an evening each on a grit of paper, wet sanding with 600, 800, 1000 and finally 2000, always using the same vertical motion. At this point the dome felt silky smooth but still had visible sanding lines.

That's where a little tip I picked up watching the webcast of last year's DroidCon came into play. I bought some Bombs Away Metal Polish last year after hearing about it during the Dome presentation. I'd used it a few times on some of the other parts, including the Center Vents. It seemed to do a pretty good job so I decided to go ahead and use it on the Dome as well. After seeing Lasse's results with a drill polishing attachment, I'd had my eye on one from the auto department at Walmart. I finally broke down and got it once I'd finished all the sanding on the dome. You can see the results of using the Bombs Away and polishing ball together.

One pass of the polish still left some unevenness so I worked my way around the dome with two applications to each area. I was very careful on the lower portions where the aluminum is quite thin. I kept the drill as slow as possible in those areas so I wouldn't accidentally break anything if the polishing ball caught the metal. Then I made one final application to the middle, wide section of the dome in order to get out as much of the splotchiness as I could. All-in-all I'm fairly happy with the results. It has a nice shine to it, there's no spin lines at all, and its not quite a mirror finish while still having a few very small imperfections when you look close. Its a good start before I eventually weather it down the road.

Move Along

Decided to try the captive studs on the body hinges today. I marked the holes on the outside of the Inner Skins first just to make sure they would be under the Outer Skins once they were glued together. Everything looked ok, so I drilled and bolted the hinge for one panel then placed the Outer skins back on and clamped them down. You can see below that there is a pretty good gap. So I'm nixing using the studs on the hinges altogether and will just glue them to the inside instead. Some may be able to live with that gap, but not me. I think its just because the studs are so close to the edge, in fact, they may have even stuck out a tiny amount once glued together. So lesson learned, at least I only tried it on one hinge.

Also yesterday I went to the parents house and used the drill press again. This time on the other foot drive to foot shell holes. I still had a similar problem as with the first one and had to use a larger hole and even ended up filing a little on a couple holes to get everything to line up right. I started wondering was why Jerry doesn't go ahead and have the holes drilled in the feet when they are made. Seems like a machine would be able to be exact and alleviate a problem on the builder end. The only thing I could think of was that other drive systems may not use the same holes, and you'd end up with unnecessary holes in your feet. Something I may ask one day if I ever meet him in person. I also decided not to countersink the holes. The steel is just too thin. Looks like maybe 1/8th inch think at most. I'll still use the low profile flat head screws though. I think they look a lot better than the rounded fatties and will hopefully blend in a little more when everything is painted.

Captive Audience

Finally got the captive studs from McMaster that I'd been putting off purchasing for awhile. So I bit the bullet and decided to try them on the skins first. Nobody on the forums had replied that they tried them on the skins. They were mainly used for the dome. But I figured its the same 2 layer principle with the skins, so why shouldn't they work? I'll use them on the JAG hinges for the front doors, the coin slots and of course later on the various dome pieces.

I used the coin slots as the guinea pig. After marking the holes with pencil first, I attempted drilling the first hole solely off the mark. I'm not sure if its the drill, the bits or me that suck, but every time I try to drill something, it glides off center even when I center punch a guide. I had barely started the first hole when I thought of a better idea. I clamped the coin slots in place very gently and protected the outside with a rag since they are already painted. Then I proceded to drill the holes out with a 7/64th bit using the slots themselves as a guide. I removed the slots, bore the holes out a tiny amount so the 4-40 captive studs went through the holes easily, and then sanded the slag off with some 120 grit sandpaper.

Next, I proceded to see how flush the captive studs would be. Loose they still stick out a bit. But once they are tightened from behind with a nut they pull into the aluminum a good bit, not entirely but pretty good. I countersunk the next three holes very lightly to see if it improved the flushness at all. It didn't seem to make much of a difference. These photos make it seem much worse than reality, they only stick out maybe a millimeter. I guess a good macro lens will do that.

So after all four were in, I put the outer skins on loosely with binder clamps. I think with a good clamping during the gluing phase, you won't even be able to tell that the studs are under there. Again the photos make the gap look worse than real life. There is no visible bulge in the outer skins, and the coin slots will cover these seams anyway. So, I think I'll use the captive studs on all the other necessary spots. Thanks to Pangborncc & CuriosMarc for the captive stud tip. Now I just wish I hadn't already spent some money on regular 4-40 screws. Oh well.

License to Drive

Spent the weekend doing various things on Artoo. First I took him all apart, so he's not standing on his own legs anymore. I'm going to do some work on the skins again in an attempt to get some white painting done before the heat of summer gets here. So they're screwed/clamped back on the frame at the moment. 

I looked through my box of blue painted parts and wet sanded some of the ones that needed touchup. The first three pieces turned out good, then the next three looked pretty cloudy and flat, so I'm holding off till it cools down a little this evening to do anymore. It was in the low 80s this afternoon, but felt a little warmer in the garage while I was painting.

After re-reading every post I could find about center foot casters, I proceeded to order a couple sets from Lowe's website yesterday since they weren't available at any local store. Hopefully one, or a combo of these will work.

I decided to tackle the foot drives this afternoon. I followed this tutorial, so I can't take any credit for originality.

Here's the steel foot shell and foot drive.

I took the large wheel out to get access to the screw holes, then placed the mount inside the foot shell.

Then I took a blue sharpie and marked all 6 holes. I also took a pencil and circled it around the hole too. The angle makes it look like the outer marks are off center, but they are not.

I center punched the marks and then drilled a small hole first just in case.

They all lined up just fine after putting the bracket back in for a visual inspection.

So then I drilled the holes out larger. First I used a 1/4 inch bit which should be large enough. I was having a little trouble getting them all to go in with ease, so I went ahead and used a 5/16 inch bit to help loosen it up. I wish I didn't have to and that they had lined up perfectly with the 1/4 inch hole, but it should be fine. Then I put the large wheel back in the foot drive bracket and screwed the whole thing in from the top/outside with the 1/4-20 screws Jerry provided.

Like the tutorial I followed, I may end up getting the low profile flush style screws and countersinking them. The bulky screws take away a little in my opinion.

One thing I noticed after I had the drive in was that the smaller back caster wheel in the drive needed to be lowered because the foot wasn't sitting level. I figure I'll fix this one later since I'd have to remove it to do so, but I went ahead and leveled out the other foot drive. It was fairly easy. I loosened the two screws using a T-bar allen wrench through the two holes in bracket. Then I sat the whole drive upside down and put a metal ruler across both wheels. Then, I used my trusty Dollar Store level to check the position of the small caster wheel and then tightened it down.

One foot drive down, one to go. With the new center casters coming this week I'll hopefully have all the wheels figured out and done soon. Then I'll have to go ahead and order the NPC motors and get busy on some electronics side of things. Can't wait for that first test drive!