I will cut you

Lots of work has been going on, and I'm finally sitting down to author a post about it. I've spent the last month testing and assembling the electronics side of Artoo. About a month ago I traveled down to OKC for a Saturday to hang out with fellow R2 builder Patrick Yeary. He helped me test wire all my electronics, and by the end of the day I had remote controlled motors rolling just like they should. It really helped having the knowledge of someone that had already done it, along with a working R2 sitting there to look at. I'm still an electronics noob, but I'm slowly becoming more of a novice. Things now make sense about 30% of the time instead of 3%.

So once I had everything test wired I knew I needed to do a few things to get my actual wiring ready to go. First up was figuring out where my switches would go. The Com8-B frame is great. Its fairly economical for an aluminum frame, its club spec and has been well engineered. That said, it has a few shortcomings because of its budget nature. There's no real good place to put switches on the frame, it only has two small electronics plates on either side of the body and the holes in the middle body plate are pretty much a terrible place for the speakers. All this needed to be addressed at this point in my build. 

I looked around at various places online to find more plastic sheets to use as electronics boards. I ordered some off Amazon but it felt too flimsy to mount anything of weight on. So I went the tried and true method of using store bought kitchen cutting boards. Target had a nice three pack on sale for less than $10 bucks. Lucky they were so cheap because I actually screwed up my first attempt at a switch plate. They are also fairly easy to cut thanks to my dad's table saw.

I didn't want to drill my frame at all if I could avoid it. So after great deliberation I decided to put the switches between the bottom and middle ring of the frame where they will be easily accessible behind the rear door. I bought some switches from Walmart and splurged on a Hella switch for my main power on - I liked that it requires a key. I laid out the holes in Illustrator and made a template to use on the drill press so that everything looked nice and even. We cut one of the boards to size and then drilled out the holes for each switch (Hella master switch, two 35 Amp switches for each NPC motor, one 20 amp switch for the dome motor, and two more 20 amp switches for use in the future). I also drilled four small holes in each corner where I will use zip ties to attach the plate to the frame.

Next I decided to make my own speaker plate for mounting the speakers behind the Center Vents. Most builders use this area for speaker placement, and it just makes the most sense - way more than inside the body where the sound would be muffled behind the skins. This was fairly easy to do. I cut one of the plastic cutting boards to size (5x8), placed the paper template for each speaker on the board and then looked at them behind the Center Vents to get final placement.

I lined up the plastic board with the vertical pieces of the frame and clamped it into place. Then I drilled four holes through the board and into the frame. Next I tapped the frame holes for 6-32 screws. I accidentally broke my tap in the first hole and had to run to Lowes for a new one. I couldn't get the broken tap out of the frame and ended up having to sand it down and flip that piece of the frame to re-drill the hole. It wasn't my finest hour, but its nothing that will ever be seen and will actually be a nice identification piece to my droid should the need arise. After all the holes were tapped I used 1.5 inch screws and 1 inch nylon standoffs to attach the board to the frame.

Next up I broke out the biggest drill bit I had and put a hole on one side of each speaker template hole. I then used my grandpa's old jigsaw to slowly cut the remainder of the holes in the board. The plastic cut like butter and in the end I had my own homemade speaker plate.

The final piece of the cutting board fit quite nicely behind the new speaker plate so I decided to use the entire thing as a good sized third electronics plate. I basically went through the same motions of clamping the boards together, drilling four holes and using long screws with 2.25 inches of standoffs to separate the two with room for the speakers.

In the end it all tuned out quite nice and I now have over double the area to mount electronics inside the body, all with only drilling four small holes into the frame.

Like a glove, a power glove

The two main batteries have arrived. There was really sticky tape on them that is near impossible to get off. Already took off some of the paint trying to get them de-stickyfied.

And here they are in their new home. Perfect fit.

Also logged in to the astromech forums today for the first time in probably a year. Already contemplating a while new dome and hinge set. That's why I've stayed off them for this long!

Get Your Motor Running

Its happening. NPC motors, Sabertooth and Syren 10 motor controllers have arrived.

Locked and Loaded

Finally got around to some R2 work. Recently got some ankle locks and finally decided to instal the center ankle set after spending several minutes staring at them over the course of a few weeks.

Install was pretty easy, but I had to take the ankle off and disassemble everything in order to do it. I clamped one side into place and drilled the ankle though the hole already in the lock. At first I tapped both the lock and the ankle, but I discovered shortly after that I wouldn't get a good tight fit that way.




I had to drill the hole already in the ankle lock a little wider so it would fit the 8/32 x 3/8 screws I purchased for these. I had originally bought some regular philips screws, but decided later to get some hex screws to look a little more industrial since these will be somewhat visible if you look close enough. I countersunk the holes so the screws would sit flush when installed. Then I rinsed and repeated for the other side of the ankle and test fit them before I did the final re-install of the entire center ankle back onto my frame.

They aren't quite as tight a fit as I'd like. Theres a very small gap between the ankle lock and the center foot shell and it causes a slight kick back when R2 goes in reverse. I was afraid that would happen after test fitting these by hand before installing. I'll probably post in the forum to see if anyone has any ideas on how to fix the gap. Its not terrible by any means, but I'm afraid it would create a problem down the road after some wear and tear. I pushed R2 around and it seemed to work fine. I'm not sure if I really need the side ankle locks or not. I may hold off on them until after I've got the drive system up and running to see how they really hold up.

Hard to Port

First part was purchased in awhile. Now I'm into the more optional pieces. This is an Aluminum Data Port Panel that hides behind one of the front skin doors. This part is offered quite a bit in plastic, but this was the first time someone offered it in aluminum. There was a big stink about it on the forum that never really made sense - something to do with it being a part only seen in the Visual Dictionary. Luckily I got in on the action before the run was closed by the builders council. So I may have a collector's item here.

Not much other progress in the last few months, but I'm hoping to ramp up again after the busy work month of March. DroidCon 2 is this August and I'm debating attending, but hope to have my guy mostly done by then either way.

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.