Grilling & Sanding. A Sunday Must.

I awoke Sunday to a beautiful day outside. Slightly overcast with a high in the mid 70's. We have family in town and had already planned for me to cook a brisket. For anyone out there unfamiliar with cooking a brisket in Texas you use a grill/smoker. An oven cooked brisket is a sin. Average rule of thumb is the brisket needs to cook for at least one hour per pound so an 8lb. brisket needs a minimum of 8 hours.

I knew I would therefore be outside for the majority of the day so out came R2 and all of the different grits of sandpaper that we still had left to use.

As always, we started with the lowest grit. Last time we used the 5 sheets of 240 so this time we started with 400. Once again we used wet/dry paper and dipped it in moms mop bucket. Below is the dome having used up all 5 sheets of 400 grit.

As you can see it is still pretty rough. We next broke out the 600 grit. 600 still has a little coarseness to it but nothing like the 240 and 400 and after we burned through all of the sheets I was starting to get a little concerned that I should have left the dome as is and never started sanding it.

Moving along it was on to the 800 grit. At this point the coarseness is almost nonexistent. We continued to dip the paper in water and work the dome over and over taking the occasional break to rinse the dome off for a clean start. Below is the dome after the 800 grit.

Do you notice much of a change? I still was not seeing it.

We started fresh with 1000 grit. At this point the 1000 grit is more of a finishing sand paper used generally on automotive applications. We were very liberal (not a term often used to describe my household) with the water and sanded till the paper fell apart.

We finally finished out with the 2000 grit. More of wetting the paper and working the dome. The 2000 grit was the highest grit sandpaper I was able to find and it was as smooth as a regular piece of paper to start with. We sanded until we were convinced that there was nothing more to sand and then took the dome inside and set it in the bath tub where we cleaned it with moms dish sponge (nevr thought that would fly) and a little dab of dish soap. We then set it in the sun to dry. Behold....the sanded dome.

We still have alot to do. The next step is to sit the outside dome (pictured above) over the inside dome and trace out the pie panels, holoprojector holes and doors so I can begin cutting them out. Luckily I recieved a Dremel 4000 last May for my birthday so it will be getting put to the test soon. After cutting out the interior dome pieces we will install the hinges for the doors and any mounts for the hp's as well as the logic displays and then I think (emphasis on think) we will be ready to bond the two domes together. After all of that is done we will polish the dome with Mothers Aluminum Polish and should get that mirrored shine that the boys wanted. 

More to come. Almost forgot....the brisket was good



How Will All This Work?????

That's a great question and even I am not sure of all of that yet. We are taking one section of Artoo at a time starting with the head aka the dome. The 3 main parts of an R2D2 build are the dome, body and legs. After that you have lights, sounds and so forth and so on. As I said in our original post the dome is where we chose to start as you can take one look at it (and people have) and immediately recognize it as Artoo.

All of that being said I thought I would post a dome design another builder did to illustrate how the dome will be laid out. Once again this is a design that another builder, Sirg70 to be exact, was kind enough to share with all of the builders so that we could better manage where pie panels housed gadgets such as the periscope. To see the constructed periscope feel free to check the previous post.

As you can see by the key in the top left of the picture, the green parts are Jag hinges that will sit inside the dome allowing the individual pie panels to be controlled by servos to open and close via a remote. You can also see where the logic displays, dome bumps and holoprojectors I have posted previously will mount which will also be servo driven. We are still waiting for a builder/fabricator to do a run of aluminum radar eyes as well as the life form scanner. Once we have those items we will have all of the major components for the dome. The lightsaber that ejects from R2 on the sail barge in Episode 6: Return of the Jedi is supposed to be coming out by one of Jags runs this winter along with mechanical riser sets that can be used to raise and lower the periscope and lifeform scanner through the dome.

Once again I would like to thank Sirg70 for the great illustration of the dome and remind anyone interested in building an R2 or other astromech droid to visit the astromech site for information. While you can purchase items through runs they still require assembly. This is not something where you buy an item and "snap" it into place and the build can take years to complete.

More to come in the near future.

Who needs Yahtzee? Family Fun Night Is Building A Periscope

Over the weekend we recieved a nice suprise. The aluminum periscope Artoo uses in Episode 5: The Empire Strikes Back arrived in the mail. This is a really cool piece and Mike Wheeler did an incredible job with the detail on it. The kit consisted of the following components:

The parts consist of the periscope itself, three lenses, black plastic O-rings, the aluminum riser base, the different shaft assemblies and finally all of the hardware (screws).

The boys and I started by assembling the riser shafts and inserting the rubber insert pieces and O-rings.

Having assembled the riser shaft pieces we then began attaching them to the periscope.

The periscope itself has tapped holes that are countersunk to run a screw through in order to attach the riser shafts as seen in the picture below:

We took our time attaching each riser piece by piece so that we could keep it straight. The boys would take turns tightening the screw while the other held the riser shaft in place.

We continued this process with all three of the riser shafts until we had them all securely attached to the periscope.



Finally we had only the base left to attach. The boys had the hang of it by then so they knocked it out with very little effort. The base is also pre-drilled and countersuck to allow easy attachment of the riser shafts. The center hole allows for us to run a wire through the base and into the periscope so we can add the lights in the periscope at a later date.

After only 15 minutes we had the periscope assembled.

This is an up close picture of it fully assembled.

The base will allow us to insert a pipe so that once installed in the dome and with the assistance of a riser mechanism we will be able to raise and lower it through the top of the dome. We will also have the ability to rotate it up to 360 degrees once it has cleared the dome. One of the pie panels from the top of Artoo's head that is currently in the sanding stage will be JB Welded to the top of the periscope and as mentioned before we will eventually wire up lights as well inside the periscope itself. We will also need to prime and paint it to make it screen accurate.

Now time to get back to sanding. We still have 4-5 differnt gritts of sandpaper to use on the dome and we also recieved all of our LED bulbs, bezels, circuit boards etc. so will be starting to solder the circuit boards for all of the main dome lights in the coming weeks as well. Between scouts and T-ball time is much more limited but we will continue to post our progress as we go.



Star Wars meets Karate Kid...Sand On Sand Off

We had a major event happen in Houston.....RAIN!!!!!

I had almost forgotten what it was and while we only recieved 2 inches which by far does not get us out of the drought we recieved something else nice. Are you ready for this? 65 degree Saturday afternoon.

My son and I headed for Tball practice and as soon as we stepped outside he said "Dad, it's not hot so can we sand Artoo?" Talk about making the ole man proud. After practice we headed home and began getting everything ready. Sanding is a long process as it requires using several diferent gritts to get to your finished look. The aluminum dome in and of itself is a thing of beauty and depending on how you want your R2 to look will determine how much sanding you want to do. Some people like it as is with the subtle spin lines. I put it to a vote with the boys and they wanted the high polished look that you would see in the movies such as the award ceremony after the battle of Yavin in episode 4.

A trip a few months back to an auto store scored me the different gritts pictured here:

I purchased a total of 6 different gritts. The lower the # the coarser it is so we have a pack of 10 sheets each of 220,400,600,800,1000 and 2000 gritt sand paper. They are all wet/dry sheets.

We began by setting down a towel in the drive so the domes would sit on something to offer them protection and we filled up a mop bucket with water to dip the sand paper in. I also had the hose close by as after a while you need to spray the dome down to clean it.

My oldest boy worked on the inside dome and I sanded on the outter dome.

After a while even mom got involved

Once mom joined the party my youngest was all in and it became a family sanding party.

At least that is until the neighbor's boys came out with their lightsabers and then I was abandoned as my boys ran inside to get their lightsabers and while the moms talked and the boys dueled a grown man set in the driveway all alone sanding an R2 dome.

After a total of about two hours and all of the 220 gritt gone I rinsed the inner and outer domes off and wiped them down and set them in the sun to see how they looked.

I am torn at the moment as a part of me wanted to jump in the truck and go get another pack of 220 to keep sanding. The other side of me knows that this is the roughest that it will look as the sand paper I used was very coarse and to move next to the 400 gritt. By the time I get to the 2000 gritt it should be smooth. Guess I'll sleep on it for now but I am hoping tomorrow will be another nice day for sanding.

The Holoprojectors Have Arrived

It's funny how things like your job and responsibilities can get in the way with the important stuff like working on Artoo.

The drought in Texas is still on accompanied with several wildfires that have left 100's homeless. The constant days of 100+ degrees has made it hard to get any work on R2 done. The boys and I are still in the sanding stage as we are having to wet sand the dome and for some reason my wife does not think it is a good idea to do it in the house and it is just too hot to do it outside. In addition school has started adding to the schedule T-ball and cub scouts. We did have a small victory however... the Holoprojectors have arrived. The holoprojector is the part on R2's dome that projects the image of Leia in Episode 4 A New Hope where she gives the "Help me Obi-Wan Kenobi" message. There are a total of 3 HP's on the dome. These were machined out of Aluminum and Bob Consodine did an incredible job on them.

 These will eventually be servo driven so each HP can be individually operated by a remote. There is also a hole in the back of each HP so a light and even a mini projector can be mounted inside.

All of the main lights in the dome including the PSI's and front and rear logic displays should be arriving this week though they are LED bulbs and circuit boards and the boys and I will have to solder everything though that is at least something we can do inside in the a.c.



Parts Have Arrived

With the July 4th holiday and the every day madness that is life and work the boys and I are still in the process of dome prep. We have finished filing down all of the panels and are ready to start sanding. In fact my 5 year old continues to hound me about it. Summer vacation.......must be nice.

We did however get a nice suprise from the post office. Aluminum parts have arrived from as far away as Austrailia so now the need to step up the sanding is there so that we can get to work on these parts. For anyone out there curious on where the parts come from allow me to explain. As this is a builders club there are several individuals who are members that have parts made for their own builds. These builders are kind enough to have extras made that they offer to other builders. If you are unable to make it yourself and wait long enough you will eventually find it.

For starters we recieved an aluminum dome topper from corellian exports. This is a small part made to sit in the center of the dome once we have finished it.

Our next part was a set of aluminum dome bumps. These two bumps are on the back of R2's dome and are blue. Prior to installing them we will need to paint them. Many builders have made these out of aluminum and some have even used the head of bolt. These were so nicely done and at two dollars I felt it was a no-brainer.

Finally my favorite part to have arrived so far.... Front and rear aluminum logic displays. These are from David Shaw out of Austrailia. He makes a lot of beautiful pieces and I will be using his parts in the future as they come available but at this time these were the only parts for the dome he had in stock. I am hoping that he will make another run of the radar eye which is R2's "eye".

Theses are all great pieces and as soon as we get the dome sanded we can start getting them installed.

Keep watching for updates... the sanding is going to be a saga in and of itself.

Emery Boards....Not Just For The Ladies Anymore

Not much has been accomplished since last time other than filing with the Walgreens emery boards.

Having removed all of the panels and filing down the tabs with the metal file there were still some rough areas that had little pieces of "slag" aluminum left over from the laser cutting process. I collected all the pieces and took them outside to work on them in the back yard while the boys jumped on the trampoline. My oldest son decided building was more fun so I showed him how to file down the rough spots and held the panel while he filed them.

We finished the majority of the panels with the exception of a few of the smaller ones. As these are thin aluminum I thought it best to do these another evening after bed time as it is easy to bend the aluminum and warp it if you exert too much force. As you can see from the tool bench the majority of the panels with the exception of the ones at the bottom right are now complete.

Unfortunately that is all we have to update for now. Tomorrow I have to make a stop at the Post Office as some parts that we have ordered will be arriving.



The Journey Begins.....

Every great saga has a beginning. For my boys and I this is ours.

The three of us are avid Star Wars fans. I guess you could say that the Force runs strong in our family. My oldest son loves Legos and one day told me that he wanted to build an R2. I am not one to tell my boys that they can't do something so with a little help from the internet I found Astromech.net which is a club dedicated to building R2D2 and other Star Wars droids. After a little research I joined and was overwhelmed by both the vast information as well as the astromech community and their willingness to help. We decided to start our build by making R2's head (referred to as the "dome" in the builders world)

We recieved our 300mm Aluminum Dome that Darren makes. As you can see....the boys are thrilled. All three of us. I quickly realized that the kitchen table was not going to suffice as a work station (provided I wished to stay married) so the first step of our R2 build was to construct a tool bench in the garage. By the time I finished that with the help of my wife and boys it was a horse shoe shape giving us plenty of room.

Now take into consideration that I live outside of Houston,Texas and we are suffering in the second worst drought on record in Houston so some work has been completed thus far at the kitchen table while my fortunately forgiving wife was out of town. Way I see it is if I am dumb enough to post the pictures I might as well be honest on the front end. Anyways..... on with the build.

As mentioned before, we opted to build the dome using the 300mm aluminum dome. This is the "Cadillac" of domes and comes laser cut as the picture shows. Cole Horton has a great tutorial for the dome (Thanks Cole!) which I read, re-read and then read once more with the boys before we started.

While the dome is pre-cut, there are still small pieces of aluminum that need to be removed. To do this (and per Cole's tutorial recommendation) I used a small metal punch from Home Depot (seen below). I would start in the corners and just exert a little pressure by hand and pop it out. On the dome pie panels which are at the top of the dome even the small punch was too big so I used the nail cleaner tip of a small pair of fingernail clippers (also pictured below).

 

Having finished removing the extra aluminum from the cutting process it was time to call it a night.

The next night I started fresh with a little hack saw fun. Now this build is something that I am doing with my two boys but as they are 5 & 3 dad has to do the steps that require a steady hand or sharp object. I point this out as the main reason for this project was so that we could make memories while making R2 but the boys are involved even if holding my hand while I saw back and forth.

 Prior to removing the panels I flipped the dome over and labeled the inside with a Sharpie marker so that when it came time to re-attach the panels I would know where they went.

Next we laid down newspapers on the kitchen table and sprayed the tabs with WD-40 so that the hacksaw blade would not slip. We would cut the tab loose on one side and then gently "wiggle" the panels back and forth until it popped loose from the opposite side. 

Having removed all of the panels it was back to Home Depot where I purchased a wood & metal file set. Letting the boys take turn holding the panels I would file down the tab until everything was flush. The sun was still out so I ran to Walgreens and picked up some nail files (180grit) so that we could start smoothing the panels where there are little pieces of aluminum slag. For the larger areas that need to be de-burred using the metal files or 240 grit sand paper ole' dad will probably do that while the boys are jumping on the trampoline. 

Emery Boards from Walgreens