What's up?

***This was written almost a month ago, but wouldn't post***

Not much, that'd be the answer.

Took R2 to a wedding for some friends in late March. And, I have the pics somewhere, just haven't uploaded them apparently. R2 was the ringbearer, and due to some poor planning on my part, I wasn't able to see his feet as I drove him down the aisle, so he slammed into a pew about 2/3 of the way down. No damage, but it did get a big laugh.

The most recent thing was PlayOnCon. This is a small con in Birmingham, only in their 4th year. The 501st has been helping them expand from a table-top gaming con into something a little more fun :) Again, no pics from me. There were plenty taken, but I have yet to find more than a couple of them.

Next up is DragonCon, of course. I'll be debuting some minor mods to R2 that should add to his popularity :)

And then, once we get home from DCon, there are JAG feet to look forward to finally. Yes, that's right, finally going to have steel instead of plastic. When htat happens, I'll document it here.

Oh, and Weird Al is coming to Mobile on Sep 28th. We'll have troopers there, and most likely R2 as well, since Al seems to like him :)

I'll post more when I remember to upload the pics...or when something else big happens.

Old Events - Christmas Fun '11

Well, these pics made it to Facebook, but never into the blog here...so since I'm not friends with the entire world on FB yet, I'll post 'em.

Story behind these goes as follows.

At the BEST Robotics event, I reconnected with Elise, who I'd known probably 14-15 years before, and she then found me on FB. Sometime around the beginning of December she asked "So, what do you and R2 do for Christmas?". I decided a pictorial would be the best answer. It's entitled "What happens when R2 tries to help".

Old Events - BWW-MAW troop, 10-30-10

Here's another one that flew by under the radar.

Since Goose and I are regular patrons at our local Buffalo Wild Wings, we were able to arrange a charity troop, where the restaurant donated 10% of their sales all day on a Saturday to the Make-A-Wish Foundation. All we had to do was troop...so troop we did!

This turned out to be a great event, especially since we only advertised at the company I work for, and roadside during the event (standing by the street, waving at the cars driving by) and still managed to raise $550. The manager of the store said it was their best Sat all fall, and Bama wasn't even playing that day!

Anyway, on to the pics, random as usual...
















Lastly for this event, a quick story that you might not even believe...
Several pics above, there's a server in an Auburn jersey. When I brought R2 into the store, she asked me "What's you robot's name".... can ya believe it? I couldn't.

Old Events - Build-a-bear 9-25-10

So it's only just come to my attention that I missed posting a couple of events here.

First, the Build-A-Bear workshop event down in Orange Beach, AL. Event was 9-25-10.

Anyway, LFL had asked the 501st to assist with promoting the event with an appearance. Since I don't really plan to ever wear armor again, with the notable exception of the once annual "active status" trooping, I took R2 instead of an armor bin.

Here's pics:







Since I didn't take the pictures (as usual) there are only a few of R2, but many more of the "gang"...



Riding on the Ferris Wheel...


Searching for Droids...


One of those multiple workstation shots:


The Build-A-Bear Force Choke:


And TB craziness...those trees can be troublesome.

Shinies!

Lookie! Got some shinies in the mail today when I got back in town:





They'll still need a little sandpaper around some of the edges before they get a coat or two of primer, but boy these things are pretty! It's almost a shame I have to paint them.

I don't think I'll be putting them on the A&A feet though. Not unless I get a little more onfo on where the JAG feet holes are, and transfer that info to the A&A.

Anyway, that's all for now.

Repairs Finished

Well, got R2 put back together.

The damaged area is still visible, but it looks more like weathering than having been in a car wreck...



the paint that's missing on the panel came off on the tape that held it in place whilst it was being siliconed back on:



Sure wish I'd have thought about that, but I'll live with it.

For the footshell I went a step further this time, and used the good old "poor man's fiberglass". Or maybe it's actually "Lazy man's fiberglass"...I forget what I called it previously.
Basically it's more CA glue, but this time with the addition of some T-shirt material for strength:



Here's the finished product:



I'm not happy about having had to move the middle screw (right where the damage was) from the inner skin to the outer skin, but the dent in the frame in that exact spot meant the skins would be separated otherwise.

All in all, we're going to score this one as a win!

Damage repaired

Well, repairs are underway at least, if not complete.

Here's how I did it:



Used a piece of the leftover skin panels and a ball peen hammer to "tap" the bent pieces back into shape.


The inner skin after repair:





Note the good old metal brake, from the motor mount creation process. Made a fairly nice anvil. Also the vinyl, to "protect" the paint... and the unused panel from the skins to make sure the curve was right.

Those things are worth their weight as straight edges and forms, so don't throw them away. Ever. Put 'em in a box and hide it. You might need 'em.

As you can see from the "overhead" veiw in the next pic, it's not perfect:



Some reason I started taking fewer pics during this process, so there's not really a pic of the inner skin by itself after repairs, although you can see it in some later pics that aren't about the bent part.

Here's pics of the skins layered together, the way they fit on the frame:





Again, not "factory spec", but pretty darn close. The panel that I pulled out to straighten just kinda stayed there for the pics, it's not glued in place yet. That'll happen once the skins are back in place.

And, I mentioned these buggers in the previous post:



Note the pretty holesaw damage on the top vent...that's from the holes I drilled for the speakers last year. I probably mentioned that at some point or another, but there's proof.

You'll also notice the fun little addition there a panel over...that's right, I remember to glue the magnet in place for the restraining bolt. I probably won't use it much, since it could walk away so easliy, but I can if I want to now...

Back to the vents. Rather than build a frame to go around the vents, I decided to rely on old faithful PolySeamSeal yet again:





PolySeamSeal brand silicone has held the skin panels and the coins returns on admirably, so it's getting a chance to hold the vents in place now.

Lastly, I took the outer skin outside and gave it a little touchup:



Looks brand new in that light doesn't it?

Ok, so that's all for now. Gotta wait at least until tomorrow to let all the silicone cure some before thinking about reassembling R2. And spending some time sitting and staring, making sure there's nothing else I wanna do before putting it all back.
And spending time wishing WoMo's most excellent side vents were easier to deal with when mounting them back again...

Next time :)