I’ve worked on a bunch of things the last few days, the simplest is probably getting my shoulder hubs finally installed.

I borrowed another idea from Victor and used rare earth magnets fix the hubs in place.

I started off by marking and drilling the holes. The magnets I used are 3/8″ x 1/8″ thick from MagCraft. There’s two magnets per hub, and two matching magnets inside the leg.

I’ve been doing a lot of drilling the last few days, and I’ve been extra careful to secure everything before I drill – even when I’m pressed for time or tired of doing it. You can never be too careful.

I then checked the polarity/orientation of the magnets to make sure they’d not repel another magnet. Otherwise I’d be in trouble when they’re presented to the magnets in the legs. Sounds simple but I almost got it wrong at least twice.
I roughed up the back of the magnets and epoxy’d them into place

I took two more magnets and epoxy’d them inside the leg stacked on top of small nuts.

Here’s a short video demonstrating the new magnetized hubs

I’ll try and post some more updates on new things in the next day or so.

This has got to be one of the best R2 videos on Youtube ever!

Now to figure out what the song is so I can put it in my sound system 🙂

As promise here’s the demo video of the new CF-III setup. Sorry it’s so long.

P.S. Don’t forget the laptop is only used to show the diagnostic messages. It’s not needed for normal operation. Electrically this setup is exactly the same as all the other CF-II/CF-III systems in droids today. I’ve only added my custom code to add the extra functionality.

Then new dome motor (a surplus Pittman GM9236) arrived today and I thought I’d share a short video to compare it to the original underpowered GM9413 motor I had been using.

It’s still runs at 12V, so no need to upgrade my electrical system to 24V. It spins a lot faster and definitely has a lot more torque.

Here’s the original GM9413 for comparison.

And finally, here’s a quick side by side shot of the two motors, the GM9236 is on the left. It’s a little bit longer and has a small shaft at the bottom which I think is to connect an encoding wheel to.

One of the challenges of owning a droid is transport. Not everyone has a Sandcrawler handy or can afford a fancy trailer, and most cars are too small.

When I went down to C4 in LA I removed his legs to fit him in the front seat of my Beetle, but I knew this was not a long term option and I needed to come up with a better solution.

Luckily we have an old 1994 Dodge Caravan that we use for hauling stuff around. It’s not in great shape and the wife has wanted to get rid of it for years, but I’ve resisted and it turns out the van is perfect for carrying R2 once the bench seats are removed.

I was tempted to build a winch system similar to Mike Senna’s, but my droid is much heavier and would probably require a welded frame. The side door of the van is very low to the ground and I decided to try a ramp system first and have R2 load/drive himself in instead. I bought an aluminum ATV ramp at Pep Boys and cut some plywood for the top.

Here’s a short video of us loading my R2 at R2-CCA this last weekend. I still need to get some thick carpet or maybe even plywood for the floor of the van to stop his feet sticking in some grooves in the floor of the van, but overall the loading is very simple.

It may look like I’m pushing R2 in the video, but he’s driving up the ramp under his own power.

Well I’m back working on R2. It’s been a while since I’ve done anything on him and I’ve still got a long list of big to-do’s. Sadly, instead of working on the small things I’ve been avoiding everything.

Inspired by reading Victors success with the Mist/Fire Extinguisher effect this week I decided I’d give it a go this weekend, hoping it would kick start me going back to work on more difficult things like the skins.

The mist is created by an inverted can of compress air normally used to dust PC’s and office equipment. When it’s inverted rather than spray air, a watery/icy mist comes out.

I decided to put the air cannister and output in the dome instead of the body. I really liked the idea of popping open a dome hatch/side panel and having something come out, and I thought this would be perfect.

I’d already bought a cheap solenoid which was part of a trunk release kit I found on eBay. I had looked locally, but eBay seemed to be cheaper. Wiring it in was a snap and it’s only a few wires. It’s triggered with a spare channel on my RF remote.

I cut a 1 1/2″ acrylic strip and bent it into an L shape. I bolted it to the Dome Mounting Ring and then used clamps to hold the cannister and solenoid to it.

I drilled a small hole in the trigger of the air cannister and connected it to the solenoid with a bend paper clip.

Here’s a rough diagram of how it’s wired

Space in the dome is tight and I’m sure I’ll need to move things around or lower/angle the cannister more to accommodate the periscope lift mech.

Here a short movie clip of the first test with the dome off

Then with the dome on

I still need to add a hinge to the hatch and power it with a servo. I did tinker a bit with the Robart hinges but decided to leave this for tomorrow.

Here’s a few more photos from C4. First up the group picture after the droid parade.

Here’s a video of the parade itself

Next up, me in the replica Tantive IV hallway

and finally me driving R2 around

Another big step forward tonight and I’m not really sure where to start or if I can remember everything I did.

Maybe it’s easier to say where I’m at – I now have a lot of the electronics installed in the body, from fuse block and power distribution to the speed controllers and sound system. I can now control the dome and periscope from my Vex transmitter and trigger sounds with my RF remote.

There was a lot of stripping of wires, routing them, testing, and moving stuff around to make it all fit on the back panels. I also installed a second Vex in the dome to control the periscope, and eventually it’ll control some servos on the pie-panels.

From the photo it really doesn’t look like a lot but there’s a lot packed in there

I’m now realizing that it may not be a good idea to run R2 around naked / skin-less at C4. I could easily see someone pulling on the wires and frying something.

Here’s a quick demo video as well.

You’ll notice in the video that the periscope doesn’t run up and down smoothly and it chatters. Some of it is due to the speed the motors run at which I can limit in the Vex, but there’s also a lot of play in the lift mech screw system itself which I need to fix somehow.

I still need to wire in the RoboteQ speed controller which will drive the feet, but you can see it at the bottom of the frame.

One problem I noticed again is that the Vex in the dome has problems receiving a signal. This maybe a big show stopper unless I can route the antenna somewhere else.

The 12 channel RF Remote also has a “problem”. The new models have a little speaker/siren on them which makes this awful bleep every time you press a button on the remote – I’m sure for most applications this is fine, but for R2 it’s got to go. You’d think it could be disabled easily, but I can’t find anything. I’m going to have to fix it before it drives me nuts.