Tuesday, September 30, 2008

Fazoli's kids Night

We had a great time!
I would also like to that the 501st members that came down to support us :)
Fazolis set a record night when we were there. R2s got Mojo!


This is the manager who invited us to attend and her kids.Even KITT showed up to the party!

The adults were taking pictures with the group just as much as the kids LOL.
You can see the start of my Jedi Costume in a few photos here. It still has a long way to go.

Our favorite pose. Charlie's Angels.
I need a haircut soon :P
A long line for photo opps.

A reporter came down to do a story on us from UNO college.

Fazoli's staff
This guy has never seen star wars and he paid for it with his life hahaha.

The kid in the back was infatuated with the stormtrooper and would not leave the poor guy alone HAHA.

All the rest of the pictures will be on our websight and on the Astromech.net galleries later this week.

Saturday, September 27, 2008

Outside of dome done....for now :)

First I want to say...Whats up with hardly anyone Blogging right now?!?!?!


I started today by making a mounting bracket for the front logics out of some scrap pieces of MDO.
The logic boards will slide into these groves and held in place by the front panel piece.
I had to put a curve in one side so the PSI would fit next to it.
The bracket is also bolted in from the bottom ring so it does not slop around.
Next I drilled some servo mounting holes in some 350 hinges
I used some 5 minute apoxy to attach them to the dome.
Now a few of my panels can open. I will do more in the future.
Kieth's Resin PSI holder was to small for the rear one without seeing the plastic near the edges so I made my own out of a crystal light container which was the right size.
All pretty now....
Now that the basic dome electronic are in all I need is a slip ring so I don't need a battery in the head all the time.

Dash came over after a while and he started cutting out his dome panels on his new dome.


I also helped him glue up his A&A legs and install the wires.
Lastly we finished off his other frame that we all built together.
We glued it up and made sure it was square and left it to dry over night.


Start Blogging people! I have nothing to read! HAHAHA

Wednesday, September 24, 2008

R2LA Webcast point of view

I have not seen any blog posts on the web cast side of the R2LA so I thought I'd better do one. I was one of the many web viewers that day. I started watching around 1pm my time and had a blast.

All photos in this post were taken by Victor and should get full credit for them.

Inside Senna's home he converted his projection screen TV into a large viewer so the R2LA attendees could interact with us webbers better. You can see my name up there a few times! DarthMoose74

Victor, Will, McMaster and other people took us on tours threw out the day.
This is us Web casters watching the award ceremony.

They did leave us outside while filming the Easter Eggs for the DVD though LOL.
Senna was giving everyone fortune cookies and was nice enough to open some for us web watchers. Mike told everyone I was from Alaska because my name is Moose while he opened mine and people believed him. Thanks Mike :P HAHA
Cole and Darren who were on the Web cast were nice enough to do trivia prize giveaways all day including a new plastic dome! I was lucky enough to win a set of skin extras.

Even the all mighty DON BIES came to the web chat and talked it up with us a few time!

All in all I had a great time and look forward to other events doing something similar for us folks who can't afford the gas to go.

Tuesday, September 23, 2008

We are made to suffer, it is our lot in life. :P

Tried to get some stuff done these last few days and had nothing but problems.
After the first coat of paint dried on the dome ring I put it on my dome just to see what it looks like.
To me it seems the area of the inner dome that shows threw the spaces looks to big. (Yes my domes are fully seated) I was wondering what anyone else thinks?

The next problem is the first two pieces I painted with the chrome started to get all funky on me because I sprayed it on to thick so I had to strip them and repaint them.

Instead of using paint stripper I decided to use my carburetor dunk barrel that I was using at the same time for another project. The parts came out clean but now smell like a used car. OPPS! It will take some time for the smell to wear off.
The next day they smelled not so bad but you can still tell. HAHA. I went ahead and repainted them both anyway.
The next day after they tacked up I started to install the rear one on the dome. Lucky me the JB weld that held the bolts in place let loose from the inner dome. So I had to pop the outer panel off. Just my luck it popped of and hit the soft pillow I had it set on :) Then it bounced up and chipped against the newly painted ring on the edges :( Back to the garage for some touch up they go.
I cleaned up all the hot glue that held the brown panel on and installed some new 4-40 bolts. This time I did not glue them in. I just tightened them together with the rear logic surround. If I ever need to take the resin surround out I can just pop off this panel again.

After attaching the logic board the the surround I installed some of the other wiring and the rest of the Holoprojectors.
The front logics brown "8" piece I glued into place and will leave it clamped till tomorrow night.
I tested out the rear logic to make sure I did not break anything else...
So far so good. The panel I touched up is tacked but not cured where I painted it but I could not help myself to just set it in place with no glue and take a picture.
Here is a pic of the painted front holo that can move and the "8" piece being clamped.
Tomorrow I will skip to getting the 350 hinges partially installed for the few opening panels and make a device for holding the front logics.

I have a lot to do to the dome before next Tuesdays event!