electronics

Some new years building progress…

So, since I’ve had a lot of time on my hands during the new years, I’ve managed to get quite a bit done!

I took a few trips to the hardware store and picked up more polystyrene cement, as well as some needed tools and a huge lot of nuts and bolts and washers. At least enough for me to attach battery boxes, the motors to the main feet and all that.

I took the first leg i finished outside and spent 10 minutes with my mouse sander on it, to get all unsmooth edges and uneven bits done and dealt with, and the end result was really nice and smooth.

In addition to that, I routed cables through the leg, and made sure my shoulder hubs fit well into the shoulder, with a magnetic lock.

Here’s the sanded leg with cables running through the leg and proper cable attachments mounted. This leg only needs a small amount of sanding on the marked, red edge before it is ready for skinning.

I decided to add a caster to the main foot as well, as the big wheel is really off center, and I wanted to make sure the foot was nice and level. I may not need this, but at least I have the option of trying this. With the system with the motor holders, and the feet only being shells, I should be able to just switch the feet around to the other leg, should I like to have the caster in the front or in the back. Having the caster in front will cause more impacts, but it will allow me to run the droid backwards through doors if I need to.

Here’s the final foot motor holder, mounted and ready! Seems sturdy and stable, and I can’t wait to get the robot to a point where I can actually have a robot that can move! =)

Apart from that, I also went back to my HP’s and made small white caps to cover the bottle caps out of 1mm styrene. This looks way nicer than the previous temp solution of using paper as a diffuser.

I am starting to get the hang of working with styrene, and using the first leg as a template, I used it to mark and cut out the parts for the second leg.

I even managed to get some time gluing half the leg together.. My plans are to have it completed by tomorrow, and thus having both legs ready, construction wise. Skinning is definitely needed, but that will be for later!

I also have plans for a magnetic lock for the shoulder horseshoes, but I’ll have plenty of time to put that into action before skinning the legs!

So at this point, I’ve got all skins cut out, fixed lights for my hp’s, got one leg done and the second halfway there… and one motor holder done!

//Micke

By |2016-12-06T00:02:03+01:00January 1st, 2012|R2-D2|Comments Off on Some new years building progress…
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More building done ..

So, after cutting a lot of styrene, I found an old tube of polystyrene cement among my old model colors. Unopened.

That cannot be, I decided, so that had to be put to work.

So, after experimenting with my own circular cutter thingy, I decided to put together one of R2’s legs!

After putting together about half, I was VERY happy that I recently bought a small sanding machine, as there were quite a few places where the height was not all even, but that was just a few minutes with my mouse sander, and it was all smooth and ready to glue together.

I also built a small magnetic lock into the hub for the shoulder hubs.
Unfortunately, I cannot take any pictures of it at the moment, as it is glued together, but here’s a pic of what all my hard work yesterday resulted in:

Behold, R2 has one leg complete! Woohoo!

Anyway, that was yesterday, and I figured I could not afford to be lazy today either.

After redoing my design for the motor holder, recutting some styrene, as I had made a mistake in the cutting, I started gluing things together… and one thing led to another, and pretty soon, I was left with this:

For a better view, look at this:

Yes, there are a few clamps, but not all I have, fortunately! Actually, I picked up a few more in the store.

I included a few close-ups of the inner workings of the motor holder. It really holds the motor snugly in place, and all I need is just a few spacers on the inside for the mounting screws.

Naturally, I had to try it out.. even though the glue had not had time to harden over night… but a few minutes wouldn’t hurt 😉

Worked like a charm, if you wonder!

So: here’s a nice view of my finished motor holder. At the moment, I need to add another 3mm piece of styrene to the inside part of the “groove” to get the proper measurements. Seems I miscalculated with 3 mm after all, but that’s ok =)

You have no idea how many small pieces I’ve placed inside this as bulkheads, to strengthen the foot in any way I can think of.

All in all, a busy day, but a fun one! =)

//Micke

By |2016-12-06T00:02:04+01:00December 30th, 2011|R2-D2|Comments Off on More building done ..
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A cheap, working solution for lights in the Holoprojectors…

After reading another builders blog, I got inspired to work on the light in my own holo projectors.

I have these, really nice hp’s from BobC:

These are CNC:ed out from aluminum, and just beautiful.

Anyway, I purchased 3 of these LED lights to use as a light source inside the HP’s:

I figured I’d find a way to attach these into the HP’s along the way. No idea how to actually do it at the time.

 

After opening up the LEDlights, I used a special type of plier, used to remove locking casters, such as the ones right inside the HP. Luckily I had one of these lying about since back in the day when I was making my own chain mail 😉

After opening them up, this is what I was left with.


By looking at the battery holder, it is the central point that is the plus sign, and any/all of the four outermost soldering points that are the negatives. This is where I will solder later.

Now, by looking at the size of that thing, I had an idea. the inside of the LED light is just slightly smaller than a normal bottle cap. Being Christmas, I had to use bottle caps from “Julmust”, which is a christmas brew only available in stores around Christmas. Good thing, as it is SOO tasty!

I drilled a hole through the bottle cap, and used an old screw to fasten it to the backplate of the Holo’s. Just look at how well the LED innards fit inside the bottle cap…

So, long story short: It is a simple task of soldering 2 wires, one to the middle, and one to any of the four end points of the LED board.

I then cut open the cap from the side to allow for the cables, and filled half the cap with hot glue. This will also serve as insulation for the center screw.

Sorry, no pics during soldering. Don’t want to burn myself…

Once this was done, I like another builder, too had the issue with the LED lights showing when lighting something, so I needed a diffuser. I also noticed that the very RED bottle cap could partly be seen on the very edges of the lens inside the HP.

My solution for this was simple. I used a glossy, slightly thicker part that I have for my color laser printer. I superglued a disc of paper on top of the LED, and also, for good measure put a dab of glue and put the original lens from the LEDlight on top of the whole thing.

Last step is to turn the whole thing on! Just look at how nice it turns out, and the total cost for this was just the cheap LED flashlights, some cable, and having to empty three bottles of julmust! *hic*

Cheers!

//Micke

By |2016-12-06T00:02:06+01:00December 25th, 2011|R2-D2|Comments Off on A cheap, working solution for lights in the Holoprojectors…
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