Entry for June 28, 2006

[Originally published on Yahoo! 360°]

Today I finaly got a price for the signfoam: $400.00 for a 4x8 piece 2 inches thickl . Time for plan B: wood. The funny thing is an aluminum R2 dome would cost almost $500.00 precut so maybe I shouldn't complain, but alas I don't have that kind of money to throw at this right now. Wood will be much cheaper and just as easy to work with. Me with my dad will build a ribbed frame for R6's head and then wrap a thin sheet of plastic around it. Then I have to make all the additional parts such as the radar eye and the holo projector. Hopefully it willl look great when I'm done.

John

Entry for June 25, 2006 (Duh Day)

[Originally published on Yahoo! 360°]

Well today is a perfect example of a "DUH" moment. Starting yesterday I was testing an LED pattern for the rear logic display, but I couldn't get it to work. I tried everything from new batteries to asking for help from other builders. Today however, after exhausting all other ideas, I thought to "DUH" read the instructions and see if I missed anything. And lo and behold, I had the stupid LEDs reversed. Once I corrected that, the LEDs lit up like a Christmas tree. So I hearby make today national "DUH" awareness day (hehe).

In other news, I decided it would be easier to construct R6's head building a frame out of the signfoam and then wrapping some kind of plastic sheeting around it. My dad agrees it would make it easier considering the shape of the head.

John

Entry for June 21, 2006

[Originally published on Yahoo! 360°]

I didn't get home 'till 2am this morning so I decided to wait until now to continue my train of thought from yesterday. So here now is part two....

....Because of all the trouble I've been having with the Logic Displays, I'm starting to consider a more voltage friendly solution: using fiber optics. This would be the more accurate thing to do. The original R2-D2 (Star Wars Episode IV: A New Hope or just Star Wars) and the official ILM R2-D2 (made for the prequels) uses fiber optics instead of a full mess of LEDs. They might be on to something. If I use fiber optics I'd only need one LED per color which means less power required which means an easier circuit design. Only drawback to fiber optics though is they'll take up more room inside the head than LEDs on a flat circuit board. This will take some more research and price figuring before I make a final decision.

John

Entry for June 20, 2006

[Originally published on Yahoo! 360°]

The one problem with doing something you've never done before, such as building a robot prop, is the costly mistakes you make because you didn't know any better. Today I learned that all the LEDs I had bought off of ebay are the wrong types. First I bought 5mm ultrabrights but discovered they were too big. So I bought the correct size (3mm) but then discovered I should have gotten standard LEDs and not the ultrabrights. The ultrabrights were requiring a lot of power so I inquired about it on "The Club's" message board. They pointed out I was using ultrabrights when I should be using standard. Well how was I supposed to know there was a difference. So now I've spent $10.00 + shipping (shipping was about $10-$15 per bag of 100 LEDs) and now have 1000 LEDs I have almost no use for LOL! Someday I'll research before I buy....but that'll be years from now I fear. Anyway....nuts, have to go to work now. I'll finish this later tonight when I get off....I have to close tonight .

John

Entry for June 18, 2006

[Originally published on Yahoo! 360°]

'sup guys During the past week I got all the other LEDs I need to start making the Front and Rear Logic Displays. After doing some research and asking questions on the R2-D2 Builder's Club Yahoo! Group message board, I'm nearly ready to begin soldering. One thing I have to finish first is drawing up schematics for how the LEDs will be arranged and connected to the QK169 PIC Flasher circuit I bought to control the flashing pattern. Because I'll be using a 12V 8amp AGM battery for the head I need to calculate exactly how much power each LED will require so I know how many I can connect in series before I max out the battery's voltage and have to create another series of LEDs to run in parallel. Apparently if you connect "things" to a battery in parallel instead of in series, all of the "things" get the full 12 volts at the same time. I'm still trying to wrap my head around that but if that's how it works then all the better.
I know, I know; pictures, pictures, give us some PICTURES!!! I would if I could, but I don't have a digital camera or anything like that. As soon as I can afford it, I'll get a digital camcorder so not only will you get pictures, but VIDEO as well. But money is tight right now so you'll have to imagine what I'm talking about, hehe.

I'll talk to ya all later.

John

Entry for June 11, 2006

[Originally published on Yahoo! 360°]

Greetings. Well all I've been able to do this past week concerning R6-C9 was ordering more LEDs for the Logic Displays. And that's it. Tune in next time, same Bat time, same Bat channel, hehe.

John