Beautiful Legs

Today was a better day than Monday. Thanks to those who gave their encouragement during my frustrations.

Earlier in the year I was on the leg run from Ryan. The legs had a lot of heavy grind marks from the welder not taking pride in his work. When a friend of mine saw them he really wanted to take them and clean them up for me.

He took them to "Revive Customs", his muscle car restoration shop in San Bruno where he used red finishing putty and a heavy dose of filler primer on them. Below is the result:













Now they just need a wet sand with 400 and a few coats of white paint!

Special thanks to Ron Gomez of Revive Customs in San Bruno, CA.

Frustrations

Most of the time people post about all their successes and the great work that is being done. Its great to share those things, but why doesn't anyone share their failures and frustrations?

R2 Building is not easy. It takes a lot of time and it takes some failures along the way. Today was one of those days. It was the single most frustrating day in my build so far.

Lets start with this crappy rust bucket car in my garage. Its not mine, its for a "Youth project" which is never going to happen. It crowds my workspace so that I have less than 2.5x3 feet of space in front of my work bench, and I have to crawl over the hood to get there. Just tonight it has been responsible for the loss of 3 screws and a small wrench. It has also torn some of my better jeans with its rusty snags.

As I continued work on my dome plates, I blew out one of the JB welded screws (one of the lost) and had a heck of a time getting the dome plates in place once the HP's and logics were involved.

So, I tried a hand at getting the PSI's set up. I couldn't get the PVC assembly right for holding the lenses and attaching to the plate. I guess I just realized how little I know on the subject, which left me throwing my hands in the air with resignation.

If all that wasn't enough, I found out that my green LED's on my rear PSI have a short and like to go out on me.

Dome Ring and Component Plates

I have been working on R2 in the evenings over the last few days and I was finally able to get the HDPE ring and lower ring installed on my 300mm dome.













I also continued work on my "Component Plates" that will be mounted inside the dome. Each plate holds the components for the dome (HP's, Logics, PSIs ,etc.) in either the front or the back. Theoretically this makes it easier to install and remove things for working on them and maintaining them later.

Below you can see the various component holes cut from the plates and how the plates fit in the dome.

Dome Electronics Mounting

As I looked at the various methods that people have used to mount their HP's, Logics and various electronic boards into their domes, I found that I prefer to give Chris James' method a try.

First thing I did was put my HDPE ring in the dome and mark the upper edge with a marker so that I would know where my panel was supposed to sit.

I bought 2 pieces of 1/4" ABS that were 6"x20". These dimensions were greater than Chris' recommendation, but I wanted to be sure there was plenty of extra plastic hanging out the sides. This gives me a place to mount some servos and boards as needed.

The heat gun wasn't working well because of the volume of plastic, so I had to heat it in the oven.

My broiler wasn't working well (top heating) so I turned the oven on bake. Also the sheets were too long for my cookie sheets so I had to put two side by side. I also had to set the temp to 350 to get much of a result.














After minute I could see the plastic sagging and tried to move it. I found it sticking to one cookie sheet and that the side over the other sheet was still firm. I flipped it around to even out the heat and that did the trick.

Once I got it heated it formed in the dome really well. Results did vary though. The second sheet was problematic and burnt a little on one side. It also got a little deformed, but nothing that I cant fix with a heat gun applied to small areas.














The next step is drilling and countersinking holes so that the plastic can be mounted. With it firmly in place, I can mark the ares where it will need to be cut to allow pass through, such as the PSI's, Logics and the back end of the HP's.

I will continue to post progress as I make the remaining modifications.