R2-Q5 is Done!

I finished basic construction on R2-Q5 and later found some photos of this droid from deleted scenes of Return of the Jedi.

I based the paint scheme on this droid based mainly on the Hasbro toy and the few photos of the full sized droid which was on the Deathstar in ROTJ.

Photos of the droid in front and back. Not the best photos, slightly out of focus.

After looking at these photos of Roger Nichol's droid room showing a full sized R2-Q5 I decided to go with the paint on the real droid and not the toy. This means I have to change a few things, or really paint more stuff and remove paint from the front logics.

If you look closely at this deleted scene from the Bluray of ROTJ. R2-Q5 has his large upper panel painted copper along with some of the dome panels. This is not on the Hasbro toy. But I can make my droid more screen accurate knowing this. So its time to get to work. I have this droid going to a Phoenix Comic Con in 7 days and I can't take him apart. So I'll drive him outside and mask and paint him there.

 Now all masked up. I'm going to be painting the large door on 'his' right and all of the panels except the HP.

In the rear I'm painting the large long panel to match what's in the deleted scene from ROTJ.

So I start painting and notice the can is beginning  to run low, the paint is starting to spit out large blobs. Time to go to the store and get another can of the same paint.

Oh, but wait! I'm using Krylon 2908 Copper and they don't sell it no more:( I bought this can 5 years ago and it lasted for all the parts so far. So I run to Home Depot and Lowes they don't sell Krylon at all.

So I go to AceHardware where I bought this can and get Ace brand copper paint which out of the 3 stores is the closest match I found. Amazon has only 6 cans of this paint Krylon 2908 left. But they don't sell via prime and it will take about 10 days to get that paint and I have a Comicon in 7 days.

So what do I do with the 3 panels partly painted? I gotta just use this new paint. With my luck, they are close but don't match:( The new can of paint has a brighter copper and my older paint had a slightly darker copper. But nobody will be able to tell unless I point that out.

A couple hours after the paint was put on. It's looking much closer to the movie droid from ROTJ now. I still have to paint the outer feet strips copper and remove the front logics and remove the black paint and return that to silver. But I'll do that after the con is over.

Side view. This is the first photo of it complete with all the parts on it. The newest parts I added are the shoulder hubs and the booster covers. I had resin boosters I was using on this droid. They are smaller than the aluminum versions and they were a bit warped. With these you have to drill and tap where you want the bolts which fasten it to the leg. I could not get the bolts perfectly and just grabbed my blue booster covers off R5-D4 and painted them black. I was running out of time and had to make due.

1 other thing that is not screen accurate are the silver hydro piston thingys are supposed to be black instead of silver. I just think it looks cooler with silver than black, because otherwise hell the entire droid is just black.

Rear view: Now the back matches what is in the deleted scene that best I could from the above ROTJ photo.

Me and this guy have a lot of adventures and good times coming soon. I'm pretty happy with how he turned out. When I had the dream of building this droid I just wanted something simple. A black droid that drove, had lights and sounds and that's it. Nothing else, so I kept the skins closed and had nothing else I wanted to do with it.

I can't stop now. I've learned so much over the past 5 years I want to apply all the cool things I did with my R5 and do all of that in this droid where I can.

So I plan to install servos to control atleast the front holoprojector and install some LED light in the front and back and a red light on the top HP.

I'm going to open all the front skin doors and I'm going to use my droid Zapper to come out the little front door on the left like you see when R2-D2 zaps the chain off Leia to free her. I'm going to replicate that since this is a ROTJ droid.

I'm also going to get the utility arms to open and close with servos like I'm currently working on for R5. I have plenty of servos and time to take this to the max.

I'm also getting another dome so I can convert this droid to R5-J2. I just need the dome and I have plenty of parts to swap and make this droid which look like it can kill people on the Deathstar who don't belong there.

Let's hope they have plenty of imperial droids in Rogue One!

Getting R2-Q5 on 3 feet and realizing I have a big problem.

Getting the droid on 3 feet is a massive accomplishment, until you see some thing has gone terribly wrong.

 I know I got the center foot properly, that pretty much can't be screwed up. But these feet are way off or atleast one of them is. So I looked over at my other R2-D2 to find out what is the proper distance to give me some idea.

The leg on the left is correct the leg on the right of this photo is sticking out way to far. No way I'll hook up the drive system and try to drive this and break something.

Here is a few from the side. How is this even possible? Both the legs simply bolt onto the frame and I had this droid in 2 legged position before and on my first time on 3 legs its all messed up. At this point I don't know whether to laugh, cry, get mad or head to the creature cantina and shine one on. All I can think of now is Captin Picard.

How many thousands done the drain for a crooked droid? What short bus did this guy come off from? Surely this can't be the fault of the man who designed these, they'd never sell so many and I'd be the first who caught this? No way the error has to be on my end. So I study the droid and figure the right leg is the one that is not done right, but how?

After taking some measurements on the side plates I found out the screw holes didn't match the the left plate. I highlighted the 2 top holes with red circles.

 The left hole in the rear comes down 2.1 inches and the other hole is about 1. 3/4 of an inch down. That's enough to make the difference so the fix here is just to take the parts off that mount the skins mount to then flip the plate around 180 degree and put the leg back on as my awesome green arrows I drew clearly show.

That fixed him:)

 So then the moment of truth, I wire up the legs turn him on and get ready to see him move for the first time in 5 years. The sound track of Rocky starts in the background I power on my transmitter and get ready to scream out "I did it Adrian I did it!" Then I turn on my droid and wait for him to breath and come alive.

Nothing, lights are on the electronics on but all radio control has died in the past 2 hours somehow. That turned out be a loose connection but he runs now. That happened when I installed a strap to hold both batteries to the frame so I can tilt him without the batteries falling through the robot.I think I should replace that electronic parts as it can/will stop me from RC in the future now that I know that needs more solder somewhere.

I'll be tweaking that next to my liking but "I did it Adrian I did it!"

Feet Assembly

I had the center food done a while ago and now its time to install it. I didn't want to remove the batteries and start unwiring that so I lay the droid on its side and slip up the batteries just enough to reach the screws. I swapped out the Philips heads for Allen wrench head.

Here is a bit of a close up. I found this much easier to use a 90 degree tool to bolt that in then a screw driver.

I have 1 leg ready so I turned the droid a bit and bolted that leg on. Next up is putting together one of the outer foots. There is a certain order for this to be done that makes it easier so read along.

 1. First you install the hoses into the battery box.
 2. Then you install the hoses in the foot and don't forget the foot strip, its easier to do this now and about impossible after the foot drive is installed.

3. Now you can install the ankle to the foot, you can also do this after the foot drive is but its easier to do it now.

4. Install the foot details on the side. If you install the foot drive system you can't install these parts as there is no room to reach the bolts. I learned all of this the hard way with trial and error until I found a good way to put this together. Despite the fact I painted these feet and related parts over and over again to get them perfect. Just be ready to see additional scratches as this don't exactly slide together easily. I think later I can just buy an airbrush and do touch up on parts I don't like.

Such as the other foot I did last week. When I put this together the foot strip did a 180 swing and scratched in a smily face into my fresh paint. Damn it! I refuse to take this apart and try to get it assembled perfect. Some masking tape and an airbrush will fix this up later.

5. Anyway now you install the foot drive system in my case it's an original JAG foot drive with 1 wheel.

6. Install the NPC motor now and then you shove the wheel and get the belt as tight as you can and tighten the 4 bolts. DO NOT have the wheel in the position you want and then install the NPC that will make the NPC motor a bit crooked. Now slide the battery box over the NPC motor.

7. I used 2 self tapping sheet metal screws to attach the batter box to the foot shell. I got a nice and solid fit doing this. I'm using battery boxes supplied by R2 member Matt and they are really nicely done.

8. This is where I placed the other screw to keep it bolted on. I hope the foot is somewhat level if the rear omni ball is too high I'll have to take it apart and adjust it. As a rule of thumb the droid only drives on the wheels and not the wheels and the omni ball. Most have the omni ball about a 1/4 inch lower than the wheel and the omni ball is sort of a backup system form when your droid takes a hard stop or goes in reverse.

Other misc problems doing your install.

There is a good chance you're going to have to grind down the top of the NPC motors or the battery boxes probably won't fit. This is kind of a right of passage for a builder.

Not everything is easy peasy what I find is my foot drive is about 1/8 of an inch off the center channel as the red arrow in the image above shows. The green dots I paint  in the U channel are where I should have drilled the holes. So 1 side of the NPC needed more grinding than the other side needed. Make sure the foot drive is centered perfectly in the U channel of your foot shells or there will be hell to pay!

What kind of hell to pay? This kind of hell! As I said before if you don't have this centered too well as I found out. You might be grinding extremely deeply into 1 side of your NPC motor is the hell you'll pay of screwing up $320.00 in motors and close to $900.00 for your foot shells you wrecked and need to have spot welded to save it. Read, read read alot of blogs before you try to wing this like I do!

This part I got from 'somewhere' I don't remember that are dual nuts to hold the hose in the battery box didn't line up. So I just cut that in half with a dremel, no biggie.

Last tip: Don't put any clear coat of paint on any of your parts as they might get messed up in assembly and you never known when final assembly is until its sat for months completed. I plan to air brush the parts later to fix them. This black Death Star Droid should have NO weathering, not until the Death Star blows up, until then it was shiny and clean looking.

Also don't use loctite (yet) because as a droid builder you never know how many times you have to take these various areas apart until you have parts just where and the color you want them. I'll probably be taking these feet apart several more times to adjust the feet level if needed and other things that will pop up. I know how R2 builders think, install something use loctite and think " This part is done, I can cross that off the bucket list". No part is ever done, you're just done with it for now... 

R2-Q5 Electronics

I've been working on this droid alot lately but haven't blogged my progress in a while.

My old batteries which barely got used were old and died. So I have new batteries and I've made my own electronics board out of 12x12 inch by 1/4 inch thick aluminum.

 The panel has holes that I have 1/4 inch hand studs that attach to some L brackets mounted on the frame. I can in about 1 minute unscrew the 3 bolts and unplug main power then disconnect and take all of it out if I need to.

I took some photos of the switch settings on the motor controls for future reference.

R2-Q5 Center Foot Build

I can't believe its been about 3 years since I did lots of updates. But here's more work I've been doing. This center foot took me about 1 month to do from start (have all the parts) to painted and completed.

It don't really take that long to assemble this foot. But it was 4 years ago that I constructed my other foot on R5-D4 and the center foot shell was manufactured different and I simply forgot how the hell this thing is assembled. So I looked up past center foot build and that gave me most of my answers I needed.

Pictured here are two heavy duty Misumi casters. These casters cost around $60-75 each! and they weigh a ton. The two casters are sitting on a steel plate that is not yet primed. Below the steel plate is a primered steel plate with rounded corners and has 3 large and 4 holes already drilled into it. This was the old standard hardware that came with the JAG foot system he created. That worked just fine for certain types of casters but these expensive monster Misumi casters need a long steel plate. So I went to Online Metals and orders a steel plat that is .125 by 5x8 inches as shown above. The cost was $4.40 and $6 bucks to ship.

 The center foot I painted black and then fastened the footstrips on bolts and lock washers. I used some Glazing Putty to cover the holes int the foot strips. I also drilled 3 holes into the foot channel to attach to the U shaped hardware. I realized I only needed 2 holes so I bondod the center hole and repaired it and reapainted it black. For this type of build everything has to be assembled in order or it's a bigger pain in the ass than it already is.

Next up I got the 2 steel plates ready. The U shaped steel plate on the left had many holes already drilled in it. I taped 4 holes for what I think was 10-20 screws. Then I screwed on the 4 spaces you see in the U channel plate. Next to that plate on the right is the steel plate I ordered from Online Metals. I placed the casters on that plate and used an automatic punch to mark where I wanted to drill and tap what I need. So I taped 8 holes 1/4 inch if memory is right and screwed in 8 bolts. Then I drilled and counter sunk 4 holes that will be used to attach this steel plate to the U channel plate. I used a bit of blue Loctite but if you also do a build like I have, it should never come apart. Also after I tapped all the holes I needed I cleaned out all the junk from tappng and then primed the steel. Remember to do this or it will rust.

For illustration of how this works I put the top plate on the U channel so you can see how this will go together inside the footshell. Also note the 8 bolts are a bit to long and I ended up using a dremel to cut the bolt in half to make it easier to put locknuts on later.

Now for the actual foot construction. This was for me hands down THE hardest part of this center foot build. As I said you need to assemble this in order or its too much work trying to assemble nearly 20 pounds of steel and aluminum. So you start this by mounting the center ankle cylinders to the center ankle. What you see above is the only method I was able to do to attach it to the ankle. I don't remember how I did this on R5 as that was 4 years ago and I don't remember what burger I ate yesterday. So at first you will simply try to bolt these on using allen bolts or hex bolts. The problem is the area you have to try to get your fingers down in is too small. My fat fingers pretty much take up the entire area. I tried to find a person with very tiny fingers to try to get the allen bolts on and it didn't work.

So above is my solution. I went to Ace Hardware and bought a threaded rod that is 10-20 by 2 inches long. Then I screwed the bolt into the cylinder as seen above and dremeled off the bolt until it just has enuff meat for a locknut to fit on. So now the bold easily go into the center ankle and instead you need some tiny fingers to get some locknuts started. Then finish fastening them with a wrench. I don't know how other builders pulled this off, but that's how I did it.

So after both cylinders are on the center ankle you are free to attach the center ankle to the center footshell. That part is pretty easy so no photos needed.

Now with center foot and ankle attached I bolted on the U channel with the 4 stand offs as seen above. After you finish that get the 2 half moons and outer foot plate and attach it to the 4 predrilled holes you see in the U channel. You have to do this now because after you install the 5x8 steel plate you won't have access to this areas anymore.

Next install the 4 bolts that fasten the bottom steel plate to the U channel. I got 1 of my holes a bit off but it all holds together extremely snugg and well build.

Next drop in the 2 casters and put on 8 locknuts and it's about ready to mount on your droid! Notice that these awesome casters do not touch or bind together when at their closest. There is also no need to remove material from the footshell like many others did in the past with casters that have a wide swivel range.

Here she is. R2-Q5's center foot ready for action. This thing is  H E A V Y. Weighing in at 18.4 pounds.

My Cylon Helmet

I haven't done an update in a while but I have been working on various projects so here is an update.

I ordered a Clyon Helmet from Starbuck. Here is what came in the kit.

Kit came with 2 side of the helmet, mouth grill, some black resin parts for the eye area.

This eye scanner I found on ebay from a guy out of Canada. It was around $50 bucks and a rapid solution to get the eye up and running.

So I removed the extra styrene from both haves of the helmets and then used left over styrene to make small tabs as seen in the mohawk. I superglued them in a staggering manner. I also took a pencil and hand drew where I needed to cut out the eye and mouth sections with a razor knife.

So with the eye area cut out that brings me to this. Its about ready to fasten together and if you do this alone it can be a bit tricky at first.

I used rare Earth magnets and a clamp to hold them together while I spot welded it slowly with super glue.

About an hour or so of doing that it left me with this! Now its starting to look like an old school Cylon. The helmet still needs more reenforcement with styrene.

So I put super glued in more tabs to make the helmet more sturdy. It looks a bit ugly inside but that will change.

Next I got a glass jar and poured Weldon 3 in there and cut up scraps of styrene and let that set for an hour and start to melt into goo. Then I used a cheap throw away paint brush and started coating the goo over the entire outside crack and then in the inside also. This stuff smells nasty so don't inhail it if you don't have too. I think Weldon 3 is not legal in California.

Here is a photo of inside the bucket. The plastic tabs are alot smoother now and the inside is reenforced pretty good. I left the helmet out side to cure for several days. PROTIP: Don't over do it with uber layers of the white goo. If you need to apply alot to build up an area do it it layers. If you try too much when its time to sand, you'll notice the white goo gums up and don't sand worth a damn. If you need serious build up then try Bondo instead.

After more sanding I applyed some Glazing Putty (red colored material) to further smooth out the mohawk crack. If you look closely in the old TV series you can clearly see both halves of the helmet and what looks like Scotch Tape holding it together. So one don't need to go this far with removing the crack if you want to look cannon.