Aluminum Dome

Today was a day to work on R2. Specifically the new Dome I got from Daren. After watching a very informative video he made about deburring the slag from the laser cuts, I was inspired to prep my Dome and remove all the inserts. The video can be found at http://gallery2.astromechbuilder.com/main.php/v/darenmurrer/videos/ I gave up on the idea of household projects and building new shelves. I needed some robot/droid building time.

Trimming the dome pieces is a time consuming process but I found it to be very relaxing and rewarding. I took my time and all the pieces came out great. They were all labeled, deburred and stored in a safe place. The last step will be to lightly sand the edges with 220 grit sandpaper. One challenging task that's still high on the list is to cut the circles for the holo projectors in the inner dome. There's a couple other cuts to the inner dome that also need to be made.

The dome also comes with a plastic inner ring and a metal outer ring that attaches to the lazy susan. ALSO ... Daniel's dome base plate fits beautifully as well as Andy's gear underneath that. This is a great combination. So ... while I wait for the holy grail aluminum frame, I'll get my dome and skins in shape by painting and prepping them all. Also will install a rising periscope working in the Dome. Plenty of projects to go around for the next couple months.

Daren mentioned a good way to treat/polish the aluminum is to use "bom's away" so I ordered a bottle online. Another member I spoke with this weekend mentioned using white Silicone to attach the outer and inner dome pieces. So that's what I'm going to use. Keith and Carolyn have that in their R2.

Doug P. stopped over this weekend and we talked about R2 building. His R2 got a new set of feet recently and this weekend he added a new front foot on his.

I also talked with a couple guys getting ready for Celebration out in California later this month. There's going to be a heck of a party out there and I sure wish we could have made it this year. Maybe next year ...