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Monday, September 10, 2007

In Quest of Robot parts

Yesterday we took a trip to the greatest place in the world to find robot parts on the cheap. It happens to be a nearby flea market that is filled with interesting junk that look like robot body parts. The problem with the place is I usually buy too much and then need to find a place to store it all.

This trip happened to be a particularly fruitful one. The best find was a couple parts that made a neat looking head for a new robot that is now officially on my "in progress" list. It was just too cool to pass up - made from electronics of the 50's. Certain parts need to be found in pairs. And in the case of bus stop robots, there's two of them so two pairs are needed for a good find. I met a guy with about a dozen inexpensive shower heads for sale. I bought 4 and they work perfect as shiny chrome shoulders for the bus stop robots. Better than my original plan of using standard ugly flanges from the hardware store. I disassembled the shower heads and was able to use some of the internal parts to construct a quick release method to remove the shoulders/arms from the torso in the future if need be.

Yvonne also found a couple of cool retro items from the 50's / 60's for next to nothing. It's one of those nice flea markets where everything is like from a garage sale. You never know what you'll find there. Plus you meet a lot of interesting characters.

Which brings me to something I've mentioned in the past. Anyone can enjoy this hobby regardless of their financial situation.

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