www.R2-CM.com

January Update

2012-01-27T20:17:00.000-06:00

Made a few quick disconnects for a few of my robot projects. It makes maintenance a whole lot easier.

Also got K-9's head together, no more blue tape for him.Working on the ears and nose next.

Happy New Year!

2011-12-31T09:13:00.002-06:00

Was bored the other night....

2011-12-30T12:20:00.000-06:00

...so I made this. :)

Childhood remembered

2011-12-10T21:57:00.000-06:00

Greatest Speach ever made done Star Wars style.

2011-12-07T23:37:00.000-06:00

Tom Kane posted this video yesterday. Pause the music player on the right and push play on this video. The person talking in the background is Charlie Chaplin. Just as true today as it was back then.

Day one of cleaning

2011-12-07T19:51:00.002-06:00

Got quite a bit done today even though it may not look like it. Got rid of the old cabinets, tons of scrap spare parts, and things I have not used in years. In all other than furniture there was 5 trash cans full of stuff! The other nicer stuff I did not want to hold onto I just gave away to new homes. Hopefully I can get this room finished up tomorrow and move on to the next room.

Time to reorganize

2011-12-06T15:36:00.001-06:00

I tore the complete workshop apart today just so I could find a remote for a friend's RC car. It just happened to be in the bottom pile of the last stuff I looked through. I think it is time to reorganize the workshop one more time and maximize the space a little more efficiently.

All that for this little remote. LOL

I started off by collecting all the spray cans back into one place. Next I will get rid of the old cabinets.

Nebraskon Fun

2011-11-11T08:38:00.000-06:00

Had a blast at the con again this year, Even got to sport my new Doctor Who scarf for a while. That is till everyone started stealing the scarf for pictures in front of the TARDIS. LOL

Some of my friends and me got together for a group picture in front of the TARDIS later on. To bad I was in my TRON outfit at the time. Oh well, I can always say I was the White Guardian. LOL

Then it was time for our droid panel.

Even Wicket stopped by to say hi!

Droids running wild and free!

Tons more pictures on my Facebook page!
Thanks to Denny Freeman for providing most of the pictures of the event. :)

TRON room finished!

2011-11-08T23:08:00.001-06:00

Here are a few of the finished room photos with me sitting on the floor without the beard on. Hope you like it!

Here is little Jack having some fun. :)

The Legacy continues

2011-10-24T01:58:00.001-05:00

Work has resumed on the TRON room, the next section has been welded together and combined with the other sections. It has gotten so big that it needs it's own room to be set up in! Did a whole bunch of wiring on it today and lighted everything up. With how bright the room is I feel I am building a lighthouse sometimes. lol

Droid boo boo

2011-09-19T12:27:00.001-05:00

While loading Patches up for an event I ended up almost dropping him because I have been doing so way to much heavy lifting and help friends move. Trying to lift a 125+ lbs droid seamed to be the final straw. Lucky his head was not on. Patches also got a wire yanked as well that is now fixed. Here is a shot of Patches after I popped the two dents out of his back skins. A little filling and sanding, then a respray of paint in the two chipped areas and all should be good. No more lifting heavy droids by myself for a while says the Doctor. Sad we had to miss the event but there are plenty others coming. I will take the lighter Astros to the next one.

BBQ and Build day

2011-09-05T04:30:00.004-05:00

Our friend Jaka has had the parts for years to get her droid, R2-AL running, but never was able to get it working right. So this Labor day weekend she came all the way from Colorado with AL so we could get him moving. (Sorry for the unturned photos) There are more photos on my facebook page!

The night before Jaka and me laid all the electrical components out, wired them together, and got a test run going.

Laying everything out on the frame. What a mess!

Hobbit hair and all, wiring everything up.

John S. lending a helping hand.

Ben says the foods is ready!

HAZZAH! Is is break time!

Sitting around eating, trading stories.

Back to work! Mo and Dave lend a hand as well with AL.Setting him on the floor after getting the legs back on.

TADA! AL is alive! Driving under his own power! Jaka is one proud mama!

All the kids want to play with AL now.

More photos on my Facebook. :)

New post finally! #885!

2011-08-29T10:55:00.001-05:00

Sorry everyone, had been laid up for a week plus had some real life stuff to do. After running up and down the stairs a million times to get stuff for B9 I decided it was time to take him downstairs. What a pain that was! At least now I can works on him easier. K-9 is coming along even though it does not look like it. I decided to try one more neck setup on him. The second one worked just like in the show but I hated having to let go of the button right when he hit the top or bottom just to keep it there. Time for some limit switches!

50,000 Hits!

2011-07-26T01:07:00.000-05:00

I did not even realize till today that R2-CM.com has gotten over 50,000 hits! Looking at the stats of this blog, it has been seen all over the world. I am so happy and humbled that so many people take the time to look at it. I hope I have helped inspire builders to go and do good themselves and help others. As this blog is becoming more than just a robot building blog I hope everyone finds something they like. Feel free to leave any comments or questions on the posts, I will get back to them in a timely manner. Again thank you to all the fans out there, without you this blog would have died out long ago. :)

OSFest 4.0

2011-07-25T08:01:00.001-05:00

OSFest 4.0 was here and gone. Had a great weekend with great friends.
Here are just a few random photos from the CON. Lots more on my FACEBOOK if you would like to look. FaceBook= Moose Mendolia

Here is a photo of half of my R2-CM gaming room. It was packed every day! Lots of different games being played. Thanks to all the GM's and gamers that came and made it great!

Me playing Flynn for the first time without the beard. Kinda like how he would of looked 10 years before TRON 2.

On the meeting of the minds panel.

A friend made a TARDIS cake. We are trying to repair it with all our sonic screwdrivers. No luck but the cake tasted great!

Jen and me setting up R2-Central at the con.

Kelly as Laura Croft and me as an SG-1 member in front of my TARDIS before the Stargate panel.

Bow ties are cool!

The first of two Doctor Who panels I was on.

Jen with her new tail :) Meow!

Patches and Shadow roaming the halls.

Me as the DUDE with Laura.

Party time with friends in our room.

Doctor Who panel #2

Tom Baker reboot!

Dinner time!

Tons more photos on my FACEBOOK! See you all next year!

OSFest this weekend

2011-07-22T05:56:00.000-05:00

Did a quick TV spot for the OSFest CON the other day with a few friends and Patches. Take a look!

OSFest 4.0 on Morning Blend

B-9 detail

2011-07-09T07:22:00.000-05:00

Last night I did a little more work to B-9 but did not have a camera. I am trying to make sure the outer details on the robot stay as original as Brad had them but update all the internals. Putting in the new wiring is not an easy task. B-9's new voice system is mostly done, just a few key pieces to link together once I figure out how.
I hope Brad likes all the improvements once they are done. :)

Getting ahead with B-9

2011-07-05T22:17:00.000-05:00

Right now I am working on getting the little lights for the head to light up. What lights that were installed were never finished and the few that were don't work anyway. So I took the head completely apart and gutted what little wiring it had so I can start from scratch. Once I go the head apart I realized the neck support will have to be beefed up as well. The glass dome has no actual support and is just resting on the brain top piece.

Details, details

2011-07-02T08:43:00.000-05:00

Jen took the time to paint Patches power coupler for me as she has a steadier hand for this kind of detail work than I do. I have put off painting this part for way to long.

Jen then painted the power coupler on her R3 who now has the nickname of "RIVER"

One final coat of paint and it is done.

Jen was nice and painted TD's power coupler as well, she also touched up a few scraps here and there.
All better now!

Trooper dance to fight Cancer

2011-06-26T14:16:00.000-05:00

A few other 501st troopers and me did a troop for Relay For Life. this weekend in Iowa. Here is one of many moments caught on tape. I will post pictures in a later post as well.

Bumps and Plungers

2011-06-26T05:04:00.000-05:00

Got some progress done on my Dalek this week. Got most of the bumps made and the plunger and eye mount started. The head is coming along nicely as well. :)

Having a little fun

2011-06-19T01:19:00.000-05:00

Patches got a picture from an admirer this week. An R2 from a coloring book painted brown.
Patches loves it and so do we! It will be going on R2-CM's refrigerator once he has carried it around for a while.
Thank you so much for the wonderful gift! Beep! Boop!

Another fun thing is this picture of B9 with R3's clear dome on instead of his own. It looks kinda cool and the dome matches the claws. lol No R3, you can not keep B9's body.

B-9's last boot-up on video

2011-06-18T00:02:00.000-05:00

B-9 in the house!

2011-06-16T21:21:00.001-05:00

I acquired a new robot from my friend Brad as he no longer has the room for it. It needs a few repairs and upgrades but for the most part everything is there. Poor B-9 has not been powered up in over two years so I took the time to dust out his insides and figure out what plugs into what. I got a few of his lights and sounds going again. On the floor you can see his EQ on the monitor and his chest lights flickering. I will probably do a complete gut out of the computer later but I wanted to get the original system working first so I can take some video of it for the history books. Other upgrades I will do is eye lights, real rubber treads and simple hand movements.

Just a little bit of CON video

2011-06-14T20:32:00.000-05:00