Grand Rapids Griffin's Star Wars Night

March 21st was the Star Wars night for my local hockey team the Grand Rapids Griffins. The Michigan chapters of the 501st and Rebel Legion participated in a charity event to raise money for the Grand Rapids Griffins Youth Foundation (we ended up raising nearly $8,000...a record so far!) As part of the charity photo booth, I brought my R2-D2.

Here are some pictures from the event:

My R2-D2 positioned for duty at the photo booth.

Ready to be admired and adored by children of all ages.

R2 with a...friend?

Group photo of the costumers.

Me (on the left) as Episode 3 Padme (the baby bump is real) next to Padme from Episode 2...I guess I'm beside myself!?

Foot Cable Progress

I had a Rebel Legion event on March 21st that I wanted to take my R2-D2 to. I desperately wanted to get the foot strips made and put on my R2's feet before the event, but we kept running into problems. So, I decided I'd at least like to put the cables on, temporarily, for the event without the foot strips. I glued the cables into the knurled fittings coming from the battery boxes but the part of the cable that belongs in the feet would be temporarily stuck into the knurled fittings (which I will remove later when I'm ready to permanently attach the foot strips). With my husband's help, I got the holes drilled into R2's outer feet.

Red Flannel Festival

I took my R2-D2 to another Rebel Legion/501st event on Saturday October 4, 2008, in Cedar Springs, Michigan for the Red Flannel Festival.

Here are a couple pictures:





The rest of my photos can be seen here

Painted skins!!

At long last (it seems), my R2-D2 is proudly sporting fresh paint on his skins! Yesterday and today I masked, primed, painted, and topcoated the skins. It meant removing his legs, poor little guy, but I am happy that I was able to get them back on tonight and take some pictures. (You can see the painting progress in my Skins post.)

Here he is, modeling:

Skins

I purchased styrene for my R2's skins in 2004 and cut them out myself using full-scale blueprints found at the R2-D2 Builders' Club Yahoo group. After several years of just taping them onto the frame with masking tape, I finally got to permanently attach them, add all the little panels, and then finally paint them. Here are pictures documenting my process:

Screwing the inner skin to the frame (front view).

Screwing the inner skin to the frame (back view).

Taping the outer skin to the inner skin.

Preparing the panels for taping to the outer skin.

Panels to be placed on the skins.


Before panels (with my son).



The first panel is attached!


Before the panel...


...after the panel is attached.



Back view before panels.



Attaching panels to the back.



Panels are attached (front view).


Panels are attached (back view).

The detail pieces are masked and I'm ready to prime the skin.

Two layers of white primer were applied, and then two layers of Wimbledon White, then three layers of crystal clear gloss top coat.

After the paint was "touchable", I removed the masking tape and paper from the detail parts.

Cheating?

My R2's shoulder to body hubs are made out of wood. I tried painting them aluminum, but it just didn't satisfy me. One day, while walking through Menard's, I noticed a display of shelf liners, and my eye caught on a faux metal version. I purchased it, and used it to cover the wood and make my shoulder to body hubs appear like they are made out of aluminum!

Scratch Made Coin Retuns

With my budget being rather small, but desperate to get my droid finished, I followed the advice of a couple R2 Builders and made my own out of left-over styrene. It took some patience, but it paid off, and I'm quite happy with them. In fact, I don't think aluminum coin returns would have fit in my droid. The styrene versions seem quite at home among the styrene skins I made.

I thought I had taken more pictures of them, but I don't seem to have more than this. Here are my coin returns prior to priming and painting: