Aren't You a Little Short for a Droid-Builder?

Okay, I'm running out of witty blog-titles! Actually, I think I ran out a while ago...haha!

I worked all weekend on my droid, and was too tired to post, so here's a Monday morning re-cap:

As I prepare to install Dizzy's legs, I'm pausing to work a bit on the last of his main body bits. Once his legs are on, he'll be much lower (right now he's perched on a stool), and the work will involve more back-breakingbending labor.

Saturday (mostly -- sometimes I'll add a few minutes of work from one day to another, blog-wise)

I was pretty thrilled at starting on the main electronics, even though the wires were a bit heavy (12 gauge) and I later undid this and decided to go with 14.

And I've been working on enlarging these bolt-holes for several days. Using a blade bit finally did the trick. Look at all the styrene dust accumulating inside poor Dizzy! This is the area where the legs affix to the body, and even though it has been reinforced several times I'm thinking about adding even more!

I'd decided to follow the method Teeces (barrettandcarly.com) used to install the A&A gear set. It looked really simple, and I figured I'd spend about 20 minutes on it. TWO days later I can testify that the simple jobs are often the ones that'll get ya! It proved frustratingly difficult to get the holes from the hub drilled into the gear, as that plastic is really slippery. Depicted below is evidence of my many attempts. :-(

And it wouldn't align properly on the Z axis:

It took me a while, but I finally figured out why -- there were these little plastic plugs all around the Rockler bearing that I'd never noticed before. Popping them out helped quite a bit.

But several months in that position seemed to have warped the large gear. :-(

Back to the work table for me!

Luckily my gear set came with an extra small gear. Doubling up seemed like the way to deal with this problem. Now that the hub is screwed onto the motor shaft I can't really test it until power is applied, so we shall see!

 All that took maybe 3-4 hours over a couple of days. I also ran to the hardware store, and spent quite some time researching online (again). All in all it was a pretty full day!

 Weekend Day Two! Sunday.

 I have made what I think is my FINAL list of droid to-do tasks:

It doesn't look that long, but I estimate at least a month to complete. Still...wooooooo!

I "designed" the caster mounting system for the center leg. I love fractions! Seriously, I did not need to write out 4.50 minus 3.25 did I? Apparently I did.

Beginning the caster mount.

And, just like magic, it's done!! 

A final check on the clearance of the caster -- 1/2 inch, as planned. Hooooooraaaaaay!

Cementing in the bolts that will hold the leg to the body. Remember when I said I should buy shorter ones? Yeah, me too. That would have been good. These are not splayed out the way they look -- that's the effect of my phone's camera, which seems to have a bit of fish-eye in the lens.

 And when you do things like this, it's time to put down the power tools and back away slowly:

:-)