Day 3 of work on the little guy. Decided to assemble the foot shells. Below is a photo of what you start with. Lots of styrene - laser-cut pieces that fit together like a jigsaw puzzle. Not much need for instructions, as the parts only go together one way.
I did, however use Alex Kung's excellent tutorial for reference. Bless the iPad and the internets - instructions for nearly anything right at your fingertips.
Center Foot all squared, glued and clamped up. I used CA (Cyanoacrylate) Glue with an accelerator. The Accelerator sets the glue instantly. More than a few layers of skin from my fingertips will ride along with R2. Then again - there are many body parts that are permanent residents in my various costumes. These projects involve blood, sweat, tears... and some skin. Progress was much quicker when I had an extra set of hands (Dad's) to spray the accelerator as I held the pieces in place.
Gratuitous clamp shot. Loves me my clamps.
Completed center foot shell. The edges will be reinforced from the inside, bondo and a lot of sanding will finish out the outside edges.
Below is a shot of the internal plate locking mechanism for the side door on the foot shell. Still not sure if it will be used, as I am a HUGE fan of rare-earth magnets. The locking mechanism is a little engineering marvel created by A&A.
Complete (almost) foot shells and center foot shells. The biggest joy of assembling (or receiving) parts is actually holding the item we have all grown to love. Instantly recognizable, and no doubt will stay that way for a very long time. Initial gap filling with plastic-welder. This will be sanded down and the bondo - sanding fiesta will commence.
Another angle of the feet. Almost ready to roll around... I can dream, cant I ? I still have to insert the lower inner curved parts on the outer feet. I saw another builder's blog that used a PVC pipe cut to size that looked rather promising.
Other items worked on:
Put the first layer of Bondo on the outer and center legs. Sorry - no photos. It would look like bondo setting, which is tantamount to watching paint dry.
I received a good amount of resin parts this week. A good chunk of the day was spent test fitting and marveling at the accuracy and detail in the pulls. HUGE thank you to Wayne Orr and Steele for your craftsmanship. Photos of these items will be coming up - keep watching.
I also test fitted the Outer skins on the body. Once again - I got very excited, as the skins make the body instantly recognizable. Tapes the skins temporarily to get some "memory" working into the curvature of the frame.
Again - sorry for the lack of photos of the test fitting of parts and such - I was too busy admiring all of my little mock-ups.
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