Booster Cover Slot Work, Dog Houses Cut and Glued

Today it was back to work on the booster covers.

The first item of business was to cut the booster cover head pieces, just below where the slots will be cut.



That was easy enough. The small part will be glued back on once I'm done working on the slots.



Next, I cut many small MDF segments that make up the "dog house" that covers the top of the leg strut.



I made more mistakes cutting these than I care to admit. (Let's just say I have a couple more stacks like this one.) A few extra pieces were cut, since I had enough material for them.



Kelvin came over to help me with the dado cuts for the slots in the booster cover tops. I printed out the picture from when we set this up for droid #1.



We cut along the dotted lines.



With video!



This also worked out well. Here are the bottom parts I cut off at the beginning of the day, loosely fitted.



I decided to square off the corner radii left from the router on the top areas of the slots on the booster covers.



I just used a hacksaw blade and went to work.



Looking better. This area is hidden by the dog house, but I needed to at least clear some material to allow room for the leg strut.



The leg strut fits in. On droid #1, the fit is so tight that it's more or less stuck in there.



The last item of business for the day was gluing together the dog houses.



Slowly getting there, one step at a time.

The Art of R2 - More Booster Cover Marking

Tonight I marked up the booster covers for more cuts that are coming soon.

I marked the alignment points for the centers of the grooves that go on the lower part of the booster cover body pieces. The router gouged the bottom edge a little bit, but not to worry, that whole side gets cut off at the end of the build.



I also marked where to cut through the booster cover head pieces, in order to make the dado cuts for the slots (whose areas I also marked).



Hopefully this weekend I can make some progress on these cuts.

Trimmed and Marked Booster Cover Tops

Tonight I had some time to return to work on the booster cover tops.

I started by trimming the pieces to size on the miter saw.



I shaved a little material from each side, iteratively fitting the width against the booster cover bodies until they matched. Not quite there yet...



A few more trims, and all is well. At this point the top pieces are 3.35" tall, 3.125" wide and 2.00" deep. Again, the height is 0.10" taller than spec because I'm going to cut through the piece to get to the slot areas later, and I am accounting for the kerf of the blade (or pretty close to it).



Next, time to pull out the blueprints, compass, ruler and pencil and start marking up the pieces for the curve that gets cut at the top.



There are two different radii centered at two different distances, so I measured and marked the center points for these arcs.



I clamped the pieces together and drew the arcs.



I marked both the front and back faces, and then drew lines connecting them along the top and sides.



Just like when I did this for droid #1, this took a lot longer than it seems like it should (around 2 hours or so). I'm glad that's over with, but sanding out the curve itself takes much longer.

Marked Up Booster Cover Top Pieces for Trimming

Tonight I spent a few minutes marking the booster cover head pieces for trimming. I cut these a bit big, and I will either sand or saw them to size. Most likely I'll use the miter saw.



I probably won't have a chance to get anything done for a few days.

Let me be the last to say, "May the 4th be with you." (We can now give that a rest for another year.)

Finished Routing Booster Cover Body Pieces, Cut Top Angles

Today I went over to my friend Kelvin's house to borrow his table saw for a few weeks, as I continue to work on the booster covers. Kelvin joined me at my place, where he helped as camera man for some of the shots, and helped me build as well.

First up, routing down the rough-cut layer of the booster covers.



A rare shot of me building, usually I have to take before and after pictures on my own.



I routed down the material a little at a a time, because the poplar doesn't give way as easily as some other materials. Looks like the time was 2:42:30 PDT (as I can see in the full-res picture.)



Here's one of those before/after shots of the keyhole area.

Before:



After:



With that out of the way, it was time to set up for trimming the 9 degree angle off of the top of the booster covers on each side. Veterans of the blog may recognize the picture sitting on the table saw from droid #1. I occasionally refer back to my own blog entries to see how I set up for various stages of the build, so I can recreate the scenario later if necessary.



The blade is a blur, but we fed the booster cover through.



With (somewhat noisy) video!


Once one side was done, we flipped the piece over and ran it through again.



After a little sanding, the booster cover bodies are in great shape!



There are a few things yet to be done, including routing the horizontal groove around the booster cover to match that on the legs, and routing the vertical grooves. I'm not sure when I will do those, I may work on the dog house and head pieces first.

Started Routing and Gluing Booster Cover Bodies, Cut and Glued Head Pieces

A somewhat busy and productive day, continuing work on the booster covers.

The first item of business was to nail down the booster cover template to the body pieces that I rough-cut yesterday, so that I could route them down to size using the flush-cut bit. First I trimmed the outer perimeter of the pieces.




Then I trimmed the inner keyhole area. Recall that the legs of the booster cover are closed to provide stability while working on the piece. At the end, the bottom part will be chopped off.




That worked out pretty well.



Note that I am not routing down the other layers just yet, I'll explain why in a moment.

Next, I cut the layers that will make up the head piece of the booster cover. This will rest directly on top of the body piece.

The head piece is made of two 3/4" layers of poplar, and one 1/2" layer, for a total thickness of 2".



One day, these six layers will make a pair of pieces like that on the right, which I pulled off of droid #1 for sanity checking my measurements. I am intentionally cutting these pieces a little large. There are several tricky cuts coming up much later, that will help bring the pieces down to size. I'd say this piece is one of the most challenging cosmetic pieces for me to make on the entire droid. (The scratch-built foot shells were worse.)



Time to start gluing layers together. For the booster cover bodies, I am gluing the rough-cut layer to the routed layer. Tomorrow I hope to route down the rough-cut layer so it perfectly matches the layer that I routed down today. It's better to route the rough-cut layer to the layer it is glued to, rather than routing it using the template and hoping for a perfect match after gluing.



Note that I left the nail holes showing on top. It turns out that the entire top surface will be cut off later, as the piece is shaped to match the blueprints. The amount removed is deeper than the holes that the nails created when the template was attached earlier.



And finally, I glued up the layers for the head pieces.




The head pieces are currently 3.5"x3.5"x2". I will reduce them to 3.125" wide, 3.35" tall and the same 2" deep. That height is 1/10" taller than spec, because I'm going to cut completely through them to create the slots, and I am accounting for a 1/10" kerf.

Started Booster Covers for Droid 2

Almost three years to the day after I started building the booster covers for droid #1, I started the booster covers for droid #2. Given my recent slow pace, let's see if I finish them in anywhere near the time it took the first time around.

I dug up the old template and traced the outline on 3/4" poplar wood, the same hardwood I used last time. Poplar is sturdy, but very fibrous, and routing it isn't as smooth as it is with other materials such as the birch plywood.



Next, I cut out the booster cover bodies. There are two 3/4" layers for both booster covers. I left about 1/8" or so from the line I traced, for routing later.




I drilled a pair of 1/2" holes into each of these, to allow room for a jigsaw blade to fit inside.



Next, I cut out the area that the leg strut goes into on all four pieces.




That's where I left it for now. Tomorrow I will route two of these layers to size using the template as a guide, and glue the other two layers to them.