Who needs glue?

Nearly a month since my last blog but that doesn't mean I haven't done any work on R2.
My goal was by Christmas to have R2 able to stand up unsupported as long as no-one touched him. This wasn't achieved however because of school holidays - yep I had to stay indoors where it was warmer and annoy Skye. To cut a long story short, Skye was not feeling well the week before xmas and ended up having an emergency appendix operation on the 23rd December. She was discharged from hospital on Christmas Eve and is back to her annoying self. Anyway, while she was in hospital we decided it would be good to take R2 round the childrens ward when he's finished as a thank you to the staff and to cheer up the children. This adds a bit more pressure to make him look even better now - gulp!

I've digressed enough now and back to the build. I managed to escape the house for a few hours and headed to the garage where the 2nd foot was built to the same stage as the 1st. This meant R2 could stand unsupported and photo time. The obligatory photo of a persons head behind R2 was also taken.

Skye with the compulsory picture

Due to my shift pattern at work, I have managed to fit in another few hours in the cold garage. At one point I was wondering how I was going to get my lunch without getting wet as the rain streamed down. Then it eased and my worries were gone.
I was now cutting the 1mm HIPS. WOW!! how much easier is this to cut and snap than 3mm? This stuff is really, really  nice to cut. The 1mm parts for the legs were cut out oversize in order to give enough material to trim up. After checking for high spots the strips going around the tops of the legs were glue on and held in place with tape. Only 1 strip on each leg at the moment though.

2nd strip taped in place.Who needs glue?

The next day after these had dried the 2nd strip was added and again held in place with tape.

Slot bits drying - hopefully!

There is so much tape around these sections that its a pity glue is applied. While these strips were drying a trim of the slots and a file of the angle bits and another part of the legs are covered in 1mm.

While in the garage I played with some filler called Milliput. It was bought from a local railway model shop and has some excellent uses and only cost £3. Once mixed by hand like dough it was put in a few places on the feet and when set can be filed, sanded, drilled, tapped etc. This could be my saviour if I'm going to display at the hospital. I'll let you know how this part goes.



The magic of Milliput?



I'm back at work tomorrow, and I had best start studying for a couple of exams in 8 weeks, so the build may be a bit slow. But while studying on the laptop I could start playing with Picaxe programming now I have the stuff - hmmm!!!

Gosh! Nearly forgot Star Wars on blu-ray - absolutely fantastic. Although Skye did threaten to destroy the discs if I kept saying quoting lines before the actors. Obviously I humoured her - for a while