Kresty working on Fusion Power Generator

[kresty]

Grabbed some hoses, took a little bit of thought, nothing really was exactly what I'd preconcieved.  Picked up clear 7/16" OD x 5/16" ID tubing and black 1/4" soaker hose. 

Lower black hose/cable


I like the idea of the black hose for the lower hoses.  The lower hoses seem to me to be placeholders for the cable that Luke plugged into Artoo, which clearly isn't really one of these hoses (because it's too long).  Makes me think of the fusion generator as a USB charging station.  It comes with some shorter cables to charge your blaster, but you can stick a longer cord into it if your droid decided to park further from the charger.

Anyhoo, the soaker hose is about the right diameter.  Maybe a hair big.  Flexible wire might be better, but rigid wire's going to bend and look stupid and the polyeurethane tubing is going to kink and look stupid.  This is rubber so it should work well, and I like the idea of it's texture.  Also it isn't marked like wire might be. It fits onto the nipple's that savage put on his parts, though it's a tight fit and I would prefer the little one stuck out a hair further.

I'm probably going to get a coiled 1/4" audio cable to mimic Luke's plugging in Artoo as well.  The cable's kinda cheap, so I might get one to chop up and see how that looks instead of the soaker hose.

Upper clear hose

The clear hose at 7/16" outer diameter seems to fit about right, it's a hair smaller than the diameter of Savage's 3D part posts.  As mentioned though, it looks like the hose on the real model goes into the T connectors.  Regardless I couldn't really figure out how to attach it to the connectors.  A hole could be made in the T bit for a thinner hose, but I fear the walls will be too thin for this hose at about 1/2mm.  I think I'll stick an adapter into the T for the hose to plug onto.  

Given the still where the hose has fallen off and the T is still intact, my guess is that it's some sort of hollow metal tube, maybe a threaded nut of some kind.  We're not going to be able to have walls that thin with printed plastic, so something else has to give.  I don't want to make it thicker, nor the hose thinner, so that's why I've decided an adapter might work.  I'm thinking a nipple that fits in the 5/16 ID tube, so maybe a 5/16 ID hole in the T?

[kresty]

So, this is what I meant by my hose fittings.

I noticed that it was transparent.  I can't tell if the hose goes through or not, but I decided the diameters were the same so it didn't matter.  Here's mine next to Savage's original.  Both stick into the panel on the side of the grill, but Savage's sticks out on top.  Mine has that bit occupied by the hose.  I printed it from translucent ABS filament.

Main Hose Mount

In case it isn't obvious, this is how my hose goes through the fitting.  Bonus is that you can slide it further in to adjust the loops if you want.

Main Hose Mount

On the other end my problem is that the 7/16" hose is too close to the diameter of the T fitting.  If I shove the hose all the way into the T, then the shell would be less than a half mm thick.  Pretty sure I'd break that in about 32 seconds.

Instead, I've created a void in the T.  Then I printed a translucent nipple to connect the T to the hose.  (Here the T is an old one, the new ones haven't finished printing.  But the bit above the hose would shove into the T).

How Nipple Connects Hose and Tee

I think these are going to work reasonably well.

[kresty]

And, of course if I have the part printed, I wanna see if it works.  These pictures make it look way better than it is because the base is still white ABS smeared with pink Bondo. 

But, wow.  It did what I wanted.

Fusion Reactor Light Test

Compared to the original... The main hose fitting glows similarly, heck I currently even have their hole (continuity error I think)

Close up of Fusion Generator and Plug

Slightly wider:

Fusion Reactor Light Test

[kresty]

Of course I still need quite a bit of work, but here's what I'm planning for the light.  Basically I stole Valor's light selection.  He'd mentioned on the RPF using an Orange LED, and I could see from the picture that it's a Phillips.  Works pretty well.

Light Concept

I stuck that in a $2 fixture, the kind you'd stick on a closet ceiling. It and the LED bulb came from home Depot. I figure I might eventually do something fancier with WS2812's to flicker or something, but this is quick and easy.

Without the diffuser it looks silly, so I put it in there. It's clear and looked a little off, so I threw in a piece of paper just for the test. I'll see if I can find something that does the same job but a little more transparent. (cheaper paper?)

As I mentioned, this was just a quick test to see if the fitting worked like I wanted, the body still needs sanded & primed & everything else. And there are a few pinhole light leaks.

Light Leaks

Those didn't surprise me. What did surprise me is seeing through the top of the lid. I guess that ABS isn't as thick as I'd've expected. Seems like most spots were covered thick enough with the primer, but some of it must be really thin. I'm surprised, without the backlight it looks totally covered.

Light Leak on Top

I suppose I'll probably cover the lid inside with a reflector - some aluminum or something - help make the light brighter.

[kresty]

So I cleaned up the 3D files and went ahead and shared them.  That's because I touched most of them.

Specifically I modified the main upper hose mount to accept my translucent fixtures and provide a way to attach the hose to the T.

I also had trouble spray painting the inside of the "heat sink", so I provided a split version in case someone wants to paint it before putting the fins in.

A couple parts I left unchanged, though I did tweak the lower hose mounts to better accept my drip hose.

Oh, I also added a post to the top of the T so that I can add some holes to the top of the laser cut M ring to make aligning them and affixing them easier (now I need to tweak the M ring laser cut plans)

[SuTaiBot]

Excellent work on this Fusion charger!

For the lighting, I had fancy things in mind so for my Fusion Furnace I went with an arduino controlling a WS2812 LED strip.
Later I switched to dotstar (APA102), just to test how they compare with the neopixel (WS2812); I would actually recommend using dotstar.
If you wished to go give it a try, just let me know ;-)

[kresty]

Thanks!

I was planning on using the WS2812's, but Valor's light seems like an easy stopgap, so I went ahead and do that.  Looks decent enough that I imagine now the LEDs will be down the list of things to do  

My biggest neopixel problem is Lara's lightsaber cane.  I built a PCB to fit her cane better, but they want to die in the wave soldering machine... I'm gonna have to figure that out if I want to do more stuff like that.

[kresty]

So... I haven't done much, but one thing that's been bugging me is the cable that Luke used to charge Artoo.  So I stopped by Vetco (local surplus shop) and found pretty much the perfect cable.  Not so luck on the ends, but I grabbed 1/4" stereo plugs for now.

(I think that's good for the generator side, you can't really see them in the screenshots, but the droid side is much more interesting so I reserve the right to find something better in the future.)

I haven't actually put the ends on yet, but on the fusion generator side, I'm thinking of using this socket.  I'm going to modify one of the "slant hose mount" parts so that it'll fit on this socket - add a 1/4" post (ok 6mm) so that it'll stay.  So it can be all pretty with all the hoses intact, or I can pull off this one and add the droid charging cord.

Springy cord for fusion reactor

I do confess that I'm pondering some sort of lego-y connector on the other end so I can plug the cord onto L3-G0

[kresty]

Ok, and here's the tweaked version for the 1/4" jack socket.  This should work OK.

First one is a "normal" one.  Then unmounted and mounted on the jack.  The special one's about 2mm shorter because that's how far the nut is going to stick up.  The nut and fitting are basically the same diameter, so it'll be exposed on this on.  Nobody'll notice though.

Printed Hose Fitting on 1/4" Jack

I think I err'd a hair on how far the socket sits above the surface - it can go about 2mm further than I thought, so I'm going to print a deeper one.  I got it on *way* too tight.  Should be good when I print it a little deeper.

It'll cut it's own thread when I screw it on, so that's good I guess.  It screws on well enough I could probably just leave the post off (I printed in 2 parts so I wouldn't have to use supports).

[kresty]

Priming!

Ok, got a few things out of the way so I could get the priming going on the main part.  (I needed to reprint some of the Greebles because of my changes for my hoses)

The boring photo just to tease folks:

Priming Fusion Generator Parts

Main body:

Priming Fusion Generator

And because Inferno was eating in my picture place and Savage likes the cat, these as well.  It's not a small fusion reactor, he's a big cat!

Priming Fusion Generator

Yes, he's a carnivore

Priming Fusion Generator