Monster Mouse Droid? Maybe?

[kresty]

I mentioned a couple posts ago that I'd ordered parts for the side greeblie chips.  Those got here.  We're planning on using the curved clips to attach to the top & bottom of the side doors.  Then we'll use the 2" strap to hold rails that'll have the "chips" glued to them.  2 straps per door.  The rails will be fixed with additional strap bits so that we can adjust the position vertically.

Fingers crossed that it might work.

Straps and hardware for attaching side bits
We're planning on using the clips to attach the straps to the doors.  The buckle fittings are to tighten the straps and adjust the position of the "chip" greeblie rails.

As mentioned, we're using 2" foam for the "chips".  We'll need to experiment with painting them...  As you can see, cutting them was more than a little interesting (eg: dangerous).  Many are marked up with random sawblade nicks where the blade threw them around.  Pretty sure I didn't use the "right" tool for this job.  Need a wire cutter that's mounted more like a table saw.

One fortuitous bit was that we want the 2" chips to be 4" x 16"... and the 2" foam came pre-scored with marks to snap it off at 16".  That leaves the edges a little rough, but way more practical than trying to cut it.  

We need 48 "chips" for the currently planned layout.  I have about 13 extra.  Theoretically a 4x8 sheet should've given me 72 of them...  I'm hoping we have enough that are "usable".

Chips cut from foam.
Power saw with 2" foam = stupid danger.  I presume it tries to melt on the blade, which then tries to throw it all over the place.  Hopefully enough are "ok" that we'll have 48 usable ones.

[kresty]

Blocks to fit the top roof racks. These are short (rear). Planning on 3 per side of each top greeble. The loop thing is hopefully for 3/8" shock cord to secure it. Holes in the top board for the shock cord, then the loop should just slip right over the block.

Blocks to fit Sienna Roof Rack Rails

Blocks to fit Sienna Roof Rack Rails

Blocks to fit Sienna Roof Rack Rails

5 printed so far, ran out of black, so the last one's a bit funny colored.

[kresty]

The Funny Colored Block

[kresty]

Front Greeblies' Stand Offs are done.... 4 1/2 hours each, ugh.  Glad we're not printing the whole thing!

These have to be 1/2" taller because the roof rails on the Sienna are lower in the front than the back.  (I guess the roof slopes back and they wanted any racks to be level?)  Probably not noticeable, but we need the clearance to keep the bottoms off the roof!  

Next step I guess is to paint these and attach them, we have the shock cord, so maybe tomorrow we'll have them up?

Standoffs for Front Greeblies
The front ones have to be 1/2" taller as the roof rack rails are shorter at the front of the car (so the bottom greeblies would hit the roof).

TO DO:
* Glue standoffs to top greeblies
* Cut & attach shock cord (probably at the same time so we get the greeblies in the right spot)
* Paint things that were printed, particularly those that aren't black.
* Bondo on the surfaces that we want to even the texture out.
* Repaint the Bondo'd stuff.
* Oh, fix all the detail tabs on the bottom greeblies that we didn't glue strong enough (as in one got knockec off already)

* Oh, and then of course we need to start on the sides...  Ideas for that are firming up.

[kresty]

Last night couldn't sleep and started counting chips..... Thinking that maybe 7 row (5 of 4 and 2 of 2) might be too many.

So... mocked up 4 top rows and 3 top rows to see what it might look like.

Experimenting with numbers of chips on sides

What do you think?  7, 6, or 5 rows?  I'll prejudice the results by stating that Lara & I are leaning toward the middle one with 6 rows.  7 does seem to busy, but 5 seems sparse to me.  (This isn't a LT/OS new trilogy mouse ) 



About that droid:

Also I was wondering about some of the rest of the car.  I tried figuring out what strips (like vinyl) might look like for the "bumper" on a real droid, but I couldn't come up with anything appealing.  

We have some other vinyl things we found online before we started this project, but that made me wonder what a vinyl L3-G0 decal might look like.

If we did that We don't really have good art for the other droids, and MCK-Y isn't gonna show up on black.

[kresty]

Finally got around to adding the shock cord and gluing the mounts for one of the top Greeblies.  We'll make sure it works OK before doing the front one.

The shock cord system seems great, very stable once they're clipped to the mounts, even without glue.  What a relief!

Shock Cord Mount (Rear Greeblies)

Shock Cord Mount (Rear Greeblies)

Obviously we need to clean up the details and improve the paint & stuff once the glue dries...

[kresty]

"DROIDS"
New license plate for the monster gigantic mouse droid.

[kresty]

Ugh, catching a cold (thanks Lara). Did find a little time to work on the "droid" but going slowly....

[kresty]

Agh, it's been a month since we did anything on the monster mouse droid, and that was just a quick thing

Put the "chips" on the slats today.  Each slat has a row of chips.

Gluing Chips

Lara Gluing Chips
Each "chip" is 4"x16" of the 2" foam.

Inferno's helping us find the best "chips" for the droid sides

[kresty]

Also did a little bit of cleanup on the top Greeblies.  Nikita managed to kick one of the tall posts off, which is disconcerting, so I repaired that, as well as some details on the bottom that hadn't been very strong.

Hmm, broken pipe
Got tripped over in the middle of the night

Also a little bit with some of the details, these caps are 3D printed (tall pipes, holes are hopefully to let rain leave)

Some caps for the big pipes
A few little details were printed