More Foot Work

Well now its time to mount the drives to the foot shells. To do this i decided to use 1/4 - 20 screws. In order to make sure they lined up correctly i made a template. I used some vice grips to secure it for drilling.

Next I used a little vhb tape to secure the template to the foot shell and drilled them out.

 

Then tapped the Senna drive housing.

 

Underside Mounted.

 

 

 

Give me some skin

Well its time to document the skins.

First step is to mark and cut out all the panels. I used a hacksaw blade for all the easy to access panels and a sharp chisel for the really tight panels. Thanks for the tip guys!

Here is a shot of the skins as panels are being cut. Make sure to number all the panels first.

Next i had to bond all the panels together. I used 3M VHB  tape. I did a tutorial on this as well and ill link the video here. Its a bit boring :)

Next i prepared my Dexter set for some painting. First like many other members, i started with Duplicolor self etching primer. I did about 2 - 3 coats.

Then about 3 or so coats of rustoleum auto primer and last i did 4 coats of Rustoleum Satin White. Its important to read the can. You can do a second coat within 1 hour or AFTER 48 hours. If you dont follow you'll get orange peal.

Once that fully dried it was time to bond the skins together. I was nervous but decided to just go for it. I used 5mil 3M VHB tape for this as well. I didnt want to try to clean a mess of jb weld or silicone off the nicely painted skins. 

I tried lining them up as best i could. This would be easier with 2 people. My back skins were a tiny off but nothing noticeable.  I pressed them tight and held them with cheap clams from Harbor Freight.

Same for the front panel. This was a lot easier to line up because you can use the coin slots as a jig to hold them true. 

Lastly the back door. I didn't cut my inner skins properly. I had to do a lot of filing to get it to fit :) But its all good now. 

Coin Returns

Needed some coin returns.. These are pretty easy to make from scraps from the skin.

I just took the cut out panels and cut them to shape based on the blueprints.

Marked then cut slots with a dremel. Sanded the outside down with the belt sander

Cut some of the other parts and bent them with a vice and a pair of these welding clamp/pliers 

And the sides.

I was gonna tig weld them but i think that iss overkill so used JB weld

Foot Drives

Well R2 needs to move so lets give him some motivation.  I decided to build some senna drives. Ive heard nothing but good things about them.

I followed the plans from the yahoo group and ordered up the supplies.

First i cut the aluminum frames on the milling machine.

Press fit the bearings and test fit one of the shafts.

I had to both sand down the wheels and also mill the bushings down some to get the wheel to fit. 

NPC motors mounted with brackets and a little more test fitting.