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Date: August 19, 2007
Today was an amazingly busy day, but I don't really have a lot to show for it. The good news is that the dome continues its slow and methodical plod towards completion.
Continuing on with the insanity that is the dome, I spent HOURS AND HOURS today gluing on the blue plates that help make up the characteristic R2 head. I'm using the process that I described a day or so ago, wherein I use a combination of quick setting epoxy and slow setting Maxim glue. I believe this will give me the greatest possible adhesion with the least amount of time.
Some of the parts proved to be more problematic than others, but for the most part, it just went like a breeze. It was VERY time consuming though, as each piece required a lot of prep, glue mixing, and holding it in place as the epoxy kicked. Then I'd need some time to wipe off any excess glue or goo that got on the dome during the process. Of course, me being "Mr. Short Attention Span", I needed to take a break after every couple of panels were glued in place. Sitting on the living room floor in today's heat was bad enough. But having to hold a dome panel in place as the glue dried made it worse.
Here are two views of the dome. This pretty much shows off the entire dome. I even got the dome bumps in, and they look great. The only thing that remains is a couple of pieces at the very top of the dome, and two or three pieces from around the edge. Those pices have yet to be clear coated, so it will still be a few days before this is finished.
I was very surprised at the end of the day when I said to myself "It's almost done". That's something I NEVER thought I would hear myself say about the dome. It's just such a relief!!!
The only part I'm unhappy with is the bottom piece along the panel that houses the rear PSI. Somehow, along the way, that piece got bent or something, because it just would NOT go in properly. You can barely tell, but I'll notice. Besides, on the real ones I've seen, that part is usually a total disaster anyway, so I guess I'm ahead of the game.
I also mixed up some more blue top coat, as I had run out. I'm also just about out of the purple base coat. That gives me a good idea of how much paint is needed to fully cover an R2. I'll probably end up selling the left overs in small quantities to anyone who wants to try to paint their own using REAL Hypo-Blue. Not that I really need the money, but It'll be good to "give something back" to the R2 community. Cuz you know: I'm a giver.
Oops, almost forgot. There's one other thing I did today worth mentioning. I continued the clean up efforts on the legs. Regular readers will recall that I blew it on these things! I got sloppy when it came time to mask off the threaded holes prior to painting, and used too much tape. When I peeled the tape off, it took off more primer and paint than I had wanted, and there were exposed areas the crept out from under the shoulder horse shoes. So I needed to fix that. Though I sprayed paint over the freshly exposed areas, upon wet sanding those areas down, I found the results to not be what I wanted.
SOOOOOO, today, I spent about an hour wetsanding the paint and clear coat back down to the primer, but this time, I made sure the transition from the clear coat was smooth. Before, there was a big step from where the tape came off. So now it's smooth. With that finished, I busted out the air brush and applied a few liberal coats of white to the newly sanded area.
I'm just about out of white paint, so it's good that there were only tiny areas that required repainting. I should point out, I still have a bunch of white paint in the garage, but it's not mixed. So when I say "I'm almost out", I mean that I'm almost out of the pre-mixed, ready-to-go white paint.
As if you cared!!!!
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