Disney reached out to our builders group, asking for 10 droids to attend their May 4th event at Hollywood Studios. That's an offer no Star Wars fan can turn down.
After sending in a couple of pictures, R2-J8 was accepted for the event. Lately this old droid has been needing some repairs, and I've just been letting it go. So I decided I needed to fix some things, and if possible, use the event as an excuse to do some upgrades if time permitted.
Over the course of doing various events, I began to notice several panels not opening correctly on the dome, or not opening at all. After doing a little testing, I came to the realization that I needed to replace 5 of the panel servos, and 2 of his holoprojector actuators. I placed an order for 5 new servos on Amazon, and they arrived really fast. So those were replaced without much grief, and J8 was back to his full 10 panel dome animations.
A few months ago I purchased an aluminum holo projector from the a guy on the Astromech forum. Let me tell you, that thing looks sweet, really makes my 3D printed plastic holo projectors look shabby. So I decided that would be a good upgrade to do, and that it would be a simple swap out of the old ones. Also, if I'm going to do an upgrade, I want it to be something that everyone is focused on, and those projectors are front and center. I had been having problems with the plastic 3D printed ones seizing up in the sockets, and I believe that has led to some of the actuating servos getting fried.
So once the holo projectors arrived, I got to work with the "quick swap out", which turned out to be anything but quick. First thing, I had applied a loctite to the threads to keep them from working loose, so each and every little bolt was a chore to remove. Then I found that the openings in the dome where smaller than the cowl for the new aluminum pieces. This led to a few hours of sanding with the ol'sandpaper wrapped around a wine bottle technique. In the end, I managed to replace the front facing projector and the rear projector. The third top one I left alone, as I was running out of time.
With one day left before the event, I decided it was time to organize the womp rat's nest of wires I had created in J8's dome. So using some woven cable tubing, I managed to get everything somewhat organized and looking much better.
So I met with most of the guys in the group over at Disney Springs for an early dinner. I think the place was called Blaze Pizza. The pizza was amazing, the weather was not.
We had two bouts of rain come through, one just before 8:00 PM and another shortly after arriving. Fortunately I was able to get J8 assembled and into the building between showers.
The remainder of the night was excellent. There were lots of great Star Wars fans, some even in costume. R2-J8 had tons of pictures taken, with groups and dozens of selfies. I had a great time as always, just driving around and working with the crowds.
We finished up around 12:30, and took a few group photos outside the Star Wars Launch Bay.
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