May the Fourth Be with You

Happy Star Wars Day everyone.  Yesterday was my first "event" that I was invited to share my droid knowledge (very limited) and construction materials (also fairly limited at this point).  The Fishers Library had a Star Wars Festival yesterday to celebrate May the Fourth.  Jamie Follis, aka Sillof, does a lot with the library and gave them my name because he knew I won the Lilly grant this year to build R2.  The day was an absolute blast.
        I was told originally that I was going to be between the HSE and Fishers robotics teams with their bots.  I was worried that I was going to have to play referee.  When I arrived, I was directed to a table right in front of the entryway, all by myself!  The other activities were in the youth room nearby and the teen zone behind me.  I became the unofficial greeter and directory, which if you know me had me all broken up and nervous....NOT!  I love that kind of stuff, the teacher in me takes over.
       The day was filled with the Bloodfin Garrison of the local 501st, a garrison of Star Wars cosplayers.  We had a few stormtroopers, Princess Leia, rebel pilot, tie fighter pilot, Boba Fett, a jawa, and a "gonk" droid.  The jawa and I bonded because I had droid parts everywhere on my table that he kept trying to steal, and he made sure that my video on my laptop kept running every time it stopped.

Most of the crew that showed up.

Benny, Boba, and Alex

I got into a little imperial entanglement.

My little Jawa friend.

The imperials and Jedi took over running the place for a bit.

        I had a lot of fun talking to people about the build process and discussing everything from building techniques to cost of parts.  A few guys that came in were very intrigued about vendors and how they might be able to help me with certain parts.  I actually collected a couple of business cards of people that were truly excited about helping me out with 3D printing some pieces and/or polyforming some skins with me.   I'm not exactly sure how that would work, but I'm excited to know that there might be some people out there that are willing to share there tools and knowledge.

My table with my right hand man.

       May the Fourth (really the Third :) kept sending me joys when I got home.  I checked the mail and my aluminum center foot shell had arrived.  It is beautiful but now I have to figure out how to get the casters to sit properly inside of it and get the resin details for the outside of it....you know, every time I get excited about getting a new part delivered it adds to my work load, hmm.  I was looking up how to connect it for an hour yesterday until I realized that I don't even have my center leg to attach it anyway.  I'm still excited, and can't wait for my dome to come in this week too.  That's going to be a big job to tackle.