Riverside Robotics Society

WALL-E & R2-D2 appeared for the 2nd year at Riverside Robotics Society's Robot Expo at the Woodcrest Community Library. One of the event's goals is to inspire children to pursue careers in math, science, or engineering. Exhibits included robot soccer, Terminator robots, a Lost in Space Robot, a singing robot Elvis and many others. Mike met fellow robot builder, and the voice of the Tonight Show, Wally Wingert. Thanks to Victor Franco for driving R2-D2 & sharing his photos.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

NBC News Story on Riverside Robot Expo

Our WALL-E & R2-D2 got some pre-event publicity:
http://www.nbclosangeles.com/blogs/worth-the-drive/Robot-Love-132614228.html

Walle Build Day

Actually, it was an R2LA build day!  There was a large showing of R2 Builders.  The vet vs noob ratio was about 50/50.  That's a great mix for a build day.  About 17 showed.  Dinner at the R2LA pizza place (Lamp Post) after. 

Since Michael McMaster was coming, we decided it would be a great time to see what Walle would look like with McMaster's drive system and tracks.  It was also a good time to debug the drive system.  Very exciting to see Walle come together.  Don't be deceived by these pics.  Nothing is really attached.  No touching or it might fall over!  I am very happy with the scale and presentation.  Lots of work ahead.

Senna, McMaster, Walle, and a side of fries.



RC WALL-E Head Demo (final)

This is Version 2. I've replaced the 150lb actuator from Progressive Automations to their 50lb actuator. The 'real' electronics still need to be developed.

Boy Scout meeting visit

I took WALL-E to visit a Boy Scout meeting on their summer movie
night, where the boys watched the WALL-E film.  I explained the
building process & answered questions.  It's very important for me to
communicate to people the possibilities of what they can do if
they have the simple ability to ignore all perceived "walls".
Most people can do way more than they think they can if they give
themselves the patience to learn and not give up.

Weathering paint job complete

Creating the look of weathered metal on wood took a lot of painstaking
effort.  This is my first weathering job.  I was extremely stressed
while doing it.  Why?  Because even if you have every detail
perfect, a bad paint job will destroy the magic. 

WALL-E Body Detail

This has been complete for quite a while now. I am finally getting around to posting the video of it. The weathering has been started on the solar panels. I'll post a video of how I did the weathering later

RC WALL-E Head Demo

This is the first time the remote control is powered up and tested. The look up and down head movement was slower than I imagined.  This was fixed in version 2.  There are more tweeks needed to this setup to make it run like it should.

Maker Faire, San Francisco

Mike Senna & Mike McMaster exhibited their WALL-E replicas in progress at the Maker Faire Bay Area 2011. Maker Faire is an event hosted by Make Magazine that celebrates do-it-yourselfers in the fields of arts, crafts, engineering & science. The event began in 2006 in San Francisco with 100 exhibiters ("Makers"), and has grown to numerous events across the country. This year's event attracted more than 90,000 visitors to the San Mateo County Fairgrounds. It celebrates grassroots American innovation.

Tesla coil demo

  





Senna family with Grant Imahara (Mythbusters)





Mike McMaster & Mike Senna, WALL-E Builders



Here's a video taken at our booth:



Building the WALL-E Robot interview

Thomas from Robots and Androids Dot Com interviewed Mike about building WALL-E. Here's the video: