He looks pretty good, why not stop with a static droid?

Oops!

After my last testing, someone more rational than I suggested "he looks pretty good, why not stop with a static droid?" or maybe I "like the mess."

Being less balanced myself, I confess I found myself somewhat at a loss to how to respond to that remark 

I guess it's kind of like climbing Everest. I'm at base camp and I'd really like to get to the summit. It may prove impossible (more impossible?) but I've made it this far, so I have to try...

(FWIW, the mess isn't as bad as it looks, "only" 3 of the panels fell off (ok, half the sphere), but the panels stayed mostly intact and it took 20 minutes or so to reassemble.)

For those questioning my sanity, this isn't even the hard part.  I'm not at all concerned that I'll be able to get the sphere to roll.

The first roll test showed that the sphere is "round enough" (& stable enough when it gets Kragle'd).

This second test, short though it was, demonstrated that an axle centered on the triangles should be aesthetically pleasing.  Three panels fell apart, but without most of the internal structure expected to support the final model that isn't surprising. (He needs more 3D printed panels, and, of course, the Kragle!)

Where I'm afraid the obstacles may become insurmountable is getting the head to smoothly slide over the dome.  THAT's going to be the hard part!

I have a fallback plan to make him approachable even if that fails.  I also suspect that even if the rolling ball works, he's likely going to be limited by terrain and in speed.  L3-G0 placed 3rd in a race, I don't think Lego BB-8 is going to do that!

More Rotation Testing.... Oops

In my previous post, What's the best way to roll?, I discussed an intriguing alternative to the "hamster" model.  That seems like a pretty promising technique, but is a driveshaft going to "look right"?  Are the 123/456 triangle centers an acceptable point for the center? 

Clearly some orientations are bad.  If the panel rings are in the center, then it'd be pretty obvious that two rings were always on the outside while the others chased each other in circles.  That might be an effect, but it's not the random looking behavior of the movie.

With the driveshaft ends in the middle of a triangle, it'd kind of alternate which side the panel was traveling up under the dome and look less regular and the motion would seem more naturally organic...  In theory at least, but would Lego BB-8 look OK that way?

One way to find out, spin the sphere and see what happens.  Unlike the roll test I decided to hold it and make it steadier. 

BB-8 says "Ack, More Tests!!!!"

That didn't quite work out.
 

3 of the panels fell off (that sounds better than saying "half the sphere fell apart"), but the test showed, I think, that this axis of rotation is pretty good.  I was going to attempt to rock it a bit as it would when turning, but I think the few seconds of rotation showed that the pattern doesn't look particularly regular, even though it is.

So, it's a go!  Depending on alignment with the panels/Lego I might make it a little off-center from the triangle, but I think this will look good enough!

Rolling Sphere Test....

BB-8 isn't too happy about this next video.  We're trying to make sure the sphere concept is sound before we add the motors & everything, so here goes....

Happy Holidays!

Happy Holidays from Lego BB-8 and MCK-Y!



More pix of us (& L3-G0) at the Pacific Science Center's Discovery Circle Gala on Flickr.

I'm also on Facebook, Twitter, and YouTube.

The first BB-8 Panel, "Hatch 3"

The postman loves me I think, I'm getting so many packages of brick that he's leaving the "Property of USPS" plastic boxes with all the brick (yes, I leave them by the mailbox for him to collect). Anyway, we have a lot more brick, and so I managed to get the first panel MOSTLY done.

This picture is missing a few of the orange "buttons" on his the orange ring because I don't have the bricks under them yet.  The red dots are placeholders for where the white buttons go on the triangles, but this gives you an idea of the panel. 

Lego BB-8 Panel/Hatch 3

I'm feeling good about the panels, I was wondering about the strength because they're relatively thin, but I can hold it from the edge/end with one hand.  They seem pretty solid!

The design has 6 of these panels that attach at the edges to make a sphere.  They're kind of an ovalish shape and the "ends" of one will attach to the narrow sport of the next one.  Six panels means I have 5 left to do. 

Since both of the white ends are similar that means that the next step is basically an assembly line of the 10 ends of the panels, here's a picture of the beginning of that process.

Lego BB-8 Panel Assembly Line

And here's a picture of inside of Panel 3.  It's not as pretty, but still pretty round so the "hamster" can drive around on the inside of the ball.  I've attached two of the start of the adjoining panels so you can see how they attach.

Inside of Lego BB-8 Panel 3 with wings

That's all for now, but I feel like I'm on a Lego building roll!

Time to start building a Lego BB-8

Well, ordering ELEVEN THOUSAND Lego bricks (plus a few extras) takes a while. In the meantime I wanted to make a little helper template. The inside of BB-8 needs to be hollow so that our "hamster" robot can drive the body. So that means smooth. This Lego brick jig helps fill the void so that I can make sure I'm not invading the interior space when I build the model.  We have a digital file, but this helps reduce the errors.

 

It has a bunch of eyes because I needed flat tiles, after all, I don't want the panels to stick to the jig.  And eyes were cheap on "The Lego Wall" at the local Lego Store.



Initial jig for BB-8 interior shape.

Originally I was just going to do one quarter and mirror it, but decided that was too awkward, so I built another half.  The ordered Lego brick hadn't arrived, but I did have some loos brick.  Enough to do a few layers before I ran out of brick.

Start of the first edge of "Panel 3" of BB-8.

Eventually we got more brick and I could build more.  Different bricks are in different boxes, and basically the build area is a huge mess... I'd rather build than organize :)

BB-8 Build area.

Here's a closer view of the panel half built.  The jig is visible here, I didn't build the whole thing since the 2nd half is just a mirror.  You can see that there's a purple inner sphere in the digital model too, serving the same purpose: to keep the real shell model from invading into the interior of the sphere.

Jig and BB-8 building area

Of course I started more as soon as the first bricks started arriving, which meant that I ran out of the bits needed for the corners and had to stop.

BB-8 Construction Zone!

Well, after some delay getting bricks and life interfering and all that, we've started building...  Here's a couple pictures of the building area.  Kinda chaotic!

Lego BB-8 Construction Area

Yes, that is L3-G0 in the background.

Artoo's doesn't realize there's going to be another droid in the house!

More pix in a bit.

Thinking about the body...

Well, one of the biggest tricks is "how big is BB-8"?  I took a bajillion pictures of her at Celebration, and have other references, so we have a vague idea.  She ran around Artoo, and as club builders, we certainly know his diameter.

Anyway, after punching in a bunch of numbers, I came up with just shy of 20" for BB-8's diameter.  Then you've gotta remember that the builders are from the UK, so inches are probably not their first measurement system of choice.  (Just listen to Lee & Oliver try to convert).  So 20" == 508mm.  Now that's a VERY interesting number.  Basically 500mm or 1/2 meter.  Now that is the kind of number you'd expect a UK design team to come up with.  I can just hear the conversation now:

"So, how big should she be?" asks the English builder

"About so" (holding arms about so far) says the Director.

"That looks like a half metre" (notice the English spelling)

"Ok, half meter it is" (American Director spelling).

So I'm going with 500mm.  There've been lots of discussions and numbers thrown out on the forums, but the next most common value is 20", which is pretty close.  Hopefully if I'm a little small it won't be noticeable.

Ok, so you've got a size, how do you make it into a Lego sphere?  Fortunately I'd seen a link to an online tool before, and a quick Bing search found me "Bram's Sphere Generator".  That cool tool make a sphere out of 6 identical panels.  I tried a bunch of different numbers and settings and options until I found one that seemed like it would work.

Adding some orange rings got me to this sphere:

Initial Lego BB-8 Draft Test Sphere.

It's beginning to look a bit feasible!
 

Well, here we go...

You may have seen L3-G0, the Lego R2-D2's blog, but now there's a new droid in town, BB-8.

Photo of the Exhibition BB-8 at Celebration Anaheim

We first saw BB-8 in the first trailer for Star Wars VII: The Force Awakens, tearing through a sandy desert, looking like she was running from something.  Fans speculation ran rampant.  The RebelDroids.net and R2-D2 Builder's forum were full of discussions, was she a real physical prop, or just CG.  Even if she was real, was she just a puppet?

Then we saw her on stage at Celebration Anaheim, rolling in circles around R2-D2, teasing him.  BB-8's real!  She drives around. There're lights!  She makes noises!

I'd been toying with how BB-8 might be constructed prior to Celebration, but the details of her movements on stage provided a wealth of new information.  She can move her head independently of the body, peering to look at things.  The body itself is very agile, being able to roll in apparently any direction, and even twist in place.  More details for us crazy fans to try to figure out and reproduce.

Before Celebration, we had toyed with the idea of making a Lego BB-8, but when she hit the stage that turned into a "we've gotta do this!".

So now a long journey begins.  Can we make BB-8 in Lego?  Can we get her to move?  What kinds of problems are we going to run into?  Where do we even start?