Both versions created in late August, 2012.
This was a quickie, mainly to see if I could make a solid connector and also
find a decent color match. I got a cheap cap gun at Dollar General and
hacked it up, then added a few bits for connection and painted it. The
aesthetics clashed horribly, but it demonstrated I had the technical chops to
pull off something better.
Having established I could do the connection part, I got a little more
ambitious and started thinking of ways to not only make something that fit
the aesthetics better, but also could turn into some sort of accessories for
the robot. My initial idea was to have the grip either hinged or pegged
together in two pieces, so that it could be turned into a shield, with the
trigger part going on the back or turned into a shoulder cannon or
something. It's also probably need some sort of stand to support it in space
pistol mode. I also considered the two pieces attaching as wing extensions,
once I realized that the robot wasn't really set up to have a shield attached
without better machining tolerances than I could manage.
But while seeking something to use as the core of the grip (not wanting to waste five bucks of styrene sheet building it up in layers), I settled on dollar store dice. Denser than styrene, they'd let me shift the center of mass back far enough that the pistol could balance without a stand. But that meant a solid grip, rather than folding (two layers of dice would just be too thick), so I went for a dual connection system that would let it turn into a big shoulder cannon. While drilling out the first hole, I got my Dremel cutter head "cookie jarred" as the tailings got so hot they melted and then resolidified behind the head...took a while to free it. I was more careful on the second one. I left a LOT of plastic shavings on the floor while making this.
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