Rockler Bearing installation

Rockler Installation on Frank Pirz frame

The dome will rotate riding on a Rockler Lazy Suzanne circular bearing mount.  This was purchased roughly 6 months ago (I bought 2, 1 was for the old R2 if I was going to rebuild the A&A frame and the other was for this new R2 unit).

Unboxing, the Rockler was wrapped tight in shipping plastic.  Once I unwrapped it, I placed it on the Frank Pirz frame looking for alignment marks - sadly there were none.

Looks like a even 1/4" and some odd spacing all around.  I measured and adjusted the Rockler to the outside edge since there are no noticeable alignment marks.

There is a small section on the frame where Frank had a single hole that aligns to the inside of the Rockler... still not good enough.

Here is another view of the Rockler aligned evenly to the outside of the frame all around.

Placing the Rockler back on the frame, I began pulling the white spacers off on both sides of the Rockler on the inside ring as well as outer rings too.

 

Once all the holes were exposed I began drilling using a 3/8" drill bit through the outer ring.  I also counter sink the outer holes to eventually install 3/8" flat head screws into each to connect to the frame.

 

Another view of all the holes with counter sinks drilled into them.  Had to be careful not to let the metal fragments fall into the sliding area where the bearings are... that would ruin the Rockler for sure.

 

I then sat the Rockler back onto the frame and drilled holes from the outer ring into the frame for all 8 holes.

Note: I had to do this twice because I noticed a few of the spots went almost through the ribs on a few areas.  Rotating the Rockler a few inches allowed acceptable clearance.

 

Here is the ooopsy - went almost through the RIB area below.

 

Below you can see clearly the lines I traced once I had the Rockler aligned properly on the Frame.

 

 

And now here is the frame with all the holes drilled (twice) and the alignment lines which I drew to help me later set the Rockler in place.

 

Ok had to now go out and find correct number of screws and nuts to put this thing together.

Ended up purchasing 1 pack of 3/8" X 1 1/2" flat screws to expose upward on the inner circle of the Rockler which will connect to the DOME and a package of 3/8" X 1" to connect the outer circle of the Rockler to the frame through the holes I drilled.  I picked these up at Lowe's

 

I then connected the A&A Dome gear kit from the old R2 unit.  May have a issue with the smaller gear that connects to the outer gear (which attaches to the inner circle of the Rockler.

 

 

Got 8 screws in the outer circle and 6 in the inner circle.  The inner circle has the longer screws facing up to have the Dome connect to it with the Dome Ring.

 

Now to connect the finished Large Data Port that was 3D printed from Frank Pirz for me.

 

 

I verified I could use the 2 holes that aligned over the LDP area (the large data port that sits on the upper part of R2).

I connected the Large Data Port to the slot Frank Pirz slotted into the frame and then screwed the two pieces together with a nut through the inside bottom.

 

I had to file down the corners of the top edges of the data port to have it correctly fit in the frame slot on the upper lip of the frame.

 

Roughly 45 degree angled filing made it fit perfect.

 

 

Now to work on the hybrid Utility Arm unit using Frank Pirz's Utility Arm box and a Automated Utility Arm mechanical kit I purchased last year for the old R2... Hopefully I can get the two to work together and align/fit to the skin.

You can see the 3/8" nuts exposed on the inside back of the Large Data Port.