Spacedock Dad

Here is upside down dad in the spacedock. We were really fascinated by this figure, curious as to how maintenance was done on it. So we were really excited when we finally made it to the catwalk area above this to finally find out how it was done.

Here is the top of the spacedock set. The blueish color vertical post on the left hand side, just in front of the catwalk, is part of the whole mechanism the dad is mounted on. And you can see the counter weight just to the right of it. So we assumed that when they needed to do maintenance, dad would be lowered into the scene so artists and maintenance could get at him. See the blueish colored 'hatch' looking piece to the left of the mechanism? We assumed that if dad had to be removed from the set completely, they would use that to cover up the hole? But I never recall ever seeing this scene without dad in it, so I have no idea if that was ever done.

Here is a shot from the catwalk looking up at the ceiling with the lift mechanism (winch, etc...) and the messed up black ceiling tiles. I wonder if this figure caused many problems for the maintenance folks? And then finally below, is a closeup of the counter weight.