WED - 15 - 77 WED - 15 - 77 , or simply Treadwell , was a WED - 15 Treadwell repair droid that was built prior to the Clone Wars , serving moisture farmer Owen Lars on the planet Tatooine for more than twenty years . Treadwell often worked with Lars ' s nephew , Luke Skywalker , on the moisture vaporators of the family ' s farm . While working on a vaporator with Skywalker one day in 0 BBY , the droid suffered a meltdown , and Skywalker , eager to meet his friend Fixer at Tosche Station near the settlement of Anchorhead , abandoned the droid in the desert . Treadwell was subsequently taken by the scavengers of the desert . Biography . WED - 15 - 77 , also known as Treadwell , was a WED - 15 Treadwell repair droid that was produced by Cybot Galactica , one of the two largest droid manufacturing companies in the galaxy . Prior to the Clone Wars , which broke out in 22 BBY , the droid began to serve moisture farmer Owen Lars ' s family on the planet Tatooine . Treadwell worked with the protocol droid C - 3PO at the Lars homestead until the Jedi Anakin Skywalker , who had built C - 3PO as a child , visited the Lars family and took the protocol droid away . Treadwell continued to serve the Lars family for more than twenty years , into the time of the Galactic Civil War . Treadwell liked to work with Beru Lars , Owen ' s wife , who gave the droid the same simple and predictable jobs . The droid often helped Lars ' s nephew , Luke Skywalker , in a variety of chores , such as repairing moisture vaporators out in the desert . Early in the civil war , not much before Biggs Darklighter , a Tatooinian farmboy was about to leave for the Imperial Academy , Treadwell broke down . Skywalker took parts of the droid to Laze " Fixer " Loneozner , one of his childhood friends , who worked as a mechanic near the settlement of Anchorhead . However , Fixer had a week ' s backlog , and he couldn ' t begin working on the droid . Finally , the Treadwell got repaired and returned to work . One day in 0 BBY , Lars asked Skywalker to service the vaporator units on the farm ' s south ridge with the help of Treadwell . During the work , Treadwell used an uninsulated manipulator and consequently received an electric shock . Not much later , Skywalker spotted a space battle above the planet . He ran to his landspeeder and called for the droid to follow him , but Treadwell ' s engine exploded , and the droid suffered a final meltdown . For a moment Skywalker hesitated about leaving the droid behind , but since the vital components of Treadwell were shot , he left the smoking droid in the desert and decided to pick him up on the way home . He raced off to Tosche Station near Anchorhead to tell Fixer about the battle . Treadwell , meanwhile , was taken by the scavengers of the desert and , as a result , was not there when Skywalker went to retrieve it . Characteristics . WED - 15 - 77 was a typical class - five Treadwell repair droid with two rows of five treaded wheel s on its base . The droid had a very small independent thought processor but had enhanced binocular fine - focus vision , which helped it to spot circuitry damage . The droid ' s enhanced photoreceptors were mounted on a long , telescopic stalk , which also held six arms , including an equipment test arm and various manipulators , at least one of which was insulated . By 0 BBY , Treadwell ' s movements had become unsteady , and only three of its arms were functioning . Treadwell was capable of accomplishing even very specific tasks with close supervision , but it could not conduct complicated work on its own due to its limited intelligence . It was a recalcitrant yet hardworking droid that preferred helping Beru Lars , since she gave the droid simple and predictable jobs . Behind the scenes . WED - 15 - 77 was designed in 1975 by production designer John Barry for use in the 1977 film . The same droid model was also used for the droid WED - 15 - I662 and for another , unnamed Treadwell during the filming of the movie . Barry ' s notes showed that the prop had one functioning arm and housed a radio controller in its treadwell base to allow for off - screen crew members to control it . Barry ' s sketch indicated that the model stood between four feet and four feet , six inches tall . Scenes featuring the droid were shot on location in Tunisia in March 1976 . While " A New Hope " was in post - production , Treadwell became the first of the film ' s droid characters to receive a voice from sound designer Ben Burtt . To create the vocalizations , Burtt combined electronic noises with sounds of himself speaking fake baby talk . Although crew members likened the noises to those of a talking chicken , George Lucas approved the sound effects . The droid ' s voice served as a template for following droid characters , including R2 - D2 . The droid made its first appearance in the December 1976 of , ghostwritten by Alan Dean Foster . The droid was featured in a scene that was ultimately cut from the released version of " A New Hope " , but it appeared in various adaptations of the film , including the movie ' s novelization , storybook , radio drama , and . Treadwell also appeared in the 2002 film , becoming one of the few characters to appear in both the original and the prequel trilogy of " Star Wars " , although its scene had been cut from " A New Hope " . WED - 15 - 77 ' s meltdown scene occurred before the appearance of a similarly - looking unidentified Treadwell in the film . In the film ' s radio drama , however , WED - 15 - 77 merely stopped moving rather than melting down , and Owen Lars mentioned at a later Jawa auction that he had " already got a Treadwell [ and didn ' t ] need another . " This suggested that the unidentified droid was intended to be WED - 15 - 77 and not another droid of the same line . However , the StarWars . com Databank confirmed WED - 15 - 77 ' s meltdown to be final and the droids to be separate characters .