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It is established that the T-1000 from Terminator 2: Judgment Day can change shape and alter its density in some form:

The T-1000 walked forward. Because of the man’s obesity, it had been stressing its ability to expand molecularly by remaining in the Lewis form, so it had defaulted back to the more energy-efficient Officer Austin. It reached the bars. But it did not stop.

But could it become "hollow" and make it self much bigger? So big in fact that it could become a giant hollow T-Rex?

Ankit Sharma
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The short answer to this one is yes but also no and probably.

As to absolute size, it's clear that maintaining a form that's only a few percentage points larger than its base form is sufficiently taxing on the T-1000's power source as to encourage it to return to normal after just a few minutes. It follows that trying to become something as massive as a T-Rex could possibly overtax its batteries to the point of exhaustion. Since the power requirement is described as the major stumbling block, it's not difficult to imagine that with access to a ready power source that this limitation could be overcome.

The bigger problem is that the T-1000 can only mimic things that it has physically sampled. In the absence of a live Tyrannosaur, the best that it could do would be to mimic an immobile museum dinosaur.

“I need a minute here, okay? You’re telling me it can imitate anything it touches?”

“Anything it samples by physical contact,” was the toneless reply.

Theoretically, however, it could build a second time-machine, travel back to the time of the dinosaurs (along with enough parts to build a third time machine) to sample a T-rex. It could then use the time machine parts to construct a third time machine and return to the year 1997.

Valorum
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  • So... elephant? –  Oct 03 '14 at 06:20
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    @legostormtrooper - Yes, almost certainly :-) – Valorum Oct 03 '14 at 06:24
  • Did it ever impersonate a non-human? I don't remember the film well enough to be sure but it's conceivable it would be limited to sampling humans. Additionally consider the time it disguised itself as a floor. It needs to sample humans to become a perfect copy but maybe it can create "generic" shapes more easily. – Tim B Oct 03 '14 at 09:29
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    @TimB It becomes a checkered floor at one point. http://stream1.gifsoup.com/view5/4704906/t1000-floor-o.gif – ceejayoz Oct 03 '14 at 13:44
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    It is established that you can't bring parts with you to build a time machine. Nothing mechanical, nothing electrical, no weapons. – ThePopMachine Oct 03 '14 at 14:37
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    @Thepopmachine - you can bring whatever you want, as long as it's enclosed by living tissue. Presumably the t-1000 could surround the pieces. – Valorum Oct 03 '14 at 14:50
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    If only it had waited a couple more years, Jurassic Park would be out and it could just visit a cinema with plenty of T-rex balloo's... – mechalynx Oct 03 '14 at 16:01
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    @TimB: And it "sampled" the floor...by walking on it. – T.J. Crowder Oct 03 '14 at 16:02
  • Technically the T-1000 could use one time machine to go back to the age of dinosaurs and then find different places to hide out until modern times. .. I guess he might need two depending on when it became obsessed with Dinosaurs. – Mark Rogers Oct 03 '14 at 20:16
  • @MarkRogers - It's certainly not canon but the idea that any machine, no matter how sophisticated could last 100+ million years without suffering any sort of accident/incident seem vanishingly small. You'd basically want to park yourself under a mile of rock on the moon. – Valorum Oct 03 '14 at 20:27
  • @Richard - lol true, though the T-1000 could technically be self-maintaining and so on and so forth. Though who knows if even if a self-maintaining system T-1000 could last that long. – Mark Rogers Oct 03 '14 at 21:03
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    The T-1000 could also build a series of machines that would then build itself later, ok I should just be quiet. – Mark Rogers Oct 03 '14 at 21:09
  • Time travel requires exponential energy the farther you bend spacetime. – Cees Timmerman Oct 07 '14 at 08:42
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    @ceesTimmerman - Is this based on the film's or is this just your personal opinion? – Valorum Oct 07 '14 at 10:01
  • @Richard That was my physical reason for sending later Terminators back later (before considering the logical one), bolstered by this answer which turned out to be speculation. AFAIK, only the size and fleshy field are canon limits for Skynet's time machine. – Cees Timmerman Oct 08 '14 at 09:14
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    @Richard Myron Stark being sent to 1920 instead of 2010 seems to disprove the energy argument. – Cees Timmerman Oct 08 '14 at 14:06