Un-com-fort-a-ble

[Marklo]

Looking great. Hopefully I’ll get started on the skirts for my Imperial and my drone (?) over the weekend.

Edited June 6, 2023 by Marklo

[The Spadgent]

Looking fab. I was in the running to get another Sevans Dalek on EBay last week. It was around £80 and even though expensive I thought I’d give it a punt. The price doubled in the last 3 seconds. 🥹😫 Needless to say I didn’t raise my bid. 💸💸💸 

 

good luck sanding those seems. My built one (I made before really getting back into modelling) still gives me the jeepers. 😆

 

Johnny

[AdrianMF]

21 minutes ago, The Spadgent said:

£80

😤😢😱

 

At that price I'd be reaching for the plastic card and the jar of split peas!

 

EBay prices have become insane recently. Even starting bids are now often more expensive than a new one from a proper shop (which will often offer free or at least reasonable P&P to boot).

 

Regards,

Adrian

[81-er]

On 6/4/2023 at 11:18 AM, The Spadgent said:

Looking fab. I was in the running to get another Sevans Dalek on EBay last week. It was around £80 and even though expensive I thought I’d give it a punt. The price doubled in the last 3 seconds. 🥹😫 Needless to say I didn’t raise my bid. 💸💸💸 

 

good luck sanding those seems. My built one (I made before really getting back into modelling) still gives me the jeepers. 😆

 

Johnny

You were bidding on that one too then? 🤣 I was after it as it had the gunbox part I'm missing from the Movie build, my plan had been to make a mould/copy of that and then flog the kit on. But someone wanted it more than I did

[81-er]

On 6/4/2023 at 11:46 AM, AdrianMF said:

😤😢😱

 

At that price I'd be reaching for the plastic card and the jar of split peas!

 

EBay prices have become insane recently. Even starting bids are now often more expensive than a new one from a proper shop (which will often offer free or at least reasonable P&P to boot).

 

Regards,

Adrian

If it had been a BIN I would have jumped on it, as that's actually a good price for one of these kits. But auction only, sadly. And yes, there's a lot of kits on there that are more expensive than they should be, I think there's a contingent of chancers who think anyone looking there will think it's a bargain, because eBay, and be too lazy to check out the prices in the shops

 

James

[Marklo]

On 6/4/2023 at 11:46 AM, AdrianMF said:

At that price I'd be reaching for the plastic card and the jar of split peas!

Exactly project Dalek has the plans, @The Spadgent most definitely has the skills. My Daleks will have cost about a tenner each, and most of that cost is the two 6” plastic spheres for the emperors.

Edited June 6, 2023 by Marklo

[81-er]

Time for another update. Starting with not the most interesting (or, apparently, in focus) photo, I’ve been doing some work on the dome and the 3d printed eyestalk support to get them to fit together a bit closer:

 

 

They do, but I think using the existing design as a template and designing a new support is probably the way forward. The eagle eyed might spot some filler on a scrape on the dome, which is where I slipped with the scriber while cutting out the eye slot. Whoops.

 

There’s progress on the shoulder section. I cut off the top cap so that I can mount the neck at the right height, which significantly weakened the structure and introduced a lot of flex, so I upended it and glued it back in, which has restored the structural integrity. I think I’ll reinforce it from below with some Miliput later. I’ve also added the front & side pieces to the gunboxes:

 

 

Although no other parts are included for those in the kit, I’ll be making some top & bottom plates from scrap plasticard for those, as there’s some pretty big gaps and the tops are way off level. That didn’t photograph too well, so here’s the (far worse) steps on the underside:

 

 

Plasticard (of which there is much from cutting out the parts from their backings) and filler are going to be my friend there.

 

After much filling & sanding, I decided to give the skirt section some primer. Not because I thought it was perfect (there were plenty of flaws still evident), but because I was struggling to get a true feel for how successful I was being at sorting some of the flaws:

 

 

I’ll be buying some Halfords rattle can filler/primer for the next coats, that’s half a bottle of grey Alclad primer to cover that much! There’s still plenty of gaps, and I’m going to have to do some more thinking about internal strengthening as some of the joins keep opening up from flexing while I’m sanding, but I’ve got some ideas there.

 

One of the reasons behind the primer is I’ve realised I’m sanding grooves into the plastic as collateral damage to trying to fix the seams, and I hoped the primer would show up how much of a problem that was (it did). Here’s one as an example:

 

 

I also need to fix the alignment of some of the panel joints, as I’ve not sanded them evenly on each side and they’re a little skewwhiff in places. This is the worst, the panel line now runs over to the right of the joint, then over to the left, before finally coming back over to the right side (top to bottom). It’s stop on at the top and very bottom though:

 

 

There’s also been some work in the virtual realm. I’ve now designed a new pivot end of the eyestalk in Fusion, so I won’t have to drill into the existing one for the brass tube I’ll be using for the stalk itself (which would be a fraught task as it’s the same thickness as the tube diameter). I’m also well on the way with designing a new neck section as I felt the kit parts would require far too much work to get to a point where they looked acceptable. That’s slower going as it’s using more advanced techniques than the eyestalk pivot (which was basically just drawing a shape and extruding, then cutting a hole into it). But progress is progress.

 

The final thing for this update is prioritising. I’m going to focus on this Dalek for this GB now, and finish off the movie one and 3D printed NSD one at a later date. If I manage to finish this one ahead of the deadline on this GB I’ll try and get as much of the movie one built as I can from then on. But for now I think one Dalek is taxing enough. Plus I can make all the mistakes on this one, the make entirely different ones on the movie kit while trying to avoid the mistakes I make with this one 🤣

 

James

[Ray S]

There is very good progress with this Dalek James, and some good problem solving too.

 

Cheers, Ray

[81-er]

Thanks Ray  It really feels halfway between building a kit and scratchbuilding, but rather satisfying each time you solve a problem

 

James

[The Spadgent]

Looking great with primer on. A spot of filler should fix that little dip you made and I can’t wait to see the new printed parts. Bravo. 🙌

 

 Johnny

[81-er]

Thanks Johnny  Printed parts are a little way off yet, I'm trying to get as much of the design work done as I can prior to hitting the print button, but things are coming along

 

James

[Fritag]

Fine update, James.  It’s tough getting a perfect result on even one dead straight joint; but multiple ones? Ouch.  It’s coming on nicely tho’.  

 

Like Johnny I’m looking forward to the printed parts; feel free to tease use with some CAD piccies

 

Ok - I think Hycote filler primer is good stuff.  You can spray it on thickly, it  dries really nicely and polishes up a treat.

 

 

[81-er]

Thanks Steve   It’s definitely a process to get this as neat as possible (but if it’s not 100% it’s probably ok, it is an alien war machine after all). Funny you should mention the Hycote primer, I ended up picking up a can of their yellow filler primer. My weapons to attack the rest of the priming (I already had the white & grey primers):

 

 

Seeing as you asked so nicely, here’s a couple of progress shots of the Fusion work. The eyestalk pivot:

 

 

And a frontal shot showing the smaller through-hole at the rear for the wires to thread through:

 

 

And the neck bin/ring assembly:

 

 

That one still needs some work as, while I’ve managed to make the bin a hollow shell, the rings are still solid through it, probably better seen from this bottom shot (fnarr):

 

 

I’m still undecided about the right way to split that up for printing. Do I keep it as one big assembly and deal with some fiddly clean up, or split it into three sections of one ring & a bit of the neck, as per the kit? I’d also like to get some holes in there to accept the neck rods (or at least be a pilot hole). That’s particularly tricky for the stage I’m at with Fushion as they are canted at an angle to follow the line of the neck bin, and there’s actually three rods at each location arranged to have a trefoil profile. Once I get one right, I can make an array to get the 8 locations I actually need.

 

I did contemplate how I could manage to build the neck in a way that the rings & rods were one assembly, and I could make the neck bin from mesh, but I think that might be a step too far. I may look at either texturing the neck bin in Fusion, or sticking on bits of fine mesh after it’s printed, much like Nigel did in his build. But we’ll see.

 

James

[AdrianMF]

Vacforms and 3D printing - attacking the comfort zone from all sides...

 

Regards,

Adrian

[81-er]

Oh yes 🤣 I mean, if you're stepping outside the comfort zone, you might as well do it properly, right? I'm currently trying to reinforce the skirt joints with sprue glued behind them in the hopes it stops them flexing and splititng the seams during sanding operations.

 

James

[81-er]

Today’s update is all about adding strength to the skirt section in the hopes the joints won’t keep flexing and opening up while I’m trying to sand it. The first thing I did was to glue some sprue behind each joint:

 

 

That helped, but there was still some flex. I did debate making a tube through the middle and then filling the rest with epoxy, but changed my mind when I worked out how much that would cost! I then remembered that in Nigel’s build (linked in the first post, if you’re interested), he filled the lower section of his Dalek with expanding foam. I handily had a can in the garage, so figured I might as well have a go.

 

I decided to do both skirt sections, even though the Movie version is stiffer than the TV one. I didn’t bother with sprue reinforcement first in the Movie skirt for that reason. I sealed the smaller hole in both with masking tape (the top opening is bigger in the Movie skirt due to the different toolings), then got ready to apply the foam:

 

 

I filled them about 2/3rds full with the foam and it started to expand quickly:

 

 

Expansion continued for quite some time, and I had to protect the outside of both skirts with some pages from a magazine. Left to harden overnight, these rather alien looking sculptures were what greeted me this morning:

 

 

 

The foam does feel pretty firm, so hopefully it’s given the skirts the support needed. I see much trimming in my future!

 

James

[Ray S]

James, are you sure you did not fill them with Ice Cream?

 

The foam is a great idea, and hopefully it will do the job for you.

 

Cheers, Ray

[AdrianMF]

It took me a moment to understand the first picture! I hadn't previously clocked how big they are. If you had time lapsed the foam expanding you'd have the basis for your own SF movie I reckon.

 

Regards,

Adrian

[81-er]

5 hours ago, Ray S said:

James, are you sure you did not fill them with Ice Cream?

 

The foam is a great idea, and hopefully it will do the job for you.

 

Cheers, Ray

It would certainly be tastier if I had 🤣

 

2 hours ago, AdrianMF said:

It took me a moment to understand the first picture! I hadn't previously clocked how big they are. If you had time lapsed the foam expanding you'd have the basis for your own SF movie I reckon.

 

Regards,

Adrian

I guess it is a bit of a surreal angle on that first shot. And they're massive, they'll stand about 12 inches/30cm tall when done. 

 

Just a mini update. I’ve removed the magazine page masking to see how the skirts have faired, with mixed results. The Movie skirt is absolutely fine (not that surprising as it’s made from significantly thicker plastic), but the TV skirt has had one seam burst open:

 

 

There’s a definite bulge side on:

 

 

So I’ll be tunnelling down behind that to remove enough foam for the joint to come back into line, then filling the gap with something that won’t expand. Maybe some thin epoxy or some plaster of Paris? I’m open to suggestions. A bit of a pain, but at least fixable.

 

James

[The Spadgent]

Lorks!!!!! You went and did it. Holy moly that’s some brass thingymajawhatsits you have there James. That expanding foam stuff is cRaZy when it starts doing it’s thing. Luckily no too much damage, I expected worse when you mentioned it but after Nigel’s build I figured it “just” worked. In my experience the hard foam is pretty tough and I’ve had to saw through it so I’ve not tried tunnelling. Has it stuck to the side walls? 
hmmmm not sure maybe try digging out then if no joy maybe remove the burst panel, cut back the foam then pop it back on when you’ve removed enough? sounds more of a pain but it might be the less destructive option? But try tunnelling first I think. Good luck sir. We are all on tenter hooks back here in the Tardis. 
 

Johnny
 

[81-er]

Thanks Johnny. This stuff isn't actually too bad, it cuts pretty easily with a sharp knife. I has stuck to any plastic it touched pretty well, but an exploratory start of a tunnel down by the joint is suggesting there's some milage in that option. Probably a bit of sideways action to take some of the bulge out of the panel as well. Sadly I don't think taking the panel off is an option now. While I initially glued them all on with superglue as recommended in the instructions, I've since gone round all of the joints with Tamiya Extra Thin, and that's what I used for glueing on the original reinforcement strips as well. I'll keep updating the thread as soon as I have any decent amount of progress to report

James

[AdrianMF]

Good luck with the salvage job.

 

Regards,

Adrian

[81-er]

Thanks Adrian  I'm hopeful it's going to be fairly easy, just time consuming. Famous last words... 🤣

 

James

[81-er]

The bulge is now fixed:

 

 

That was a bit more complicated than I originally thought though. I was correct that the problem was caused by the glue on the strengthening bits of sprue not being dry, but what I hadn’t considered was that said glue would have dried in the bulged position. So I had to hack out all of the foam to get access to fix that:

 

 

The sprue resisted all attempts to remove it, so plan B was to use my rotary tool to notch them until I could bend everything back into line:

 

 

Now it’s all straightened up and set I’ve attached more sprue, this time liberally glued with and covered by 5 minute epoxy:

 

 

I’ll give that 24 hours to be totally set before repeating the foam application.

 

James

[Kallisti]

Brave man! My first thought on seeing this was "hope the seams don't split from the pressure of the expansion!"