Doctor Who Handles Foam Pep Disaster

Yeah, it was all going too well. Since I can't clad the shoulders single-handed, and my kid's not going to be around to help until tomorrow, I thought I'd crack on with the gun boxes. They're small parts that'll go on the shoulders, but it would be useful to have them assembled ahead of time. But even with detailed plans:
20180422_160435.jpg(This is just one of FOUR pages outlining the gun box dimensions) I still managed to utterly, UTTERLY stuff it up. Now I'm waiting on the glue drying so I can get really cross about it and throw it away.
On the plus side, I got to do more plumbing this morning. Grrrr.
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Ok, it's been most of a week since we actually did the shoulders, I think I can talk about it now.
We had this bit:
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I had two large sheets of hardboard, and I sat them on the floor of the shower and soaked them. Then I discovered that manhandling a large, wet hardboard sheet into place is very hard. My kid tried to help, but we just ended up smacking each other in the face with wet hardboard when the clamps slipped. I finally got the damn thing into place and bunged some nails in.
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Then I hacked off the extra bits freehand with my jigsaw. My old Craft and Design teacher from school would be sobbing on the floor right about now. I don't blame him.
Since I was now a seasoned professional, it only took another ten minutes to get sheet number two clamped into place.
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Now all I had to do was trim it where the two sheets met. Which I couldn't see, because that line was hidden under the new sheet. Can't draw on the inside, because I'll be cutting on the outside. I eyeballed it, and got it horrifically wrong. There are not pictures of this. Instead, here's one that shows my daughter making the bumpers, a safe distance away...
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The second sheet gets trimmed. Breaks and cracks and shorts are filled with wallboard filler. Most of the disaster areas will be covered by the second skin and the slats anyway. But before we get to that I have to screw up the gun boxes a bit. Let's stack it all up and put my kid inside it first, though, eh?
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Yeah.

This whole thing has been a bit of a sobering experience. I realise just how contained my previous projects have been. Although the skills I have picked up along the way will be useful in the finishing, and probably some of the manufacturing, tackling a macro project like this is very different. Glad I never went for that "life size Speeder bike" I wanted to build.

Anyway, I have Monday off, so I'll build the second gunbox and measure the shoulders to mark where they're supposed to go. There aren't really any easy bits from this point on, and some mass-production parts that I haven't thought out at all. Hope all is well with your latest projects, rpfers!
 
It's too early to build the dome, and this is the wrong way to go about it....
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Tried to put on the next layer of cladding, and the hardboard was too brittle, even when wet.
I'm gonna put the spacers on, but use a cheap camping mat made of foam to actually do the cladding. Then I'll have to paint it with fibre glass resin for the surfacing.
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It's been nearly a week because there was work and *shudder* camping to get through. However, I managed to have a day off today, and despite one child electing not to go to school (when did that become optional?) I have the house mostly to myself. I got some actual admin and work out of the way early, and then settled down to measure, cut out and glue the collar from the camping mat. Despite my fervent hopes, it came up a little short, but (as ever) I'll fix that in post. At least it's on now.
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Next comes the long process of turning out enough spacers for the much wider bottom collar, for which I'll need another camping mat. There's plenty in the dollar store right now. Better stock up, in case this takes longer than I thought.
I also glued a couple of the half-spheres of polystyrene to a board, and tried macheing over one to see if it's good hemi-production method. So far the answer is "meh"...
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On the one hand, we have a lot of surfacing work to do when the thing dries, and we have 56 of the things to make, so a long process. On the other hand, I have lots of glue and newspaper, and my Eldest (who is supposed to be helping with this) has more time on her hands than I do, and plenty of experience with papier mache. Despite the huge collection of scrap wood in the workshop, I'm going to need new stuff for the three neck rings which are the component parts of the next section we have to build, and I haven't come close to finishing the gunboxes that go inside the shoulders. No more free days off for a while either. Still, it's great to make progress.
 
There are no shortcuts.

I was looking at alternatives to buying hemis, since I theoretically have no budget for this build. After papier macheing one hemi, I wanted to see if I could shortcut the process. Instead of bondo and fibre glass resin on the papier mache, I applied resin directly to the polystyrene hemi. This is what happened:
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Pretty sure it's because of SCIENCE.



So, back to Plan A....

Meanwhile, my kid was working hard on producing the basis for the dome, using some foamcore sheets and more patience than I have ever shown on anything.



The stack looks weird because the shoulders are missing and we haven't built the neck yet. Mini dalek is just for reference.

It's a long weekend here in BC, and though I have some writing work to catch up on (as ever) there's possibly going to be some time to cut spacers for the lower collar and maybe get that in place, so we can start noodling about how to produce the slats (still no bandsaw, despite heavy hinting.) Also unhappy about the fact I'm gonna have to buy more wood for the neck rings - I can't move in my workshop for scrap wood, but none of it is the right dimensions....
 
Weird. I've done loads of work on the dalek, yet not made much progress...
My kid went to work on the dome, filling in the gaps between struts with card:
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Then I came along behind her with the papier mache:
20180604_074723.jpgThis picture was actually taken after the second session of mache, because you can see I've already slapped some wallboard filler on the first half. The whole dome is going to be fillered, then sanded down and smoothed into the right shape. I hope.
Saturday, I finally got around to cutting the holes out of the front of the gun boxes. Oh dear, oh dear.
See, I had a hole saw, but just for door handles, which is about 2.5 inches. I needed a 4", so what I opted to do was cut out the middle 2.5", try to cut out the rest with a jigsaw when I couldn't clamp the damn things securely and oh...damn...bugger...Right.
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Ok, aside from the circles that aren't round, the gaps at the bottoms of the boxes, and the terrible joints that are slathered - SLATHERED! - in filler, there's also the issue of the slots on the side that you can't see. They are bad. They're supposed to be recessed at one end and..., well it's hard to describe, let's see if I can pinch an illustration... Here we go:
gunboxes.jpg
Damn, that's good! And that's someone's home build, too! Anyway, I think I've rescued the slots with some deft mache:
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And the circles on the front will be covered and corrected by that fancy overlay plate that I will get my daughter to make out of decent cardstock, because she won't screw it up.
 
Ok, I took a break from the unimportant stuff - paid work, visiting in-laws, DIY etc - and added a few more pieces. The big step was cutting two of the three neck rings. I made six of the eight supports for the rings too, and a couple of the neck blocks. I didn't do a great job, but I think I'm learning. The sad thing is, it'll be a couple of weeks before I get another comp20180702_094843.jpg20180702_094852.jpg20180702_191449.jpg20180702_191554.jpglete day to work on this.
 
I always scrap my projects because I don't think I can finish, so I have little to show for all my attempts (stormtrooper bucket, Mass Effect armor). Your attitude and this thread give me inspiration to get over myself, plow ahead, and make something.

Keep the updates coming, Dtrasler!
 
I always scrap my projects because I don't think I can finish, so I have little to show for all my attempts (stormtrooper bucket, Mass Effect armor). Your attitude and this thread give me inspiration to get over myself, plow ahead, and make something.

Keep the updates coming, Dtrasler!

This is so good to hear! I think the fear of imperfection is the thing that holds most of us back from attempting many projects. Once you accept that everything is a step on the way to better, it really helps.

I spent all day yesterday cutting skirting board for my newly-floored basement. It was depressing and repetitive. Tomorrow my parents arrive for two weeks, likely putting the kibosh on any more building for a while. Still, you never know - my mum's quite handy with a craft knife and papier mache.... Maybe I can put them to work?
 
I'm a little behind with my updates, thanks to some unexpected time to dalek, then a forgotten deadline biting me in the behind that meant two late nights at the keyboard. Anyway, I got round to the neck cage at last.
The manual lays it out: Eight supports, resting on the bottom ring, supporting the other two rings with a few inches to spare out the top. Nowhere does it say how the heck you're supposed to hold the whole thing together while you glue it. I used my tried and true method of waiting until I was tired and a little bit beered up, then trying to do it all by myself. None of my clamps were big enough to go around the support and the rings, so I tried dry-fitting the bottom ring with the supports. I could only get three out of the six I'd cut to stay. Add any more and the whole thing fell down. Then I realised I would have to slide the second ring down over the top of the supports that were in place. They fell down too.
I tried adding glue to the first set of supports. They fell down, and now my workbench and my hands were covered in glue.
I honestly can't explain how it worked in the end. I think I got three supports wedged/glued in place on the first ring, added the second and caught them before they could fall, then taped them in place with painter's tape (also no mean feat if you want to hold the supports AND the rings while you tear off your strip of tape...) But look:
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Ha! The old "Sideways upload"! I still have to cut two more supports and glue them in place, but the cage is pretty solid now. I have only dull jobs to do for the next few stages - I have to cut out more neck blocks - I did two tonight, but I still have to drill their holes:
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I still have the spacers to cut for the second collar, and when that collar is in place, I have to be brave and cut holes for the gun boxes. I have to finish the filler on the dome and get it sanded. Then we have to cut into the dome to prepare the ground for the eyestalk.
When I think about all that, I get a bit queasy. The Vancouver Fan Expo date has been moved forward to October this year, instead of November. I have less time to get this finished, and more work than ever before (which is good, because food and mortgage and shiny things for the wife) and I haven't even thought about the builds for the other two kids. Or me.
On the positive side, this is as tall as the thing is going to get, and it LOOKS like a dalek now.
 
Hot damn, really does look like a Dalek! Part of the fun of building is no one ever knows about the blood and tears, they only see the finished prop.

Too right!
This week, I have a week off work. My folks are here, but my mother has obligingly injured her knee (only minor, but it needs rest) so there are no outings or expeditions for a few days. I therefore got an entire 90 minutes to dalek this morning.
I started with cutting down one of the gunboxes. My kid is finally making the front pieces for the, and she's doing those to scale. I cut down the side and the bottom and re-glued it. Much better.20180716_114430.jpg

Then I cut the spacers for the second, lower collar. I used foam because even my shiny new band saw is causing me grief right now. The end result is a bunch of white rectangles around the waist of the dalek.
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Which makes it look a LITTLE like a stormtrooper. And now I'm fighting the urge to paint the whole thing white and shiny..... Bet that's been done.
 
Got the lower collar put into place.
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And then I started to fit the first of the gunboxes. It's really fiddly, and the topography of what shape you cut out to accommodate the box is really melting my brain (as is the actual heat...)
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This weekend I also finally built shelves to hold my helmets. They all fit on, because I trashed the DeathTrooper helm. Not sure where I out my next build, though...
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OK, I stole time today and made the aft end of the gun. There's surfacing work to do on it, but the measurements are right. Well, close.
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I'm a little worried that drilling the hole right through the middle will mess up the stack, but I'll worry about that tomorrow.
I paid a price for my skimping on prep with the collar. The support/backing pieces I made weren't the full width of the collar, so the lower edge was unsupported. I wanted to use filler to make the angle between the underside of the collar and the rest of the shoulders, so first I had to pack the gap with spare foam and then fill. Tomorrow I'll make the angle, ad start cutting the right shaped support pieces for the slats. Oh, and do a hell of a lot of sanding, I guess.
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My prediction came true. Putting the hole through the aft end of the gun tore the stack to pieces. I slid everything on to the tube, then re-glued it, then covered everything in filler. Then I made the other end. I got the wire I need for the next part, but there's measuring to sort out before I actually bend that. I also sanded the heck out of large sections of the shoulders, which did nothing but cover everything in white dust. I think I might do a better job with the power sander, but that'll have to wait until after the camping trip.
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