Shoulders

Pete’s Dalek – Shoulders

	Here you can see the plywood frame for the shoulders. The angled sides are set up to give support to the sheet cladding that would later be put on. Each of the uprights is liquid nailed into the top and bottom sections with tenon joints. It is quite light but sturdy.
	The gun and plunger arms of a Dalek have spherical bases that swivel in pivot holes in what is known as the “gunbox”. To hold these swivel ball bases you need front amd back plates with bevelled circular holes. Most people use a router for this, but as I’m a right stingy bastard I used this high-tech router AKA: an upturned teracotta pot with sanding paper. A stray cat has since broken this pot so I don’t know what I’m going to do if I need to make another one.
	The gunbox is made from bits of 12mm MDF and held together with your friend and mine – Liquid Nails! It took a lot of adjustment and referring to photos and plans to decide exactly where the box would sit on the frame.
	All those complex angles and curves from the circular top to the oblong base, and the holes required for the gunbox to stick through, makes planning the cladding shape quite tricky. This shot shows how I’ve used cardboard to make a template for the final cladding. I’ve used bits of masking tape to “fill” some of the bigger gaps so that the final template is as close as possible to a perfect fit. Then it’s trace over onto the 3mm MDF and cut out.
	Here is the front section of cladding glued and screwed onto the frame. The fit was quite neat with only a few gaps to fill with car body filler. To get the thing to bend around the frame without breaking I had to soak the MDF for about 6 hours in the bath and then clamp on the frame until dry. This makes the cladding sort of “pre-bent<img src=”compfirstclampcollar.jpg” />” which makes screwing it on easy. I didn’t cut out the gunbox holes until after bending the cladding as I was worried it might crease or break some of the thin pieces when wet.
	A “green slimy creature” view of the inside of the gunbox controls. I’m making these balls out of my Christmas baubles yet again – obviously they will eventually be painted to the appropriate colours.
	This photo shows how the “pre-bent” cladding looks before attaching to the frame. This is the back section of cladding after soaking and clamping till dry.
	Despite being “pre-bent” I still had to clamp and press the panels into place whislt the Liquid Nails set. The screws in place do keep the cladding located, but the high-tech weight presses you see here keep the thing flat until dry.
	When dry, I trimmed off the overhanging edges of cladding and gave the shoulders a coat of high build wood sealer/primer. After this I will spray some auto primer onto bits requiring filling.
	The gun bits. The barrel is a 25mm aluminium tube. The end collars are irrigation pipe joiners cut and drilled with 8 equally spaced holes. The rods were purchased from a hobby shop and bent to the required shape with a vice, hammer, pliers and cursing. These bloody rods were made of such hard steel that even hacksawing them took a lot of effort.
	After finishing the basic construction of the gun – with all the priming and painting yet to do – I couldn’t resist assembling the bits so far to look at “Darling”. He/she/it is really starting to look menacing now!
	Here is the shoulders once finished priming and sanding ready for the final coat. I was very happy with the smooth finish.
	The shoulders have two collars around the top and bottom of the shoulders. Many builders make these from aluminium, but as mine will be painted I figured MDF will be fine for the job. I used the good old soak and bend to shape them. This shot shows one of the collars drying in an approximate position to be attached later. Each collar sits about half an inch from the shoulders, so I made a stack of spacers from thick MDF.
	The Genesis Dalek has slats around the top collar. Yet again I made these from good ol’ MDF. The tops and bottoms of the slats need to lie along a level plane as viewed from the side. This means that each slat varies in length for its specific position. Here you can see the paper templates I used to get each slat dimension correct. The measuring jig on top of the shoulders I used to ensure each one was the correct distance down from the top of the shoulders.
	To enable myself to get in and out of my Dalek I needed to put a hinge on the shoulder, bolted to the skirt. I’m yet to be sure that the single hinge will be strong enough, and I may need to add a second one later. There is a chain fitted to hold the top half of the Dalek when open. I had to make the skirt before doing this part – to see details on the construction of the skirt, check out the appropriate section in this build diary.
	Genesis Daleks also have mesh underneath the slats along the top collar. I have continued my policy of being a stingy bastard and using cheap stuff – here is the mesh, a $2.00 roll of gutterguard. It did prove a bit difficult to prime, but has the right size of mesh.
	Here is the shoulders nearly complete. I still have to make an oval for the front of the shoulders, between the front appendages (ooh-errr, that sounds a bit rude).
	Just a few more pics of the gun in construction. Here is the basic gun primed. The earlier photos showed the Christmas ball and pipe used to make the gun. Once primed you’d never know what it was made of!
	Here is the completed gun, painted black and “firing” with those funny firing fingers. I made the fingers from a yoghurt plastic tub. Unfortunately the black paint made the fingers a bit brittle and I’m not sure how many firings it will last. The black paint job, with clear coat for wear resistance gave a nice slick finish. The gunbox will have felt in the clamp circles to enable a smooth, scratch-free rotation of the appendages.
	Finding an appropriate shaped sink plunger is supprisingly difficult. This one has a good profile and size, but the ribs are not accurate and the inner flange (ooohh errr) not required. The inner flange of rubber was removed and came in handy as the bushes inside the arm tubing to allow the plunger to telescope backward and forward (oohh errrr, again).
	Once again I couldn’t resist assembling “Darling” to see how she looks. What a sweetie, peeking around the corner, just waiting to exterminate someone.