A Dog Without A Head - K9 Assembly Testing

So this is another quick blog entry. Last night I did a test assembly of the main body, the dorsal control panel and the drive base. I just wanted to see how (and if) the parts fit together. This video features the new right side door which I will talk about more below.

For the longest time, I never bothered to manufacture a right, side door. This is where the classic K9 logo will go when the body is finished but up until now it was just a big access hole. The door needed to be custom fitted because even though it is draw out in the BBC plans, the body itself has a unique shape because it is built out of wood and glue as opposed to metal which would be far more rigid. I started with a cardboard test cut out which I roughly cut to fit and made adjustments on that. Then I duplicated this in particle board and spent quite a while sanding the edges until it just fit the hole.

It is interesting to point out that the lower portion of this door is angled down about 6 degrees to conform with the way the body itself is angled. Rather than cut and join two pieces of wood, I routed a horizontal line through the particle board along where the angle change occurs just thick enough to make the wood bendable. I then bent it into shape and filled the routed channel with plastic wood.

This turned out to work really well. The resulting door was a perfect fit and once it was sanded and sealed, looked like a natural bend in a single piece of metal.

This door will be held in place with four magnetic cabinet door catches so it will be secure but come off easily. You are also looking at the primed finish, not the final finish which I am waiting to apply until the entire body is complete. I will probably go with the dark blue metallic finish of the K9 Mk III as shown here when done.