K9 Diaries - 11 days to go

Head Mould

Only 11 days remaining before the appearance of k9 the wonder dog, so I'd better get my skates on. Fortunately I've been working slowly but steadily towards the ultimate goal. Sometimes it seems like he'll never be done, and so many different things to organise, and co-ordinate, with things slowly lumbering into position, it's like the aligning of the planets.

Fortunately the head mould did come apart mostly OK. Just a little sticking on the front of the head in the mouth area. Relatively cleanly, so only a little tidying up and it and it should be good to go.

The control panel is also progressing, this needs to be completed so I can gauge to correct size for the hole to accommodate in the body. Then I can move on to prepping and painting, before fitting all the systems in the body shell.
I decided on a two part mould. Hopefully the two parts will pull apart easily. Again with the experimental, I went for plain MDF with no primer, just 6 or so layers of wax release agent, all holes and imperfections filled with wax.

Both sides of the control panel mould are now covered.

K9 Diaries - A Body in the Garage

Removing the mould

It began like any other evening, visiting family, what I really wanted to do was to get home to deal with the body in the garage. I had quietly secured it the previous evening, and I just needed time for the idea to gel. When I finally got into the garage, it was like driving a wedge between reality and a shadow. How would it turn out, would this be the end of a dream? Would the Fibreglass police turn up at my door and charge me with insufficient application of release agent?

One side revealed

After the wedges had been gingerly tapped in, the mould began to release again quite easily at the top, but it seemed to be sticking in the recesses again. Oh the torment, until with a cracking sound it just popped off. I was so relieved!

It also looked quite good for saying I'd taken a chisel to the mould.

Then it was on to the other side, I wasn't out of the woods yet.

Right side and front.

I was on a roll, the wax release agent is definitely is the way to go. Perhaps I'll try Easy Lease again in the future but I'll test it out on some not so important bits before I roll that dice again.

Here are three sides revealed, it was going too well!

Time for the bum

The rear section was a little  tricky, I thought it was going to give me some problems, but in the end just a little gentle teasing and plastic wedges tapped in all round, was all that was required.

The top section was a breeze. So this is it, K9 has a body shell, just a bit of a trim to remove the excess fibres around the edges and a little light sanding required around the edges.

K9's body revealed

Photos by my lovely wife, Debs :)

K9 Diaries - 3 Weeks to Whooverville 09 - PANIC MODE

Front and rear panels

After soaking the MDF and then scraping the primer off with a chisel, I've finally got a mould. There is still work to do cleaning it up, so I believe I need to fill any defects and then give the panels a light sanding.

This will probably take me through the weekend leaving less than 3 weeks to finish K9. Oh woe is me.

3 Weeks and counting - The situations is: Still no body, head, side panel or control panel.

The Motorised base is still good, and batteries have arrived, but charger needs sorting out.
Raspberry Pi is good, I2C connection to Arduino works.
Screen is good and the HiFi Berry should be great.

If I  can press on with the fibreglass this weekend, I may have a body shell and maybe a head.

The control panel could be fabricated quite quickly, and side panel is a quick job (famous last words).

So just a bit of filling where required, then onto waxing before fabricating the body shell......

It's a mould, huzzah. Not as pretty and shiny as it could have been but hopefully serviceable. With six coats of wax mould release agent, I'm pressing on!

Still no head, and I'm dreading trying to remove the bit's I've attached.

K9 Diaries - Sticky Situation

With high hopes, I started gently inserting wedges and tapping them in. The mould should have just popped off.

After carefully working my way round tapping in wedges, it became apparent that it wasn't going to be that easy.

Unfortunately the release agent hasn't done its job. Rather than separating easily, I had to apply excessive force, which ripped the recess out of the pattern.

Wailey, Wailey!

I now had a big hole in the pattern and was quite anxious about the rest of the mould.

This is strange because the top half has released reasonably well, but in the worst possible places, the recesses, the mould has stuck to the pattern.

I messaged easy composites to get their take one the situation and was told that on new moulds they recommended 6 coats Doh!

So the issue was repeated on all four panels.

Side panel
The same with the other side, as well as front and rear.

In the end, I've had to demolish the entire K9 pattern to get the mould off.

This could slow things down a bit :(

And here's the remains of the K9 pattern, 'tis but a scratch. I'm sure that with a bit of glue and a polish we can get it back together and have another go.

The plan moving forward is to remove the MDF from the mould. Then it's the primer coat that'll need scraping off. Then clean up the surfaces.

No doubt a little filling and sanding here and there, but don't get too hung up about scratches in the surface just light sanding and smoothing.





After a day of soaking and scraping, the majority of the MDF is removed, but the primer is still attached. 

I've had some success scraping the primer off with a chisel, as long as I don't scratch  the mould surface too much it could be the way forward. Either way it's a lot more work, and time.

K9 Diaries - Glass Half Full

Left Side Done

My fibreglass isn't getting any better. I just hope it's good enough to do the job.

I applied the gel coat, then realised I hadn't cut any bits of fibreglass matting to shape ready, so I had to wing it a bit and it was a bit hairy.

Just the far side to go.

Only a few more days before I'll be able to progress onto actual body shell making rather than, a pattern for the body or a making a mould from the pattern. It'll be the actual body.

More resin has been ordered together with some slightly heavier weight of matting, from East Coast Fibreglass Supplies, so I should now have plenty to complete the task.

I'm sure the mould should have had more layers to make it more robust, but as it's not intended for a production run of hundreds, it should be OK I hope, fingers crossed.

I've also not progressed the head any, so only half a job today, but it is a week night so just glad I could get some done.

I'll push on tomorrow, but prep time seems to be a lot longer than you would think.

K9 Diaries - Saturday Morning and All is Well

K9's head ready for more glass

K9's head was a bit of a mess, as I'd managed to get runs of resin on the sides and top as well as bits of fibreglass strands stuck on here and there. Fortunately they cleaned off fairly well, but it's something to look out for in the future. I'll have to look over the areas I'm not working on after, and clean off any spillage before it sets.

Front, with dams.

Today I was supposed to crack on with K9's fibreglass, but life conspired against much progress.
I did manage to start preparing the front end of the body shell, which takes longer than you might think, but then had to stop, as the fibre glassing can take 2 or 3 hours, when you take setting time of gel coat and clean-up time etc.

So Sunday morning I managed to get back into the garage and get some glass on.
First you cut out the fibre glass into the sizes you think will best suit what you're going to cover. Then you mix the gel coat apply that and wait 45 minutes. I went for a walk in this time. I've taken to doing a 5 km walk at a brisk pace to try and get into shape, so this was an ideal time. On my return, it was straight on to mixing a batch of resin, applying a coat and starting with the first layer of fibreglass.

Front completed.

Getting into corners is always interesting. On some of the hardest ones on the head I've used chopped strands of fibreglass then applied resin. It can be a bit messy as the strands like to stick to your paint brush. It does seem to be a good way to get into corners though.There was the usual misalignment's and patching.

It's getting quite exciting now, just the sides remaining, which might take less time as there are boundaries to set-up as they are already there. Just a strip along the bottom.


I've not decided how to handle the panel cut-out yet. Perhaps I should set up a boundary of some kind where it'll be cut-out? It seems a waste to cover an area that isn't required.

The same with the monitor aperture, it will take a little extra setting up time, but will save materials.