April 10th, 2026

Last week I was discussing the Black Hills Con with my sister, and while talking I realized I only had a little over two months to finish the Dalek. Eek!

I modified the shoulders and added some holes to mount the neck to it, and some to help mount it to the skirt. Then I cut it up in the slicer (remembering to add pins/connectors this time), and started printing.

I had four printers working every day to get all the shoulder parts printed, 16 shoulder pieces, 18 slats, and 24 neck ‘bolts’. All the pieces came out nice, and I am again surprised about the size in real life (I really should be used to that by now).

For the long slats, I originally printed then horizontally. This led to some bad stair-stepping on the slope in the center. This time I decided to print them vertically. To help avoid any wobble, I added 2 small small “fins” connecting two slats together. This kept them rock-solid, and avoided any artifacts near the top since they are so tall. The fins are easily removed with some flush cutters.