If anyone was wondering about the progress on the Drypod - there isn't any. I was unhappy at the flimsy nature of the body and any measures to correct it were not likely to leave me with anything I'd be happy with. After much pondering and procrastination I have determined a new direction for an attempt:-
Visually similar but a completely different manufacturing path to the Mk1. The chassis come lower body is to be plywood with the blue lines with red dots being horizontal panels and held either side by the solid blue panel. Holes will need to be made in relevant places to keep the weight down and a minimum of structural ply will be used with correx bridging any gaps to keep weather out. The door on the original was a major headache being extremely flimsy and difficult to get it to hold shape. The new version will have no door and will hinge up at the front. The upper body will go somewhat high tech and be made from honeycomb Thermhex panels which are exceedingly strong and light. I've considered Thermhex for the chassis, and whilst it's certainly up to the job the ability to join it into a cohesive chassis is simply not there without creating a rigid steel perimeter structure. The top bodywork is not structural and aluminium angle tabs can join it together. Sitting atop the Thermhex body is a polycarbonate set of windows though I'll use Thermhex for the back and top as it's lighter. The upper half will slide just outside the lower half to shed rain outside rather than in. A bead of silicone can be run all around the inside joins and I hope / expect this will be more water tight than the previous failure would have been. Again I'd like to make a curved screen as it adds very little extra weight but looks so much more professional. As to expected weight - this is much harder to guestimate. I think the wooden chassis is going to hit 12kg itself but the Thermhex will weigh less than 1.5kg - it's about a seventh the weight of wood. There'll be 5kg of 2mm polycarbonate and 3kg of channel to run the side windows in. There'll be all the usuall extras such as wheels and fasteners too. It be my first monocoque structure with various metal bits bolted through so there's much to learn on the way. Conveniently the wooden structure all comes from a single piece of 8x4 and I'm thinking 12mm will do rather than 18mm.
I've already noticed that the body to steering column bracer showing in the diagrams will have to go in favour of a floor mounted one or more likely I'll go with side levers by the seat.
Visually similar but a completely different manufacturing path to the Mk1. The chassis come lower body is to be plywood with the blue lines with red dots being horizontal panels and held either side by the solid blue panel. Holes will need to be made in relevant places to keep the weight down and a minimum of structural ply will be used with correx bridging any gaps to keep weather out. The door on the original was a major headache being extremely flimsy and difficult to get it to hold shape. The new version will have no door and will hinge up at the front. The upper body will go somewhat high tech and be made from honeycomb Thermhex panels which are exceedingly strong and light. I've considered Thermhex for the chassis, and whilst it's certainly up to the job the ability to join it into a cohesive chassis is simply not there without creating a rigid steel perimeter structure. The top bodywork is not structural and aluminium angle tabs can join it together. Sitting atop the Thermhex body is a polycarbonate set of windows though I'll use Thermhex for the back and top as it's lighter. The upper half will slide just outside the lower half to shed rain outside rather than in. A bead of silicone can be run all around the inside joins and I hope / expect this will be more water tight than the previous failure would have been. Again I'd like to make a curved screen as it adds very little extra weight but looks so much more professional. As to expected weight - this is much harder to guestimate. I think the wooden chassis is going to hit 12kg itself but the Thermhex will weigh less than 1.5kg - it's about a seventh the weight of wood. There'll be 5kg of 2mm polycarbonate and 3kg of channel to run the side windows in. There'll be all the usuall extras such as wheels and fasteners too. It be my first monocoque structure with various metal bits bolted through so there's much to learn on the way. Conveniently the wooden structure all comes from a single piece of 8x4 and I'm thinking 12mm will do rather than 18mm.
I've already noticed that the body to steering column bracer showing in the diagrams will have to go in favour of a floor mounted one or more likely I'll go with side levers by the seat.
