I pretty much wasted tonight with an attempt to make an iris-valve style door out of cardstock.

I studied camera iris diaphragms, and made a mock-up with blades tacked down at one end. However, it'd be just too darn big for an indoor portal or airlock. With this method, there needs to be a large area around the opening, for the blades to retract into. Good for the side of a large ship (like a double-height FL landing bay), for small ships to go through, but there's no way to make a bulkhead in a hallway without making a basement.

Any other ideas for making this possible?

No help here, I have several in resin, but none operate, sorry. I could maybe see one in a deck, but as a vertical door it would be hard to get a good seal I would think. But sure would look cool.

Okay, I just spent waaay to much time drawing up a beautiful rotating iris design in friggin powerpoint.

How do you like this beauty:

Mount the door tunnl in a carboard tube...with a helical slot cut to open it.
Attach a bar to one side of the tunnel , and run it in the slot.
Might work...but it would take a fair bit of room.
Maybe mount the whole unit inside an airlock section.

See, that's why you'd need to make the tunnel part from som sort of flexible material. If only one could find some sort of thin rubber tube, about an inch in diameter...

Aleph,

I know it has been sujected before but why not a removable door with one picture open with the opening, one closed and one half closed.

I know that it defeats the reason of trying to build a working door but in the works of Savage Worlds:

Fast, Furious, Fun!

The real question is are you making it too hard for yourself?


Now a iris door with organic textures printed on transpancies would be very funky.

Lord Abaddon of Wormwood

The main reason I'd want a functional door? Because it would be cool, and I'm a geek.

Barring a functional door (and rather than having swappable doors that sit off to the side and get lost/sat on/spilled on/slid under the masterboard), how about a 6" wide wall, with a sideways sliding door insert that has all three door textures (each 2" wide) that you can just slide to one side or the other for that image?

That might work pretty well. Like a pop-up book.

How about a textured round door that slides into the wall; just have the top protrude 1/8" so you can use your finger to roll it back and forth.