For as long as I can remember, I’ve always wanted to have a full sized TARDIS prop all of my very own.  I even badgered my Father about it throughout my early years and although his response was on the whole quite positive in this regard, we never quite got around to actually doing it.

Things changed in 2004, I won’t bore you with the details as many of you will already know the story, so for one reason or another, I began to build that TARDIS and during the on and off process, I even used some of the construction techniques that I developed when I was about 12 years old!

The first thing that you have to know is that I could only spend about a week or two each year working on this project because I was using my Dad’s tools and workshop at the other end of the country from me.  Perhaps because of this, this is the reason why I never actually finished the project… in the end, I kind of abandoned it so very close to the finish line. 

What follows is a mainly pictorial build process of that TARDIS.  It was a custom design that had to work as a filming prop.  It encompassed all the details that I liked about the various Classic TARDIS props, thrown in together with elements taken from real world Police Boxes and then tweaked with my own design twist using various mathematical rules to produce what I thought would be a nicely balanced looking item. 

Let’s get on with it then.

PRE-BUILD:

Right from the very beginning, I knew that I wanted my build to have a surface texture with the appropriate weathering.  At the time, no other fan builds had this feature which meant that I couldn’t build upon other people’s experiences, so I had to go it alone and work out a method to realise this effect myself.  I began to look around for various products that I could possibly use to achieve the effect that I was after; a sort of worn and aged concrete look.

After several product tests, I settled on this acrylic render material and began to try out different methods of application using coarse brushes, a sponge and a spatula.  Through this trial and error process, I found a way of using the render that seemed to do the trick and generate the effect that I was looking for.  Texture Test Two was heading in the right direction and so I made a mental note of how I did this so that I could apply to the final build in due course.

To commemorate the first day of the build, my brother made me a WHO Salad sandwich and supplied me with copious amounts of tea to keep me going.  This was very much appreciated.  With my final build plans and a bunch of construction doodles, I set about my work.  Thankfully my Father was on hand to help me out when a process required more than one set of hands and for that, I am eternally grateful.

The materials that this build was constructed from are: 

Joiners’ Grade Red Pine timber stock.
Rough, “as sawn” stock.
12mm Marine Grade Ply.
12mm Marine Grade MDF.

Because some of the stock was not quite the size that I had ordered, being slightly under sized, I had to re-jig my plans on the fly.  Problem solving and trouble shooting is usually part of the job on projects like this, so you just learn to deal with it and move on.

THE BASE:

Although the base was the first part to be started for this project, it turned out to be the last part completed.  Quite why this was, I have no real idea – it was too long ago now.  It’s built using a standard, staggered lattice affair with an outer frame.  This had to be robust enough to sustain the full weight of the build sitting on top of it and when my Dad looked at it, he told me that I’d rather over-engineered it.  He was probably right, but I’d rather be safe, than sorry.

In the bottom left hand image, you will see two base construction drawings.  The one on the single sheet of paper is my original 1:1 construction drawing that I did at home, the one in the book is my re-jigged idea based on the incorrect timber that had been delivered to me that morning.  The curse of building this out in the middle of no-where was that if stock had to be returned and new stock brought in to replace it, doing so would cause massive delays – something that I couldn’t afford.  This was the first of many on the fly amendments that I had to tackle, but you have to take these issues all in your stride, otherwise you come to a shuddering halt and nothing ever gets done.

THE CORNER POSTS:

The method I used here was one of those that I came up with when I was about 12 years old.  It’s simply four lengths of board that I’d run through a thicknesser to achieve the desired depth of 25mm or 1″, these were then assembled as two “L” shapes (joined with a biscuit joiner and screws for strength) and laminated onto one another in such a way that you could not see any joins, or board ends, when looking at it in the position that it would finally take on the prop, ie upright. 

The last step was to attach the quarter round beading that makes up the outer corner detailing.  These were absolute over long and then trimmed in situ with a hand saw.  The reason for this is to ensure a snug fit.  Cutting them to length prior to fixing them into place could result in a mismatch and thus waste valuable stock if I’d accidentally cut it shorter than I should have.

DOORS AND WALLS:

Being doors would obviously require the placement of hinges to allow them to function as desired.  However, because I was using stock thicknessed to 25mm which was then added to a 12mm ply backing, this would mean that where they interfaced would be the exact spot in which the hinge screws would sit.  I had to avoid this as I didn’t want the screws to act as a pivot that over time would force the ply and the timber apart, thusly ruining a perfectly good door.

To circumvent this, the hinge side stile (the long upright section) was ripped to the full thickness of the door and set back from the leading edge by about 40mm, a rebate was cut into the timber to allow the ply to sit in place away from the hinges and their screws.

Here you can see the completed left hand door.  On the reverse side image, you can see how the ply sits in the afore-mentioned rebate, allowing the full thickness of the timber stock to receive the screws that fix the hinges into place.  I thought that this was a nifty little idea at the time!

The walls were made in pretty much the same way as the doors, though because there are no hinges involved, all the stock was thicknessed to 25mm (with a 21° chamfer) and then glued to the ply wood.  Once the glue was dry, the walls were flipped over and screws were inserted through the ply and into the timber to give extra strength to the lamination. 

PROGRESS CHECK:

Having completed two walls (these are actually the left and right walls) and all of the corner posts I couldn’t resist the idea of quickly assembling what I had of the TARDIS so far to see how it was starting to take shape.

It’s just clamped together here, but I felt it really was starting to look very TARDISy.  Viewing it from the end of the drive way brought a smile to my face as my age old dream was starting to become a reality.  Oddly at this point, we began to receive visits from neighbours who wanted to come round and check if we had this or that, their visits had absolutely nothing to do with the enormous box.  We were the talk of the village by all accounts.

SIGN BOXES:

These are the only two photographs that I took of the sign boxes at the time of their construction.  The reason is quite simple; they were so easy to make that each one only took around fifteen minutes to complete, so I had all four done within an hour.  I got so carried away with making them that I didn’t stop to take any pictures.

They are marine grade MDF with left over timber stock acting as the internal scaffold bracing.

And here is how they lock into the walls.  I didn’t want to shape the interface to the contours of the corner posts, so instead I had the beading end at the point at which the boxes sat, I then continued the beading above the boxes and this produced a seamless and easy transition.

It was also at this point that I elected to permanently affix the corner posts to both side walls.  This is something that I would later slightly regret as I soon realised that it made the walls very heavy.  From this moment on, it became a two man job to move the side walls around… that said, the box did go together very quickly – about ten to fifteen minutes from start to finish.

BUILDING THE ROOF:

By the time that I got to the roof build stage, I realised that I was running very low on material stock, so I threw my original construction plans out of the window and made up a new method right then and there on the spot that would use as little material as possible, but maintain structural integrity.

The picture montage above is fairly self-explanatory as to how the roof was constructed, what I should mention is that each tier was fashioned with the construction screwed down directly to the workbench itself to ensure that everything was true and level.  Any twists or warps here would have resulted in one ill-fitting and very wonky roof.

I cannot take credit for all of the roof top pitch plywood cladding as I had to go home not long after I began this.  While I was away, my Father chipped in and finished off the other three sides for me, which was very kind of him.  He loves to tinker!

WINDOW FRAMES AND JIG:

Sixteen identical window frames were required and to facilitate this, a special jig was built to ensure uniformity.  As I was back home and my Father knew that I dreaded the monotony of doing this part, he kindly did it for me to the construction specifications that I’d left behind.  He did a fantastic job, exactly matched to my drawings and I have to say that not only was I very pleased with the excellent result, but he also did a perfect job and I didn’t have to tackle it myself!

Here you can see the frames sat in their position in the oversized hole cut into the ply backing. 

The image to the right shows not only how the frames were placed, but also how the hinge side stile in the door was cut to allow the rebate and screws for the hinge butt itself – look towards the upper left part of the door, in line with the top row of the window frame.

FINAL CONSTRUCTION PHASE – DETAILS:

On the home run now just finishing off all those final details such as fixing in the window frames, making and attaching the stepped detail below the sign boxes and adding things like locks, door handles and the cubby panel for the Pull To Open sign.

Interestingly, the only thing keeping this box together are four small bolts; two in the back wall and two in the front wall just below the sign box.  It’s designed to have more, but I discovered that just the four will suffice and the whole prop is as steady as a rock.  Gravity keeps everything else in place.

You can see me up a ladder here with what we call a “Windy Gun” as I nail the stepped detail into place while the glue dries.  It was also at this point in my original build diary that I kept whilst I was the admin of the TARDIS Rebuilders (and TARDIS Builders) sites, where in nearly every progress photo that I posted there was a shot of a step ladder.  This turned into a running joke, so not only did I include more step ladder shots, but other builders started to ape me in their diaries too for comic effect.  The tradition of the ladder shot has now stuck.

Look, two ladders here!  You can see the final details that have been added, as well as the knotting compound that I applied to every single knot in the timber.  This was done to prevent sap seepage which I knew would ruin any paint and texturing effects as time progressed and the box got older.

I don’t appear to have any pictures of the lamp construction phase.  I did have, but they must have been lost over time.  You can see how it was built quite clearly here during this early test fitting.  What you cannot see is the rest of the housing that sits inside the lamp base here, it’s about the same height as what is visible… the whole unit slides into the base and locks in purely under its own weight.  There is absolutely no way that this could ever fall off or get blown away.  It’s in there tighter than a duck’s arse under water!

More step ladder shots as the TARDIS gets painted in white primer.  At one point, it looked like a scene from The Mind Robber in which the TARDIS turned completely white when it materialised in some kind of void in the space between reality and the Land of Fiction.  Don’t ask, I don’t know either!

Grey undercoat.  Speaks for itself really.  The image to the left was my take on the“Totters Lane Junkyard” scene from the very first episode.  Yeah, I know – nothing like.  Still no bevel detailing on that base, even at this late stage in the game!

TEXTURING AND PAINTING:

Finally the base gets the bevel, you can see it stacked up against the cupboard at the bottom left of this image.

Space is now at a premium in the workshop and it’s getting very tight in there.  Even with my slender frame, I still have to breathe in and shimmy between things! 

You can see the component parts of the prop dotted around the shop as they get their texturing effect in the blue tinted, two part acrylic render – seen at the foot of the workbench there.

There’s no real hard and fast rule to generating the aged concrete look, but the way that I did this was to do it in several passes.  The first was a general stippling pass, the brush was dipped into the render and daubed over everything.  Once that had cured, another batch was made and this was applied with a spatula.  I more or less just troweled it on, making sure to let this layer break up during the application across the surface to reveal the stippled layer underneath.  Next I tore up a sponge and gently dabbed the damp render to soften the edges.  I repeated this with several further layers across the whole prop and that, as a cumulative effect, then produced the weathered texture that I wanted.

It was about now that my Mother, who really couldn’t give a monkies about “Doctor Bloody Who” and who also up until this point was completely unphased by the project that was unfolding before her, but on stepping out into her garden and seeing the almost done prop that was now in varying shades of blue (caused by the different consistencies of the render), suddenly a smile cracked across her face and she uttered the words that I’d never thought I’d ever hear slip over her lips, ‘Core blimey.  That’s good, isn’t it?  It’s the TARDIS!’  One particularly hot summer’s day I even found her sat on a stool inside of it, keeping out of the sun but still enjoying the weather and her garden from within, as she knitted a jumper.  Oh yeah, the power of the TARDIS!

Here’s where I coined the phrase, “The blue paint moment” – that point at which the blue goes on and ties your entire build together, where suddenly it becomes the TARDIS.  Actually, I came up with that years before this, but this is the point that it refers to.

As you can see, it’s almost completed.  The sign box graphics have been added and all that’s left to do now is what I call the “filth wash” which is a paint effect where you apply thinned black paint (of different consistencies) to create the look of years of accumulated crud on the surface.  I also need to decide on what to do for the phone panel; white lettering on a blue background, or blue lettering on a white background?  Finally, I have to glaze the windows and I’d call it done.

The last time that I did any meaningful work on this project was during the late summer of 2006. 

Since then, I’ve gotten married and had two children.  Mana, my eldest, has only seen the box once – when she was very little and I had the prop up while I was replacing the sign box graphics during one of my annual visits to see my parents.  My wife also saw it for the first and last time at this point too – which I think was Easter 2008.  My son has never seen it, which is a shame because I know he’d love it too.

Will I ever complete it, especially as it’s so close to the end?  Well, I certainly hope so, but these days, just finding the time to get up there and work on it is so difficult.  I have a family now and when you are in such a situation, planning to work on trivial things such as a TARDIS prop can be a little problematic. 

One day, I shall come back.  Yes, I shall come back… and all that nonsense.