Custom Hudolin/Yardley Jones TARDIS.

[drgonzo]

But how to secure the bottom of each corner post? No where to hid bolt heads down there! Thats where our hangar bolts from earlier come into play.

Rather then having a wooden tenon or any sort of extension from the bottom of each corner post that would slot into a mortice in the base with the probability that such a design might swell and stick in summer thus making disassembly a nightmare, it occurred to me to use hangar bolts; a bolt with one half threaded as a lag bolt wood screw, the other half a standard carriage bolt thread.

I installed a pair of them in the bottom of each corner post to act as pins. Steel alignment pins rather then as actual bolts. These serve to guide and hold the base of each corner post in position by simply slipping down through corresponding holes drilled in the base that are positioned to accept them. This way the Cornerposts cannot kick out and away from the base of the walls and also allows easy repeatability with regards assembly and dissasembly.

Again you can see the hangar bolts installed in the base of the corner posts here.



and the corresponding pin holes drilled in the base to accept them here.



Theres no need to secure the pins with nuts underneath the base of course as the weight of the corner posts and the use of the top bolts keeps each corner post securely situated. This bottom Pin design works exceedingly well, the posts once slotted into position, then bolted to the walls up top, makes the whole assembly rock solid with absolutely no wiggle. It was a design feature I very much wanted to share with you all because it just worked so well for me.

[drgonzo]

With finished walls and corner posts it was time to build the base. There were two design elements I wanted to feature in the base. The first was no visible seem between the outer edge of the base frame and the plywood inner floor. Second, I wanted solid uninterupted wood from the edge of the doors out to the edge of the base.

In order to achieve this I had to build a mighty wooden frame from 2x10's ripped down to width, rabbeted on one side to accept the plywood floor chamfered with a 45 degree bevel on the top edges and finally miter cut at 45 degrees on each end, to create a 54" square "picture frame" as it were. This would form the top frame for the base. I cut six sides total and picked the best four for glue up using my strap clamp in concert with my pipe clamps. It took tremendous pressure to bring those 45 degree edge seems together!

Here is the top frame assembly gluing up on my kitchen floor.


In addition to this 8 inch wide top frame I made an additional 3 inch wide frame from squared off 2x4 stock with mitered corners again cut to produce another 54" square. This second narrower "picture frame" was glued underneath the top frame to provide the proper 3" thickness for the base. Here it is upside down glueing up on the table saw.



This is more of a TYJ inspired base design in that its one inch thinner then that found on the Hudolin. Note the rabbet is positioned such that the seems of the plywood floor will be on the inside of the footprint of the Tardis walls

This is just one beautiful hunk of wood.

[drgonzo]

I dont own a power surface planer so I spent two days working with a belt sander and a block plane to true up the 8 inch wide flat top surface of the frame. Working each side smooth and flat and true both to itself, working inwards to remove any cupping, but also true and flat to every other side of the top frame. I used a 60 inch steel layout ruler as a straight edge for reference such that no matter where I placed that straight edge it made gapless contact with the wood face frame.  I was struggling through a nasty cold at the time and the work was grueling in the late August heat. I like to say in regards to those few days that "the base almost killed me"

This truing operation was however crucial if all four walls were to sit flush and true to each other when placed on the base as it is that alignment that would dictate how well every other part of the Tardis fit. Sometimes you gotta just grit your teeth and do it.

[drgonzo]

Next I measured and cut the 40" square piece of plywood used for the inner floor. I chose 3/4" thick Cabinet grade Oak Hardwood plywood for this piece as I wanted both strength AND a nice smooth finished surface for the floor. I used a good quality construction adhesive along with screws spaced every couple inches to affix the plywood floor down into the rabbet I cut into the frame. None of the screws would be visible once the box is assembled as they are covered by the walls.



As you can see in the picture, even my trusty block plane was getting tired out from all the work (note the shavings all over the floor that were the result of the truing process described in the previous post)

[drgonzo]

The base, as it is with only the Oak plywood inset floor, is very sturdy. But in order to properly transfer the appreciable weight of roof, walls, sign boxes and corner posts as well as any occupants to the ground correctly the floor would need significant additional bracing and support.

I designed a double support system consisting of both a diamond brace made from 2x4 stock aligned diagonally to support the corners of the inset floor along with an X brace made from half lap joined 2x4 stock oriented on its side (the way floor joists are built in a house) to support the middle. All mating surfaces of both braces were fully glued to the outer base frame as well as to the floor. The screws you see were only needed to keep the joints tight together until the glue set up.

there are also additional blocks glued over the corner seams of the top frame to further reinforce those 45 degree corners.



Also visible are the adjustable leg levelers I installed, there are 8 total but only four were in place at the time of the above photo. These will aid in leveling the base which i found out the hard way is absolutely vital in order for every other component of the Box to assemble properly. These are heavy duty levelers and with eight installed its more then enough to support the Box and any visitors.

They screw out when in use then can be screwed back in and are recessed away when not needed.



All tolled the finished base weighs in at 85 pounds and as such is the heaviest single component of the build. However all the under bracing makes for ready made handles to provide a reasonably good grip. Surprisingly, despite its weight, its not to bad maneuvering it around.

[drgonzo]

With Base, corner posts and walls complete it was finally time to do a bit of test assembly.

I was genuinely shocked that it all went together as smoothly as it did. A few tweeks and a shave here and there with a block plane was all it needed. Considering the size of these pieces to get this close to a good puzzle fit was a wood working miracle.



I was very pleased when I saw the results. You can see how nicely set back those walls are with the correct thickness corner posts.  These extra thick corner posts forcing the walls back and inward is definitely the most pronounced Hudolin influence expressed in the build. Yet with all that beautiful raw wood I wondered how I could ever bring myself to paint it all blue! If it were my box I would probably stain it a nice dark walnut and keep it like a fine piece of furniture...seriously!

A keen eye will notice that my diary is a bit out of chronological sequence as the quarter round moldings and door jamb molding haven't been applied yet. I tried to organize my posts more by component worked on and finished then by actual chronology which, with my scatter brained approach, would have been very difficult to follow accurately.

I enjoyed these few fleeting moments of triumph as I knew what was coming next.

THE DREADED PITCHED ROOF.

[tony farrell]

This is just one beautiful hunk of wood.

Indeed it is drgonzo, indeed it is. And beautifully crafted too!

[drgonzo]

Thank you Tony! The amount of hand crafted work that went into the base far exceeded that of any other component and though its just the base, I think it was that factor that made it my favorite part of the build.

[museumdave]

WOW
Truly stunning.

This is a wonderful piece of craftsmanship!
I am blown away.


What a gift!

Wow

You now I am married... and well I don't want to be greedy, but I don't remember what you gave US as a wedding gift- you know it is still not too late...?

In all seriousness- truly beautiful!

wow


Dave

[DoctorWho8]

Looking great!
Bill "the Doctor" Rudloff

[drgonzo]

The first step in constructing the two tiered roof was to decide on exactly what sort of roof we wanted to have on the build, A TYJ style or a Hudolin style. To that end I did a couple mock ups right on the assembled box of the tiered steps so we could get a life size idea of how each style would look. Keep in mind these are adaptations of both styles and are not absolutely true to either design.



Turns out we actually chose a Hudolin style first roof tier height, which allowed for the use of taller 2" high corner post caps, and a more TYJ style second tier height to keep the roof from becoming too tall and pyramidal. So it wound up being a cross between the two. Taking what we thought were the best parts of both.

[drgonzo]

Unfortunately I took no photos of the construction of the first tier. Its not a complicated thing, simply a frame mitered on its edges and assembled box wall style into a square, a mounting cleat was attached around the inside perimeter to accept the "top" of the first tier which was simply a 2" wide mitered frame that rested on the cleat.

The real trick as always is the second tier and the pitched roof. The way I did this was to again assemble a mitered frame from stock ripped to the right width 2 and 1/2," then I plowed a 1/4 inch rabbet along one edge of each piece to allow for a "ledge" to catch the roof panels and hold them in place. Similar to the way I did the rabbet for the inset floor on the base.

You can see the edge of that rabbet just a bit in this photo where the base of the trapezoidal roof panel meets the edge of the roof tier. The roof panel is sunk down into the rabbet thus keeping it from sliding off the edge of the tier and onto the floor.

[drgonzo]

The method I used to figure out how to cut the trapezoidal roof panels was one I gleaned from this website. I measured a piece of scrap plywood to the length of the inside edge of my roof tier- 39.5 inches

I ripped it to a width of 16.5" which is the measurement taken from exactly where on the centered pedestal lamp support I wanted it to rest across to the opposite edge of the roof tier. In doing this measurement you thus determine the roof pitch. After playing around with both shallower and steeper roof pitches, trying to find one not too tall and not too flat, I finally chose one that was about 11 degrees.

So now I had a sheet of plywood that was 39.5" X 16.5" that I could slip into the rabbet I had cut and lay down onto the center square pedestal I had built. As though it itself was a roof panel.

Then I drew a line from the corner of the centered pedestal to the corner of the roof tier wall and 'viola,' thats the bottom angle for each trapezoidal roof panel! Its just that simple.

Here's a graphic I put together to help explain this process;



The white rectangle represents my 39.5 X 16.5 plywood sheet resting in the edge rabbet on one side and proped at the desired height against the center pedestal on the other side. The red line is the pencil line that now dictates what the cut angle for each trapezoid's side will be

I took the Miter gauge for my table saw out of its slot, turned it upside down so I could see the bottom bar and simply aligned the face plate of the gauge along the bottom edge of my scrap plywood and set the bottom bar of the miter gauge (the bar that rides in the miter slot) to the pencil line I had just drawn and locked it back down with the miter gauges turn handle once I had them lined up together. Thus I just transferred the angle my pencil line was indicating directly to the miter gauge.

AND NO MATH WAS REQUIRED!  YAY!

[drgonzo]

Next I built a practice pitched roof with some thin 1/8th in stock I had. Ripping the stock to width (16.5") then using my newly set miter gauge to run the stock through the table saw for the end cuts thus cutting a perfect reproduction of the angle line.

I then flipped the piece over and moved it down 7" (the width of the roof pedestal) from the edge of the previous cut and then went ahead and cut the complementary angle for the other side of the trapezoid, it actually went very smoothly.

I did a test fit.



All looked good so I repeated the whole process again but this time using the 1/2 cabinet grade plywood I had set aside to use for the actual finished roof panels..this wound up being the finished product pictured below.



Neat thing is; if you build those roof panels accurately enough and with each "long" side held in place by the edge rabbet, they will all hold each other in place once assembled. This was convenient when it came time to construction edhesive them all together. In fact to hold all the seems together tightly while the adhesive set up I carefully placed a 30 pound cinder-block balanced across the top square opening. The roof held it just fine!

All that was needed was to take a block plane and just knock off the edge of the vertical roof sides along the perimeter where the edge of the roof tier meets the pitched roof panels so that the angle of the roof pitch remained uninterrupted straight down to the sides of the roof tier. The fit was tight enough that no filler was needed along the panel edges.

[drgonzo]

Next it was time for some assembly.

The now finished top tier of the roof was carefully centered on the bottom tier and then glued together with a good quality construction adhesive.

once dry I flipped the whole assembly over and added corner block reinforcements, roof panel joint reinforcements and cross bars to support the lamp pedestal and then glued the pedestal base in position. You'll get to see some of those supports in better detail when we get to the roof electric photos.

Skipping a bit ahead..here is the finished roof. With its lamp. You can also sneak a peak at the window frames.





Note the blocks underneath the base located at the corners. Those are "L" shaped alignment cleats attached inside the perimeter of the first tier at each corner. Those act as guides that center the roof on top of the walls. They slip down on the inside of the walls and keep the roof from falling down into the box when you slide it into position, they also serve to lock the roof down into place allowing the roof itself to square up the tops of all four walls.

To be very honest the roof made me nervous. I really wanted it to come out as nice as some of the "Pro" builds I've seen on this website. I hope I accomplished my goal.