Volpone's TARDIS build...

[galacticprobe]

Ow! This all sounds painful (emotionally and physically). I hope the repairs go well. (And you get those "eight legs" out of there! (If you look up the definition of 'arachnophobia' in the dictionary, you'll see my picture!) And once you clear out as much of the rot as you can, I believe they make something that you can paint onto damaged wood that makes it "solid" again. I can't remember what it's called, but someone at Home Depot should know if you describe what it is and what it does. That should stabilize things until you can get that laminate in place this summer.

Such a beautiful box. Good thing you caught the problem before things got really, really bad.

Good luck with the repairs, and do keep us in the loop so we're not left wondering.

Dino.

[Volpone]

This is really more of a gallery update, but since I mentioned rot problems, I'll provide a little good news:  The view as I pull into my garage after work often makes me laugh out loud. 

[Volpone]

I was out inspecting today and discovered some of my worst rot is in an unexpected place:  Just above the base.  It looks like it's been running down the outside and then when it hits the base some of it runs off to the ground, but some of it pools and gets inside.  So I've got moisture in all my top corners, where the corner posts meet the roof.  That works its way down in various spots to a bit below the windows and all the way down the corners.  Then I've got moisture problems in spots at the base. 

Unfortunately it isn't possible to tell how much of it started before the refit.  Some of my fixes may have closed the barn door after the cows got out. 

I think I'll be able to keep her for awhile.  I've got 4x4s in the corner posts, tied into 2x6s for the POLICE BOX signs (yes, they are now cutout so the signs can light up, but they're still fairly robust) and 2x4s for the base.  So I should be able to just patch in panels and trim piecemeal, like repairing an old wooden garage door.  (Which is also on my project list.)

[galacticprobe]

So I should be able to just patch in panels and trim piecemeal, like repairing an old wooden garage door.

Volpone, you are absolutely correct! If I could do it with an old 20-foot wooden skiff - using piecemeal to replace rotted planking here and there (and the entire bottom!) - then it should work just fine with your Box. The trick is keeping up with it.

The people that the historic house bought the skiff from didn't keep up with it, and it was pretty well rotten in many places. It took me five months to get that thing seaworthy again, but it was doable. Then I just had to keep an eye on it and replace small areas of planks when necessary. (Unfortunately since that historic house did little to help protect the skiff - including removing the tarp I personally bought to cover it and keep out the rain, and snow, and ice... using that tarp for a patio cover - there was a falling out, especially since all the money to restore that skiff came out of my pocket because I was still working and they were a non-profit starting to enter the red. They refused to put the tarp back over the skiff, there was a row, and I left. I haven't seen that skiff since 2010 just before I got hurt, and I have no idea what condition it's in.)

Sorry for the ramble, but the point of it all is that since you know how bad your Old Girl is now - which doesn't sound too bad - you should easily be able to piecemeal the repairs and have her look just fine.

Dino.

[Volpone]

Just a couple random thoughts. 

1) Water is funny.  There's rot all over my box.  But the most rotted spot is...the bottom crossbar on the wall section with the phone panel, next to the door.  The 1/4" ply rotted and delaminated above the POLICE BOX signs in a couple places to the point that I replaced them, but this is a 1x4" that is about rotted through.
2) There's a very good chance that I'm going to go with a 1963 paint scheme this summer. 
3) That said, I just rewatched "The Space Museum," and in the scene where they discover the TARDIS in the museum, before they've "arrived," where The Doctor is able to walk through it, it is clearly one of the miniatures, because it definitely has blue window trim. 

[Volpone]

More bad news.   Had some friends from out of town visiting, and they hadn't seen her since the refit.  Of course as people not versed in the minutinae of TARDISes, they didn't notice a significant difference from the old TARDIS so I was pointing things out.  I popped her open to show the interior...and noticed a patch of daylight about the size of a pencil eraser, shining through a corner of the roof.    

Today I finally had time to break out the spray foam to effect temporary repairs until I can really get down to business...and discovered that the foam has, in spite of my best efforts, dried in the nozzle, making it completely useless.  Then, while I was trying to get it to work, I discovered the cause of the hole is that the tar paper I'd covered the roof with had gotten incredibly brittle and poking around created an even bigger hole. 

I popped into the house for some gaffer's tape and improvised repairs not 30 minutes before a torrential downpour.  Now I've got another project for the weekend that I don't have time to do. 

[galacticprobe]

I feel your pain, volpone. That spray foam is literally a one-shot deal; no matter how hard you try, that nozzle and the "extender straw" are going to dry just like the rest of the foam once it leaves the can. That's why when I have the need to use it, I make sure I've got a job big enough to take up the entire can. It seems like such a waste to spray one crack, and then have 95 percent or more of that foam left in the can to become useless.

I have a can of it waiting for more places to be foamed. The new back doorframe is one place, but that might use 1/4th of the can if I have a heavy hand at it. I've got a couple of more places that need foaming, but not enough for an entire can (and that stuff isn't all that cheap). So I keep looking.

If you get a new can to use, go ahead and spray every single seam on the Old Girl just so you use up the whole can. (Have it go to a good cause rather than have most of it end up useless because you can't clear the nozzle or the tube.)

Dino.

[Volpone]

Bah.  The plan for the long weekend is a TARDIS renovation.  Crucial work will be on the structural integrity field--battling rot and water intrusion--which will of course entail repainting.  I'm planning to do the classic pre-1966 paintjob. 

I'm also planning a few things to make it closer to an actual vintage police box--little things that only you guys will notice:  adding a rim to the signal lamp's cap, a blue tinted bottom center windowpane.  I think I've found a cheap and simple way to do very authentic looking pebbled glass.  More on that later. 

In a perfect world, I'd put a working phone door on and pick up some military surplus field phones, but I don't see that happening this weekend.  Maybe not even the blue window pane. 

My real conundrum, then, is the top panes.  I used the standard "crackle" pattern neon light diffuser for my windows, which won't pass for clear glass.  So if I want clear panes, I'll need to take apart the tops of the windows (for the bottom panes I can just stand my new panes in front of the existing ones), carefully cut out the old "glass", and then add in the new--without adding water intrusion points.  And then, when everyone can see in, I've got to make sure the interior looks decent. 

I mention all this before starting any work for a couple reasons:  1) I was over in the Met Box Catalog forum and there was a wonderful new picture that convinced me I really needed the clear glass to make the white window trim "pop."  2) There's a cat on my lap, so I'm stuck at the computer for the foreseeable future. 

[Bob's your Uncle]

2) There's a cat on my lap, so I'm stuck at the computer for the foreseeable future. 

Ha Ha!
I'm reading this with two chihuahuas on my lap, and they're a little annoyed with my typing. 

Can't wait to see your results.
Greg.

[Volpone]

Well today has come and gone with no progress.  Reality intervened.  Laundry and dishes needed doing.  Lawn needed mowing.  Dog needed walking.  Then it was time for grocery shopping and by that point it was 7:30pm.  So hopefully tomorrow I'll make it to the hardware store.  I guess I could have baked my pebbled "glass" tonight, but truth be told, I'm almost too tired to type, so I probably wasn't in any condition for even something like that. 

But I will say I finally found a big bag of cheap clear acrylic beads at Michael's Crafts.  Well they're not really beads.  They're kind of domed disks.  I think beads would have worked better, but you work with what you can find.  I did a small scale experiment with them.  If you put them on a cookie sheet and heat them to something like 345F for 5 minutes (I'd have to go to my notes), they melt together into fairly passable pebbled glass. 

[galacticprobe]

Ah-ha... another person trying to type around a cat on the lap! (Fun: isn't it?) You've piqued my interest with your method for creating pebbled "glass". (So please do check those notes and post more on that - such as did you use any sort of wax/ parchment paper under the acrylic domes, or some kind of cooking spray so they wouldn't stick to the cookie sheet when they came out of the "melting together" process?)

Dino.

[therenegade]

Man, seeing the damage from weather makes me glad I went to the (somewhat forced to the) work of bringing mine inside.
Like, I did plan at some point on moving mine outdoors to free up garage space. But now I don't have a garage anymore lmao.
But I give you and anyone props who puts the effort into maintenance from the elements. 

[Volpone]

That bottom panel in the back in the earlier photos, boy, I didn't think it would get much worse, but it definitely has. 

End of Day 2 of a 3 day weekend.  I did manage to get all my supplies.  I'm really really happy with the blue (of course we'll see when it gets on the box and the sunlight starts hitting it, but the sample splotch on the lid looks even better than the paint chip). 

For my blue window panes, the plan was to go to any craft shop and get a sheet of blue mylar or something to overlay the existing pane.  Turns out craft shops don't have anything like blue mylar, so I'll need to go downtown to the theatrical lighting shop to get a blue light gel overlay.  Plan B was to just get transparency paper that works in an inkjet and make a PowerPoint slide of dark blue and print that out.  Turns out no office supply stores carry them anymore.  Turns out office supply stores are as depressing as Radio Shack or Sears these days.  But as I was about to give up I found an expanding file that was made of transparent blue plastic.  $5 so I took a shot at it.  I suspect I'll be disappointed by it, but such is life. 

Well, gotta get going.  Food is on the stove and the cat is eyeing my lap so if I don't sign off, I'll be stuck here while my dinner burns.  No pictures yet. 

[Volpone]

Ugh.  Ugh, ugh, ugh.  The Plan was to empty out the TARDIS, scrape out any rot and get a good clean base.  The other day, while working on another project, I found an assortment of Hardibacker I have leftover from tiling the bathroom.  It is kind of like a cross between drywall and concrete and I had an idea to use it in the renovation.  Partly because it wouldn't rot and partly because it amused me to have a concrete(ish) TARDIS.  I also got this white plastic that is used for cheap bath surrounds and such.  I planned to glue that onto the cleaned up work as a kind of laminate. 

That was The Plan.  There was a lot more rot than I expected.  Luckily not a tear-down like Chris' or...14th Doctor's(?) but enough that there was daylight in a number of places where there shouldn't have been.  And even some of the boards (as opposed to the plywood) were badly rotted.  Places you'd expect it--the corners of the roof and going down the edges where the corners meet--and also around the base.  I suspect water collects on the base and works in on the wood from there.  Also probably 75% of the places where there's wood over plywood, the plywood has rotted out.  I didn't build the panels like proper panels, just screwed them down onto sheets of plywood.  Most places where the ply is exposed to the elements it is fine.  But most places it was behind lumber, it rotted.  I suspect this was from before the renovation, when I had a lot less caulking and no ventilation.  Oh, and anyplace a screw broke the surface (I did most of my screws from the inside) water got in and rotted the wood around the screws.  Indeed, if I hadn't used up my leftover bucket of thinset to add trim to the panels, the walls may well have fallen apart. 

Anway, it got all cleaned out and patched up and then I used up my can of expanding foam.  Now that I'm done with a late lunch and I've given the foam time to set and the wood to dry out a bit, I guess I'll get out there and start caulking.  Right now I've scrapped the plan to use the plastic lining.  I feel like it will just make rot even worse.  For now I'll hold off on little cosmetic details like reworking the windows and the top lamp and try to just get her water-tight and painted.  I may have to see if the hardware store is open and pick up another bucket of thinset.  I've got a tiling project coming but I can use some of it on the TARDIS.  Well, for now I've got 2 gallons of roofing compound.  We'll see what that gets me. 

In closing, though, I think the classic props guys (or the Doctor, for that matter) would be proud of my effort.  It is far more cobbled together and jury-rigged than possibly any other build here.  But when all is said and done she should look fine and be good for another couple years. 

[Volpone]

Well, I think I'm ready to paint.  I'm not really ready but I'm going to do it anyway and maybe do more improvements next spring. 

I got a can of spray foam and 3 tubes of caulk.  The foam went from the inside and the caulk on the outside.  At one point I was starting to worry that 3 tubes wasn't going to be enough, but then I had extra that I used up on secondary "nice to have" spots.  Of course then when I was loading everything back in at the end of the day, I noticed a spot I missed.  It was a freak angle that you couldn't see from the outside.  I guess I'll buy another tube of caulk. 

I also got 2 gallons of rubberized roof patching compound.  The plan was to use 1 can on the top of the TARDIS and the other on the bottom.  But I'd forgotten how miserable the stuff is.  It's like the tar baby in the Uncle Remus story.  Just a big pail of sticky black goop.  No matter how careful you are, pretty soon it gets on the handles of your putty knives and from there it gets onto your hands.  On top of that all the work, the goop stiffened hands, and a bit of dehydration started making my hands cramp as I was working with the roofing sealer.  I used the one pail and called it a night--about 2 hours later than I thought I'd be. 

The good news is, I think I've got the roof watertight.  And I cut out a bunch of rotted wood.  So hopefully this will slow the entropy.  At this point I don't think I'll be putting in clear glass in the top panes.  The inside is just too messy (and it is too much work.)  The bottom panes will probably have to wait a bit.  I used up far more time than I should have on this project this weekend. 

Oh, and I've got a lot of work cut out for me if I ever decide to put in an actual phone.  The way the door was rotting, I had to caulk around the phone door to stop further water intrusion.   Still, if I get around to it, I just need to make the right sized box.  Then I can just screw it to the inside of the TARDIS and kill 2 birds with one stone:  Stronger TARDIS and place to mount a phone.