Mobius's Baroque Victorian French steampunk art-nouveau closet Tardis build

[warped in storage]

At the  first stage of the build, I tought it was going to be crap wasn't going to be much, (I've seen a few ) but this is looking great!!
It's different for being a Newbery-style Tardis, and the Vfsadc (better call it art-deco tardis :))look (no way I'm going to write it all ) really sets it off! I'll stick to it to see your progress.

EDIT: Ok, I've should have been a bit more Polite on my chosing of words, and I apologize for That. and for "crap" I ment the salvaged wood, which didn't look like it could be used properly to build something to last, and the "I've seen a few" wasn't intended to dicourage anyone, but just refering to some "tardis" "Builds" that from the beggining weren't going to look at all like a tardis; like "tardis dress" and "tardis shoes"(well, when I think of "Closet", it's not really a tardis what comes to mind...)that look good, but are far from what I can call a "Tardis police box".
I think this should clear up some of the things I said above .The builds here are great and I gave just my opinion, If you are happy with your builds, that's what matters .

[mobius]

lol, thanks Warp. it's slightly radical, but nothing like that hexagonal steam punk one (which is really cool). if you squint it'll look normal! sort of. I wouldn't call it Newbury style as I'm not even sure what that is. perhaps it is.

[galacticprobe]

I wouldn't call it Newbury style as I'm not even sure what that is.

Mobius, it's the TARDIS designed by Barry Newbery, which replaced the 13-year-old Brachacki TARDIS that had been repaired and modified so much since its debut in 1963 that it was beyond safe usefulness. So in 1976 Newbery introduced us to his Brachacki replacement: The Newbery. There are plenty of threads and reference photos of that TARDIS here: http://tardisbuilders.com/index.php?board=45.0.

At the  first stage of the build, I tought it was going to be crap, (I've seen a few )...

Nice thing to say to people... not.

...but this is looking great!!

Okay... good recovery. But still, it's not always a good thing to put such a complete thought into type, especially when you consider that a newbie might see this at some point, and then think twice about joining to share his build because he's afraid someone will say that it started out looking like it was going to be crap. (And how many members are now thinking that their builds are one of the "a few" that you say you've seen?) Let's be positive as much as possible, like, say, maybe: "At the first stage of the build it didn't look like much, but this is looking great!" (Now that's a little softer of a blow to someone's ego, and we have seen that some people do doubt their own skills; so we don't want to give them more cause to further doubt themselves.)

...the Vfsadc look (no way I'm going to write it all, from now on, i will refer to it like this )

Vfsadc? Okay - time for me to announce my denseness again, but I can't find what this stands for anywhere. I may just not be looking in the right places, so, as we used to say in the military: "Whiskey Tango Foxtrot, over?"

Dino.

[mobius]

I believe the acronym refers to the name of my build thread, thanks! I take it as a compliment that someone thought this was going to be crap but now thinks it is cool, that happened to me at talkbass.com where I posted a thread about building the Bat Bass, some doubted me, but I won them over, hoo ha! I take your point tho, not everyone has thick skin. thanks for your mini history lesson too. I thought before typing that I wasn't sure which one was the Newbery, "am I going to look foolish for admitting that?" and decided not to worry about it. I'm an expert in a lot of things, but I don't have anything to prove to anyone. also I'm old now and forget stuff d: lol.

[mobius]

Do you sometimes find that this site doesn't load, and you have to try several times? happens to me. is it just me?

well I can't make noise at this hour in my shop, but I can make clickety sounds on my computer, so I cleaned up the oldest st john's logo I could find, the scan on this site seems to be from a book and you can see backwards text through it, so I painstakingly painted that out, and ended up tinting the ribbons and animals, since I had to leave them greyish anyway, too much work to clean them up. then I did another mockup to see how that'd look on a panel, roughly the size, I have 7 and 5/8" of flat space between the vertical frames of the panels, that panel anyway. so I think an inch on either side is ok, might go a little smaller, I'll print it out and see. the real question is how to affix it. just glue it on? I might cut out the outline in the clover shape of the logo, rather than a circle, on the other hand, if I can figure out how, might make a round frame and glass for it.

how am I going to cut glass round? hmm. oh yeah, I have a band saw. (and plexi glass) I guess I could do that. maybe I'll look for a round roughly 5" frame. wish me luck on that! d:

[warped in storage]

I like the Logo, It has "The Feel" of something Victorian, and it took me a lot of Head-turning to be able to read ( not sure if a bad thing, but who cares?  ) I think it should take some kind of border/frame around it, if you are going with circular glass; if you are able to get the shape properly cut, It looks fine just like that.

By the way, I edited my previous message  (just saying, so that nobody feels offended)

[galacticprobe]

Do you sometimes find that this site doesn't load, and you have to try several times? happens to me. is it just me?

It's not you. The Forum does on occasion "hang" when it comes to loading. When it happens to me, it takes about 10-15 minutes before I can get it to load, refreshing the page quite a few times. I find that it happens more often when I'm trying to post a photo, but if I select my photo and then add a line of text before clicking on "Save Draft and Continue >>", it seems to load a little better.

...I cleaned up the oldest st john's logo I could find, the scan on this site seems to be from a book and you can see backwards text through it, so I painstakingly painted that out, and ended up tinting the ribbons and animals, since I had to leave them greyish anyway, too much work to clean them up.

Wow! Nice early logo! (You might want to add your cleaned up version to the http://tardisbuilders.com/index.php?topic=806.0 thread for easy-to-find reference for anyone else that wants to take this route in their build.) Cleaning up old scans isn't easy. I've had my eyes watering many times in the past doing that, and ended up a few times doing just what you did - fill in the background with a matching tint when there was too much to clean up. The grey tint for the ribbon and the animals looks pretty nice with this one: gives it more character, and lets the eye have more to look at.

then I did another mockup to see how that'd look on a panel, roughly the size, I have 7 and 5/8" of flat space between the vertical frames of the panels, that panel anyway. so I think an inch on either side is ok, might go a little smaller, I'll print it out and see. the real question is how to affix it. just glue it on?

That looks really cool! Is the yellowish tint intentional? Or just a trick of the light? (If it is just the lighting, then it's one of serendipity as it fits right in with your Victorian theme.) Affixing it is a quandary that many have gone through: glue it on, paint it on (though this one could drive you mad with all the intricate lettering curves and ribbon curling), have it printed as a sticker and then stuck on... A few people have had theirs mounted on a thin metal plate (one that won't rust) and either used a strong (rare earth) magnet inside the door to hold it, or used screws to fasten it in place. The options are (almost) endless, but it all comes down to what you can afford. If you print it and glue it on, use a laser printer so the design doesn't run, and then cover the logo with a clear varnish to protect it from the elements.

I might cut out the outline in the clover shape of the logo, rather than a circle, on the other hand, if I can figure out how, might make a round frame and glass for it.

Does the original logo have the circle around it? If so, then IMHO that's how I would do it if I was going for the Victorian look. It would also make it easier to find a frame for mounting it if that's one of the options you're thinking of. Then again, the clover pattern would give it your personal touch and any one of the above mounting methods would work.

how am I going to cut glass round? hmm. oh yeah, I have a band saw. (and plexi glass) I guess I could do that. maybe I'll look for a round roughly 5" frame. wish me luck on that! d:

Plexiglas! If you're going to cut a circle of clear material use plexi! (I've seen what a band saw can do to glass and that's just making straight cuts. Not pretty - at least the end result wasn't. ) A 5-inch round frame shouldn't be too hard to find. At the worst, you could always go with a 6-inch round frame. Check out craft stores and Target-type places. They usually have more frames than your eyes can take in.

Fantastic so far: definitely a first of this kind on here!

Dino.

[mobius]

3-2-14 sunday

today I managed to cut one piece of egg and dart moulding to 10" for the top of one of the window frames, perfect cut first try, in spite of the fat pencil and cutting it upside down. looks nice, I like it. going to alter the st John's emblem a little, blackening the middle background as in another version I saw somewhere, probably here. and do another mock up because I can't really do anything else tonight. 5 hour rehearsal with my band, followed by a consult for a job, (more carpentry!) and sax practice. too tired to do anything physical, and it's too late to be chopping or nailing wood.

well, I did a little nailing just now. but tiny nails. nailed the inset panel frames to the doors. also used woodfiller on nail and screw holes, and other random holes. Zarquon I wish I could just be painting this already d:

and another mock up, I did tint the background yellow, Dino, since you ask, to make it look like old paper, but I think I'm going to print it backwards on acetate, then paint it from behind, so  I can make the animals and possibly ribbon metallic gold/brass. will then set that on yellow cardstock, and hopefully frame it under plexiglass, speaking of which, my neighbour across the street was throwing out some lucite! quite a bit, unused too, so I snapped that up, I might not actually even need it for this project, but it's not cheap, and I will need it eventually. she also put out some orangish tinted plastic possibly from the 50's, sort of almost mexican looking or something, hard to say, I could use it if I was going to do a stucco southwest call box! not sure what I'll use it for, but couldn't let it get trashed.

oh and a Colin Baker Tardis, from when he got the Chameleon circuit, sort of working again. an organ, which if I can't find someone to haul away for her, will be destroyed! that would be criminal, and I might gut it and make it into a desk. at least I can save the box not sure if it works or is repairable, or even worth repairing, I suspect is it. hope I can find someone to help me move it. mostly hope I won't have to.


will post my cleaned up 1930's logos, have to host them elsewhere I imagine? they're over 1MB.

I don't have to worry about rain, this is an indoor time machine. I added the circle as a cutting guide. I would not try to cut actual glass on my bandsaw, I have glass cutters, but have only ever cut straight lines (intentionally that is) with them. I use plexi whenever I can tho as it's easier to cut on my table saw. I will look for a round frame. there's a frame shop up the street come to think of it.

tomorrow, I'm hoping for snow, so I can stay in and work in it.

something like this:


awesome Colin Baker Tardis

has anyone build any of those?

[galacticprobe]

Wow! Throwing that black into that inner circle really makes that logo "pop"! And the coloring is beautiful! You can post your image here if you can "Save As..." a version and reduce the image quality just enough to get it at or below the Forum's 500k limit. I've done that before and the quality of the image was hardly different than the over 500k image I started with. So you might try that. The problem with posting an image on a hosting site is that the hosting site changes its URL or something else, or the person that posted the image to the hosting site removes his image or account there and we lose the image link. It's happened many times already. There are so many of those "dead" image links in posts throughout this Forum it's nigh on impossible to count them all.

So if you want to do both - just to cover all bases - post your really high-res image on a hosting site, but also do the "Save As..." and reduce the quality until it meets the Forum's limit and post that copy of it here. This way we'll always have it even if the link to the hosting site goes dead.

And I think I need to move a little closer to you! (What sort of neighbors to you have that just toss sheets of unused lucite like that? I'd love to be able to do some bin diving in my neighbors' bins or skip piles and come out with finds like that! But no one around where I live has ever done that, and I've been in this house since 1989.) Great finds there, you lucky dog, you!

Dino.

[NotaMountainGoat]

Agreed about the logo. Looks fantastic!

[mobius]

thank you for the kind words fellow sentient beings, I will post those pics, maybe I'll host them on my flikr account.

carved out a little time to work on her today, cut the frames for the wall panels and glued them in, wanted to use nails but can't nail into 1/4" Lauan and toenailing wasn't working. also sanded a bit taking down some harsh edges, and caulked gaps. painted the doors blue. the photos are all different, yet none have accurate colour for some reason. camera phone I spoze, that's the reason. I like the blue paint I have, but one photo came out looking much darker, and I liked that too. too early to worry about the final colour anyway at this point. I had enough material of the sort I used on the door frames, to do 4 more on the side, thought I'd only have enough for one, so I used it, had to cobble it together but that's ok. ripped down another sort of moulding to match the overall size, (eyeballed it, nailed it!) had some of something else, I have one frame which has the same stock on the bottom and one side, something else similar on the other side, and then I ran out, so for the top I put 3 different things together, which happened to come out just the right size, or near enough, and used that on the next frame, used something else entirely on the bottom, and quarter round on the open vent panels. that side won't really show much anyway.

and now for some pixels.



here's my emblem at the moment

[galacticprobe]

maybe I'll look for a round roughly 5" frame. wish me luck on that! d:

Mobius, I just posted something in another thread that gave me an idea which might help you with this and your St. John logo cover. Tap Plastics sells acrylic discs in diameters from 2 inches to 24 inches:
http://www.tapplastics.com/product/plastics/plastic_rods_tubes_shapes/clear_acrylic_circles/140
They come in two thicknesses: 1/8th and 1/4 of an inch, and their prices are very reasonable. Depending on how you want to mount and cover your St. John logo, one of these should save you the trouble of hunting down a suitable picture frame, especially if you're just after the glass part, and the anguish of having to cut a circle of plexi and then polishing the cuts smooth. Acrylic, pre-cut, great price. (Might be worth a look.)

Dino.

[mobius]

the TARDIS as you've never seen her before! naked! well, you've seen that. lots of unpainted ones around here. time for some modesty. also TMI...

thanks Dino, that seems like a very useful resource. I will first seek out a round picture frame, maybe I can find one that comes with glass. woke up at 5am for some reason, went down and primed everything blue. I would never normally start painting a cabinet before I'd even finished building it, but for my own sanity I needed to see it blue, and I feel much better. now I feel like "holy crap I have the TARDIS in my workshop, and I need to fix it and put it back together!", instead of feeling like "when am I gonna finish this thing so I can paint it?"
 found my (phone's) camera has a mode called rich colour or something, which should really be called, more accurate colour. still not true, but closer to reality.

for those keeping score at home (remember kids, no wagering), the doors have uniform framing around the panels, the leftt wall, has the same for the middle, or top 4, (discounting the windows), the lower 2 are the same as each other, but different, my original blueprint and materials estimate had that wall as having 6 different kinds of frames, but I'm happy it worked out like that, it's not that noticeable, but adds detail like a movie you can watch over and over and keep noticing new details. the right wall, which will be hard to see, is another story altogether. and here it is in excruciating detail.

the upper left panel, same moulding, let's say trim, that'll save me time typing, as the bottom of the left wall, oh no wait, this was the stuff I ripped down to the same width as that, right, looks similar, just a little more detail tho.



upper right panel, I had enough of that left for only the right side, enough of what I used for the bottom of the right wall, for the left and bottom of this panel, so for the top, I took the leftover cutoff, roughly 3/16" x 3/4" from the one I ripped down, sandwiched with some maybe 3/8" x 3/4" shoe, and some 1/2" x 3/4" inverted shoe moulding, which is darker, taped them together and how about that, just about the right size, and if you squint looks kinda the same.



I had enough of that left to completely uniformly frame out the middle left panel



the lower left I used some 3/4 x3/4" oak inverted shoe, which stands proud of the surrounding wood, except on the left where it's flush, I sanded it down a little, but decided not to belt sand it flush all around



the middle and lower right have 3/4 shoe, some of it oak, some pine, one bit I had to patch together, could have done it one piece, but I'll need more shoe for the roof so I decided not to. these 2 panels will be vented with brass radiator grille material, which I have lying around leftover from a radiator cover I made for someone years ago, the Lauan is uneven in those holes, cut with my jig saw, I will be belt sanding those flush so I have a uniform looking opening there.



and that's the end of the wackiness really. everything else on this build will be intentionally (relatively) uniform.

I got the blues...



will be out and about today, going to start my wild picture frame hunt.

[mobius]

wasted not a little time seeking a round picture frame for the emblem, instead resolved to make a hexagonal one. (* edit, by "hexagonal" obviously I meant Octagonal). should have just drawn up a template by hand, doing it by computer took a stupid amount of time, and had me nearly tearing my own head off in frustration trying to get an apple printer to print my pc jpeg, which it should have been able to do, just a bloody jpeg, but apples suck galactic donkeys. anyway, I made it, partly, cut out the inside holes, 2 layers, one smaller inside than the other, and a plexiglass octagonal hexagon, glued it and clamped it by screwing it onto another piece of wood, when its dry, I cut out the outer edges of both layers simultaneously, and then I can paint it, and just screw it onto the doors. do still have to print the emblem backwards on acetate so I can paint it from behind.

also filled in the missing bits at the tops of the walls and doors, and did some caulking.

[warped in storage]

I like the hexagon. Reminds me of the Tardis console. Was that your intention?