Convertable Brachacki

[ryanj]

It was only a few months ago I set out to craft myself a little McGann TARDIS to sit and look nice on my shelf. Keeping to as low a budget as I could, I used mainly cardboard from old boxes to knock up this little fella here



'Lovely' I thought, quite proud of my little box. Yet at the back of my mind there was this notion I couldn't shake. In having chosen to make a model of the 1996, Richard Hudolin designed TARDIS Exterior, I had neglected all the other various designs of police box through the years. And there are many versions of the tardis that would also look nice on my shelf...



And so I set to work on a 2 in 1 convertible model...



It was the Original 1963 box's turn to get the cardboard model treatment. Obviously this prop was modified through the years to better fit it's filming requirements or though general wear and repair. The plan was to build a model tardis that could be converted from a 1963 model to say a 1969 one. Not too dissimilar to an idea brilliantly executed By a one Mr. Scarfwearer here: http://tardisbuilders.com/index.php?topic=7174.0 .Here's some carefully planned out measurements and guidelines based on the 1963 prop I found online.


I go into the making process a lot more in my Hudolin build diary so I'll keep it brief, I'm using cardboard to build my TARDIS'. I'm using multiple layers of cardboard to create some depth where necessary.
One example of this is in the main panels. In my Hudolin box, the panels were about three layers deep. Just going by eye, the Brachacki box seems to have less of an inset in it's panels. Because of this I've only made them 2 layers deep rather than 3.





Here's the first side, sign and all. The window frames are already cut but aren't glued in. They're held in place by a little system I'll get into later.



Now getting the sides together. There's something about an unfinished, unpainted TARDIS that looks so nice that I don't want to finish it. Anyone else?



now on with the roof, it's important to get this bit right, I think so much of this box's unique look comes from it's weirdly tall roof section.

Once the first three sides were mounted onto the base (which is almost half as thin as the 1996 box) I set out on a paint hunt. Naturally if you live in the UK and are fortunate enough to have a Wilkos round the corner, it's a safe first place to start looking. It was there I found it... An almost perfect blend of that greyish inky blue. The only problem...





This is the smallest size they had. And so for £13 (about 17 USD) the paint was the priciest part to this build.



But LOOOK at it



Next up were windows. Same routine as last time, the windows are cut from polyester, sanded down on either side and the framing applied on top. the two secions where the glass is bubbled are blobs of dried glue.





I was having a play around with an old bike light I had lying around. turns out if you just sit it on in the box, you get this lovely, lovely effect



Next up were the front doors and signage. I did a loose mock up of the front door sign and the st Johns ambulance cross just to get a vague idea of how it'd look. After finishing it I realised that I'd get a clearer sign if I were to hand write it rather than compressing an image and printing out a tonne of squiffy pixels like my last box's sign


something's not right here...



That's better!



much like the last box, the lamp is cut from an old clear pen (only this time a little chunkier). The top is cut, stacked and sanded into shape and some cocktail sticks make up the 'cage'.



playing around with the lights a bit



And some labels for the signs and We're all done. A little bit of dry black paint is brushed about here or there to add some subtle weathering. (I'm sure I'll add much more later) I'll probably redo the door sign to look a little neater too.





In it's familiar black and white





I have no doctor's to model my TARDIS', this'll have to do

So that's my classic 1963 TARDIS all finished and looking nice on the shelf but hold on one minute.



what's this?



the roof obviously comes off so I can unhook the doors from the inside...



but then...



something else happens...



a swappable inverted sign complete with little door stoppers?!?



a completely different roof?!?!



a roof with a central elevation so small and a bevel that's so almost nonexistent but is existent enough to be really annoying if you get it wrong?!?!?

Now evidently white windows and the altered Brachaki roof is an inaccurate combination. I just wanted to show how some of the parts are swapped. There's plenty more to do yet, stay tuned folks....

[Volpone]

That's just nifty.  And it shows that you can do some really cool stuff without spending a lot of money on lumber and having either 10' ceilings or a spot in your yard to park a TARDIS.  And best of all, it's a lot easier to justify building more than just 1.