Bigger On the Inside

Welcome back.  The first step in this project is to cut out the panels you'll need to build the main 4 walls of the TARDIS.  As I am sure you know, the walls of the TARDIS are fairly detailed in a life-sized model, but out model stands about 250mm when it's all done, so we're going to have to make some shortcuts for the very basic, very simple 1.0 version of this model.

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The way I cut the pieces was the make the gross cuts on my mat board cutter and the finer cuts requiring more accuracy and repeatability on my small paper cutter.  Also: I cut out the 200x90mm panels as full panels first, then cut out the windows one panel at a time.  You should follow the process you think will work best for you, knowing your own workmanship and tool mastery.

The right way to plan to cut, however, is the old wood-workers' maxim: "Measure Twice, Cut Once."  If you don't lay down your cut lines accurately before you start cutting, you are likely to get panels which are not square at the corners, and your TARDIS will look saggy.

Also: as a shortcut, you might consider that to map the window cuts, it's easiest to cut one piece of scrap from your mat board which is 10mm wide as a guide because all the "slats" on the front panel wafer are exactly 10mm wide.  It's a LOT easier to draw on the slats than it is to try to draw the windows one by one.  First use the 10mm piece of scrap to draw the outer boarder of the panel, then draw the center slat left-to-right by aligning to the midpoint at the top and bottom of the panel.  Then do the top-to-bottom center slat, and the the upper center and then the lower center slat.

You should cut 4 front panels, and 4 back panels.

When you are done, take a look at this assembly diagram:

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In order to assemble the 3 non-hinged sides, you will need to first cut the frosted window panes for these doors and also the window slats.  If you want additional dimensionality in the window for the slats in the pane, use the same plastic the windows are made of for the slats.  If the dimensionality is not a big deal for you, or you just aren't good at cutting 2mm-wide stripe of plastic, you can build the slats our of plain paper.

Once you have the slats assembled, measure the windows on the front wafer to get nice, straight lined for the slats, and glue the slats to the front wafer.  Remember that only the top row of windows need the slats.

After all the windows have slats in them, take the panels to a clean, well-ventilated area and PRIME them, them PAINT them.  You only need to paint the exterior side of the panel, but you must do it for both the front and back wafers.  You should also make sure you paint the window slats at this time.  It's urgent that you paint these 3 walls BEFORE you assembly them, otherwise you'll wind up painting the windows.

Wait an hour for your paint to fully dry, and then bring the parts in for assembly.  When I assembled my walls, I applied the Tesa tape to the back of the FRONT wafer on all the surface area, used a small pieve of tape to secure the window pane in the right place, and then closed the sandwich of layers up, making sure that all the edges were clean and straight.

That was also the end of my first day of assembly.  Next time: we assemble the 3 walls into a box shape, and them assemble and attached the door.