Man Creates Dalek Out of Matches

If you’ve got a “Doctor Who” fan who has everything on your holiday shopping list, you may want to consider this next item as a gift.

A man in West Sussex, England has created a full-sized Dalek out of matchsticks.

Brian Croucher (no relation to the actor who appeared in “Blake’s Seven”) began the job two years ago at the suggestion of his wife. The completed Dalek stands 5ft 3in tall and is made up of 480,000 matches.

“I spent an hour or maybe two on it at a day because I have a bad back and it is difficult sitting still for such a long time,” Croucher told the UK’s Daily Telegraph newspaper. “Besides, it can be a tedious business.”

Croucher said that he has been an avid fan of creating matchstick models since his childhood.

In order to create the Dalek, he used a small plastic toy version as a template and scaled it up five times to make his full sized version. He said: “I did a Dalek because my wife Hazel bet me to do it as a challenge. Because I had made the five foot motor launch I wanted to make something bigger with more detail.

“I made a frame at the bottom and got the shape right and just went on from there. I stick the matches together in little blocks and then gradually build them up. My wife hands me the matchsticks and I put them together.

“The hardest bit was the little bubbles on the body because they have to be rounded. There are 56 of them and each one had to be built up and then sanded off.”

The Dalek sits on casters to help it move around and with the help of a voicebox inside its domed head can even utter its chilling catchprase “Ex-ter-min-ate, ex-ter-min-ate.”

And Croucher says that he’s willing to part with his creation–for the right price.

“It takes up too much room and I want to sell it,~ said Mr Croucher. “I’m prepared to listen to offers and sell it to the highest bidder.”