My next build will be Babcock Boiler by Bar Mills. This is my first Bar mills kit. I liked the look of this kit with it's roof details and side assemblies. After looking at the build thread that Karl (postalkarl) did, with his usual exceptional results, I decided to get the kit. Bar Mills proved to be very easy to order from and I received the kit within 10 days of my order. Upon opening the kit I also discovered a 240 grit sanding stick with the kit itself. Free stuff is always nice. So let's get started
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The obligatory picture of the box and the free sanding stick.
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The box contents. I really have to clean up my workbench one of these days
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I spread out the laser cut pieces, the stripwood and the roof card.
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I cleaned up minimal flash on the door and window castings with small files- you can see one in the picture. I think I bought the small files at Harbor Freight, which is a tool supply house type store down here in the Phoenix area. The prices at this store are very reasonable and they have many small sized items that apply to our hobby very well.
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I added bracing per the instruction with the included stripwood and then weighted the walls down while the glue set. The weights are my ballast material containers which I got at Michael's.
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The braced walls. I always add additional bracing, especially at the roof peaks for both structural integrity and additional glueing surface for the roof cards. That's it for now more later
Oh Sweet! Looking forward to seeing this build, I have this on my next purchase list.
-Steven
I will definitely following this build.
Thank you Steven and Curt for looking in. Steven, as I mentioned, for more information about this kit check out postalkarl's build thread from earlier this year.
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Here I've taped the wood walls to a piece of cardboard for preparation to painting with rattle can dark grey
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After painting the back side of the wall dark grey, the front side was also painted. To this point in building wood kits I have first stained the wood walls with AI solution, but this time per Bar Mills instructions I painted both sides of the walls with dark grey paint.
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Here are the craft paints that I am going to use for this kit. The light avocado will be for the trim and the antique gold and cocoa bean are for the wood walls
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The walls have been dry brushed with the antique gold and two have also been dry brushed with the cocoa bean. I was really pleased with the result of these two colors. They produce, in my opinion, a very realistic wood color. You can also see the door and window castings painted with the avocado color
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All of the wood walls have now been painted with the wood colors. The wall color is different than that achieved with the AI solution and dry brushing, this technique of pre painting with grey and then dry brushing produces a newer looking wall. The other way gives a peeled paint effect. Not all buildings need painting in the real world, so it is nice to have buildings on the layout in different stages of appearance.
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Doors and windows have been installed, corner trim glued on and trim installed around the large door openings. The trim color on the freight door outer layer gives a very nice effect. Signs have also been attached to the walls. I spread glue on the backside of the signs and after positioning them on the wall, gently use my fingernail to press them onto the wood siding. That's now more later
Nice selection of color and signage Jeff.
Great start Jeff.....I'll be looking in. :)
Hello Curt, thanks for looking in. As I said, I'm pleased with the wood wall color. The signage is included with the kit and I must say that I'm impressed with this Bar Mills kit to this point. And thank you Greg for looking in.
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Another view of the walls. This one gives a better look at the wall color. I dry brushed some antique gold on the doors and windows. The small window frames on the large door look nice- I was afraid that I would damage the laser cut wood for these, but they cut away from the card easily. I stole the different color idea from Karl on the outer layer of the large door, they give a real nice look. Thanks Karl
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View of the right side and rear after wall assembly, the rear wall is blank because of the large rear side addition. The vertical slots in the right side wall are for the small side building assembly. A nice touch with the Bar Mills rafter tail wood piece and it fit easily into the pre-cut slots at the top of the wall but I did have to trim the ends because of the added bracing on my side wall gable ends. It will be easy to insert the cut-off rafter tail into the end slots later.
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View of the left side and front after wall assembly. The holes in the walls are part of the kit- they are for the canopy supports above the doors and the lower ones are for the loading dock.
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This is the rear building addition, you can see the extra bracing I installed at the top and bottom of the front. The small windows that come with the kit allow for modeling in the open position and I like to model doors that are partially open. I added a small wood floor inside the door to give the appearance of a finished interior and I will place something on the floor later so that the interior looks used. Walthers has an unpainted industrial little people item that never seems to be in stock- I'd like to have someone standing at the door later on.
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A view of the assembled loading dock and ramp- these items went together easily and once again I was impressed with the fine detail of the laser cut wood pieces. You can also see the assembled front roof dormer- these small pieces also went together easily
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Here I've started on the roof. You can see the pencil marks for the cardboard trusses that I will install to give the roof some rigidity. I cut my trusses to match the end wall gable ends and you can see that I've positioned the roof card into the correct position and am holding it with wood blocks and my ballast material weights. That's it for now, more later.
Coming together really nicely.
Hey Jeff:
looks great so far. Looking forward to more.
Karl
Thank you Bob for the nice words. Thank you Karl, I'm just trying to do justice to the kit as you did so well in your build thread. Continuing on...
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Here I'm installing the cardboard roof trusses- I just spread glue on the edge and positioned them in the roof card. This technique gives the roof additional stability
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Here all the trusses have been installed
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The overhangs above the doors have been installed. Once again I was dubious about the overhang supports handling being cut from the laser cut sheet- they are very small delicate pieces. They all made it without damage, the laser cutting process used by Bar Mills is amazing. Full disclosure- I did break one of the pieces when installing it on the wall, but I was able to repair it with no problem. I used corrugated roof pieces left over from my Beer and Ice build here. The roof for the rear building addition has also been added- I used rolled-roofing from a previous build here as well. I have a box with all of my roofing materials handy at all times.
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I used paint washes to color the roof shingle sheets provided with the kit. I used light grey and the cocoa bean wall color for these washes. I dry brushed the washes until they looked right to me.
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I've begun to install the roof shingles using glue spread on the roof card and then pressing the shingle rows onto the glue surface. In the instructions we are told not to cover the entire roof with shingles, because there wouldn't be enough. You can see the pencil outline for the front roof dormer on the other side of the roof in this picture. I didn't cover this area with shingles. I plan on additional pastel chalk being applied to the shingles after the shingles are done
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The roof shingles are done and the dormer has been installed. The gable end trim pieces have been installed. The end rafter tails have also been installed and you can see the floor section I installed inside the open large doors. It doesn't take much to suggest a finished interior. Again, I was very impressed with the rafter tail pieces fitting into the slots on the top of the walls- excellent engineering. That's it for now more later.
Awesome start Jeff! I'm following along for sure. ;)
Hello Bob, it's nice to have you looking in. I'm having a good time with this build. Bar Mills does a great job with it's kits.
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I've started painting the detail castings. First I painted all of them with a rattle can grey primer, this gives a good base for the brush painted craft paints. Later I will use an AI solution wash to tone down the bright colors.
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Here the front roof dormer has been glued onto the main roof. I like the look of the shingles. Trim has been added to the corners and edges of the roofs.
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The roof top details have been painted- here we see the large vent and it's base along with the window frames for the dormer and the sign that will be placed on the top of the dormer.
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The window frames are in- I like the look of open windows, it gives the impression of life inside the building. The roof top sign has been added, again the small sign supports were easy to remove from the laser sheet and easy to install. Can't say enough for the quality of the small laser cut pieces in this kit. The base for the large roof vent has been glued to the rear face of the roof. You can see on the roof where I left out rows of shingles and used brown construction paper as exposed underlayment. I think this makes the shingles more interesting to look at.
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Here I've painted 1/8 square stripwood dark grey for a foundation for the building. All buildings need a foundation.
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Foundations have been added to the main building and the rear addition. I found that I also had to add a foundation under the loading dock or it would not have the correct height next to the building. I'm hoping that it looks alright. I will use pastel chalks to tone down the colors later. That's it for now, more later
Awesome Bob.
Hey Jeff:
Looking just great.
Karl
Jeff,
Just getting caught up on this one. I would say nice start but it looks like you are about finished. Nice build.
Tom ;D
Thank you Curt, Karl and Tom for looking in. As I said earlier in this thread, this is my first Bar Mills structure kit and I've been very impressed with the quality and engineering of the laser cut wood pieces. Continuing on...
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Nothing is glued together yet, just placing things together to see how they look. I just placed some pieces of stripwood on the interior floors to give the impression of inside activity.
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The roof is on and I've mounted the front dormer window frames. I'm pleased with the overall look of the kit. I like the way the shingles came out, but I will use weathering chalks when everything has been glued together.
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My thin styrene base has been painted and the first layer of scenery material has been put down. I placed the kit's pieces on the base and drew a pencil outline, then I used a brown craft paint which I covered with my base scenery material which is sifted dirt from my yard. I put some fine turf soil material on as well.
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Everything has been placed on the base and I'm starting to figure out where the castings will go
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You can see the large roof vent and the support wires here. This was the first time that I've attempted this detail. I used stiff brass wire which I painted black. I used my pin vise drill to start small holes in the vent and then placed the wires in those holes and onto the roof with super glue. I noticed that Karl did this in his build and I liked it. Thanks Karl
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A better view of the support wires here and also the exposed underlayment on the shingle roof. I will cover the exposed white at the building perimeter with more scenery material when all is glued down. I really like the way this kit has come together. That's it for now, more later. Thanks again to everyone that has looked in, it's nice to have the support and interest.
Great job on the kit Jeff.
Very nice job Jeff. Dennis
Hey Jeff:
Frank B & I did A test fit for this kit for Bar Mills. It's A neat little Kit. Can post A few picks if you'd like me to.
Karl
Thank you Curt and Dennis for the kind words.
Kark- please post your pics, I used your build thread quite a bit as a reference when doing mine. You did such a good job on yours. If there are some folks who did not see your build they would enjoy your pictures for sure. I never mind anyone posting on my thread- that's what the forum is all about. Jeff
Continuing on...
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I've added a few more details and some scenery elements. This will do it until it's on the layout
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I've really enjoyed this Bar Mills kit and definitely would like to do some more. The instructions were very well done and as I said several times I was very impressed with the quality of the laser cut wood pieces. That's it for this build, now on to another. I want to try a larger wood kit next time, I've done several smaller style buildings and want to try something a little larger. Thanks to everyone who looked in.
This will be a very nice piece for your layout.
Thank you Curt. When I started my layout I relied on styrene kits because of their affordability. As I progressed I began to realize that there was more out there than plastic. Now that the trackwork is finished and I've finally ballasted most of my track, I have found out how much enjoyment there is in wood craftsman kits. I discovered the forum and saw how the real experts assembled these kits. It has opened up a whole new phase of the hobby for me. I'm at a point where I will have to begin removing some of my old styrene kits to make room for the wood kits that I am building now. That's not a problem and it just shows once again what a great hobby this is. As we all know, a layout is never finished.
Hi All:
Jeff gave me permission to post A few of my pics of this kit here. So here they are.
Karl
Karl, That's a Great looking kit. You did a superb job on it!!!! Dennis
Great looking, detailed kit.....well done on both Jeff & Karl versions..... 8)
Hey Dennis & Greg:
Thanks Guys. Yeah Jeff did A great job on this one also.
Karl
Great job Jeff....Dennis
Thank you Karl for posting pics of your build, as I said, I used it quite a bit for reference on mine. Thanks to all for the kind words.