Hi everyone, I've been slowly working on this kit this summer that I've had in my kit stash for a very long time.
I spend a lot of time at our cottage in the summer, but I do manage to get back home from time to time to continue working on this kit.
I don't model up at the cottage, I have to many other things to look after while I'm there.
I always imagined that I would have loads of time in my retirement years to build all of the model kits I have collected through the years.
This has not been the case at all, I seem to be more busy in retirement than I was when I worked full-time.
I know it's crazy, but it's true!
Anyways here's what I have managed to get done on this kit so far this summer.
I have built the wooden platform that this freight house will sit on, using the template provided in the kit.
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I then added the deck boards with hundreds of tiny nail holes added to the boards using a fine pin.
You can also see the wall sections that will make up this freight house layed out behind.
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I then stained those wall sections with "Hunter Line" driftwood stain both sides of the walls.
I then painted just the exterior of the walls with a 2 tone paint scheme.
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I then added interior framing to the walls which the kit does not call for, I thought it would help the interior look better since I plan on lighting this structure up.
The sections of walls without framing have sliding doors attached to them, so I can't add framing to those areas.
Also I have to run some magnet wires for the gooseneck lights over those doors before I can complete other framing.
The nice thing about not building this kit for so long, it now allows me to light it with LED's in a way that I never would have been able to in the past.
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So that's all I have to show you so far.
To be continued.
Greg
Outstanding modeling so far Greg. I look forward to this thread.
Hello Greg, I really like what you have done to this point and I look forward to seeing you continue with this build. Very nice sir
It is amazing now that you're retired you could ever fit work into your schedule!
Well I'm glad you have time to do another beautiful build for all of us.
And your off to a good start as usual.
Jerry
Good start on a classic kit... What I noticed when I retired is that I'm much more driven by -other people's schedules-, doctor appointments, etc. Those really cut up the day.
dave
Good start, Greg.
My problem with retirement is that I get distracted easily and when I am making progress, it's very slow. :)
George
Howdy Greg,
Excellent work on this beautiful kit. Your thread will be one to watch.
Have fun,
mike
Looking Great!
Greg,
I stumbled upon this kit build and actually had to pinch myself to see if it really was you!
Thanks for taking the time to do another great tutorial, your builds are always a wealth of knowledge and great to follow. I will be following along.
I hear ya about the retirement thing. My wife thinks if I'm not building something every day that I'm lazy.
I told her I didn't retire to work steadily every day. So far she has won. :o
Rich
Greg, it's exciting seeing you start another build thread.
Looking good so far.
Terrific, Greg!
Looking forward to watching this build come to life.
Cheers, Mark.
Guys! Thanks so much for your posts & for your interest in this old FSM's kit.
It's about time I finally got around to building it!
Greg
Greg,
It is great to see one of your build threads again. Looks like you are off to a great start.
Hi Ron, thanks very much!
I'm happy to have you watching.
Greg
Greg wrote:
QuoteI spend a lot of time at our cottage in the summer, but I do manage to get back home from time to time to continue working on this kit.
I don't model up at the cottage, I have to many other things to look after while I'm there.
I always imagined that I would have loads of time in my retirement years to build all of the model kits I have collected through the years.
This has not been the case at all, I seem to be more busy in retirement than I was when I worked full-time.
I know it's crazy, but it's true!
Like Rich (Pennman) I'm in the same boat. Wife wants to spend more time at the cottage floating in the water. At home she complains I don't do any of the honey due list. Only time I get any bench time is when we're home for a couple of days to take care of neccesities or it's raning. Can't wait for fall when we close camp for the winter. Tough taking care of two living places.
Ok, off the "rant box". Like Rich I'll be following along. Thanks for posting.
Bernd
Hi Bernd, It is indeed tough taking care of 2 places!
Especially when one of them is over a hundred years old(Our house) and the other one(Our cottage) only allows you 6 months at best to work on it.
Our cottage is a three hour drive away and it's boat access only, so that makes it a even harder task to get stuff there.
It's on a lake called "Go Home Lake" I call it Go Home Tired lake.
Anyways it will be nice to have you following along, in what spare time we manage to find this summer.
Greg
Quote from: Ensign on July 17, 2025, 07:59:37 AMHi Bernd, It is indeed tough taking care of 2 places!
Especially when one of them is over a hundred years old(Our house) and the other one(Our cottage) only allows you 6 months at best to work on it.
Our cottage is a three hour drive away and it's boat access only, so that make it a even harder task to get stuff there.
It's on a lake called "Go Home Lake" I call it Go Home Tired lake.
Anyways it will be nice to have you following along, in what spare time we manage to find this summer.
Greg
Greg,
Same here, three hour drive to the St. Lawerance River. The cottage is on the main land so no boat trip.
Always liked following you on the RRL forum. Have learned much from your modeling techniques.
Bernd
Looking forward to seeing this one come together Greg, I've had good intentions of starting mine for a couple decades now..... :)
Gregory, thanks for your post and for your interest in this.
It's funny how we all have these kits waiting on our shelves for decades to be built.
I am now in my sixties, so I'm thinking I better get building them before I run out of time to do so.
Even then I don't think I'll ever build all of the kits I have now collected over the years.
Though I will try to do so! :)
Greg
Hi everyone, well I have managed to get a little more done on this kit.
I have glued all of the walls together and have also made up and installed the 4 exterior gooseneck lights.
Also painted and glued into position the window and door castings.
Here's how the freight house looks sitting on it's platform.
I have not glued the freight house to the platform yet, I still have a few more interior lights to do.
_DSC2802.jpg
Using LED lighting with the hair like magnet wires really allows you to do things that just would not be possible using old style lighting with bulbs and heavier guage wires.
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I plan to run my wires for the LED's down the middle wall of this freight house a through a hole drilled into the platform so that the wires will all be under the platform.
I then will cover those wires with another scribed wood wall panel to hide them all.
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So that's all I have to report for now, thanks for having a look!
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Greg
Greg,
We are all thankful that you are at it again!
Especially when you show your expert detailing with regard to lighting effects.
This reminds me of your excellent thread on the old Railroad Line Forums "Gooseneck Lighting".
I always enjoy reading your threads and one can gain a lot of insight from them.
You make lighting a building look easy, although it is difficult for some of us to understand.
Why some folks use resistors and some don't? Anyway, your build is taking great shape.
Rich
Just beautiful done. And as usual the lighting will be the highlight!!
Jerry
Thanks! Rich & Jerry.
Rich, when it comes to using resistors I sometimes use them depending how bright you want your LED to shine.
The distribution boards that I get from "Ngineering" are designed so you can hook up your LED's with or without using resistors.
If I did not use this distribution board from Ngineering, I would have to use a resistor as part of the LED hook up.
Also If you choose not to use a resistor while using one of these distribution boards the LED will be lit up at full brightness.
By adding different strength resistors to the board you can dim the LED to the level of brightness you like.
Jerry, I always look forward myself to seeing how the completed model looks with it's lights turned on!
Greg
Excellent modeling Greg.
Nice start Greg!
Curt & Philip, thanks for your encouraging words!
Greg
Hi Greg,
Just catching up with you on this build thread. Thanks for posting. I'll be following along on this one. I always learn from your builds. Looking good so far!
Jeff Betcher
Hi Jeff, nice to see that you've joined the Modelers forum!
Thanks for making this build your very first post.
The real good news for us Canadians is, it's completely tariff free! :)
Greg
Greg,
Thank you for the explanation on the lighting. It always takes me longer to understand
some things when I'm not used to doing them. I'm sure I will succeed now that the
"Teacher" is back! I will have to see what I can come up with.
Rich
Greg,
Enjoying this thread. I built my freight house some 40+ years ago and had to settle for the old "grain of wheat" bulbs.
Ngineering is wonderful for getting the correct items to "correctly" light the structure.
Excellent job on this one sir.
Tom
Rich & Tom, thanks so much for your posts and your kind words within them!
Rich, I also found LED's confusing when I started to use them.
However after building some of the "Rail Scale Miniatures" kits that had lighting kits designed by "Ngineering" for them, I found that I got better with each kit that I built using them.
So now I'm using them on most of the kits that I build, with excellent results.
Tom, I bought this kit 40+ years ago as well. It's kind of sad that it's taken me so long to finally getting around to building this kit.
Back then grain of wheat bulbs were the way to go. It was the best we had at the time for scale model lighting.
Using LED's now is the best we have for scale model lighting.
Tim owner at "Ngineering" has always been very helpful to me, in answering any questions that I've had regarding the use of LED's.
Greg
Greg aren't we due for an update??? :)
Jerry
Greg, your build looks great and brings back memories of my build from 45 years ago which was posted on this site some 10 years ago...
https://modelersforum.com/index.php?topic=1332.0
Only had Floquil paints and PFM 1.5 V bulbs back then...looking forward to your updates !
Tommy
Greg;
I came across your build and love the ideas you share. Great modeling to say the least. I too enjoy lighting my structures. Looking forward to seeing all you do with your lighting.
Jim
Hello Jerry, Tom & Jim, thanks for your posts and for your interest in this build!
Jerry, your right I should be doing an update with this build.
However my wife & cottage keep getting in the way.
I just got back from the cottage on Monday evening, so I do have a little something to show you.
Tom, thanks for sharing your freight house topic with us, it looks wonderful!
Real nice to see that you included lighting in your build of this kit 45 years ago.
I wish we still had the old line of "Floquil" paints available, my stash of them is now running out.
Jim, I'm glad you found this build and thanks for your nice comments.
Yes lighting structures up has become a requirement for me now.
So now here's what I've been working on before I headed to the cottage last week and all day yesterday.
I decided to paint up all of the wonderful FSM's castings that come with this kit.
The kit's instructions have little black on white labels that you can cut out and attach to the parcel boxes & crates.
I used different colours of markers to give them some colour.
I think that idea really paid off in making them pop a little more.
Here's a group photo of all of the castings that I completed painting.
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That's all I have for now, thanks for having a look.
Greg
Greg, your castings look excellent.
The colored labels are a nice touch.
Rick, thanks very much!
On another note, I really miss your old "Favorite Music" thread from RRLines.
I think about it and other things that I miss from that now gone forum often.
Greg
Fun Fun!~ 8)
Great job on the detail painting and labels.
Your details look great. That's the step I'm on for my Jeffries Point FSM build. Hope mine look as good.
Jeff
Philip, Curt & Jeff, thank you for your encouraging words!
Greg
Greg,
I must say you have been busy, look at all of the finely painted details!
I'm sure all the little scenes will pop once you place them in specific points.
I would not say you haven't been busy, heck, it would take me a week just to
think about painting one or more of them. I am the world's worst procrastinator.
Good luck with the rest of your build.
Rich
Greg a fine job painting those castings.
Jerry
Rich & Jerry, thank you both for your interest in this and for your kind comments!
Greg
Quote from: Ensign on July 30, 2025, 09:18:40 AMOn another note, I really miss your old "Favorite Music" thread from RRLines.
I think about it and other things that I miss from that now gone forum often.
Greg
Greg, funny you mentioning that thread.
I thought about it recently as well.
Maybe I'll post in the baggage car asking if it's OK to start a similar thread.
Quote from: Rick on Today at 09:34:40 AMQuote from: Ensign on July 30, 2025, 09:18:40 AMOn another note, I really miss your old "Favorite Music" thread from RRLines.
I think about it and other things that I miss from that now gone forum often.
Greg
Greg, funny you mentioning that thread.
I thought about it recently as well.
Maybe I'll post in the baggage car asking if it's OK to start a similar thread.
Baggage Car is the place for a 'favorite music' thread.
dave
Hi Dave, you know what they say "Great minds think alike"
Perhaps it would be better if you let Rick do that, since it was he who originally started that thread on the old RRlines forum.
I will give him a PM with your suggestion about starting one on the baggage car.
Thanks!
Greg
Howdy Greg,
The detail painting is amazing and will complement the freight house. Exceptional work, and I bet tedious.
Have fun,
mike