I'll call my Army buddy in KY later today.  From what I've heard, the worst of the weather was well east of where he lives.  

They've substantially reduced the rain forecast here in SE NH for today.  We had an "audible" call for Scotch Club last night, because the evening turned out to be quite nice, and the forecast for today called for rain in the late afternoon.  (Topic was 'heavy peat'.)

Today I'll work on the double windows for Wichendon, paint some other windows, and possibly start assembly on the walls.  Plan there is to test fit the windows, then do the interior wall studs that fit around the window and door openings.

dave

Urs, thanks!  I find the instructions to be lacking in some significant details.  A good kit, but definitely not a kit for beginners.

While digging through my boxes of parts, I found 3 bags of Rio Grande Models belt drive parts.  VERY Nice stuff!  I'll see if I can use these with some of the other parts I have on order. 

For this kit, I need to glue together 2 Tichy window castings to fill the large double windows.  I did a jig to hold the windows, and i'll glue a piece of Evergreen strip between them to hold them together.  I need 17 pair of those. 

dave

The problem I have after I clean up is I can't find all that stuff I "put away"...  I can remember where it was before I picked it up, though!

dave

Partly cloudy, also headed to 78 in SE NH.  But muggy, with clouds moving in and chance of showers and t-boomers later this afternoon.  I'm planning to smoke some ribs, I hope I can get them on when it's not raining. 

Cleaners are coming today, so I have to sit with the dogs.  Then a run to the store, before heading back to Winchendon...

I think Karl's part of Michigan got hit by storms and power outages last night.

dave

Quote from: Zephyrus52246 on May 15, 2025, 03:56:30 PMAre you planning to put any livestock on the ramp?  It will be difficult with the roofs on.  I can't wait to see the cow poop weathering.

Jeff

"cow poop weathering"  Spoken like a true son of Iowa!  

dave

I have some cone pulleys in the Crow River set.  I was thinking "most of the tools have a 3-layer pulley, the pulleys on the shaft should match."  But (a) that's a nit, (b) I could argue that the largest layer is just there as a flywheel   

One interesting thing about the LM3 kit is that most of the wall stud pieces are -pre-cut-.  Plan is to check the windows, assembling the double-windows (trimming and gluing 2 Tichy castings together), and then use those to double-check the stud locations that are laser-engraved on the wall panels.  The laser cutting on this kit was done from the back, and there's very little laser scorching on the window openings, etc.  

dave

A question for Swisstrain:  How hard would it be to build this so the roof is removable?  I -think- after going over the instructions, that should be doable.  It would be a somewhat tight fit with the eave returns on the gable ends, but I don't think there's any overhang.  My thought is to make the roof removable so that one side could also be removed.

dave

A quick update today between Dr/Dentist appointments.  I've ordered a couple sets of belt hangers as part of their belt drive kits from Crow River, some different belt pulleys from BEST Trains, and another copy of Gustafson's Sierra RR Machine Shop book. (I can't find my copy, I'm sure it'll show up after the replacement arrives.)

I also sent a message to the Henry Ford Museum asking 2 questions about their machine shop:  (1)  How do you start up the system?  Is the drive shaft disconnected from the motor?  If so, how do you do that?  (2) does each machine have a belt shifter or other mechanism to disconnect it from the drive shaft?  

In the meantime, I'm pondering how to do belt shifters, how to cut down cone pulleys (about half the machine tools need cone pulleys on the drive shaft to match the cone pulleys on the machine tool, and how to actually assemble the shafts.  And I need to decide if I position the machine tools (and operators) first, or do the drive shafts first.  I think it's the latter.  

So once I'm home from the dentist this afternoon, I think I'll start work on the interior walls, adding the studs.  That's something I can do independent of the work on the ground floor's contents.  

dave

I wouldn't add a roof to the lower level, not only would that be painful, I doubt the cows would really appreciate it. 

But if you decide to do that, you could pre-assemble the lower roof using the upper roof as a template, and just glue the assembly into position.

dave

I'm always very happy to see how others tackle the same kit or similar problems, so no worries from me about hijacking!

dave

Not much modeling for me today.  Morning appointment with the urologist (https://davebarry.substack.com/p/tariffs ), afternoon at the dentist.  Cloudy day, muggy, chance of showers all day, and pretty much through the weekend.

dave

Wow, what a Treasure Chest!  X Marks the Spot!

dave

The fundamental problem with removing the clutter from the top of the layout is finding other shelf space to put that stuff!     It'll be fun to watch how you plan this out.

dave

It's great to see this, it helps me visualize some parts of the structure when it's assembled.   How did you run the wires for the ground floor lighting?  Did you cut notches in the ceiling joists?

Today I did more work on the belt runs and realized two of my proposed tool runs won't work, it would have two tools trying to connect to the -same- pulley.  So I reworked those tools, so that won't be a problem.  I also thought more about the pulleys and shifters.  My current thought is to assemble each line shaft onto 'sticks' cut to length, then glue those 'sticks' to the ceiling joists.  I have enough parts to finish the design, but will have to wait for some stuff I'll order to finish the assembly.  And I think I can position the machines and operators while waiting for line shaft parts.

dave

Seems to me the problem with those wheelset-benches would be moving it into location.... 

dave