That's really cool looking Dave.  I've seen the Clever models stuff at the Expo on Randy and Sue's module.  I think it took me two or three passes before I realized they were cardstock models. 

Okay, I received a couple of e-mails notifications today from the USPS that the kit I'm going to build should arrive on Wednesday.  So what to do in the mean while?  Well, I opted to try my hand at casting some stone walls that I may incorporate into the scenery.  I haven't done much with Hydrocal over the years so this'll probably be an adventure that will make the King cringe.

Attachment 1:  Here are some molds I picked up at the 2012 Expo.  It's finally time to break them out of the package and try my luck at casting some walls.

Attachment 2: I sprayed them with wet water and then put them back in the convenient little card board cutout they came with to support them.

Attachment 3: I mixed up a small batch of Woodland Scenery Lightweight Hydrocal and poured it into the first mold.  Rats!  I mixed up too small a batch and didn't even have enough to fill one mold completely.     In a panic I mixed up another batch as quickly as I could and finished the pour.  While the first batch looked nice and smooth and perfectly mixed with minimal air bubbles the second batch was watery and looked like a frothy milk shake.     Oh heck, I'm just experimenting anyway so I went ahead and finished the pour on the first mold and filled a second one as well.  By now the wife was calling me to the dinner table so a quick clean up and let 'em sit was in order.

Attachment 4: To my utter amazement they turned out okay.  I broke one piece off of the big wall (one of the connecting stones) but I didn't see any obvious air bubbles on the surface of either.  Next chance I get I'll take my time and fill all three.  Then I'll have some stone walls to start experiment with the coloring.   

That's it for the first official, if you'll consider it that, post of my build thread.   

Quote from: Zephyrus52246 on February 23, 2014, 08:53:09 PM
Great looking chili.  What's the green stuff between the sidewalk and the street next to the mailbox?  All our snow is white, and dirty grey, does it come in green, too?

Jeff

What's this 'snow' you speak of?   

Quote from: EricQuebec on February 23, 2014, 11:23:56 AMYour chili seems to be very good. Personnaly I prepare mine with brown beer.

In the chili or in the cook?   

Quote from: EricQuebec on February 23, 2014, 11:39:43 AM
Very nice job as usual Bob.
here's a pics about the nailholes debat and reflect my posiyion about them....
Sorry Bob for posting a pic on your thread.
Eric Québec city

Thanks Eric.  You never have to apologize for posting a pic in one of my threads.  Your contributions are always welcome!   

Dave,

I've never tried the Liquitex method for stucco.  I've always used the water putty method (I've run across this in both FOS and FSM kits) and I've been pleased with the results.  This is the first I heard of applying crackle paint over the water putty though.  I'm anxiously awaiting you're decision as to what looks best!

Quote from: Dave K. on February 23, 2014, 08:46:15 AMMy sentiments exactly!  Just for fun, shall we resurrect the "Great Nailholes Debate"? 

Uh-oh!     Dave K. wants to start the "Great Nailholes Debate" again.  This reminds me of a line from one of my favorite movies "The Big Chill".  After getting the group all riled up with some pretty caustic observations Nick (William Hurt) says "I was just trying to keep the conversation lively." 

Attachment 1: Once all the ingredients (except the beans) have been added stir, cover and let it simmer for a hour and quarter.

Attachment 2: Add the beans, one can of dark red kidney beans and one can of refried beans.  Stir well.

Attachment 3: It's ready to go!   

Serve with shredded Monterey Jack and finely chopped green onions on top.  A good beer goes well with it too.

Here's the ingredients.  One I leave out is the instant coffee.  Neither my wife or like the taste of coffee.   

1 lb. mild Italian sausage, skinned and crumbled
1 lb. ground chuck
1 large yellow onion, diced
2 large garlic cloves, minced
1 1/2 tbsps, chili powder, or to taste
1 (6 oz.) can tomato paste
1 1/2 cups water
1 tbsp. instant coffee
1 tbsp. sugar
1 tbsp. paprika
1 tbsp. oregano
1 tsp. salt
1 tsp. pepper
1 tsp. cumin
1 cup dark red kidney beans, drained
1 cup refried beans

When the kit arrives next week I'll start posting photo's of the model! 

Well, here's my thread for the contest build.  I'm going to be building the Foscale Fisheries kit from RailroadKits.  I haven't seen this one on JimmyD's site (yet) and I don't even know what it looks like!

Attachment 1:  I'm waiting for it to arrive in the mail.  Checked the mail today....nope, not here yet so I can't show you the kit contents at the moment or start the build.   

Attachment 2: Since I can't start the kit today let's make some Chili instead!     Okay, word of warning, if you're the type who gets nit picky about "what is" and "what isn't" Chili stop right here.  This won't cut the mustard for you.     Start by chopping up one large yellow onion and mincing two large garlic cloves.

Attachment 3: The recipe I use (I'll list ingredients at the end of the next post) calls for 1lb of mild Italian Sausage and 1lb of ground chuck.  Slice through the casing on the Italian Sausage.

Attachment 4: Peel off the casing off the Italian Sausage and discard the casing.  We just want the meat contained inside.

Attachment 5: Put the meats, onions and garlic in a large pot and brown the meat.

Attachment 6: When the meat has been browned add all of the remaining ingredients except for the beans (I warned you nit picky Chili aficionados to stop reading back in attachment number 2 didn't I?).

More in the next post.   

Quote from: ACL1504 on February 22, 2014, 03:57:02 PM
Bob,

I'll be following along and I'll even bear with you!

Tom

Thanks Tom!  There may not be much to follow.  I can't get a single 234KB 800x598 picture to post at the moment.  I keep getting:

An Error Has Occurred!

Your attachment couldn't be saved. This might happen because it took too long to upload or the file is bigger than the server will allow.

Please consult your server administrator for more information.

Funny, I didn't had this trouble the Engine House thread.  I'll take a break and try again later.   

For some reason I'm having trouble creating a new thread and posting attachments at the same time so I'm going to try creating the thread first and then posting to it with attachments.  I keep getting a response that my attachments either took too long to upload or are too big (all are under 400k).  Bear with me during these technical difficulties.

MAP and Bart,

Thank you both very much for the kind comments!

I know I repeat a lot of stuff from one thread to the next but I figure there's always the chance there might be someone new reading one of my threads for the first time or I came across something like a new product or something I forgot to document previously.

Great start Brad.  I don't have that one but it looks like a really fun one to build.  I'll be following along.  Thanks for sharing.

Okay, continuing on....

Attachment 1: I painted the inside of the walls black to help prevent them from 'glowing' if I light up the interior.  For the engine house portion of the structure I later went back and painted over the black with a light gray since the inside walls may be visible.  I also washed the outside of the walls with my A&i wash to tone everything down.

Attachment 2:  Using my ponce wheel and a square I added nail holes on roughly a 24" spacing and around door and window openings.  I don't worry too much about prototypical accuracy cuz, well...., I don't know any better and they look good to me.   

Attachment 3:  I added a little detail, just here and there, by using razor blade to cut through a single clapboard along one or the rows of nail holes.

Attachment 4: I then added nail holes next to both sides of the cut with a pointy tool I have in my arsenal of tools.    

Attachment 5:  The finished 'joint'.  I don't worry about adding too many of these.  Just enough so nobody really notices that there are some single clapboards over 80' long in some places.   

Attachment 6:  I then glued on the corner trim to the walls as per the instructions.  I glue it on longer than needed and trim it to length after the fact.

I have one more picture showing the trim being cut to length but I'll save that for the next time I do an update. 

Thanks for following along!

Thanks John, Gnat and Dave,

I spent a lot of time on this today (gotta get things moving so I can clear off the old work bench to get ready for the contest build ya' know).

Attachment 1:  John thought he'd like a green band around the bottom of the structure kind of like I'm doing with another build I'm finishing up for Tom so I started by masking off the walls where I want the band to end.  Really I just picked the bottom of the smaller window at the rear of the wall and used that as a guide.  I could do this free hand buy picking a clapboard to use as a guide and being really careful but the tape saves me the trouble of trying to remember which clapboard I picked.   

Attachment 2: With some Polly Scale Dark Green I painted the band on the bottom of the engine house walls.

Attachment 3:  Now it's time to beat the walls up and get that peeling paint effect going.  I'm doing this kind of in reverse.  I painted the walls there finish color first and now I'm going to dab on paint to simulate the paint beneath showing through.  I started with a craft paint that's close to an Earth color.  This really stands out on the walls.  I put some on a sponge and then got most of it off the sponge before I started dabbing the sponge on the walls.  Kind of 'dry sponging' if you will.  I just want speckles of the paint on the walls.

Attachment 4:  I followed up the earth color paint with a light grey color.  This covers up most of the earth color and blends in with the Reefer White I originally used to paint the walls so it's difficult to see in the pictures and in person but it really does tone things down and adds to that 'primer is showing through where the paint peeled off' effect.

Attachment 5: Now it's time to really beat up the walls.  Using a chisel blade in an X-Acto handle I carefully (well sorta) started cutting underneath the clapboards and 'lifting' them.  On a few I even twisted the blade a little to splinter the wood.  This adds another layer of texture to the walls.  I did more than usual on this particular kit.  I really want the walls to look old and beat up.

Attachment 6: I'm not sure how well this shot will show the difference between a wall that I really beat up (top) and one I've just started on (bottom) but here it is.

More in a moment...