Bar Mills - Sokol's Furniture and Mattress Company Build

[ReadingBob]

I waffled on whether or not to do a build thread on this build but I've taken the photo's, cropped them and uploaded them so why not?     I'm building the Bar Mill's - Sokol's Furniture and Mattress Company kit for the SBG's Honory President and Chief Bottle Washer ACL1504.

The kit comes in two boxes.  I'll let Tom relay the "tale of two boxes" if he so chooses.   


One box contains the laser cut components.  It's quite a collection of stuff.


The other box contains the Instructions, casting and other assorted odds and ends.


I started the build by removing the plastic casting from the sprues using a sprue cutter.  Some folks prefer to leave them on the sprue until after they're painted because they're easier to handle that way.  My preference is to remove them and clean them up prior to painting them so I don't have to worry about touching up any spots with paint after the fact.


After removing the plastic components from the sprue I touch up any rough spots with a quick swipe or two of an emery board.


There are some nice resin castings of stacks of lumber that only needed a tiny bit of smoothing on the bottom just to ensure they'd sit flat.  I ran these over the emery board as well.


More in a moment or two 

[GPdemayo]

Neat looking kit.....I'll be following along Bob. 

[ReadingBob]

I used a small file to clean up the metal castings included in the kit.  The quality of the castings was pretty good so the cleanup was minimal.


After I cleaned up the plastic, resin and metal castings I went through the laser cut components and cut out and cleaned up anything I wanted to paint the door and trim colors.  I took all of this and attached it to trays I use for painting using strips of blue painters tape that are taped sticky side up to the tray.  When I airbrush these I don't want the spray from the airbrush to blow them around. 


I took one of my few remaining bottles of Floquil Primer  and, after thoroughly mixing the paint, unloaded nine eyedroppers full of paint into a metal mixing cup (okay, it's a measuring cup from the grocery store).


To that I added three eyedroppers full of thinner.  That gave the a 75% paint to 25% thinner mixture which works well in my airbrush.


I mixed it up paint/thinner with my little electric paint mixer making sure to let the mixer come to  STOP before removing it from the paint.  You can easily envision what would happen if you didn't.    


I use a cheap home air compressor I bought on Amazon.  It's also handy for pumping up the tires in the vehicles and assorted other odds and ends.  It's cheaper than some of the more expensive hobby compressors and, since I do my painting outside, I don't really need the whisper quiet kind that shut off when you're not painting.  This one does the trick for me.


More in a few moments.   

[ReadingBob]

I'm painting out in the driveway, just outside my garage.  I start by giving everything a coat, painting right to left and making sure I get all the 'bottom' edges.  I don't worry about getting complete coverage of everything at this point although I try to get a nice thin coat on everything.


I rotate the tray 90 degrees and again paint everything from right to left making sure I get the bottom edge (which was previously the left hand edge of the pieces prior to rotating the tray.


I rotate the tray and paint two more times to make sure all the edges get painted.  Afterwards I wait until the paint is dry enough to allow me to flip over the parts that and paint the bottom side.  The only parts I didn't flip over are those that are from the peel and stick sheets since the bottom of those is the part that gets peeled away and tossed.


While the paint was drying I started on the walls.  I found one wall had a piece broken off but that was easy to repair with just the tiniest amount of glue.  I didn't want any glue squeezing out on the front where it would interfere with the stains and paints.  There's a piece of bracing that goes behind this so I only needed to use enough glue to hold it in place until the bracing was glued behind it.


I applied the bracing material per the instructions and weighed them down under some marble blocks (salvaged from old bowling trophies).  The bracing material wasn't cut to length at this point. It overhangs the walls.


One thing I should have done differently on the bracing - On the top of each wall the instructions show to run a piece horizontally and the vertical pieces run up and butt into that.  In the future I plan on running the vertical pieces from the bottom all the way to the top and then fitting the horizontal piece between them.  Doing it the way the instructions show was faster but it allowed the walls to warp ever so slightly where the vertical braces but up against the horizontal piece.  No biggie but it wouldn't have happened at all if I had done it the other way.

After the glue had set I removed the weights and trimmed the bracing to length using a single edge razor blade.


That's all for now!  Time to run to the grocery store then mow the lawn (maybe) and then get back to the work bench! 

[ACL1504]

THE TAIL OF THE TWO BOXES:

The following is a true story and no fake names were used to hide the identity of those involved.

A couple of years ago I was going through my kits and saw two boxes for Bar Mills Sokol's Furniture and Mattress. Since Reading Bob had built some kits for me at the time, now it's several more kits, I decided to give him one of my Sokol's.

A few weeks later when Bob came over for one of the SBG meeting, he brought back the box. I saw it and said, "Do you already have the kit?" He said no and added that I gave him box two of two. You see, Sokol's came in two boxes for one kit.

I sure felt like a dunce but I'll tell ya'll this.

It's hell to get old.

Tom

[rpdylan]

Your off to a great start! This kit took me a while but I went slow and the results are great, this is one massive, beefy looking structure when done. The window frames are delicate so be careful. I read the instructions carefully and fully to make sure I didnt miss anything. This is one of the best kits Bar Mills has ever done, in my opinion.

Bob C.

[Mark Dalrymple]

I'll be watching your progress, Bob.  Oh - and great story Tom!

Cheers, Mark.

[fbernard65]

Bob,

Looking good.  I always liked this kit.  Looking forward to your progress.

Frank

[Janbouli]

I'll be following along.

[martin.ojaste]

Bob, always looking in and its getting interesting.

[ReadingBob]

Your off to a great start! This kit took me a while but I went slow and the results are great, this is one massive, beefy looking structure when done. The window frames are delicate so be careful. I read the instructions carefully and fully to make sure I didnt miss anything. This is one of the best kits Bar Mills has ever done, in my opinion.

Bob C.

Hi Bob,

I saw the photo you posted of your build on the daily thread and you did an absolutely wonderful job on this one!  With regards to the window frames, did you follow the instructions and spray the back of them with an adhesive spray to attach them to the glass?

Thanks for following along!

[ReadingBob]

Thanks to everyone who is looking in and following all.     I appreciate all the comments, tips, ideas, suggestions, stories, etc. that you all post.  This is a neat looking structure and an interesting kit.

In the instructions it says it's not recommended for beginners and I'd have to agree with that.  There's a lot to it and, being a five sided structure, it's not as simple as forming 90 degree corners when attaching the walls to one another (I haven't gotten to that point yet).

I'll post more progress pictures as soon as I make some progress on the build.    

[postalkarl]

Hi Bob:

looking good so far. I have one of those around somewhere. It's a lot of work. Lots of pieces to assemble.

Have fun:

Karl

[rpdylan]

I had put the window frames on some blue painters tape, then sprayed the backs with 3M adhesive. then with the windows still on the strip of  tape, I put them on a sheet of THIN clear styrene. After they were dried, i took the tape off and carefully cut out the windows/acetate with a new SHARP #11 blade. years on, they are still together. I left the tilted windows out of the walls until the entire structure was completed- then I put a small dab of sticky glue on each side of the window- outer edge of frame- in the center and using tweezers, slid them into the openings at a slight angle and then rotated level. If I remember, they were a bit of a tight fit.  I put the walls together over the templates- I cut some inside corner brackets from some strips of bracing material, using the template as a guide for the angles.
   You are correct, this kit is a bit advanced as you will use techniques learned from building smaller kits

[ReadingBob]

I had put the window frames on some blue painters tape, then sprayed the backs with 3M adhesive. then with the windows still on the strip of  tape, I put them on a sheet of THIN clear styrene. After they were dried, i took the tape off and carefully cut out the windows/acetate with a new SHARP #11 blade. years on, they are still together. I left the tilted windows out of the walls until the entire structure was completed- then I put a small dab of sticky glue on each side of the window- outer edge of frame- in the center and using tweezers, slid them into the openings at a slight angle and then rotated level. If I remember, they were a bit of a tight fit.  I put the walls together over the templates- I cut some inside corner brackets from some strips of bracing material, using the template as a guide for the angles.
   You are correct, this kit is a bit advanced as you will use techniques learned from building smaller kits

Thanks for the prompt reply.     I'll give the 3M adhesive a try when I get to that step.  I was planning on not installing the tilted windows until the structure is just about complete so as to avoid knocking them out while working on it.