Carolina Craftsman kit Rural Post Office.

[ACL1504]

...here's the prototype of the kit inspiration....located in heavily rural Penland NC....there is an O scale version of this one coming too....

Jeff,

As I said from the start, this is a great kit. Okay, you have a winner in this one, I love the backwoods look.

Thanks for posting the photo of the original.

Tom

[ACL1504]

I've got my quarter's worth of candy, so I'm ready to follow along.

Donato,

Grab another hand full of candy and stay tuned. Your Dentist will love me for it!

Tom

[ACL1504]

I enlarged Jeff's photo of the original Penland, NC. Post Office.



After some time spent studying the photo, I made a some observations.

1.  The two large windows on the front are recessed into the wall whereas the square one on the right is about flush with the wall.

     If I were scratch building the structure, I'd recess the windows as well. However, the Tichy windows will look normal as well.

2.  Also, I noticed a horizontal board at the lower portion of the peaked roof just above the Coca-Cola sign.

     If you look closely, you'll see the board is cut in and flush with the wall and not on top of the battens.

     I like this feature on the post office. It gives it more character.

3.  The screen doors on the front are framed and are set outside the door frame vs. inside the door frame. More on this later  in the thread.

4.  There is also what appears to be either a 1X10 or 1X12 horizontal skirt on the bottom of the two visible walls.
     
     Notice it only appears on the front above the porch or deck. It is not on the left of the front porch area.

     I like this feature as well so you know what I'll be doing.

     More in a few.

[ACL1504]

I used a square and made sure the top of the square was level across the battens.



I then drew a pencil line across the top of the square.



More in a few.

[Dave K.]

I'm along, too. Love me some CCK. 👊🏻

[ACL1504]

I took a scale 3x3 and lay it along the pencil line. I drew a second line above the scale 3x3.

I then used a new/sharp #11 blade and cut on both lines. I then removed the battens between the cut lines.



I then very carefully glued the 3x3 next to the wall as shown below. I say carefully as I didn't want to get any glue on the exposed wood that will affect the stains and paints later in the build.



More in a few.

[ACL1504]

I'm along, too. Love me some CCK. 👊🏻

Dave,

Thanks, this one is a neat kit and will be great for the A&S RR.

Tom

[ACL1504]

Jeff included in the kit some screen doors. They are very fragile and I broke one getting it out. It will be fine though when I'm finished.



In the next photo I only have the screen door frames on top of the Tichy doors.



I'm going to try and frame these on the front of the Tichy doors. I'll get to that later in the build.

More in a few.

[ACL1504]

I went kinda crazy with the bracing so bear with me for a while.

There is a sheet showing suggested locations for the bracing but as I said I went a little crazy.

The bracing included in the kit is 1/8" square. I decided to take my bracing all the way across the bottom and top of the peaked walls.

However, the 1/8" bracing wouldn't fit across the top without some modifications. I opted to use HO scale 10X10's for the top and the 1/8" on the bottoms.

By placing the 10 X 10's even with the top of the large window, the 10 X 10 brace fit just below the slopped end of the roof and no cutting is necessary for it to fit.





More in a few.

[ACL1504]

Over the years, I've glued bracing two different ways.

I've applied glue to the walls and then added the bracing and I've added glue to the braces and then placed them on the walls. Either way will work but I though I'd mention the two anyway.

On this build, I did both.

I added glue to the 1/8" brace but not to the area shown in red below.



I then placed the 1/8" brace on the wall. I did the same for the opposing peaked wall section.

I then placed the two walls on top of each other making sure the 1/8" brace was over on the 10 X 10's. This way they were flat and weights were added until the glue dried.





More in a few.

[ACL1504]

Notice I glued the 1/8" brace across the door openings.  I didn't want to cut the brace and chance weakening the walls.



Not to worry. The doors still fit into the openings with no interference from the brace.



More in a few.

[ACL1504]

I forgot to mention when bracing the walls. I placed the wall against a piece of straight metal and added the brace. I then pushed the wall and brace against the straight edge.

This gives me a flush brace at the bottom of the wall.



The next photo shows the side walls braced.

Notice the top brace on the high side wall goes all the way across the top?



More in a few.

[ACL1504]

I planned ahead to get the maximum bracing on the building as I do live in the muggy south.


The next photo shows the bracing at the bottom portion of the walls on the slopped end.



The next photo shows the bracing at the peaked end of the walls. Notice now why I made the peaked end, actually the high side wall brace go to both edges, maximum gluing areas.




I'll have more to report on Monday.

[jrmueller]

Ordered mine tonight. Jim

[MAP]

You're doing a great job with this build Tom.  Thanks for the detailed "how to" with the bracing.  And I'm liking the added detail/mods you're doing to the kit to make it more like the prototype.