Two cities layout.

[Random]

Moving right along...

Another small addition is beginning to take place.  This is an interesting set of small walls.




And back on the other bench, details have been added the passenger shelter.




A bit of yellow paint and these walls are starting to take shape.   Interestingly I made the accidental discovery that titanium white acrylic artist's paint makes a very good primer on gray plastic parts.  This was applied with a brush.  I also discovered that this yellow craft paint is very translucent and the pencil marks show though.




Not wanting to watch paint dry, I added blinds to the windows of the express building.  (This would have been much easier to do before I glued the walls together but I forgot.)  I added some simple view blocks into the building to prevent being able to see all the way thought it. 




The blinds are cut from tan pastel paper and glued in place with canopy glue. I cut various heights of paper to prevent them all being the same.  Although there are a few matched pairs implying an office with a picky occupant. 

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Some brown trim, more rolled roofing, a cash register and some magazines and news papers later and those yellow walls tuned out to be the news stand for the station platform.  The newspapers and magazines are from the supply I made for the Leroy's Grill build.  I used newspapers and magazines "hung" from the front wall to cover those pesky pencil lines.






That was a lot of work.  So how about a break and a couple of beauty shots.   Here is how the scene is coming together.







This concludes the marathon update.  I will try not to go so long between them in the future.

Cheers!

[vinceg]

Great work, Roger. Outstanding scene. Clever idea for the view block in the brick building.

[Janbouli]

Coming along great Roger, love the canopy roof .  The cornice details came out excellent, just wondering why the cutter couldn't cut it 

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Thanks.  I've seen the view block method used before in articles.  They are tacked in place with a bit of white glue but can be popped lose easily.

The issue with the cutter is the result of several factors:

Very small detail parts.
Material held in place by the tackiness of the mat.
Thick material being cut with a lateral blade movement in crosscutting motions.
Software limitations in creating the cut diagram.

The mat in use was not new and may not have had enough tack to hold the material.  The paper being cut was 140 lb watercolor paper and is fairly thick. The cut diagram resulted in the long horizontal cuts being made first then the smaller cuts occurring inside the small resulting areas.  I only posted one picture but there were several failure modes.  Sometimes the full sheet shifted resulting in offline cuts. Other times sections pulled loose when the blade crossed previous cuts.

I think this could have been cut on the machine but I needed more advanced software to design the pattern with as few cuts as possible.  I needed to control the order of the cuts.  And a new mat and possibly a new blade would have made a difference.  In this case I had simply exceeded my desire to fiddle with it.  Making the cuts by hand was not hard and got the project back on schedule.

Cheers

[Random]

I started the next structure for the station scene.  This is the diner.  It started out as a Pullman Palace sleeper car from Roundhouse.  These are great old kits.

First step, slice.  I cut the car on my small band saw from Micromark.  This is the second best tool I've ever bought for modeling.  (The first being the thin beam square).  I made my cuts to match the general layout of the original model.




The diner will only use the ends.




Only minimal sanding was required to match the ends. 




I used an index card to mark up the dimensions of the storage shed.  I selected windows from parts I had on hand and the door casting was used as a sizing guide.  I'll be making the actual doors myself so that the details are double sided.




Since the large front doors will be modeled open the shed will need a full interior.  So I decided to frame it rather than using scribed siding.  I framed the 4 sides flat using the index card guide covered with waxed paper (but failed to take any pictures) and then assembled the shed frame.




I attached a roof from cardstock to give the model some stability.




The framing of the shed is matched to the car so that the vestibule door opens to the shed.





I built a frame to support the car from wooden ties from my parts stash.  The frame will be covered with a stripwood skirt.  The shed's base is made from stripwood cut to match the ties.  I wanted a lighter finish on these so I did not use the pre-stained ties.  The floor is made from scale 2x12s.




I added horizontal framing members for the window and door openings.





I then added siding to the shed with scale 2x10s.  These were lightly stained with ink & alcohol stain.  I still need to go back and sand the window and door openings square.




I stained the shed base with ink & alcohol stain.  Note that the shed's roof extends over the car and tucks up against the clerestory.




Cheers.

[Janbouli]

Looking good , can't wait to see this diner serving food and of course coffee.

[Opa George]

Roger,
So much to comment on, so to keep it short: beautiful work. The brick triangular building looks amazing and I am really liking the passenger shelter and news stand.

[Random]

Thanks.

You know, I am really looking forward to Jimmy getting all those detail castings on the market.  But not wanting to wait I spent entirely too much time this week building four doors for the diner's extension.  These are built from scale 2x4 inch stripwood.  The pair for the front of the shed that will be open were built attached to each other by the horizontal pieces so that they lined up.  They also needed detail on both sides.  The single doors for the sides will be modeled closed so I just wanted planking to show when you look inside the shed.





Cheers.

[Lynnb]

I once tried using Durham's for roads but found it way too hard to work/sand once dry. Thoughts?

Ditto.  I can't recall if I ever got around to painting it when I was finished.  If I did it I most likely used Floquil and that probably worked okay.

I've used this Concrete Paving material to make roads with some success.  It takes a little practice to find a consistency you like to work with and some patience to get it spread just right but it can make for some really nice looking streets.


Unlike Durham's it can be softened up by misting some water (or rubbing alcohol) on it.  It can be carved when dry.  It takes powder/chalk very well. 


They also have a couple of Asphalt mixes I bought but haven't tried yet.  A little seems to go a long way.

Wow that is one beautiful piece of work.

[Lynnb]

Roger you're doing alot of really nice work here.

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Its been a while since I last updated.  I have managed to get some work done.  I just haven't had time to update.  So I'll be playing catch-up.

I assembled the green building.  I started with the beveled corner as this needed the most precise fit.  I used a bead of gel super glue to attach the beveled walls.  Wooden clothes pins in the windows provided good clamping points.





The cornice still had a gap at the corner.  I filled that later with squadron putty.  I allowed the beveled corner to dry overnight before moving on to the back wall.  A couple of clothes pins trimmed to blunt ends allowed me to use window openings on the back wall to help hold it in place.





I allowed that joint to set for a few minutes before adding the final wall and clamping everything in place. 




The butt-joints had slight gaps but those will be covered by drainage pipes and other details.  This was allowed to sit and cure for several days.

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Once the green building had time for the joints to set firmly I placed it in the scene to test the fit.  Turns out the building is a trapezoid.  I didn't realize it until this point but the back wall was slightly longer than the front.  This left a visibly narrowing space for the sidewalk that would not have looked right.




My solution was to trim back the road to allow a full width sidewalk.  I used strips of basswood to build up the sidewalk and raise the building to properly align with the road.




I continued the basswood the full length of the block and joined it to the existing road. 




With the building placed into the scene the narrowing road is not apparent and the sidewalk space looks correct.

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It was at about this point that I realized I had not installed window shades before assembling the building.  Rather than try to position individual shades I decided to try using strips of paper to install them one floor at a time.  I cut strips large enough to cover the window opening and allow space above the opening for gluing.  I cut strips of pastel paper on a paper cutter. 




I made a template with markings for the position of the center mullions, top of the window openings and the center point between windows.




I placed each strip into the template and marked off the grid in pencil.




I cut each strip vertically up to the window top line and then trimmed each shade to the desired length and applied a bead of canopy clue along the upper edge.




I spread the glue out with my finger being careful to keep it above the window top line. 




I positioned each strip behind the windows being sure to locate the center mullion line behind the mullions.  The process went fairly quickly.




Here is the full front of the building with all blinds in place.




I used a similar template for the left side.




More updates to come.

Cheers.

[Janbouli]

Looking good Roger , I use strips of paper with office buildings or other buildings where they would have had the same window shades through the whole floor or even the whole building.