illinois Central Chicago District - Monee Rebuild

[jerryrbeach]

Vince,


I read thru what you are proposing, and I have a suggestion.  I would suggest that you remove the top 2" layer of foam.  With that out of the way, you can build your dioramas on 1" foam bases and adjust the height by shimming them above the two layers of foam.  If you check out Harbor Freight,  they have a rather inexpensive "Oscillating Multi-Function" tool.  If you used one of these with a wide flat blade, you should be able to use it to remove the top later of foam.  It could also be used to cut down into the foam to allow you to drop in the diorama bases into the existing foam scenery. 


What Mark means by "trapezoid' background buildings are shallow relief structures that have a longer end wall on one end than the other.  Thus, they are not rectangular and sit at an angle to the backdrop rather than parallel.  This allows you to lay out your roads at a similar angle. Laying out roads at an angle to the backdrop helps draw the viewer's eye into the scene.  Slight changes in elevation also help draw the eye into the scene.  In my opinion, even a quarter inch of elevation change makes a scene more realistic than an area that is dead flat.  FWIW, when I laid the track on my modules, the sidings are laid directly on the foam while the main is on cork roadbed. 


You can cut DPM or other plastic structures with a razor saw.  Once you decide where you want to cut, firmly clamp a straight edge as a guide for the cut.  Then it just takes some time and patience.  Of course, you will no longer have the brick surface where you made the cut so you will have to decide how to handle that, maybe with some plastic brick sheet or something similar.  Cutting plastic with a power saw can be tricky.  It is very easy to generate enough heat to melt the plastic along the cut.  I prefer to use a razor saw, it takes longer but I find I have a better result. 

[Mark Dalrymple]

Hi Vince.

I had the same idea as Jerry - remove the top layer of foam.  By adding more height you are also loosing more flat area for structures - so I think it would be worth the effort. 

Cutting DPM (and other) kits up I have found easiest with a Tamiya scriber.  This little device pulls a V out of the material quickly and easily.  It is also very neat, and so very little filing is needed.  Just don't use it on your cutting board, because your board wont heal.

Jerry is correct with his interpretation of my last reply.  The road and the backdrop would leave behind a triangular shape.  Rather than use a whole lot of words - here is a link to one of my threads where you can see how large you can make a wedge shaped building with a very small base appear.  Page one shows my use of mock-ups letting me visualize the finished scene - including paper for roads and water.  On page four is a great example of how mock-up roofs can let you see how a view could be framed.

http://www.railroad-line.com/forum/topic.asp?TOPIC_ID=38814&whichpage=2 

The road does not need to be on much of an angle to work wonders, and of course it can kink back the other way when it runs too far from the backdrop, or it can be curved.  I love elevation changes.  I think it adds a ton of interest to the scene, but it does make the build more complex.  Page three of the above thread shows my corner diorama.  You can see how much impact the tower on the brewery (far right) has by being forward from the main structure by just 1/2 inch.  This idea was suggested to me on an on-line forum.  I already had the plaster roads in place.  I mocked the idea up and could immediately see how much of a difference it made.  It was a lot of work to redo the roading, but very much worth it.

Re the cutting up of craftsman kits.  One option is to use a structure in a position where only two sides can be seen, and using plain walls on the other two sides.  In this way you still have half a kit remaining for another structure.  A wedge shaped relief building is an example of where this would work.  I'm not saying you should do this - but building the entire structure and then placing it in a position where half of it can never be seen is to me more wasteful.  Its a waste of a beautiful scene and a waste of your time.  I just think its a problem you (and many others) will ran into.  I started off kit-bashing smaller, cheaper kits and moved my way up to more complex and expensive undertakings.  I try to change every kit - ultimately to a state where the original kit is unrecognizable.  I also kit-mingle.  The wedge shaped building in the tread uses parts from several different kits.

Cheers, Mark.

[vinceg]

Well, I'm finally back and working on this. Man, it has been over a year. OK, sticking to my plan, I want to try to fully scenic one segment or town of the railroad just to have something I can call complete and something that visitors would enjoy. I have decided that Monee would be that town. If you look back a few posts, you will see that I had already planned a location for two previously built craftsman kits - SRMW Ware Knitters and Rugg Mfg. I decided that I would start north of Monee where these two industries are and work my way south.

These two industries are on the aisle side of the tracks. I don't want to be reaching over them to work on scenery near the backdrop so I will start there. This is in a corner and I decided that the FOS scale Bandit's Roost would be the anchor for that scene. I just finished the buildings for the kit. Here's the site I will start with:



The frame in front is where Ware Knitters goes (you can see it in place at the top of page 4). I put a first layer of foam down in back to just hold up the buildings. That isn't the final layout. The plan is to have the terrain mimic largely what Doug did with his demo model - increasing in height from front to back. I will be playing with this now to see how to structure it in a way that will also allow me to extend roads in both directions (left and right) to include several more buildings.

The kit was quite an experience for me - definitely overmatched considering my experience. I'll share some thoughts at the end but first some pictures of the individual buildings. I am nowhere near Opa George's creativity for innovation here. My goal was to try to go by the book to get the buildings more or less to FOS' plan.

Pictures to follow.

[vinceg]

First up is the Vallon Paint Shop and adjoining burger joint. For all of these buildings, I still have some roof stuff and detail/junk to apply. I'm waiting until I figure out the final staging to see how I want to manage that stuff.

This kit had many firsts for me. One of them is using stencils. Another is those scaffolding-style of rooftop signs (burger joint). Is there a real name for that type of sign? For the display window in the paint store, I grabbed an image of the inside of a paint store from the internet and used it inside. It sort of works -- better than just an empty bay. But, some actual details in the bay window and a background picture more aligned with the rectilinear shape of the building would be more convincing.

I like the way the corrugated siding and roofing worked throughout the kit. Another first for me - paper corrugated product rather than the metal stuff. Super easy to work with. And, props to Jason Jensen and his videos for helping me up my weathering techniques for corrugated metal. Definitely looks better to me than the Rugg roofing I did (I did a build thread on that). And, one more first - doors and windows that were made of really skinny laser-cut wood rather than plastic. Very interesting.

[vinceg]

Next up, the gas station. Another first - never did stucco before. Did the usual thing with the Durham's Rock Hard Putty. Did some practicing on scrap first. I'm pretty happy with it. The pilot model uses stucco on the posts for the island where the pump is located. I decided I preferred to just use painted wood. Another scaffolding sign. My wife noticed the dot over the 'I' in Curtis. Made all the work worthwhile.  Oh yeah, another first - task board construction. No biggie really, just a bit different.





You can see I did not do a good job of cutting out the Texaco decal. I missed some of the outer black line. I will have to decide whether I want to go in with a fine-tip Sharpie and try to fix it. Pretty sure I won't. I have learned over time that when I go back to fix something I almost always make it worse.

[vinceg]

The Callahan Machine shop. Another first - a building with angles that are not 90 degrees. Notice the signs here. The Beech-Nut sign should be black but it shows as brown because the sheet printed by FOS was done by a printer low on blue toner. The Callahan sign on the left was also a very pale brown. Fortunately, John Siekirk sent me a scan of his sheet (Thanks a bunch, John) and I was able to print one on my own printer with the proper colors. I thought about reprinting and re-doing Beech-Nut sign but felt I could live with the brown.

[vinceg]

The Harrison & Rochelle building. I love the architecture of this building. Another building with non-90 degree corners. Wasn't as difficult as I thought it would be. I especially like the tower. Instructions here (for the tower) were a bit difficult for me to follow. Many thanks to Opa George who clued me into how it went together.

The slate roof here was surprising. I had done slate before on Rugg, but South River gives you slate shingles that are made of gray paper. You only have to color the darker ones. The FOS paper was white. Had to paint it first. Small thing but something you notice when building a premium kit. Yet another scaffolding sign on the roof. I really hate building them but I love the way they look.

Also, the dormers for this building have windows with individual sashes. They also have accompanying window glazing that is pre-cut. Sounded good when I first saw it but the sizes don't match. I didn't have the patience to fully take advantage of their flexibility. I saw a comment from someone on this forum in the last week or two that said something along the lines of "I'm a layout modeler, not a contest modeler." I totally get that.

Lots of interesting details that I saw for the first time. The pulley in front is made from that skinny wood stuff. Even more interesting are the hinges for those three sets of doors in front. Takes a lot of time - those babies are really teeny -- but the effect is great once it's done.

For window glazing I tried Gallery Glass for the first time. Last time around (Rugg build) I just used Canopy glue. I have to say that I think the Canopy Glue works a little better. The Gallery Glass seems to be more prone to producing bubbles when it dries - even when you don't see them at first. Finally, I followed Doug's instructions and painted on the window shades rather than use paper. When I first did it I didn't like the effect but looking at it later I think it's OK. Again, layout modeling not contest modeling.





Looks like I was too heavy-handed on the dirt-colored chalk weathering at the base of the building. I'll go back and soften that up a bit.

[vinceg]

The stable building (or something like that). I didn't want or need a stable. Instead, I called it a Garden Supply shed. Very simple building.

[vinceg]

Last building - I don't recall what it is called. The FOS pilot model has a chute connecting this to the Harrison & Rochelle building. Not sure if I will use that or not. Will depend on how I have to lay the buildings out. Certainly a very unique structure.

Dragged out my PanPastels for the first time. I really like these. The colors and the adhesion is great. Have to be careful -- a little goes a long way. More corrugated roofing. I actually ended up being about 3/4" short of having enough roofing material. Fortunately, I took the time to stock up on a few things earlier this year and roofing was one of the things I purchased.



Those diagonal cross members on the supporting posts aren't really white -- it's just a lighting thing. I'll take another look at them now and maybe hit them with another coat of inkahol wash.

Some closing thoughts in the next post.

[vinceg]

So, this was my first FOS kit. I have to say that I think the creativity of the building designs is excellent. Not your run of the mill building designs. Doug really uses angles to create interesting looks. Also has some good construction ideas. For example, for those rooftop signs he has you make one of the legs longer and then push it through the roof to aid installation. Really helps a lot.

I was disappointed at some of the quality aspects of the kit. It was short two windows. As I mentioned above, the sign sheet was not printed properly. I feel the bracing diagrams are frequently inadequate to prevent warpage (actually, no feeling about it -- I experienced warping). The 1/8" square wood supply is far too small. Fortunately, I keep a supply of that wood around, too. I ran short of some of the strip wood, ran short of corrugated roofing paper. Perhaps if I had cut things somewhat differently I would have had exactly enough material. Shouldn't be that way, though. At the price level of these kits, I wouldn't expect to have to go scrounging for material to finish. In the boiler house for Harrison & Rochelle, one of the laser cut walls was cut to the wrong size (too big, fortunately). And, in another forum here I already commented about the way walls are intermingled on the various sheets. It is a bit of a treasure hunt to find the matching pieces for some of the buildings. I definitely got spoiled by others (FSM, SRMW) that bag each building separately so that you are ready to go. Also disappointing was the fact that I couldn't get a response back from FOS when I asked for help (missing windows, and bad sign sheet, e.g.).

Lastly, the instructions are very light. I guess I can't complain because, in the end, I was able to build the kit (with the exception of George bailing me out on the Harrison Tower). But, it was a lot of work to track things down. I frequently had to go to the Internet to look at pictures I pulled from Facebook to check a few things. I think it would be reasonable to expect a few more pictures to be included in the kit - especially given that FOS seems to be leading the pack in terms of pricing now.

In the end, I enjoyed building this....and love the result. I also have Printer's Row that I am sure will produce a great model. I'll probably think pretty hard about getting any other FOS super kits, though. And, of course, I should build my zillion FSM and SRMW kits first anyway (my wife keeps reminding me).

Time to think about how to bring this all to life with the right terrain now.

Cheers,

Vince

[ReadingBob]

Vince,

What a beautiful job you did on the build.  Absolutely stunning.     I love everything about it.  The finish you got on the corrugated roofing is something I've been trying to emulate for years with varying degrees of success.  You absolutely nailed it.      

I too echo many, if not all, of your sentiments regarding the quantity/quality of materials, instructions, etc.  I almost always find myself digging through my scrap box or strip wood stash to complete one of these builds.  It's particularly frustrating when, say, you've painted and weathered all the 1/6" square wood include in the kit for the corner trim on a structure and you come up a couple of inches short.  Then you have dig around for another piece then paint and weather it to match.  Missing parts (walls, windows, etc.) are an issue too.  Hey, I get it.  Mistakes can happen.  But they seem to happen a little more frequently than they should.  That's a real concern when you're putting these on the shelf and won't get around to building it for several years.

[Zephyrus52246]

Great works on the structures.  My only complaint is it looks like they'll be far away from the viewing aisle when you've planted them.      I agree with you (and Bob) about kit issues as well. 


Jeff

[vinceg]

Thanks, Bob. As you said, mistakes happen. But you would at least expect a response when you try to contact the supplier to report a problem. And there were many problems. The good news is we always have the elite group of modelers here that can help us out when we get in a jam.

For anyone interested, here is Jason Jensen's YouTube video on modeling corrugated metal. It definitely changed what I do:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=od4g4lKnV-o

He has videos of a lot of modeling techniques as well as pictures of his own evolving layout. Good stuff.

[vinceg]

Great works on the structures.  My only complaint is it looks like they'll be far away from the viewing aisle when you've planted them.      I agree with you (and Bob) about kit issues as well. 


Jeff

Thanks, Jeff. Yep - had the same thought about distance from the aisle. I am hoping that a somewhat dramatic terrain contour that slopes up as it goes back will help some. Also, the distance from the aisle is one of the reasons I was willing to experiment with Gallery Glass and the painted window shade technique. For close up buildings, I am hoping I will have the discipline to use thin styrene or acetate. I really like that look so much better. But, I'm a lazy sack when it comes to some things.... (another fact not lost on my wife).

[Janbouli]

Those structures look great , now get that scenery done so they loo like a great town  .