Fountain Brewery kitbash #2 - 2021 winter build challenge

[Mark Dalrymple]

Hi guys.

Since its now mid morning of the new year here in NZ, I thought I'd get started on this years winter build challenge.
   
If you've been following my Tellynott and Shadowlands thread you'll know I recently bought myself a second Fountain Brewery kit with the intent of mingling the walls and creating a couple of different looking kitbashes.  This kit has four gable walls that are all different, as well as a front and back that are different.  Half of these walls have arched windows and half have squared windows.  For my first kitbash I used the walls with arched windows, and so I felt that another large kitbash in a different shape and using squared windows would look quite different.  The Fountain Brewery kit was made by Magnuson models, and later by Scale Structures.  I ended up with one of each.  What I didn't count on was walls of quite different sizes!  The Magnuson walls are significantly smaller than the Scale Structures walls - by some 1/4" in height, and 1/8" in width.  This caused some issues that I struggled to solve, so in the end I felt it necessary to make a mould of a single gable wall and make three castings to be used as part of the bash.

I always make a half reasonable mock-up of any kit I bash, as I find this necessary to check that it will work in my cityscape.  The town of Tellynott is on a steep slope, with many curving roads at grade.  I like both the look and the challenge of this.  In fact, when designing the roads in this area of my layout I photocopied a road map of Lyttelton, a nearby port town with very steep terrain, and used a section of this on my plan.  As this was a lot of the inspiration for this part of my layout, Tellynott takes its name from Lyttelton, of which it is a an anagram.  For my mock-ups, I generally scan and print the walls, cut them out, and then attach them to a cardboard 3-D mock-up.  I start with a site plan along with surrounding elevations.  Things are checked regularly by placing the mock-up in situ as I build, and changes can then be made if necessary - which they almost always are!

Photos 1 and 2 - show the mock-up in position on the layout.  The small gable one story section at the left end of the structure will likely be scratchbuilt out of timber.  So too will the covered stairwell, which I think will help disguise the two rectangular front walls being identical.

Photo 3 - shows the two boxes including images of the original kit design.

Photo 4 - shows the walls I will likely use laid out.  I will also use City Classics spare side and back walls at the back of the structure as well as 1.5mm sheet styrene.

Photo 5 and 6 - show the difference in wall height of the two back walls of the kit.  There will have to be a bit of consideration and tweaking to address this issue moving forwards.

More soon, cheers, Mark.

[Keep It Rusty]

That mock up looks great and I'm sticking around to see your journey! Great start!

[jerryrbeach]

Mark,


I'm not sure what I enjoy more; the backstory, the planning and mockups, or the modeling.  Lucky for me, I have no need to choose.  I'm going to tune in, sit back and enjoy all aspects of this build. 

[deemery]

The difference in size between Magnuson and SS Ltd is -really surprising-.  If I had to guess, I'd speculate that SS Ltd used a mold compound that has 5%-10% shrinkage. 

I have this kit (SS Ltd version, I think).  I found the back part in the original box, but the front parts were removed for some test fitting on my previous layout.  I'm sure they'll show up at some point.

dave

[S&S RR]

Mark


Thank you for getting things started for this years challenge. I will be following along. At the time of this post we are still dealing with 2020 here in Michigan, USA.

[NEMMRRC]

Very nice. I enjoy the older kits. I guess because I drooled over the Walthers catalog repeatedly when I first joined the hobby back in the early 1990's shortly before OJ made his famous getaway in the white Bronco....


Jaime

[Raymo]

Nice! These Magnuson kits always look great when built.

[John B]

Mark,


I know I have this kit somewhere; so I too will be following along on your build...if only I could remember what I did with my kit...

[Mark Dalrymple]

I'm not sure what I enjoy more; the backstory, the planning and mockups, or the modeling.  Lucky for me, I have no need to choose.  I'm going to tune in, sit back and enjoy all aspects of this build.

Thanks very much, Jerry.  I'll try to keep you entertained.

Cheers, Mark.

[Mark Dalrymple]

The difference in size between Magnuson and SS Ltd is -really surprising-.  If I had to guess, I'd speculate that SS Ltd used a mold compound that has 5%-10% shrinkage.

Thanks for this Dave.  It sounds feasible.  Doesn't make it any less of a pain, though.

Its good that its not just me who likes to play around with kit walls and then not put them back in their box!

Cheers, Mark.

[Mark Dalrymple]

That mock up looks great and I'm sticking around to see your journey! Great start!

Thanks, Craig.

I like the way the mock-up looks.  Its a bit more work to turn the kit into this likeness.  There will be a fair bit of cutting and splicing and fitting to do.  Resin isn't my favourite to work with, either.  Its very hard and brittle and has to be glued with that horrid sticky 2 part epoxy that takes 16 hours to cure.  I tried to get some epoxy in separate tubes rather than the double barrel stuff.  I could only find it in small tubs - which might have been OK - but I could find no information about working time, set time and cure time - which I deemed as pretty important information, so just went with another tube of the devil I know.

Cheers, Mark.

[Mark Dalrymple]

Thank you for getting things started for this years challenge. I will be following along. At the time of this post we are still dealing with 2020 here in Michigan, USA.

You are very welcome, John!

Yes - with us being in Summer, and day light savings time, we are even closer to lapping you guys.  In fact the time difference between here and Hawaii is only 1 hour (or more correctly, 23 hours).

I listened to the latest Planet Money podcast yesterday.  One of the presenters of the show is from New Zealand and he travelled back home from the US to spend time with family.  They finished the show with a recording of him leaving his 14 day quarantine, walking out, removing his mask and then shaking a random strangers hand - which he said was the first time he had done so in 9 months.  He is actually an ex student from the school my wife teachers at, so she is keen to get him along to talk to the kids.

Cheers, Mark.

[GPdemayo]

Looking forward to seeing how this develops Mark.....

[Mark Dalrymple]

Very nice. I enjoy the older kits. I guess because I drooled over the Walthers catalog repeatedly when I first joined the hobby back in the early 1990's shortly before OJ made his famous getaway in the white Bronco....

Thanks, Jaime.

I think I saw what George Sellios did with many of these kits and bought a bunch a decade or so ago when the exchange rate between NZ and the USA was good (for me).  I always intended to do large multi story kitbashes with them, but over the years I have shied away from this look, tending more towards small to medium sized structures.  I feel my layout is too small for huge stacks of kits,  Also, more smaller structures helps keep things in scale and give the illusion of making my layout appear larger.  I still have a few fairly large low relief structures, but no where near as big as the F&SM.

Cheers, Mark.

[Mark Dalrymple]

Nice! These Magnuson kits always look great when built.

Thanks, Raymo.

Yes - they have a bit of a unique look to them.  I really like the gable ends of the brewery, and also the versatility of the different shaped windows.  I found a photo of the original structure online recently - the kit is a pretty good likeness.

Cheers, Mark.