SRMW TUCKER & COOK MILL - 2021 Build Challenge

[S&S RR]

Jan, Jerry, and Karl


Thank you for stopping by this thread.  Life got in the way of me finishing this years challenge build on time, but I got back at it the last couple of days and here are a couple of progress pictures.  I finished the roofs and started adding the roof details.  You will also notice that the fire escape made it's way back from the paint booth and has been installed.


I have posted about the bench cookies I have in constant use on my workbenches,  you will see another great use for them in these pictures.












I have not used the eraser on the chimney, yet.  You are seeing it just after I applied the chalk for the grout.

[Mark Dalrymple]

You're making me nervous, John...

...I hope there are no earthquakes over night!

Cheers, Mark.

[GPdemayo]

Love the Rube Goldberg solution to keeping the rod and stack vertical till the glue dries.....

[postalkarl]

Hey John:

The roof looks just great.

Karl

[S&S RR]

You're making me nervous, John...

...I hope there are no earthquakes over night!

Cheers, Mark.

Mark 


Earthquakes in Michigan are pretty rare. I probably shouldn't say that .  I have experience three of them in my life time and they were pretty tame.  The worst one I thought the wheel fell off my chair until the computer monitor was rocking. Nothing like what you have experienced. The gripping material on the bench cookies does a good job of holding things in place - I will give you that the square looks unstable in the picture. 

[S&S RR]

Love the Rube Goldberg solution to keeping the rod and stack vertical till the glue dries.....

Greg


Thank you for stopping by the thread - I do like to find a way to hold things in place until the glue dries.

[S&S RR]

Hey John:

The roof looks just great.

Karl

Karl


Thank you for the compliment - I'm pretty happy with it - this is the first time I have used Bob's tile roofing with the markers. I have the Sayles mill coming up next so I will get to use the technique again, soon.

[nycjeff]

Hello John, I don't know, your dirty railroad crew members will never want to leave such a nice place. Great job.    Jeff

[S&S RR]

Hello John, I don't know, your dirty railroad crew members will never want to leave such a nice place. Great job.    Jeff

Jeff


Interesting comment - I have been doing a lot of research on the copper mines in Michigan's Upper Peninsula. I went to college up there at Michigan Tech. Univ. and Yes the research is for a future modeling project on the S&S RR.  Anyway, the mines all had a shower locker facility where the miners could clean up before heading home.  I'm making the dye house from the mill into a bath house for the railroad workers before they head into the Crew Quarters for some R and R.

[S&S RR]

I managed to make a little more progress on the build so I thought I would post a couple progress pictures.
















I need to decide how far I want to take this before I move it to the layout for final detailing. I think I'm going to add some of the scenery and details close to the buildings.  The front loading dock needs to be added once it's on the layout because it spans two different baseboards. I will be deviating from usual mill yard clutter because this is a crew quarters, now.

[S&S RR]

I decided to mount the gator board base to the plywood Benchwork base before moving on with the detailing of this build.  It will share the same plywood base as my 2020 Challenge build of the FSM 145 Coaling tower.  Here is a picture of the dry fit on my workbench.

[deemery]

A nit :-)  Seems to me the 'crew quarters' would get a lot more dirt and dust from locos fueling at the coal tower.  That's both coal dust and smoke residue as the loco sits and smokes while being fueled. 


dave

[S&S RR]

Here are a few pictures to describe the mounting process. I have been using a 3/16 inch gator board for the structure build on this section of my layout and then mounting it to the 3/4 inch plywood benchwork base.  The process has worked well for this area of my layout, but I should note that for my future sections of the layout, I will be mounting the structures directly to the 3/4 inch plywood baseboard.  The advantage of the gator board is that it is light weight and makes it easy to move from workbench to workbench through the build process. It was also easier to take a build to a show. I found that the light weight came at a cost in dollars, durability and stability.  I broke a corner off my 1/2 inch gator board base on my Beach Farms build lifting it in to place. And I have had to clamp out some warping of the models when mounting the gator board to the plywood. I don't want to start a "Nail hole" debate on this - I just prefer to work with wood and will be completing each section of the layout on a piece of manageable weight 3/4 inch plywood from this point forward. I really like the 3/4 inch exterior grade plywood that Mernards sells. I stocked up last year thankfully before all the inflation kicked in. Most of the landform stack up will be accomplished with wood stack - ups for the structure baseboards.  I will still use the 1 inch foam for landforms that are glue in place.


Here is the plywood base with the FSM 145 Coal tower already mounted.

[S&S RR]

A nit :-)  Seems to me the 'crew quarters' would get a lot more dirt and dust from locos fueling at the coal tower.  That's both coal dust and smoke residue as the loco sits and smokes while being fueled. 


dave

Dave


I remember asking a guy that worked in a paper mill how he could stand the smell.  His response was "what smell".


I'm sure the employees of the S&S RR that made a living running steam trains fired by coal would say "what dust and smoke". Reference the pictures of the high line running through NYC.    I can't imagine what it was like in these yards with all the locomotives fired up. Oh wait a minute - I have seen it in China. Actually, a good point Dave but I don't think it was a design criteria in the 1949 timeframe.

[S&S RR]

Step One: Drill the clearance holes for the LED wires.