FSM Crocker Bros Feed Mill

[SteveCuster]

Hello everyone,

Next project in line is Crocker Brothers Feed Mill from Fine Scale Miniatures. This is one of the first bigger industry kits George put out 41 years ago.


Top of the box photo...


This kit was all the wood pre-bagged by section instead of the usual color coding that most FSM kits have.


Box of castings...crisp and clean as you would expect from George.


These older kits have saw cuts vertically for all the windows and door openings. You have to cut horizontally across the top to finish the opening.


After cutting out the window and door openings the pieces get glued together to close up the window openings.


Here the top and bottom are glued together to finish the wall.


For the castings I followed my usual process. I blackened all the pieces that represent mostly metal, sprayed anything to represented wood with khaki paint and a few of the concrete pieces got sprayed gray. I also washed over all the tan pieces with A&I. This gives me a good base to work with especially on the windows and doors.


Since the walls were made up of a top and bottom section I made sure the glue had dried both on the butt joint between them and all the bracing before I started working the walls. In this photo all the bracing is done and I've added some grain to the walls with a wire brush. I also pulled some of the clapboards with a razor. The section on the bottom that isn't finish will be a small strip of vertical siding.


I wanted a darker gray base for the walls so I colored them with 2 washes of A&I. This gives me a good weathered wood color for under the peeling/missing paint.


The walls were washed with mineral spirits then color with Folkart Linen paint before the mineral spirits could fully dry. This keeps the paint from fully adhering to the walls.


Once the paint was mostly dry I attacked the walls with a wire brush horizontally to pull the paint up and weather them. This same technique was used for all the walls. The wire brush can only go horizontally with the clapboards, if it's used vertically it looks terrible.


This is the before for this wall prior to weathering.


After wire brushing..

That's all for now...

Thanks for following along.

[S&S RR]

Steve


This is a fun kit to build, you are off to a great start. I will be following along.

[Oldguy]

Oooh, great start.

[EricQuebec]

I will follow your effort on this one too.
your A&I solution seems to be very more darker than mine, and I like it on the casting . What is your recipe ?
Eric

[postalkarl]

Hey Steve:

Progress shots look great.

Karl

[postalkarl]

Hey Steve:

Progress shots look great.

Karl

[nycjeff]

Hello Steve, another build already, you're on fire !  Looking forward to this one as well.   Jeff

[SteveCuster]

Thanks everyone.

Eric, I do like my all purpose A&I to be pretty dark. I use cheap amazon pipettes to measure the ink, it's about 22-24ml of india ink per 1 qt of 70% alcohol. I usually start with 20 and then add a few more drops till I'm happy with the color. I have a weaker bottle I use for signs or if I need to just tone something down slightly.

[Jerry]

I like the weathering technique.  it looks good.


Jerry

[SteveCuster]

Thanks Jerry.

I managed to dig into the kit a bit more last night. It's starting to come together now.


I added the wood along the lower portion of the walls. I've built a few kits that had this feature before and I know from experience being right up against the ground where the area will get wet during the scenery install plus the vertical scribed can really cause some warping so I made sure I had it really glued tight.


I weathered it the same as the walls...A&I base is done here.


First coat of paint after the mineral spirits.


I peeled the paint off using both tape and the edge of a xacto #11 blade. After this photo I added 2 washes of A&I over it.


I added the doors and windows, acetate and glued the walls together.

That's all so far. I did start bracing and working on the elevator portion of the structure more pictures coming soon.

Thanks for all the feedback and for everyone following along

[nycjeff]

Hello Steve, great job on weathering the walls.    Jeff

[GPdemayo]

Good start on a neat kit Steve.....I'll be looking on this for sure. 

[postalkarl]

Hey Steve:

Looking just beautiful so far. Keep up the good work.

Karl

[deemery]

The weathering on both siding and foundation boards is spot-on, the contrast between the two is particularly appealing.


dave

[ACL1504]

Steve,

It's always a fun aspect of my  day when "catching up on your threads". Nice weathering on the walls.

Tom