Syzdek Mfg by Downtown Deco

ReadingBob · July 10, 2024, 08:45:56 PM

Jeff, my apologies for interjecting this into your thread but here's my rendition of the DD Trackside Tavern. It's been referenced in many of the Judges stories (I sure wish I had his story telling abilities). Randy, at Downtown Deco, produces some wonderful kits!

nycjeff · July 11, 2024, 08:21:06 AM

Hello Bob, no problem with you joining in. In fact, my first DD kit was the Trackside Bar and I used your build thread as a reference when doing mine.

darrylhuffman · July 11, 2024, 02:41:12 PM

I'm enjoying this thread.

One little tip on corners.

Mike Lynch offsets the corners a little so the side walls are not flush with the end walls.

The side walls are thus inset a little.

Sorry, I don't have a photo.

nycjeff · July 11, 2024, 08:31:42 PM

Hello Darryl, I appreciate you taking the time to look at my build thread. You're not the first to offfer the suggestion of offsetting the wall edges. I can see that it would be a good thing to do. I'll have to try it on my next hydrocal kit. Again, thanks for looking in. I have enjoyed following your work for some time now.

nycjeff · July 17, 2024, 08:35:33 AM

Continuing on...

Here's a picture of the almost completed covered loading dock. I've stained all the wood with my A&I solution and added a few detail castings.

As I said before, I am trying to model this kit as more of an active business than an older dilapidated one. My only criticism of this kit is the boarded up windows in the annex as shown below.

I didn't want to try to cut out the boarded up windows. The chances of breaking the wall castings was too likely if I did. So, I decided to cover them up by scratchbuilding a wood bump-out. Here's a picture of the inside of the bump-out.

And here's a picture of the bottom of the bump-out showing the floor joists and also the rafter tails on the roof. I only made the bump-out 1/2 inch deep.

Here is the bump-out after gluing it to the wall. I used black construction paper for the roof and I found some arch top windows in my Tichy stash to match up with the windows in the main building. The covered loading dock will be placed below the bump-out when all of the sub-assemblies are put together.

Vietnam Seabee · July 17, 2024, 09:20:16 AM

Great save, Jeff

terry

nycjeff · July 17, 2024, 09:21:51 AM

Hello Terry, thanks for looking in and for the kind words.

deemery · July 17, 2024, 09:40:56 AM

Consider adding some diagonal braces underneath your excellent bump-out. What I'd do is a wood beam that runs along the edge underneath the windows and below the joists, and then diagonal braces to support that against the walls. Thinking as if I were a structural engineer, seems that supporting the overhang without this brace would create quite a load on the brick wall opening where the brick wall windows were.

The one complaint I have about Randy's kits is they are too "pre-aged". Since I model 1890s, I'm looking for buildings that are relatively new. Randy says "Well, my interest is in decrepit structures."

dave

nycjeff · July 17, 2024, 09:43:34 AM

This side of the annex building has even more boarded up openings. I decided to do something a little different on here. Since the larger opening seems to be at railcar height and the location on my layout for this build is on a spur, I thought that a larger bump-out over the spur would be a good idea. I've seen several kits that use this concept and I've always liked the way they look. Here's a picture of the bare wall.

This is a look inside the larger bump-out. Again, I stained all of the wood with my A&I solution before painting. The large horizontal pieces of wood at the top and bottom fit up against the wall between the protuding window sills and lintels. It's hard to see in the picture but I had to cut the wall cladding to fit over these same areas.

A look at the bottom with the floor joists.

And a look after gluing the bump-out to the wall. I used super glue for this, it is my glue of choice when gluing different materials together.

This larger bump-out is 2 inches deep, so it needed some support at the far end. I used 5/32 stripwood for the verticals and of course stained all with the A&I. I cut a thin piece of sheet styrene for the bottom of the posts to hold it all together at the bottom. The top will be glued between the floor joists of the bump-out.

That's it for now, more later.

nycjeff · July 17, 2024, 09:53:28 AM

Quote from: deemery on July 17, 2024, 09:40:56 AMConsider adding some diagonal braces underneath your excellent bump-out. What I'd do is a wood beam that runs along the edge underneath the windows and below the joists, and then diagonal braces to support that against the walls. Thinking as if I were a structural engineer, seems that supporting the overhang without this brace would create quite a load on the brick wall opening where the brick wall windows were.

The one complaint I have about Randy's kits is they are too "pre-aged". Since I model 1890s, I'm looking for buildings that are relatively new. Randy says "Well, my interest is in decrepit structures."

dave

Hello Dave, thanks for looking in and for the as always excellent feedback. You are right about adding some support below the bump-out, but as you will see as I proceed there wasn't room below the bump-out for any supports. I am going to claim modelers license on this one and assume that the builder extended some steel beams from inside the building through the brick wall to support the bump-out. That's my story and I'm sticking to it.

You will be happy to see that I did add sufficient support under the larger extension on the side wall. Thanks for keeping me honest.

deemery · July 17, 2024, 09:53:35 AM

Ah, I missed the last post! Those supports make me feel much better!

Another thing to consider: Add a pair of steel (Evergreen/Plastruct) I-Beams parallel to the wood joists, one near each end That way, at least you're not depending on relatively weak wood joists to hold up the entire bump-out.

dave

GPdemayo · July 18, 2024, 10:54:43 AM

Really coming together Jeff.....

Mark Dalrymple · July 18, 2024, 05:34:55 PM

Looking good, Jeff.

I like the wooden support with the diagonal bracing. Very cool.

Cheers, Mark.

nycjeff · July 18, 2024, 06:59:14 PM

Quote from: GPdemayo on July 18, 2024, 10:54:43 AMReally coming together Jeff.....

Hello Greg, thanks for stopping by and for the nice comments.

Quote from: Mark Dalrymple on July 18, 2024, 05:34:55 PMLooking good, Jeff.

I like the wooden support with the diagonal bracing. Very cool.

Cheers, Mark.

Hello Mark, I don't know how prototypical that diagonal bracing is, but I just thought that it looked good.

nycjeff · July 18, 2024, 07:16:04 PM

Continuing on with the annex building.

Here is a picture of the rear wall of the annex. As you can seee, it's sort of a blank slate. I thought about adding a bunch of various signs, but I've always admired wall sized signs that I've seen on the forum.

Years ago I saved some signs that were posted here on the forum and I found this one. It doesn't really fit on the wall, but I liked the mermaid picture so I thought I would try it. I'm very pleased with how it looks.

The fourth wall of the annex is one that I built from 1/16th plywood and some 1/8 stripwood bracing. This wall goes up against the main building so it won't be seen. I just wanted to give the other three walls some added stability.

Here's a look at the roof of the annex with the larger side bump-out. The roof material is just some colored packing paper glued onto cardboard roof cards.. I cut the paper a short 1/8 inch long on all sides so that it folded up against the walls around the roof perimeter. I used some weathering chalks for color and added detail castings from my stash. The ductwork casting is from Showcase Miniatures and is all fiberboard parts glued together. I plan on adding some black sealant around the bases of the roof penetrations.