Winter challenge 2024 - The South Tellynott wedge

[Mark Dalrymple]

Hi guys.

It's time for me to throw my hat in the ring! I've been thinking about this challenge since it's announcement.  I even went so far as to do a matrix, rating all the projects I could think of under several different headings, until I ended up with five shortlisted projects.  I then doubled the scores for the two most important categories and the South Tellynott wedge narrowly took out Thorndikes mill kitbash.

Photo 1 - Here is the area.  Its exactly 288 square inches.  It took some time to work this out!  If you look closely you can see the big wedge has been broken up into lots of smaller pieces to measure.  I laid the piece of paper on the layout top and creased the shape of the curved backdrop into it.  Likewise, I ran my thumb around the track to mark the two tracks on it.  I then drew an offset line on the inside of the track and worked out a 288inch area.  I may move this area slightly to the left or right, re working out the area, if I end up with half a structure on one end.


Photo 2 - This is the river to the left of the wedge.  A rail road bridge will cross the river here and the road will then curve around in the same direction as the track, but closer to the backdrop, gaining in elevation.  At some point it will need to curve back the other way and exit into the backdrop.


Photo 3 - Here we see the Thorndike Mills kitbash mock-up.  The South Tellynott wedge is behind this.


Photo 4 - Shows the position of the wedge.


Photo 5 - Here we see the scenery to the right of the wedge.


Now you all know where the wedge will reside.  The next part will be deciding what kits, bashes, scratches will be needed and where exactly the road will go.  This may go smoothly or it may involve a lot of problem solving and many iterations before I come up with something I am happy with.

More soon, cheers, Mark.

[Mark Dalrymple]

Hi guys.

Photo 1 - One of my first mock up tools is some polystyrene formers for roading.  I got these strips of around 3" square pieces from work several years ago.  They are packing strips.  You can see I have marked an angle on the side of these pieces and marked them into 2" chunks.  I first cut the angle with my circular saw and then cut the 2" sections on my drop saw.  Easy does it. Both saws did not quite cut all the way through - which I think was a good thing - as the strips stayed as long, although rather flexible, strips.  I finished off the cuts with a sharp knife.  The angled pieces were glued onto rectangular 2" blocks for greater height.


Photo 2 - Here they are forming a curved road.  I'm test fitting the bases from a Faller brewery kit here.


Photo 3 - This photo (I'm afraid I don't know where I got this one) has been pinned to the benchwork in front of this corner for several years now.  I've always seen it as the main inspiration for this area.


Photo 4 - So when I saw this photo in an email update from a New Zealand based shop - and at an excellent sale price - I took a gamble and bought one.


Photo 5 - I've built at least one Faller kit before, and they have multi layers parts that fit together.  This makes them difficult to alter.  However - I do intend to attempt to change up the height of this kit, and perhaps splay it around the curve of the road.  The back of the kit will face the viewer.  Here is a quick sketch of what I have in mind.  I had a quick look online to see what I could find in the way of kitbashes for this brewery - but not only could I find nothing, I could not even find a photo of this kit where someone had painted the pieces a different colour than factory.  I guess I'm going to be the first! (I seriously doubt this).


This is a BIG project.  The last few days I have felt like moving away from my track design/ road bed/ cork trip that I have been on.  I still have a bit to do there, but I guess it's time for some juggling.  I've been keen to get this area designed, imagineered into being, so even if I do not finish on time it will be a great section of the layout to have well underway.

More soon, cheers, Mark.

[jerryrbeach]

Mark,

That's quite an ambitious project.  I'll be following along, even looks like I managed a seat in the front row!

[GPdemayo]

That's going to quite a structure Mark, looking forward to seeing you put it together.....

[deemery]

I love a good kitbash!

The local radio station had a raffle for a $15,000 travel gift card.  If we win, we're coming to visit :-)

dave

[ACL1504]

Mark, Cheers,

I'll be in the group following this fantastic build. Great start.

Tom

[Mark Dalrymple]

Mark,

That's quite an ambitious project.  I'll be following along, even looks like I managed a seat in the front row!

Indeed you did, Jerry.  Welcome, and thanks for coming!

Yes - it will keep me entertained for a while.  I still need to juggle my layout construction and the large scratchbuild for behind Graves elevators - just to the left of the river shown above.  I've been plodding away at this one.  Each Thursday modelling session a seem to get one more subassembly done.

Cheers, Mark.

[Mark Dalrymple]

That's going to quite a structure Mark, looking forward to seeing you put it together.....

Thanks, Gregory.

Yes.  Pretty much no words in the instructions.  It has one short paragraph in the beginning and then it is all pictures with part numbers.  There are 657 parts so I figure the build could take up quite a bit of bench space!

Cheers, Mark.

[Mark Dalrymple]

I love a good kitbash!

The local radio station had a raffle for a $15,000 travel gift card.  If we win, we're coming to visit :-)

dave

Thanks, Dave.

Yes - Its been a while and I've been itching to do one!  I've got many kits to choose from.  I want to through in a few craftsman kitbashes here too - a few smaller wooded structures along with the larger cast concrete and brick.  I pulled out Bar Mills Majestic hardware and feed, thinking about this project.  I've had this kit for years, but never found a space that was right for it.  The idea suddenly came to me that I could cut the kit in half and get two different half relief structures out of it.  I'm not saying it will work - but it will get investigated.  That's what this planning stage is all about.  Sometimes the idea is fantastic, but it just doesn't fit the diorama.  The sketches still get filed away as a possibility for a future project.

Let me know when you're on the plane and I'll start cleaning up the model room!  Actually - when we came to the USA in 2015, my wife had won a teaching prize which was two weeks paid leave and $10,000 towards travel costs to travel to Australia and visit five different schools.  She asked if instead of Australia she could visit USA and instead of visiting five different schools could attend a week of math conferences in Boston.  We took the trip over the NZ school holidays, so she got another two weeks paid leave.  This ended up paying for about half of our five week trip.  In that trip I managed to fit in meeting George and Cathy and seeing the F&SM in the flesh and attending the Modelers Expo in Scranton.  We also did some fantastic drives including a 12 day drive around the Colorado plateau.

Cheers, Mark.

[Mark Dalrymple]

Mark, Cheers,

I'll be in the group following this fantastic build. Great start.

Tom

Thanks, Tom. 

Great to have you along for the ride.  There will be a lot of time spent planning in this one.

Cheers, Mark.

[deemery]

I've done several RDA kits as "cut in half, add the back panels to the front to make the mill twice as long"...

dave

[ReadingBob]

Neat! Extremely ambitious too but you'll knock it out of park.

[Mark Dalrymple]

Neat! Extremely ambitious too but you'll knock it out of park.

Thanks, Bob.

I'll give it a go.  But everyone is along for the discovery stage as well.  I can never predict how that will go.  I've got to get things to the mock-up stage where I say 'YES!  Now that works!'  Hopefully I'll get there...

Cheers, Mark.

[deemery]

Well, it doesn't look like I won the $15k travel lottery.  Bummer!  So I'll just have to follow your build here.

dave

[Mark Dalrymple]

Hi guys.

So I got a quick mockup made yesterday.  Still a bit of work - but very necessary.  Its fairly crude - without any of the details in the kit.

Photo 1 - Shows a bit of an overall to see how the mass of the complex might fit in the scene.


Photo 2 - A bit closer.  I photographed things first with the windows drawn in pencil and with just polystyrene formers supporting the structure.  When I uploaded things you couldn't make out the windows at all.  I drew them on with a black marker.  Adding the rock casting made a huge difference to the visualisation process.  It seemed to go from unbelievable to quite logical in a flash!


Photo 3 - Shows the view from the end.  The rooftop details here are very different to my quick representation.


Photo 4 - One of my concerns with this layout is that the kit is very wide, and it leaves very little room at the left end for structures on the other side of the road.  Here I have mocked up the road to let me consider changing the shape of the left hand wing by angling the side facing the road.  This would allow half relief structures behind.  I think this idea has potential, so I will consider it further and look closely at what this will involve kitbash wise.


Photo 5 - My potential colour scheme.


More soon, cheers, Mark.