North Coast Railroad

[Dave Buchholz]

A few hours later...
The basic truck shed. It needs to be puttied and painted of course. Also a pit below and a fill pipe above coming from the mill house will be added as things proceed.

In the corner by the first silo is what I'm thinking will create my electrical connections to light up the tower.

As mentioned the actual prototype had huge cables for running power, so I'm thinking having exposed wire going to the model isn't a necessarily a bad thing overall. Makes disconnections easier if needed later on.

Any thoughts?

[Dave Buchholz]

I'm sure many of you are of a similar mind, that we get burned out on one task, and before further brain cramps occur, move on to something else.

(One momentous discovery tonight was remembering that tiny LED lamps have an incredibly short life at a full 12 bolts. Of course that was rediscovered AFTER the 12 bolts was applied)

So I moved on to the mill building of the silo complex and did a little further imagineering while little whiffs of LED smoke drifted over the North Coast harbor.

I tend not to detail things not seen. Like the backside of a building. Seems like kind of a waste to put parts on something that will never be seen by anything but spiders trying to catch whatever else is crawling around downstairs. I prefer to load up more detail to the more visible areas.

So the Milling building will get a truck dumping pit and and truck dock. I decided the dock should be directly under the original door that is several floors up. The impression to me is that there would be an elevator behind those doors.

Earlier today, a memory returned from  when I was a kid. Iwr grew up in Buffalo, on the East Side. There is a history of   flour milling in Buffalo.
My uncle Pete worked in  the second George Urban flour mill. ( Now the Wonder Bread factory) He gave us a tour once. Indeed there were elevators  and conveyors inside.

So now after you have read through all that trivia (polite word for "crap") here is an initial progress pic of the changes. I added a nicer employee door from my scrap parts box. The dock, steps and dock door will add a bit more character and purpose to the exposed side.

Obviously it's just a preliminary picture at this point, needing paint,  an awning and safety rails, pallets etc.

[Pennman]

Nice work so far Dave. It looks like you know what you're doing.

Regarding your perspective of not detailing sides not seen, what works for you sounds like a great plan.
If you recall from one of my last builds on the Railroad Line Forums, whereby I pin my buildings to a base,
rather than glue them down, I can remove them later to feature another side. I can't do that if it is glued.
So, to this day, I do detail all four sides of my structures. It's just me I know. And, if I give a building
away to another person, he or she may want to feature a different side than I did, so that works.
Keep at it.

Rich

[friscomike]

So I moved on the the mill building of the silo complex and did a little further imagineering while little whiffs of LED smoke drifted over the North Coast harbor.

Howdy Dave, 

Uh, funny, not funny. Indeed, there is no benefit to modelers in letting the smoke out of the lights.

Have fun,
mike

[deemery]

Actually, it's not the Volts but the Current that lets out the LED magic smoke.   The easiest way to manage this is with the Current Limiters that Microlumina sells.  Bill had a really great instruction sheet/tip on how to plan LED lighting, but I can't find a copy on the intertubes.  

dave

[Dave Buchholz]

Thanks for the reminder of current limiting applications. Might have some limiters kicking around in the electronics parts box.

If you or anyone finds that article, please feel free to link it in this topic.  Thanks

Dave#5

[Dave Buchholz]

If you recall from one of my last builds on the Railroad Line Forums, whereby I pin my buildings to a base,rather than glue them down, I can remove them later to feature another side. I can't do that if it is glued.
Rich

Good point. Do you use actual sewing pins, vs small nails?  Are they set into mounting blocks in the lower corners of the structure? Got a picture or two?

Thanks for the insight.

Dave #5

[Mark Dalrymple]

Looking good, Dave.

I typically don't spend too much time on the back of my structures.  Although, all the photos from the caboose and selfie sticks on the F&SM changed my philosophy a little on this.  I used to just put plain sheet plastic on the backs, now I'm inclined to add a bit more detail.  I also move around a lot on projects, although my reason is that I tend to lose motivation as soon as I have solved all the problems on a project.  Every year I make a list of projects to be finished (with the best intentions of finishing some of those off) and every year that list gets longer!

I stumbled across that MRR article I mentioned earlier in the thread.  I've added a photo of the multi page spread.  Let me know if you would like a copy.  It is in the July 1973 issue.  I realise you have your project all sorted, but just thought it might be of intrest.  The plans sure picture a cool looking project!



Cheers, Mark.

[Dave Buchholz]

Mark, I'd greatly appreciate a copy.

Nothing is ever really sorted on the North Coast. Maybe sordid instead. The chief operations engineer has no clue as to what the hell he is doing from day to day. Kinda like "Oh look ! A Squirrel!"

I will PM my email address to you. Might be easiest to simply sent things as attached  documents.

In some prior pictures,behind the silo/mill/marine leg structure is a malting operation.(Beeeeer...mhhmmmm!)

What a coincidence!  Beer is/will be a featured operation on the North Coast.

Maybe not so coincidental, there was a malting operation on the prototype  RW&O at Sodus Bay NY for the Genesee Brewing Company.  Grain was brought in commonly from Canada across Lake Ontario. Another malting house,  Perot Malting was in Buffalo NY along the harbor/riverfront. It does tours in the Summer as part of the ,"Silo City" historical tours.

The last two images are from the Perot operation on Buffalo, past and current. Note one picture features TWO marine leg towers!  One moves on  a carriage full railroad wheels. The other is stationary.

[Dave Buchholz]

Sometimes different textures are only a rattle can away.

[Dave Buchholz]

Lots of detailing options exist via some Walther's accessory kits for industries. I've been going through boxes and  boxes and drawers of stuff simply in an effort to remind myself of all the "wonderful  inspirational hobbie materials" I possess!
( In other words, all this crap I've collected for the past  40+ years and haven't done a damn thing with!)

[Pennman]

If you recall from one of my last builds on the Railroad Line Forums, whereby I pin my buildings to a base,rather than glue them down, I can remove them later to feature another side. I can't do that if it is glued.
Rich

Good point. Do you use actual sewing pins, vs small nails?  Are they set into mounting blocks in the lower corners of the structure? Got a picture or two?

Thanks for the insight.

Dave #5

Dave,
Looking back at post #40, on my thread, (Sierra West Brass & Iron Foundry Scratchbuild), I showed a box of Map Tacks. There, I used them to make a vent for the outside of the building that is mounted on the wall. I also use them to pin my structures to foam, by gluing them to the bottom of buildings, then push the building into the foam. The tacks keep the buildings from moving around. I suppose you could do the same thing using thumb tacks, as long as the spikes are at least 1/4" to 3/8" in length. Also make sure the tack heads are somewhat flat so they seat themselves after gluing.
You could also use brads that have a flat top surface, by epoxying them to the bottom of your structures.

Another reason why I use this method to seat my buildings is when spreading a dirt cover or ground foam around buildings, it's a lot easier to see the actual building perimeter as you go to seat the building. You don't have to brush away the ground cover to find the lines you drew for the perimeters on a sheet of paper you glued to the ground surface. It eliminates the use of the paper.

It's all in fun, my friend, although I'm no expert, I just do what I can to get by.

Rich

[Dave Buchholz]

As a throw back to past history of the Marine leg tower, the original build was lost with the demise of the old Railroad Lines Forum. I'm simply adding a historical photo to show what it was developed from, It was no more than Evergreen sheet plastic and structural shapes purchased from a local hobby store  It has come a long way from an inspiration and idle thoughts caused by a visit to Buffalo's harbor.

[elwoodblues]

Dave,

Love the throw back photo.  I can see that the project has come a long way since that photo.

[Dave Buchholz]

Uh ohh!

The silo complex in the harbor on the North Coast Railroad had a surprise visit today. It was raided by OHSA !

Apparently they found a number of critical safety violations!
OSHA immediately shut down operations! Somebody is about to catch hell!
There are zero lights for night shift operations and no guard rails whatsoever on the upper decks to keep workers from falling to their deaths far below. Why there are even doors that open up to sky!  No fire escape or observation decks. Just rushing air as gravity takes over!

Add there is grain dust everywhere, just waiting to explode because of the lack of dust collectors and cyclones.


Back to reality...
So today was more a thinking day. Finding boxes of detail parts and electrical components to add things like exterior and interior lighting. Vents , dust collectors, fire escapes, safety railings. In other words, all the cool stuff that doesn't come with the original Walther's mill & silo kit.

I'm making a safety railing jig for soldering up brass rail. It isn't quite all glued together yet. I'll post up a few pics as things progress.

Fifth Dave to the right