A steam powered flour mill from Keep it Rusty

[nycjeff]

This is a build thread for the "kit" that I won in the Winter Challenge, but since it's much more than just a kit I had to put it in the diorama section of the forum.

Here's a picture from the Keep it Rusty website of the completed diorama that Craig built. I can only hope to do half as good a job as he did. He is a master modeler for sure.



The box that everything came in



When I opened the box and started stacking things up on my workbench, I ran out of room.



Three bags of strip wood, a hardware bag and a large parts bag were only the beginning.



This box literally has over a hundred detail castings.



That's it for now, much more later.

[Larry C]

Jeff that certainly is a very nice prize!! I'll have to check in and see how you're progressing;
should be a beauty and exciting to watch your build.

[deemery]

Thanks for the unboxing photos.  So far, that looks like a well organized kit.   How are the instructions?

dave

[Rick]

That's a good looking kit.
Have fun building it.

[Jerry]

Looks like you have your work cut out!!

Jerry

[Mark Dalrymple]

Neat, Jeff.

Looking forward to this build.

Cheers, Mark.

[Pennman]

Jeff,

It appears the buyers of this kit got their moneys worth.
That's an enormous amount of wood. It looks like you have your work cut out for you.
I will be watching.

Rich

[craftsmankits]

Looking forward to this.  I purchased the kit, but didn't even open the box, so it's nice to see what's inside.  Will be watching.  Mark

[nycjeff]

Jeff that certainly is a very nice prize!! I'll have to check in and see how you're progressing;
should be a beauty and exciting to watch your build.

Hello Larry, a very nice prize indeed. This project will keep me busy all summer long for sure. Thanks for looking in.

Thanks for the unboxing photos.  So far, that looks like a well organized kit.   How are the instructions?

dave

Hello Dave, it is a very well organized kit.  My next post will talk about the instructions.

That's a good looking kit.
Have fun building it.

Hello Rick, it is a great looking kit, Craig obviously spent a lot of time on the research and design phase when developing it.

Looks like you have your work cut out!!

Jerry

Hello Jerry, upon opening the box, the kit is definitely intimidating,  but after reading through the instructions which took several days I think that if I take it one step at a time it will go smoothly.

Neat, Jeff.

Looking forward to this build.

Cheers, Mark.

Hello Mark, I'm looking forward to this as well

Jeff,

It appears the buyers of this kit got their moneys worth.
That's an enormous amount of wood. It looks like you have your work cut out for you.
I will be watching.

Rich

Hello Rich, it's a little misleading just calling this a kit. It's really about 5 or 6 kits in one.  If you were to total up the cost of 5 or 6 small kits, then the cost of this is a bargain.

Looking forward to this.  I purchased the kit, but didn't even open the box, so it's nice to see what's inside.  Will be watching.  Mark

Hello Mark, I hope that by watching my build you are inspired to open your box.  I would love to see what you could do with this one.

[nycjeff]

Continuing on...

The instruction manual for the kit is 96 pages long.  It gives a detailed step by step for each of the many different parts of the kit



Here's a look at the inside of the manual. There are lots of pictures along with the detailed narrative.  Also included in the kit are many pages of what Craig calls a Parts Map.  These pages give identifying details for all of the many laser cut sheets.



This is a look at a full size drawing of the diorama as Craig built it. There are also many pages of full sized templates to assist in the build.



The main mill building has all 3D printed walls shown here.  These walls along with the many, many detail castings really make this kit stand out to me



Here's a closer look at one of the walls. The detail is just amazing.



All in all, a very impressive box opening.  It took me several days to figure out what was what and to get things a little organized so that I could begin actual construction.

[nycjeff]

Before beginning construction, I wanted to give you an idea as to where the kit will be located on my layout. One of the corner scenes on the upper level of the layout was home to a grain elevator from Walthers which was served with a siding. I had been planning to do an upgrade to the scene, but when word came that I had won such a great prize from the Winter Challenge, my plans changed.



The first step was to remove all existing buildings and scenery along with the siding down to the plywood surface that makes up the upper level shelf of my layout. The single track main line of the upper level runs near the back edge and I left that alone.



As I always do, I first cut a piece of packing paper to fit the overall footprint of the scene. This gives me a pattern for the base of the new scene.



Here I've cut a piece of 1/2 inch Homosote to fit the scene. This will give me a base which I can build on. The cut-out at the right side is where the siding comes into the area.



I wanted to have a creek cutting across the area, so my first step was to cut some more of the packing paper to form a pattern for the new creek bed. This will be the location for the man bridge that I scratch built while waiting for the kit to arrive.



Well I've unboxed the kit and set the scene for it's location, so next I will actually begin to build this steam powered flour mill diorama.

[deemery]

Well, of course the proof of the instructions will be how well the kit goes together.  But the pages you show, with lots of photos, looks quite good.

dave

[Philip]

Nice looking kit and new real estate! Lot of strip wood.