Modbury

[65179]

Ian,

 

It's probably less fun than building it up yourself, but if your station building is to be based on Bovey Tracey have you thought of using the Scalelink etched kit?

 

Regards,

 

Simon

[Ian Smith]

Ian,

 

It's probably less fun than building it up yourself, but if your station building is to be based on Bovey Tracey have you thought of using the Scalelink etched kit?

 

Regards,

 

Simon

 

Simon,

I did look at the Scalelink kit, but I decided that since I would be using Slaters embossed plasticard for the stonework on all of the buildings (Signal Box base, Goods Shed, and weigh bridge building) that I wanted them all to match (or at least look like they were built from the same material).  Additionally, the only photos I could find of the N Gauge Bovey Tracey building are all actually of the 4mm scale one, so I didn't really know what I would have got!

 

But you're right, there is (for me) far more satisfaction in scratch building something than having it (almost) ready made.  It's one of the reasons that you won't find any re-wheeled N gauge stock on my layout too :-) (not that is much RTR stock that would be suitable anyway)

 

Ian

[Ian Smith]

A little more progress on the Main Station Building...

 

As alluded to in the previous post, because the building is going to be clad in embossed stone plasticard which is 0.020" thick, adding this to the outside of the 0.040" main structure walls will mean that the windows and doors will be recessed some 0.060" (1.5mm or a scale 9").  I feel that this will be too much, so the area around each window/door reveal was milled away to give a roughly 0.020" deep recess in the main structure walls :

 

A few of the walls after cleaning off the "rag" caused by milling (a bit of a scrub with a fibre glass pencil) :

 

The main walls assembled (although the end extensions haven't been fixed to the main structure yet as I need to add the flat roofs to these before I fit them in place) :

Platform side

Non-platform side

 

Once the end extensions have been fixed in place, the next stage will be to fit the quoins around the wall corners, the stones in the window/door reveals and the plinths around the foot of the walls before the embossed stonework is fretted to fit between all of these - that'll keep me quiet for an hour or two :-)  I also need to cut and fit the internal walls between the waiting room/ booking hall and office.

 

Ian

 

Edited August 27, 2022 by Ian Smith
Replacement of photos

[Miss Prism]

A note of warning on plasticard platforms.The difference between the temperature expansion coefficients of typical polystyrene plastic and wood is disturbingly large. I did some long-ish platforms (about 6' in length, in two sections, with a join over a baseboard joint) some time ago, and very similar in style to yours. I knew there was going to be an issue with temperature expansion, so I built in some slop in the fixings and put in a 'sliding fit' thingie at the ramp end of the platform where it abutted a barrow crossing, but I had not envisaged the expansion difference would be as great as it turned out to be. The room the layout was in was largely dry, but subject of course to natural seasonal variations in atmospheric humidity. The room temperature variation was typically 5 degrees in winter to 30 degrees in high summer. For that 25 degree span, over the 6' length, I was experiencing an expansion differential in the region of 1.5mm to 2mm.

[Ian Smith]

A note of warning on plasticard platforms.The difference between the temperature expansion coefficients of typical polystyrene plastic and wood is disturbingly large. I did some long-ish platforms (about 6' in length, in two sections, with a join over a baseboard joint) some time ago, and very similar in style to yours. I knew there was going to be an issue with temperature expansion, so I built in some slop in the fixings and put in a 'sliding fit' thingie at the ramp end of the platform where it abutted a barrow crossing, but I had not envisaged the expansion difference would be as great as it turned out to be. The room the layout was in was largely dry, but subject of course to natural seasonal variations in atmospheric humidity. The room temperature variation was typically 5 degrees in winter to 30 degrees in high summer. For that 25 degree span, over the 6' length, I was experiencing an expansion differential in the region of 1.5mm to 2mm.

 

Russ,

Thanks for that bit of info.  As my platforms are only about 21-22 inches long (including ramps) hopefully I will not experience a huge expansion/contraction issue, but it is something to be wary of so thank you.

 

Ian

[Ian Smith]

A little more work on the Main Station Building...

 

The plinths have been added around the building from strips of 0.020", this is simply to build up the depth of the plinth as they will be clad in further strips of 0.020" embossed stone.  Before adding the corbels around the tops of the extension walls, lines were scribed parallel to the wall tops with the aid of dividers.  The corbels themselves are built up with strips of 0.030" and 0.020".  I felt that the thickness of the wall top wasn't quite enough above the corbels so added individual stones from more 0.020"and once fully hardened, the mortar lines around the corbelling was chopped out with a sharp scalpel.

 

The quoin stones around the wall corners on the extensions were tackled next.  However, before the quoin stones could be added around the corners, dividers were used to scribe a pair of lines to delineate the edges of the stones using the corner vertical for the datum (the scribed lines on one side need to be slightly further away from the edge to take account of the 0.020" strips used for the quoin stones).  Individual over-length quoin stones were then secured to one side of the corner using those scribed lines and left to dry overnight.  Once fully dry, the excess was trimmed back to the edge of the wall vertical and further individual quoin stones added on the other side of the corner (once these were fully dry the excess was removed again to give the illusion of full stones at the corner).  While adding these, similar sized individual stones were added around the door reveals.

 

To form the arch stones around the tops of the doorways, a patch of 0.020" was cut to be a snug fit within the quoins and the inside of the arch carved and filed in this patch to match the existing arch in the main wall.  Once the inside had been finished, the patch was removed and dividers were used again to scribe the outside edge of the arch stones parallel to in inner arch.  The excess around the arch was chopped away and neatened with a little filing before mortar lines were cut out and the complete stone arch fitted in place.

 

The window surround stones in the extensions were formed in the same way as the door arches - patches of 0.020" cut to fit between plinth, corbel and quoins and then cut, carved and filed to match the window reveal in the main walls.

 

Once the patch had a correct sized window in it, it was removed and lines scribed to delineate the surrounding stonework, including the sill and the arch.

 

The excess was simply cut away to leave a stone window surround that could be added around the window in the main wall.

 

Embossed stonework was then cut to size and fitted around the windows.  I found it easier to do this in two pieces, making the join halfway across the window reveal.  hopefully, the following images will illustrate.

 

 

Finally a photo of the "finished" extension housing the Parcels Office and Coal Store.  Because the areas of plain wall between and around the double doors in the end wall were so small, I decided to cut individual stones from 0.020" plain plasticard in lieu of embossed plasticard for these tiny areas.

 

 

With the end extensions "finished" the next phase will be to perform the same operations on the walls of the main central section of the building.  This will be done in exactly the same manner as described but I have no doubt will take somewhat longer.

 

Ian

 

Edited August 27, 2022 by Ian Smith
Replacement of photos

[Kris]

What fantastic painstaking work with exceptional results. 

[nick_bastable]

very clever but I think I would cheat and cut / score by a laser

 

Nick

[Miss Prism]

very clever but I think I would cheat and cut / score by a laser

 

Well I suspect Ian likes building buildings the way he builds buildings, and I like it. This new laser-fangled stuff would I feel give too precise a cut, unbefitting Ian's layout and period. Besides which, what can a laser do about the nice angled and rounded edges?

[nick_bastable]

latest models will also cut in 3d although for me its a step to far and to expensive

 

NIck

[Donw]

Excellent work Ian I don't know how you manage to do it.

Don

[Ian Smith]

very clever but I think I would cheat and cut / score by a laser

 

Nick

 

Nick, for a very short time I did consider drawing the building in 3D and getting it printed (much like Ian Morgan has for his Freshwater buildings), but I don't think that the process is good enough yet (at least for the money that I would be prepared to pay).  So I fell back on my favourite method of producing model architecture - I  find plasticard much easier to work than card, although I readily accept that others feel the exact opposite.

 

Well I suspect Ian likes building buildings the way he builds buildings, and I like it. This new laser-fangled stuff would I feel give too precise a cut, unbefitting Ian's layout and period. Besides which, what can a laser do about the nice angled and rounded edges?

 

Russ, you are quite right I do enjoy making buildings the way that I do.  Once the main structure has been constructed in 0.040" you can get an idea of what the building will look like, it's size, shape, etc, and as the layers are added the whole thing seems come alive as it were - it's really very satisfying (at least to me), which is of course what a hobby should be!

 

Excellent work Ian I don't know how you manage to do it.

Don

 

Don, thank you.  I don't think that I do anything particularly special!

 

Ian

[andy stroud]

The stonework as seen up close in that last picture is beautifully modelled.

[Ian Smith]

Over the last couple of weeks further progress has been made on the station building for Modbury.  With the end extensions complete, strips of 0.020" were added around the main part of the building to pack out the plinths at the feet of the walls, and the corbeling was built up along the tops of the long walls wrapping a few mm around the ends from further strips of 0.020" and 0.040".  These were all added over length, and once the solvent had fully dried were cut and filed back to give invisible joints.

 

The embossed stonework was then tackled on the ends of the main building before the end extensions could be fixed in place.  The embossed plastic sheet being cut to fit between the previously added quoins, and corbels.  I found this far easier to do in smaller sections than trying to fret it all out from a single piece.

 

 

 

Once the embossed stonework had been added to the ends of the main part of the building the end extensions were secured in place.  However, before I secured the end extensions I had a bit of a re-think on their roofs!  I have no idea what the roofs of these extensions were actually covered in, so I decided to remove the initially fitted flat piece of plastic that I had built the walls up around and substitute it with a slightly sloping piece that had some 0.010" square strips added to it to represent a lead covered roof.  This sloping section stops 1mm short of the back wall to provide an internal gutter.  A hole drilled through the back wall and into this gutter will eventually lead to carved conductor head at the top of the drain pipe that I will add after the walls have been painted.

 

The stone window and door reveals of the main building were done in the same fashion as those on the extensions - a piece of 0.020" was cut to fit between the quoins/plinth/corbel, and the windows and door ways replicated onto this blank.  The stonework surrounding these reveals was scribed and cut out before the individual stone reveals were added around the reveals in the main wall.

 

Once the window and door reveals were in place it was "simply" a matter of fretting out embossed plastic sheet to fit around the stonework of these, marquetry fashion.

With all of the walls complete, a start was made on the roof of the main part of the building.  The barge boards at the ends of the roof appear to be some 9" or so deep, so in building the model I had taken this into account making the walls the right height to allow a 0.060" thick roof to sit directly on top of the walls.  Each half of the roof was cut to size and a suitable angle scraped along the edges so that they butted together at the apex and had vertical soffits.  Further pieces of 0.060" were cut to match the angle of the roof apex, and these were secured to be an interference fit between the end walls.

 

The lower ends of the barge boards have a "squared off" shape to them, so small oversize pieces of 0.060" were cut to fit around the corbels that wrap around the building end and secured to the underside of the roof.

Once these were fully dry (left until the following day), they were carefully cut, filed and sanded to shape to provide the "squared off" ends that I was trying to replicate.

 

With the main section of roof now complete, the next stage will be to add the bits that will form the underside of the porch on the approach side of the building.  This will also need to include the wooden supports for the porch.  Additionally, the gutters will be formed and added to the soffits before the roof gets its slate covering, but that will have to wait until I can work out how to manufacture and fit the squat octagonal chimneys.

 

Ian

 

Edited August 27, 2022 by Ian Smith
Replacement of photos

[Donw]

Very nicely done. I agree with the cutting out the plasticard infill in smaller pieces rather than trying to cut a very awkward shape out. I found that much easier. I like the extension roofs even if the original was different it would have been a practical way to do it. An alternative might have been to have an asphalt surface laid to a slight slope to a drain/gutter as you have drawn but when did asphalt roofs come in?

 

Don 

[Ian Smith]

Since the last instalment of the main station building build, I have been doing various other things for Modbury :

• Re-painting all of the baulks on the track with a wash of thinned Precision Paints Track Colour (Weathered Sleepers) as I felt that the brown colour initially used was far too stark.
• Removing the "Simpson Springs" that I had fitted to the leading wheel of my Metro Tank, and replacing with a top-acting wiper of copper/beryllium strip which bears on both the leading wheels and the leading drivers.
• Building an add-on box to the control panel which houses a press to make switch and a multi-way selector switch for the various uncoupler electro-magnets to replace the push to make switches along the front of the layout.

 

But back to the Station Building ...

 

The canopy at the rear of the building is an extension of the main roof, so the underside was boxed in with 0.020" plascticard and stone projections added to the wall.  The actual supports for the canopy were arcs of timber and I originally thought that I could form these from 0.040" square strip bent to shape.  However, despite warming the strip I found that it had a tendency to fracture slightly and refused to hold the tight bend required.  After a quick re-think I decided to form the supports from 3 0.010" strips laminated together, the laminating being done in situ.

 

The next operation was to build up the chimneys.  The bases were formed from solid plastic with a V filed in them to fit over the apex of the roof.  These then had 0.020" plastic added around them which subsequently had stonework carved into them.

 

The chimneys themselves were octagonal in shape, so some 3mm square plastic rod had it's corners scraped off to provide the octagonal shape required before being cut to length for each of the 3 individual chimneys.  These embryonic chimneys then had small pieces of 0.010" strip added around the tops to give the decorative fatter top lip.  These pieces were added over length and when fully dry were cut back to size and the missing one or two added afterwards (it was impossible to secure all 8 in one go with them being over-length).

 

The gutters were formed in my usual way of gouging a 0.9mm trough near the edge of a sheet of 0.030" plastic, then scraping the under-side away to form a "half-gutter".  The other side was cut off square so that it could be secured to the soffits. The exposed end of any gutters being filed to a half-round section for the end couple of mm of the gutter.  Although not shown in the next photo, the very ends of the gutters have 0.005" capping pieces welded on and trimmed back to size once fully dry.

 

All of the stonework of the building was painted in a mortar colour, and once dry had various shades of grey and occasional fleck of red dry brushed to pick out the individual stones.

 

The next stage was to get the glaziers in...  On the smaller back windows I decided to use a bow pen to draw the glazing bars but on the larger windows I've skrawked the glazing bars into the clear plastic, then filled them with chocolate paint.  Once the paint had dried for a few minutes several cotton buds were used to buff the paint of the surface of the glazing but leave it in the grooves.

 

 

The window frames themselves were fretted out of 0.005" plastic sheet, and painted chocolate.

 

Once all of the paint was fully dry, the frames and the glazing were united with canopy glue.

 

And once the glue had dried the individual windows were fitted into the recesses in the back of the walls with more canopy glue.

 

 

I still have the toilet windows in the end extension and the windows on the platform side to fit, and also the doors all need to be made and fitted, but am feeling quite encouraged by the way that the building is coming along.

 

Ian

 

 

Edited September 8, 2022 by Ian Smith
Reinstatement of photos

[andy stroud]

Hi Ian, that is modelling to a very high standard indeed. Many thanks for sharing and also for your informative commentary on your methods of construction.

[Ian Smith]

Seems some time since the last update, but I've not been completely idle!

 

The main station building is now pretty much complete (just one down pipe on the rear of the building and the lead flashing around the chimney stacks to do).

 

Since the last instalment, which only had the windows fitted, the doors have been fretted from more 0.005", and fixed to the glazing material with canopy glue.  The arched frames for the glazing above the parcels and coal store doors was added separately.

 

The double doors for the entrance to the booking hall/general waiting room were constructed as a closed pair.

 

 

The double doors on the platform (viewing) side, I decided to model as open.  This meant fretting out two individual doors, which were attached to pre-folded glazing.  In this instance, the door frame was painted and attached within the building first, and once set, the doors were painted and fitted behind the frame (before they were fitted, simple door knobs were added from short lengths of 0.45mm brass rod - I defy anyone to notice that they just spigots of brass wire poking out and not fully formed door knobs in 2mm scale!)

 

I should add that any paint that strayed onto the glazing was easily removed with the point of a cocktail stick.

 

In parallel with doing the glazing, I was also slating the roof.  The slate strips were drawn up in CAD (Countess size), with double width ones at the gable end.  A feint line half way up was also included to aid with having a consistent overlap and keeping the rows parallel.  The CAD file was printed out on an A4 sized self-adhesive label, and the individual strips carefully cut out.  Before fitting to the roof, each slate was half-separated (i.e. cut from the bottom up to the feint guide line).

  

 

Down pipes have been bent up from 0.5mm phosphor-bronze wire.  Fixings being formed from simple twists of single strands from multi-stand cable (about 0.2mm dia.)  Effectively, a strand was doubled over, the tail ends trapped in a pin vice, a piece of the PB wire passed into the loop, and the pin vice spun until the tails break off (always happens at the pin vice jaws).

 

These fixings were soldered in place on the down pipe by suspending the down pipe in such a fashion so that the fixings hang down on what will be the wall side of the down pipe.  Gravity helps to keep them in the right place and at 90 degrees to the bend in the pipe.

 

 

Once made, the down pipes were attached to the building by drilling holes through the walls in the relevant places for the fixings.  The two rain water hoppers on the rear of the end extensions were carved from 0.060" plastic, and once hollowed out were given a backing of 0.010" and fitted to the tops of the down pipes.  All of the down pipes were painted in situ, a small brush and a steady hand being quite useful, but a slip of paper behind the pipe can also help reduce the chance of slipping and applying paint to the wall!  In the event that any paint does get on the wall (I managed to do all mine without), a brush moistened with thinners will lift the spilt paint quite easily so long as its not allowed to dry too much.

 

Most Victorian/Edwardian station buildings always seem festooned with enamel signs.  I found some suitable ones for c1906 online (a website that not only has images of the signs but also rough date and importantly the size of the sign).  Some of these were printed on an inkjet (having reduced them to scale size, obviously).  The backing of the photo paper was carefully removed to thin the signs a little, the edges and back were touched with a rust coloured felt tip to disguise the stark white cut edge.  Before the signs were added to the building, battens of 0.015" x 0.010" plastic strip were fixed to the walls (after painting them) as the signs were invariably attached to battens on the prototype.

 

The company notice boards (which were also attached to the battens) were made up by attaching strips of 0.015" x 0.010" around a backing of 0.005" (the strip being secured vertically around the perimeter of the 0.005" back board).  Once complete these were painted chocolate, and notices from more self adhesive label attached.  The notices themselves were simply made from dots of ink from a rotting pen with a 0.1mm nib.  Once fully dry these notices were toned down by giving them a wipe with a brush that had been dipped onto a used tea bag to take away the stark white of the self-adhesive label.

 

 

I'll finish this post with a few images of the completed building (with the exceptions alluded to in the opening paragraphs).

 

And one final one showing the rather rudimentary internal detailing :

 

That's all for now.  I can now move on to finishing the platforms and the bedding them into the surrounding scenery.

 

Thanks for reading.

 

Ian

Edited September 8, 2022 by Ian Smith
Reinstatement of photos

[Caley Jim]

Stunning work Ian!

 

Jim

[Donw]

Excellent work Ian. You have made a superb job of it. You refer to the internal detailing as rudimentary but it looks pretty good to me, unless you could get your eye right up to the window I doubt you could see any finer detail. One thing though wouldn't there be spaces divided off for the ticket office and the Stationmaster's office?

 

Don

[Mikkel]

Beautiful work Ian. I've just been through a similar process on a 4mm building but yours is more refined. That feint line on the slate strips is a good idea, must remember that next time.

[Branwell]

Lovely work Ian.

 

Any chance of a link for the website for the signs please?

[Ian Smith]

Excellent work Ian. You have made a superb job of it. You refer to the internal detailing as rudimentary but it looks pretty good to me, unless you could get your eye right up to the window I doubt you could see any finer detail. One thing though wouldn't there be spaces divided off for the ticket office and the Stationmaster's office?

 

Don

Don,

 

The plans I have seen for the real Bovey Tracey building (a leaflet on the building from the Bovey Tracey Heritage Centre) show the office as a single space.  If it were separated into two rooms I don't think either would be very big.

 

Lovely work Ian.

 

Any chance of a link for the website for the signs please?

 

Here you go ... http://www.advertisingantiques.co.uk

 

Ian

[Ian Smith]

As a change from making buildings, I've moved onto a little scenic modelling - A start on the wood that will be at the back of baseboard at the right hand end of the layout.

 

The position of the wood can be seen in this photo I took of the whole layout some time ago, the 3 dimensional part will be modelled in front of the painted trees on the backscene :

 

(Although having lived the backscene for a few months, I decided a few weeks ago that I hadn't painted the trees tall enough, so added an inch or so to their height).

 

Having made a few trees for St Ruth, I have elected to produce those for Modbury along similar lines - A trunk and branches from copper wire, soldered for strength.  Because the bundle of wires at the foot of (and indeed some way up) a tree trunk form such a good heat sink, I found it necessary to employ a small blow torch to generate enough heat for the solder to flow on the thicker parts of the tree, and using my electric iron for the finer stuff on the branches.

The basic tree shape is formed by twisting various numbers of strands of wire together, usually doubling them up to form loops which are subsequently cut open once the soldering has been done.

 

 

Once the trunk and main branches were formed, I gave the tree a coat (or two) of PVA to try to disguise the twists within the wires.  A dusting of polyfilla (or Wilko's equivalent) was applied to the wet PVA through a tea strainer.  The finer branches at the ends of the boughs was made from Woodland Scenics "Poly Fiber" - small finger nail sized pieces being cut off and teased out before being PVA'd to the bough ends.  Once this was complete and had dried, the whole tree was given a coat of grey primer.  I found it easier to see any straggly bits of poly fiber when it was grey rather than in it's natural green.  The straggly bits were trimmed off with a pair of curved nail scissors until I was happy with the shape and form of the tree.

 

 

Before adding foliage the whole tree was sprayed a grey-brown, and once dry the foliage was applied.  I used hairspray to initially secure the flock which was dusted onto the wet hairspray that had been applied (mainly) to the poly fiber clumps through a tea strainer.  Once the whole tree had been treated with flock, any that was stuck to the trunk and branches was carefully removed, and a final spray of matt varnish was applied to hopefully fully secure the flock.

 

 

In making the trees, I am trying to produce beefier specimens for the outside of the wood, and somewhat stragglier ones for the interior.  Effectively, trying to take into account that the branches (and hence leaves) will tend to grow where the light is.  So those trees in the interior have foliage pretty well at the canopy only, while those at the edge are being modelled with foliage around one side with a suitable canopy.  As I'm making the trees I'm trying to make them to fit the place I intend to plant them so that they kind of knit together.  So far I've made half a dozen which will fill an area less than 12-15 sq inches, so I'm going to need quite a few!

 

Before I actually plant any of the trees though I want to put in the ground cover and finish the fence that borders the wood, this way I can position the trees so that they overhang the fence and I won't have to try to push ground cover underneath the trees!

 

Ian

 

Edited September 8, 2022 by Ian Smith
Reinstatement of photos

[nick_bastable]

very nice 

 

Nick