Exhill Works and other adventures in 7/8ths

[John Besley]

Completed the guttering, including scrunching up some old dried leaves and adding into the gutter then fixing with gloss varnish not forgetting to run some out of the shoe. 

Next back to inside detail for the workbench, the window above this is now glazed with a cut up CD case and weathered with a wash of grimy black that was allowed to run down the glazing for rain streaks.

 

 

 

 

 

Edited June 13, 2022 by John Besley
Reload

[John Besley]

Back in April 2012 I built a pillar drill that I fitted in the grounded van body, this has now been removed and is going to be relocated in the workshop, the attached shows the drill stand and all the parts I made for this item.

 

 

 

Edited April 3, 2022 by John Besley
Reload

[John Besley]

Final check round before lights out 

 

 

 

Edited April 3, 2022 by John Besley
Reload

[John Besley]

Just built a sack truck from one of our kits...

 

 

 

Edited June 13, 2022 by John Besley
Correction

[John Besley]

The workbench is pretty much finished as is the immediate area around, just need to add in some more dust and rubbish etc. 

 

Made up a tool chest from a Lego drawer unit, along with various tool crates from Lego bricks, and A pirate chest for a wooden crate, all filled with junk etc. Made up a tea mug from brass tube and copper wire...

 

Found a neat drawing for a 7.1/4" Battle of Britain screen shot an edited in paint then printed out in "A2" along with a copy of June 1951 Model Railway News, made up a SR route indicator disc and found a spare number plate from my traction engine TT 2759 these where all dropped behind the workbench against the window along with some old rags and scraps of wood 

 

 

 

 

Edited June 13, 2022 by John Besley
Reload

[Woody C]

Just pure brilliance John! 

[John Besley]

Having 90% finished the workshop building ( there is always something else to add) I then made a start on resolving the running of the ex WW1 Baldwin, this was built around a old Wren R1 chassis ... back last year I brought a High Level Kits road runner motor and gear box kit.

 

Made a start on assembling this and setting up in the existing chassis after I'd milled out some of the metal, this also then required new pickups and these were mounted on the existing tufnell packer. The motor itself was secured to the chassis with a plastic block to build up the height a double sided foam pad to give it some support and a wire strap around everything to stop the motor climbing over the axle gear on start up.

 

The running of this is now excellent and so quiet 

 

Next task will be to build up sets of my old 16mm P&J C1 Chopper Couplings ... these will be resurrected again...

 

 

 

 

Edited April 3, 2022 by John Besley
Reload

[John Besley]

A new baseboard has now been built out of 12mm plywood as there were one or two issues with my original version, I've since increased its width now to 460mm instead of 410mm as clearances where tight.

 

Each section cross brace has two 12mm holes drilled for cable ways and now also has cross pieces added so the whole frame sits neatly on cantilever shelf brackets

 

 

 

 

Edited April 3, 2022 by John Besley
Reload

[John Besley]

Having assembled the baseboard a hole was cut through the plasterboard wall between the two halves of my workshop so track can run through into the other part of the Exhill yard....

 

 

Now I have to decide how to disguise the hole in the sky...

 

To cover the roof support behind the lean to loco shed a facade of a two storey factory building will wrap round this with the top section being above eye level.

 

To disguise the cut through I favour a couple of trees and scruffy shrubs .... but in 7/8ths these present a challenge - A wire armature as a trunk is easy to make out of twisted wire, the challenge comes in creating realistic leaves in this scale.

 

As an alternative I could hide the hole by building a water tank above and the support frame will help this effect.

 

Decisions, decisions...

 

Edited April 3, 2022 by John Besley
Reload

[John Besley]

Roughed out the corner building and cut out for the end door and loading door on the first floor, modified a dolls house window and cut out ready to box up these parts for the plaster cover and scribbled brickwork.

 

 

There will be a brick retaining wall running behind the stationary boiler as indicated by a section of plywood, behind this will be the backscene of sky and a hint of woodland

 

I need to have a think about the section between the completed workshop and the stationary boiler how to fill the back section .... I could leave it open and see how it develops 

 

Any comments would be appreciated...

Edited April 3, 2022 by John Besley
Reload

[Keith Addenbrooke]

10 hours ago, John Besley said:

Roughed out the corner building and cut out for the end door and loading door on the first floor, modified a dolls house window and cut out ready to box up these parts for the plaster cover and scrubbed brickwork.

 

 

There will be a brick retaining wall running behind the stationary boiler as indicated by a section of plywood, behind this will be the backscene of sky and a hint of woodland

 

I need to have a think about the section between the completed workshop and the stationary boiler how to fill the back section .... I could leave it open and see how it develops 

 

 

Any comments would be appreciated...

Hi John, if I might make a suggestion - your own idea to “leave it open and see how it develops” is a good one: I’ve recently been reading about ‘negative space’ in layout design, which actually means intentionally (ie: positively) deciding to leave a gap between feature rather than visually overloading the viewer.  If, in time, something catches the eye and you want to add it into the space, well - that’s what happens in real life anyway.  In the meantime it gives the freedom to press on with track laying, ballasting, ground cover / detailing, etc.  Just a thought, Keith.

[Chris Williamson]

Regarding the backscene for the gap, another possible suggestion to add to Keith's very good observation:  A capped brick wall, to at least the height of the eaves of the brick shed.  This could incorporate brick pillars or buttresses at regular intervals to break it up a little or it could be left plain.  A closed pedestrian gate and/ or a closed main yard gate might possibly be added as too?  As ever, "less is more" is probably a good guide unless you are intentionally looking for a very crowded scene.

[John Besley]

Many thanks Keith and Chris, having given it some thought while driving on the M5... M4.... etc.  

 

There is going to be a part brick wall from the section behind the stationary boiler and Corner Shop as indicated by the plywood section and a part open post and vertical rail fence going towards the Workshop building which will have vegitation spreading through the gaps 

 

More photos to be done later to show the ideas.

 

Leaving the back section open will make the space less crowded - less is more...

[John Besley]

Ok well I've also mocked up a wall section to disguise the cut out through to the other part of the workshop as this will in fact come out of the side section of a tractor shed, the wall section will be clad in a mix of timber planks and old corrugated tin sheet (cut up baked bean cans)

 

 

A start has been made on the brick retaining wall from 18mm plywood and 3/4 pine strip to add on enough height, a corner pillar has been knocked up all ready to be skimmed in plaster once the edge profiles are tacked on to the walls so I have something to float the filler upto 

 

 

 

 

Edited April 3, 2022 by John Besley
Reload

[John Besley]

Tacked on the edge trims allowing for a 4mm build up of filler ready for scribbling the brickwork. Then gave the building a couple of coats of filler, sanding down to keep it uniform.

 

So far the Corner Shop has used 3kg of filler and bearing in mind the sub form is 18mm plywood 600m x 500 on the main side it's coming out quite solid!

 

 

 

 

Once the filler is dry the edge trims are prized off and then the corners are tidied up with spot filling, the doorways and window surround will be built up to finish.

 

It may not be very obvious but the first floor opening is for a door with a lightly hoist to add interest 

 

Edited January 1, 2023 by John Besley
Reload

[John Besley]

While I've been busy with the Corner Shop - the building not the Rock Band - I've also tackled the backscene.

 

 

 

Fitted two sheets 1220 x 600 6mm MDF to batten, filled and painted the sky adding in the cloud base

 

(Paint not fully dried in the above pic)

 

Then played around with some distant hills and a couple of small trees to see what they looked like...

 

 

 

Add in a fence and I think it might work...

 

 

 

All a bit of an experiment... havent done anything like this for 36 years 

Edited April 3, 2022 by John Besley
Reload

[John Besley]

Painted in a scruffy hedge (well started it) and thought I'd better weigh it up with other buildings etc. In front

 

Edited April 3, 2022 by John Besley
Reload

[John Besley]

A brief interlude from buildings and back scenes...

 

For a while I had been pondering V Skips, looked at 7mm, 009, LGB, Triang Big Big train in my pursuit of building at least one for Exhill... nothing looked hopefull until I found a 16mm V skip from Binnie as pointed out to me by Kevo.

 

To make it work for 7/8 - 16.5mm I cut the top section off to reduce the height and at the same time the width.

 

 

 

Cut out a 30thou trim to finish off the top section, made up the end skip supports and cut the centre section out of the skip leaving just the end section.

 

 

 

 

To this was added a Girder from Plastistrut along with some additional frame work.

 

 

The main sub chassis comprises of a section of brass strip with 2 x brass axle tubes to take the Bachmann disc wheels, this was soldered up ending up looking like a skate board.

 

 

To finish off the chassis frame 4 dummy axles boxes where made up and fitted to the chassis along with Cambrian dummy rivets.

 

 

To clear the ends of the pinpoint  axles ends the lower section of the axleboxes tube was cut open leaving a horse shoe shape when viewed from underneath. 

 

 

 

Final task is to sort out couplings along with the rest of the stock so will return to this later.

 

Edited April 3, 2022 by John Besley
Reload

[John Besley]

The backscene is taking shape in stages... with a patch of dense bushes

Not to mention stinging nettles growing wild just over the fence

 

 

 

 

Edited April 3, 2022 by John Besley
Reload

[John Besley]

Many thanks to all for the thumbs up etc. Please feel free to comment and dont be afraid to point out or question anything as that's how we all learn 

 

It's a free country so join in 

[Chris Williamson]

John, You're quite right.  It is how we all learn.  At the moment, I'm sat at the back of your Art Class wondering how I'll ever hope to develop the skill and talent you have on show here!  The colouring of that fence is just perfect to my mind.

[John Besley]

Glad you have joined in, the more the better.

 

There are some great YouTube videos out there that helped me brush up on painting backscenes - last one I did was 35 years ago for my 4mm Exhill this was based on articles in Model Railroader which at the time was light years ahead of Railway Modeller 

 

 

 

YouTube below

Backscene painting - pale blue sky first with graduated fade to almost white at the horizon, its vital to work out your viewing perspective and think where your vanishing point will be.

 

Go over the area with a very thin white was making sure you paint horizontally and dont leave runs this will give the distant haze and where the clouds form. 

 

Paint clouds as washes with a round brush in a circular pattern add in light grey for shadow 

 

Again pale to grey for distant fields - dont paint steep hills as they will look odd, you have to view the natural world around you thinking " how would I paint that".

I find it helps to make your eyes slightly out of focus, that way you will see the graduations in bushes trees etc. 

Dark green / black for shadows

Mid Green for basic shape

Light green for highlights

 

 

 

 

The fence is just a scenic prop to get the format right, made out of chopped up strip wood for the posts and 4mm plywood for the rail and slats, painted a mucky brown wash of thinners to add tone

 

Hope this helps

Edited April 3, 2022 by John Besley
Reload

[John Besley]

To keep myself busy the last few days, I've hand scribbed just shy of 3500 bricks on the corner shop building...

 

 

 

Then gave the whole thing a coat of Orange Blush or some such name as that... the finish I was aiming for is to match the terracotta colours of brick work around the Exter - mid Devon area.

 

 

This was then toned down with a grey wash followed by picking out individual bricks and then a grimy wash....

 

 

I've also assembled the boundary walls and added some detail including where the render has fallen off (after 6 hours doing the brick work the thought of then doing more again on the boundary wall was too much)

 

 

Edited June 13, 2022 by John Besley
Reload

[John Besley]

The Corner shop brickwork then had all the mortor lines picked out individually which made a huge difference, the boundary wall then had another coat of a lighter shade stippled on instead of brushing to give it some texture.

 

Started to plan out how the yard area will shape up along with a wagon turntable - non working scenic feature.

 

 

 

 

There's all the caping to be finished on the corner shop and the boundary wall, this is made out of DAS air drying clay - then need to make up a batch of paving slabs

 

Edited April 3, 2022 by John Besley
Reload

[John Besley]

Now the corner shop is pretty well complete as the main structure goes I finished off the caping slabs for the roof primed them and gave a quick spray over with khaki then a grime wash, these where fixed in place with PVA - well impressed with DAS, next off need to make a batch of paving slabs for the yard, at 2' square these work out at 40x40mm ...

 

Started to sort out the back of the next building that will hide the 'hole in the wall' while doing this and checking levels realised that this is out by just over an inch in vertical height.

 

Built up a ramp and test fitted this to work out the gradient etc. This wasn't the intention but now adds more interest to the set up - none of my track in the yard is going to be in neat straight lines the idea is that everything will be on a slight curve to make for some interest 

 

 

This will nescsetate a retaining wall from timber cribbing to hold the embankment back

 

 

The track in the lean to has now been fixed in place after I'd wired up the dropper cables to this, seeing as this track is going to be buried in plaster I cut out every other sleeper to space them outso they look correct.

 

The more visual areas will be useing Peco 0-16.5 NG track

Edited April 3, 2022 by John Besley
Reload