Beginners OO 1950's Banff

[David Bell]

This is looking superb.

I think you might have to change the thread title. You are well past "beginner" stage now!

Cheers

David

[aardvark]

Thanks for your kind words, @David Bell. Regretfully, the word Beginners will remain firmly attached for quite some time yet.

 

Yes, the station building is looking good, but it's slow progress, having started in November.  I suspect I'll be pushing 12 months before the slates are in place, something that will undoubtedly cause the old hands to shake their heads in dismay.

 

But that's ok to me, as my "goal" when I (semi-) retired was to do things to an acceptable degree of goodness rather than good enough to satisfy the time constraints, as was always the case during my working life.  Although I've possible got a few years in me yet, I've long since given up the concept of getting this layout "finished".

 

As for Beginners, there  are lots of things to do yet that I have no experience with.  We'll all see how I go with acceptable degree of goodness when it comes to scenic-ing and other artistic endeavours.

 

[David Bell]

Your pace and mine are not too different!

[aardvark]

Success!  In fact, so there was so little cussing today that I'll make another one.

 

 

Five shorter sections (66-79mm) were cut and painted.  The David Neat blocks again came into use: the acetate was pushed back against the larger block, while the small one was put on top to stop the acetate skittering off.  Each frame section was lightly sprayed on the back in turn, then placed down onto the acetate using the Neat block and the previously laid section as guides.

 

Here is a close-up of the worst of the four joins.

 

 

I think that the bottom leg might have been missed by the spray adhesive altogether - I'll try nudging it into position with a Neat block tomorrow, then a touch of regular adhesive, or perhaps just a spot of paint would be enough?  But you'd be hard pressed to spot this join in the overall photo, and from Normal Viewing Distance ...

 

I'd give myself 9.3/10.

 

Here's a photo of my spray booth. A little bit exposed, but well ventilated!

 

 

If anyone's interested in some 5.25x23.5mm bits of 10-thou plasticard, do let me know.  Ready cut, easy to handle, Aardvark's Individual Emperor Plasticardettes*! A million household uses! As used in hospitals!

 

* with apologies to Monty Python.

 

 

[St Enodoc]

13 minutes ago, aardvark said:

Aardvark's Individual Emperor Plasticardettes*! A million household uses! As used in hospitals!

 

* with apologies to Monty Python.

Wasn't that Spike Milligan, not Python?

[aardvark]

Nope, Python all the way.

 

https://youtu.be/7qNj-QFZbew

 

Edited August 7, 2023 by aardvark

[St Enodoc]

1 hour ago, aardvark said:

Nope, Python all the way.

 

https://youtu.be/7qNj-QFZbew

 

Ah, I was thinking of the spoof ad for "Threadgold's Thorogrip Garterettes", which seems to be very similar.

[aardvark]

 

The baseboards came out this morning - first time this year - so I could trace the outline of the outside platform using the conventional pencil-on-the-side-of-a-carriage method.  It was good to see the station building in situ.

 

[aardvark]

Yesterday's photo has me thinking that I should be thinking about backscenes.  The idea is to write something here, hopefully get some ideas and suggestions, with a view to doing something in a couple of months.  I've already bought ID Backscenes premium Overcast Sky P503A and B, so have 4 sections of 1.5m each in self-adhesive polypropylene, but the question is how to mount them to the layout.

 

The layout is 4 baseboards of 1.2m. These spend most of their lives on shelves in the garage, so the backscene needs to be portable, disassemble-able and store-able.

 

One option is to mount the prints on ply, card or mount board. This would stiffen the prints up dramatically, and might mean that'd have to be done in 1.2m sections to match the baseboards, or 1.5m sections to match the prints themselves.

 

The other option would be to not mount the prints, and to have some sort of frame to hold them to the back of the baseboards. I suspect getting unobtrusive joints between the prints might be difficult.

 

[aardvark]

Research has shown up Balmoral Road by resident @brossard. This is a 7mm exhibition layout, and his backscene is boards (mdf?) which sit on top of the baseboards, held in place with magnetic kitchen door catches against 2x1 uprights screwed to the rear of the baseboards.

 

Miracle of miracles, the crucial post actually has photos ...

 

 

I will continue the research, as there's undoubted other options out there.

 

Edited August 12, 2023 by aardvark

[aardvark]

The spray booth got another outing today to make more skylights.

 

The previous mentioned skylights are up near the ridge of the roof and are a scale 342x25mm each.  Today's go down near the edge of the northern roof, and are a scale 6x4mm.  You can see them on the drawing below.

 

 

I made 6 so I can pick the best ...

 

 

... and I sincerely hope I don't have to make any more.

 

I am reminded why I didn't choose N-scale.

 

Edited August 14, 2023 by aardvark
proofreadinf is not one of my superpowers

[Tortuga]

Is all this skylight work being done using a silhouette cutter?

 

I’m thinking scratch building the signal box on my layout is the way forward, but I’m not looking forward to cutting out all those small window frames!

[aardvark]

 

23 minutes ago, Tortuga said:

Is all this skylight work being done using a silhouette cutter?

 

I’m thinking scratch building the signal box on my layout is the way forward, but I’m not looking forward to cutting out all those small window frames!

 

Yes, but ...

 

Window frames are cut from 10-thou plasticard using a Silhouette cutter, but the finer glazing bars are scribed into the glazing (clear plastic), which is then filled with paint. Scribing is also done with the cutter, but doesn't absolutely have to be.

 

I'm also aware of etches for signal box windows (Scale Link?), and Freestone do a range of paint-on-clear-plastic glazing bars. I bought the Freestone product but couldn't make the sizes work

for me.

 

[aardvark]

A couple of weeks later, and I've finished pasting paper slates.  I have to admit that this has gone faster than I thought.

 

 

With the tedious part over, I've started the tedious part of cutting between the tiles with a scalpel.  This provides a subtle texture to the otherwise flat surface, and helps to disguise the joins.

 

 

One of these has had this treatment. Can you tell which?

 

 

[aardvark]

Well, that's that then.

 

There are plenty of errors, some corrected, but after nearly a year, and with so many other things that are needed on this layout for it to be viewworthy, I think that it's high time to move on.  At some stage, the station building might get downpipes and vent pipes, and a few chimney pots are waiting in the wings for me to find an appropriate dirty terracotta colour.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Edited October 23, 2023 by aardvark

[ISW]

On 07/06/2023 at 04:40, aardvark said:

This is on the back of a baking tray with a few magnets to help keep things in place

Now that is / was a very good idea. I'll have to add it to my 'tips and hints' file!

 

Ian

[aardvark]

Thanks to everyone for all the "likes" - I'm pretty sure that that's my first "Popular post", and I'm a bit chuffed.

 

I think the next activity will be the adjoining external platform, which will be separate from the building but still removable from the layout as it crosses a baseboard join.

 

 

Here's a mock-up to help check alignment, height, distance from the track, gradient of the ramp, etc, etc.

 

[aardvark]

The external platform has been constructed, and is shown here along with the station building.  The platform still needs to be dressed with coping and an uneven asphalt surface.

 

 

 

 

[aardvark]

The external platform is done (I think), excepting a couple of gas lamps.

 

Here's the ever-patient 80121 arriving with the 4:55 from Tillynaught.

 

 

... and the obligatory helicopter view.

 

 

A moments silence 'was held when the mock-up went in the bin.

 

 

The next project will be a limited bit of scenic-ing to blend the platform into the adjacent trackwork, then onto the goods shed, which will fit over the outer track in front of the station in the helicopter view.

 

Another project to consider is where to store the buildings and platform when they're off of the baseboards.

 

 

[aardvark]

I've made a start on the goods shed.

 

Based on the earlier discussion in this thread, I've opted for the shorter version of the shed: scale 170mm long.

 

I only have two photos of the northern side of the shed.  The 1928 Britain from Above photo shows two loading doors and three small windows, although with poor resolution. The second photo which is quite oblique, seems to show one loading door and one window, although it is hard to be entirely sure.  With some license, I'm going to model the 1928 configuration with one door open and one closed as being more interesting to a viewer, should one happen along.

 

I've decided to use plasticard over a 1.5mm Screenboard carcase this time.  This was the construction that I used on the western end of  the station building, which seems to have gone well (so far). Generally, I'm really happy with card and paper, but in my early(er) days, I did some credit-card modelling, and bought a "sampler" of various Slater sheets to see what they were like, so I might as well use what I have.

 

To date, I've constructed windows and doors, and cut out the plasticard for the sides of the shed.

 

 

In the process, I made a typical beginner mistake - believing the manufacturer.

 

Slaters 0433 2mm Spaced Planking Buff isn't.  It's 2.16mm.

 

This doesn't sound like much difference, except that it is when you were expecting 85 planks on a 170mm side, only get 79, and had "cleverly" planned window and door sizes and positions in plank-sized increments to make it easy.  The net result is that my sides aren't quite the sizes that I planned, and hence that the plans require some modification to permit reality.

 

 

[MrWolf]

That's looking very good already and is immediately recogniseable as a railway building from Scotland, keep up the good work!

 

As for your problems with the boarding, that's the opposite of what the real thing has become. If you're faithfully replicating Victorian timber, you have to buy the next size up and machine it down to size most of the time.

What we used to buy as 3"x 2" planed is now 50x75mm, except that you actually get 46x69 and you're paying for the kerf that's been taken off! 

 

I've ended up sizing window apertures on models with vertical boards or corrugated iron to suit the gaps and making the window to suit, which is a barrel of laughs, I don't think.

[aardvark]

Yes, once bitten and all that.

 

Next time I'll make the windows after making the cutouts. I might still make a second set of windows, if I can maintain a suitable level of enthusiasm.

 

Or might call on Messers Bodgit & Scarper of Chuffnell Regis fame.

 

Edited December 11, 2023 by aardvark

[Nick C]

4 hours ago, MrWolf said:

That's looking very good already and is immediately recogniseable as a railway building from Scotland, keep up the good work!

 

As for your problems with the boarding, that's the opposite of what the real thing has become. If you're faithfully replicating Victorian timber, you have to buy the next size up and machine it down to size most of the time.

What we used to buy as 3"x 2" planed is now 50x75mm, except that you actually get 46x69 and you're paying for the kerf that's been taken off! 

 

I've ended up sizing window apertures on models with vertical boards or corrugated iron to suit the gaps and making the window to suit, which is a barrel of laughs, I don't think.

Particularly an issue for wagon restorers - the ironwork has holes in for the bolts, which of course no longer line up if you can only get metric sizes...

[aardvark]

Hmmm.

 

I wasn't going to bother modelling the internal roof details of the goods shed, but after the track-level photo of the station building above, perhaps I should.  I do intend on modelling the internal platform and the framing of the rear wall, as I'm more sure of their visibility.

 

I have no images of the internals of the Banff goods shed.  If anyone can suggest a possible configuration of goods shed roof trusses, I would be most grateful.

 

Edited December 14, 2023 by aardvark

[25kV]

7 hours ago, aardvark said:

I have no images of the internals of the Banff goods shed.  If anyone can suggest a possible configuration of goods shed roof trusses, I would be most grateful.

 

My guess would be a similar arrangement to the GNSR shed at Alford, given the similar proportions of the building:

(https://www.undiscoveredscotland.co.uk/alford/railwaymuseum/index.html)