Im trying to build a small oil storage facility and cant figure out what to use to build 2 oil tanks. Mainly I want to use things I can find around my house and spend as little and if possible no cash at all. Any suggestions?
This is a link to the Walthers “Interstate Fuel and Oil Company.” It’s a plastic kit, available in HO or N gauge.
http://www.walthers.com/exec/productinfo/933-3200
I put one of these kits together and I have it on my layout, but it’s really only for purposes of illustration.
What you really need is some tubes. If you have scraps of white PVC pipe around, that would work very well. Even a metal soup can would serve, and an oatmeal container could be made to look like a large vertical tank with a bit of paint. Think about putting some rubber bands around the tube before painting it to get the “rings” characteristic of this kind of tank.
For piping, check out the coffee stirrers in fast-food places and cafeterias. I use both the wood and plastic stirrers for all kinds of things on my layout.
BBC:
Take a couple of small tin cans, glue on a posterboard wrapper, scribe panel lines, paint and weather.
You can also use mailing tubes, dowels, or even tanks from some junker tank cars.
Scale Scenes has some nice tank wrappers you can download and print as often as you like. Take the file to the copy shop, and they can laser-print it for about 50 cents a sheet, or use your home printer. These won’t need painting or weathering.
Thanks guys! I found 2 plastic cans which I just spray painted white. I have a general Idea in mind and will post pics shortly. Im doing this basically from scratch so far.
A friend of mine took some PVC pipe, cut some styrene to fit inside as a “floating” tank roof (these are vertical tanks). To scribe his lines, he got a hose clamp big enough to fit around it, after measuring off equal lengths down the tank, he moved and tightened the hose clamp and used a exacto knife to scribe the horizontal lines. He then used a metal ruler to scribe the vertical lines as appropriate. The front tank and the three smaller ones clustered together were done this way.
http://i44.photobucket.com/albums/f17/redgrey62/AugustaRefinery3.jpg
Rick
I model in N-Scale so this might not work for you. I save the cores that come with scotch tape. Those center cors can be stacked to from nice sized oil tanks. You need to find something to make the tops from but it seems to me that the eggs some women’s panty hose come in might be the right size for that. Failing that, you might be able to form them from thin plastic sheet and something with the right shape like a large ball. Cut that to size and glue several scotch tape cores together with the top and use thin thread to form the seams, paint it and voila you have your oil tanks.
Irv
Heres what I came up with in about an hours work, everything made from scratch and I have one more tank being painted. (ignore the army tank its just holding a sign in position)
Another source of “pipe” is the sprue from model kits (that’s the stuff that all the kit parts are attached to when you open the box). It can be cut up and glued back together to make a piping system.
If you save spare bits of Romex electrical wiring, #12 or #14 solid wire could be another source of pipe material.
BBC:
“Oh, you ordered THAT kind of tank…”
I like your little tank…the oil one, I mean [:)]. I think it will look better, too, as you add more. If I might add some advice, I’d add some that were taller. You don’t have room for very large tanks, but taller ones will look big. Have canned pears with breakfast for a few days. I’d build the tanks but leave them loose, and move them around until you find a good configuration.
If you have any room, an earth dike around the base of the tanks would look realistic on a modern layout. Just spoon out some plaster, shape it into a rounded dike, and cover it with grass. If you don’t have room, don’t worry about it.
You can use heavy cardboard tube, wrapped in cardstock & painted.
tk:
It isn’t every gas station that offers Time Lord parking. I hope the store sells jelly babies.
I wonder if the Doctor is there for the air races?
Something makes me [:)] about the two signs nearest the tank advertising cigarettes and matches.
I like the understated rust on the white steel tank.
Employee parking!
Solo shot of tank.
Looked at this last night, saw some good ideas, so moved on. Today it came to me that the plastic “cans” that pre-made frosting comes in would make a good vertical tank. (Might have to shave off some lettering on the bottom.)
What you have made looks good, but thought I’d just throw in another idea.
Have fun,