As mentioned in a previous post, I’ve been building the kits I’ve been meaning to get to since before Brutus stabbed Caesar.
So I picked up the Muir Models Alameda Engine House and looked inside. The picture on the box looked like this:
Now right off the bat, I know I don’t need an engine house that will hold two Big Boys end-to-end, so I know I’m going to cut it down some. Now I recently had a bad experience with a Muir Model where the guy who I got it from on eBay had built it and sent me only what was left when he quit 3/4 of the way through. So the first thing I did was stack all the bits of wood and count them.
They were all there, but the wood walls were in odd sections. When I read the instructions, I found out what I was supposed to do is tape them together from the back, then glue a brick print to the wood. I swear the model in the picture on the box looked like wood.
But it got worse–or so it seemed.
The print of the bricks was faded badly. But not evenly. It was perfectly new in places, but it was obviously been out in the sun for like 6 months with the instructions sitting on top of the bricks. Because the instructions are faded too. I could recreate just how they were laying if you want. The bricks were unusable even if I wanted to, and I wanted a wood engine house anyway.
So, I decided I’d use the big old windows and the back doors and everything else would be made of popsicle sticks and coffee stirrers. So, I drew up a plan. My engine house would be only 9 inches long and have only one vent instead of four. And 9 inches fits the longest engine I have by over an inch. Engines weren’t that big in 1895.
Oooooh, you have a treat in store. Look up the recent thread on ‘scratch building brick walls’ and see what is available in laser-etched brick in wood. You can use these as patterns for molded fascia brick if your budget doesn’t permit…
I must not have been clear. I wanted wood to begin with. This is a town built around the lumber industry and so naturally, the guy who owns the Rock Ridge RR would buy the lumber from himself, the owner of Rock Ridge Lumber. He is after all, Randall “Rock” Ridge.
His brother, Douglas “Duke” Ridge owns the silver mine and foundry. Lawrence Ridge, who has no “middle name” is currently trying to start a new saloon/whorehouse to compete with the Flattened Penny. He’s not been very successful with his preveous grand schemes either.
No, this is the venture by the finance guy who married Ridge sister Mantelle, the secret plan to make bricks out of compressed wood dust and chips to be set with ‘renewable’ mortar with low taxable carbon involvement (made with processing of wood). Touted as the greatest potential improvement since glulam, a technology I see the Ridges seem to have missed in general…
Modeled economically by just not painting the laser-etched sheets when you use them… [;)]
I just can’t picture a tree-hugger in a logging family. They could get some of the fake wood made with recycled styrofoam. (Save your blue and pink scraps modelers.) At least that almost looks like wood.
Strange you mention this as so much of the proprietary chemistry in binder conditioners and fireproofing is sourced by them. As the salesmen say "Our sufficiently-advanced technology is indistinguishable from magic’.
I made up decals for my old streamlined passenger cars. Governor William LePetomane is on the observation car. The dining car is Alferd Packer, the only American ever convicted of cannibalism.
GERN is a long-running model-railroad trope. Think snake-oil patent medicine company with formulae adapted for ‘industry’ instead of pharma. While retaining the nostrum-like cagy reluctance to describe precisely what is in the products or how they work… but good with the branding campaigns…
The majority of the GERN discussions take place on a different forum. Can’t post links to them, per the rules here, but the color of your avatar’s shirt references that other board.
Well, I got the details on the wall. It took two partial days. It was tedious work and I had to take a nap yesterday. I had a heck of a time getting photos with my phone. Either the colors were washed out or autofocus wanted to focus on a bird out the window.
You probably noticed that I didn’t go back on the wall more than about a third of the way. When it’s on the layout, you will have a limited viewing area, and those blank shelves won’t be seen…hopefully.
This is more the angle from which you’ll be seeing it. That is if you drive up to my house and are wearing your face mask and I have it on the layout.
Those are supposed to be different colored paint cans and look that way in RL. Also, for some reason, that generator is so washed out you can barely see it. Oh, well.
Great name for a railroad! My freight yard is named Rock Ridge Freight Yard, named after that famous movie, as you did! still building my railroad. Got any dimes?? [:D]
Just like in real construction, the job goes faster in your mind than it does in real life. I only got the two end walls framed. I spent a good deal of the day making sure everything was square. I ended up using angle braces in the corners making sure they don’t interfer with the roof joists and the soffits.
This is the front view of the framing. If you are wondering about the horizontal piece that looks like it will clothsline the smoke stack, that’s just temporary until I can put the siding on.
This is the rear of the building. No one will ever see it except the train drivers and they won’t care. I’m thinking putting some graffiti on there. Probably something about my wife or model railroaders. I didn’t expect it, but I’m going to have to do some sanding to get the siding even.
Tomorrow I’ll do the roof joists, soffits and facia. Probably. I’m learning not to make promises I can’t keep.
