I’m modeling the late 60’s/early 70’s era and am looking for a good cement facility to build. I read Yankee Flyer’s post about something similar, but none of the suggestions there would match what I’m looking for. I saw the Kibri version on the Walthers site…looks too European…and also saw the Cement Works by Faller, but again, looks kinda European. I could probably make that one work, with some good weathering (weathering fixes everything, doesn’t it??[;)]), but wondered if anybody else had any other options.
Even though I’m in the 70’s era, I have a friend that owns a local cement plant and I’m going to name my plant after his, but they weren’t around back then…still, I thought it’d be cool to have him see it. Given that, I wonder if I should just try to scratch-build a replica of his, rather than trying to make another one work???[%-)]
How about Walthers Medusa Cement?? Looks pretty good to me, pretty close to Model Stone Co. in south Minneapolis that I used to live by. It’s a “retired” model, but I bet you could still find one at a flea market, LHS or online somewhere.
I saw that one, Stix, and I thought it looked pretty good, too. But I saw it was “retired”. I haven’t tried to search online for it, though…thanks for the info.
Try eBay for the Medusa Cement model. You should be able to find it there.
The Medusa Cement facility is a bulk cement distributor, much different from a cement plant. A full-blown cement plant is a huge, sprawling complex that includes all the processes of cement production from raw materails through bulk storage. Cement plants are comparable in size to steel mills or oil refineries.
A bulk cement distributor (like Medusa Cement) is a “forward deployed” (to use a military term) storage/distribution point for bulk cement. They used to be located in most every major city and large town, and would receive the bulk cement from distant cement plants in 2-bay covered hoppers. Trucks would then haul the cement to local construction sites in special trailers. Some of these facilities had “bag houses” which would put the bulk cement into 50-lb (or so) bags for smaller jobs.
The Walthers Medusa plant looks to use the same silos as the Walthers ADM grain elevator, which I recently built. I’m a relatively inexperienced modeler, but I have two observations from this build that you might find helpful:
My mistake: The silo vertical sections are molded in 4 pieces - “sides” with about 25% of the arc for each silo exposed, joined with 2 “end” sections, which contain another 25% or so of the 2 end silos. The result is that you have unsightly vertical seams on the 4 corner silos. Post-build, I’ve heard from others (but didn’t do myself) to build the vertical silo sections, fill the seams with white Squadron Brand putty, and sand smooth to cover the seams. All this before painting. Wish I would have done that.
My success: Lightly spray the silos with tan or white sand-textured paint from a spray can. This paint is cheap and available at any hardware or discount store. I used tan to simulate raw concrete, with a very light white overspray of non-textured paint. This gave the effect of a concrete structure, once painted white, with a significant amount of weathering. Turned out great - has the look and feel of poured concrete! Spray light - doesn’t take much.
I just wish I’d done the seam filling (point 1) prior to the textured spray (point 2). Ah well - guess it’s time for a fill, sand and repaint job. Live and learn.
I’ve been trying to find another one - I had one but it went along with the rest of my stuff. Less the exposed kiln, Valley Cement loosk EXACTLY as I remember a local plant from when I was a kid, I passed it every time we went to my grandparten’s house. It was unbuilt in the box, never got around to figuring out where to put it. Now that I am building a new layout which is in part based on a branch that served a cement plant, I have a palce and use for it but no kit anymore.
SOme good info so far, but along these same lines…I’m also trying to find some cement carrying rolling stock. I found the Trinity cars, but according to the write-up on the Walthers site, those were produced in the early 80’s (I’m modeling the early 70’s). What’s out there for that era of cement carrying cars?
Saying cement plants are comparable in size to steel mills and oil refineries is an exaggeration. Cement plants are large (tens of acres?), but not huge (hundreds of acres?).
Cement is an ingredient to concrete. Concrete plants receive cement and mix with sand, gravel, water, and whatever to make concrete. If cement is sent to the building site, the building contractor will need to mix sand, etc. to make the concrete. The rotating-drum cement truck is actually a truck built to carry concrete to the construction site before it sets up.
Walthers used to have the “Blue Star Ready Mix” facility that I got. Part # 933-3086. During this time when Walthers was advertising this product, you could buy Con-Cor made cement trucks with the Blue Star logo on them to go along with the facility.They had the dump trucks and the cement trucks. I’m finally getting ready to add it to my layout.
Looks like about $25 worth of styrene, another $20 worth of detail parts, and some scrap PVC pipe could build that same complex. Check out the various structural components that Plastruct has available, and try your hand at some scratch building!
From the forties-fifties on, covered hoppers would be used for bulk cement, although I seem to recall boxcars were used - both carrying sacked concrete but also some old wood boxcars were made into kind of honorary covered hoppers, with hatches on the roof for loading.
