This thread was started in July 2013
Bill
July 2013 edited July 2013 in HO Scale Builds
Hi everybody…I’m back again for another Sierra West build. This time I’m taking a crack at Quincy Salvage. I bought this kit a couple years ago mostly because of the main barn. It has two qualities that kept grabbing my attention: the look/color of the wood siding and the beautiful sagging roof. As you’ll see, both effects are achieved with amazingly simple methods (a trademark of Sierra West kits!).
When I start a project, I like to have two sets of goals in mind: one for the model and another for modeling skills. I’m stating them here as a reminder for myself but it may be helpful for others, too. For the model, I’m hoping to end up with a scene of a thriving auto salvage yard that’s about to fall on hard times. The owner probably was a good mechanic but a real pain in the a%$ to deal with. He knows cars and scrapin’ but he’s a bad businessman who doesn’t take care of his employees or his property. The structures are starting to reflect his “if you don’t like it, go some place else” attitude. Keeping that little image in mind can help solve modeling challenges: his tools and parts would be kept in neat order, but the roof? Bahhhh…slap some tar paper on the leak and call it done!
Now for my modeling skills. As in the past, I’m hoping to try some new techniques and different materials. I’ll be trying some stuff with the roof(s), working on my dry brushing, and experimenting with some scenery ideas. I’m not quite ready to alter the shape of the structures in a kit but I’m going to incorporate a new/different structure somewhere on the dio while maintaining the balance of the scene. The other challenge will be the vehicles. I’m going to need LOTS of them in various stages of disintegration. I’ve never built a single Jordan so why not dive in and build a dozen or two!!
I’ve done a fair amount of research (or, “over-thinking”) and have built up a decent collection of reference pictures that match my vision for the model and capture the organized chaos of a salvage yard:
Please feel free to comment as I go along. Like a good doctor, I value second opinions. The extra eyes on the forums have served me well in the past–no matter your experience or skill level!
Comments
Joel
July 2013
Great shots. Looking forward to this build. I’ve always loved this kit (Did I hear O Scale?) and love your skill as a modeler. The two together should be fantastic.
brownbr
July 2013
Looking forward to the build
Bill
July 2013
Joel-thanks for the vote of confidence. BTW, I love your chalk idea in the Lineside Shed. That’s one I’ll be trying for sure!
Bryan- glad to have you following along. Any chance you’ll be bringing you Tool Shed to the Expo? I wanna see that beauty in person!
Okay…let’s begin Quincy’s! The prep work for the castings and stripwood are all pretty straight forward. I made a few variations here and there. One was with the soaking recipe (I used considerably less of the brown colors in favor of more Oily Black…no reason; just to be different). Another was with the coloring for the storage shed–I soaked the strips in a bath of alcohol and black leather dye. The specific brand/type was Angelus Jet Black leather dye. It’s got a tiny hint of blue to it which is nice for getting a silvery aged look. A quick 30 second soak then wiped 'em down:
For the paper shingles, the instructions call for staining the sheets with the thinned brown stain (30% Roof Brown, 10% Grime, 60% Dio-Sol). Following a light staining, I let the sheets dry then added some chalk streaks for color variety (a little orange, yellow ochre, some olive green and a little light gray). Next, I blended the chalk streaks with another coat of the same stain so that there were no hard color lines.
Ultimately, I may use individual cedar shingles, but I like the way these look and it sure was simple!
Bill
July 2013
One of the unique features of Quincy’s is the faded coloring of the wood siding on the main barn. The color is Floquil Southern Freight Car Brown (grab a bottle now because all Floquil and Polly Scale paints will soon become the new “Driftwood Stain”). The look is achieved through a two step process: application AND removal of the color. First, texture is brushed/scribed into the pre-stained strips. Next, the SFC brown is added with sort of a dry brush application. I say “sort of” because you can get lots of different looks depending on how much paint you apply, how dry it is, how hard you scrub it into the strips etc. Generally, less is more when adding the color. The real trick is in the removal of the color–which comes next. Using a single edge blade, the paint is scraped off the stripwood. Different amounts of pressure yield different results.
What I found most important was to allow the paint to dry COMPLETELY (like a good 24 hours) before trying to scrape any off. Without that drying time, the paint would sort of ball up rather than peel and flake off. I also experimented with the angle of the blade. By hitting the edges of the strip, the paint was removed and it looked like the board was a bit warped (“cupping” is what wood workers call it). It’s pretty subtle effect, but like most good details it simply adds to the final look. Look at the edges of the two darker boards to the right of the blackened area. See how they’re lighter?
There are areas of the barn where repairs have been made. Rather than vertical siding, horizontal planks are used for the patch job. I used some pieces without the SFC brown and a few pieces of left over siding from the Twin Mills that had the white peeled paint on them. Kinda suggests a “who cares” attitude toward the maintenance:
After boarding up the walls, I needed to tone down the red somewhat with a little dry brushing. Working from dark to light, I used raw umber, Khaki tan and a medium gray (all cheap acrylic craft paints). It makes a noticeable difference in softening and weathering the final look of the siding:
ironmountainlumber
July 2013
Wow! The colors on the walls look fantastic. Thanks for the detailed explanation and the many pictures. This is really helpful in trying something new. Keep it coming!
Jim
KKarns
July 2013
Bill, I concur with Jim, nice to get a tutorial on some new techniques. What a great start on the walls and the board treatment with the edges scraped of their color and the amount of weathering detail is perfect. Subtile rich old looking wood…can’t wait to see more of this build and how you do the automobiles. It’ll be a treat and a privilege to follow.
brownbr
July 2013
I really like the way the walls turned out. The who cares maintenance job is a nice touch. I’ve tried a similar technique to the paint and razor blade but used chalks or IA followed by 220 grit sandpaper. Nice effect and it works well on these walls.
I don’t believe that I will be attending the Expo this year, but if you make it as far south as Virginia Beach I’ll be happy to give you a tour of the layout room.
Karl.A
July 2013
Nice work Bill, always a kit that I loved from Brett. The wall colouration is…
Wait a minute, did someone say beach ? ? ?
Blue skies, the soft sound of the waves lapping, sand between my toes. Corona in one hand, exacto in the other… I can see me now…
Oh yeah… really, REALLY nice job on the walls so far. This is going to be a fun build to keep up with. Sweet!
Karl.A
Jerry
July 2013
Bill good start. I like the coloring you’ve gotten so far.
Jerry
Bill
July 2013
Jim, Ken, Bryan, Karl & Jerry-
Thanks for the nice words and encouragement. There are plenty of challenges ahead and I’m glad to have you along keeping an eye on my progress. (Karl-be careful with the Corona+exacto combination!)
Next up-more weathering. (I apologize in advance…I was rather lax in taking pictures of this step, but I need to repeat it on the next structure and I’ll do better job on that one) I wanted to get a heavy water damage effect at the bottom of the boards. In the past, I’d used repeated applications of alcohol & India ink of various strengths. That works pretty well but this time around I used oil paint and mineral spirits. After a little experimenting, here’s the method that gave the best results: I took clean mineral spirits and dabbed it on the bottom edges of the vertical siding allowing it to seep about 2/3s to 3/4s of the way up the siding. Next, using raw umber oil paint, I dabbed small amounts on the bottom edges and in the lower cracks and gaps. Finally, I flooded the boards liberally with more clean mineral spirits (again on the bottom edges). This diluted the oil paint and carried it up higher into the wood.
By pre-wetting the boards with spirits, there won’t be any hard lines from the raw umber. The dark “water damage” will simply fade and blend in with the original wood color.
The barn has two stories. A visible seam in the vertical siding confirms an upper and lower level. I looked at some pictures of old barns to see how that seam weathers. It’s pretty interesting to note that the upper vertical boards react to moisture in a similar way as the lower ones. As moisture drains down, it will still collect at the base of the vertical boards–even on the second story:
Again, I experimented to see if I could model this and if it’d make a noticeable difference.
First, here’s the upper and lower stories butted together with no weathering around the seam:
In this picture, you can see the bottom-up weathering of the upper level compared to the wall with no weathering around the seam:
I used the same technique to weather the upper level (as previously described), however a bit less oil paint was applied.
ironmountainlumber
July 2013
Nailed it! The effect you were after is very convincing in the pictures you posted. The boards look like water has wicked up the boards staining them. This is really interesting technique I have to try. Bill you seem to always come up with some unique and effective techniques and tips. Great job. Did you get more track laid on the layout?
Jim
Karl.A
July 2013
Darned impressive stuff !!! Looks fantastic.
Karl.A
Bill
July 2013 edited July 2013
Thanks guys! Jim-I haven’t laid a single tie or rail on the layout. It’s a combination of business and laziness (how’s THAT for covering my bases!?).
Here’s the upper left wall–which features the “Quincy” dry transfer decal. I was going to name the business after a relative of mine but when I looked into creating dry transfers, the process seemed pretty complicated and/or expensive. To get it right, you have to go through many steps. There isn’t a special sheet of printer paper you can buy at Office Max that allows you to crank out dry transfers!
The decals can be a little finicky and you basically get one shot at positioning and placement, so it’s got to be right. But with a little care and patience the results are awesome. I also should mention I tried using real glass for the windows. I used microscope slides.
If you go this route, get the scriber. I’ll be honest…working with real glass is a real pain! You use tape to hold the pieces in place in order to scratch scribe lines to crack them into the correct shape, but just removing the tape (even low tack) cause the glass to break. You can get some really cool glass break effects, but overall it’s a major pain and the end result probably doesn’t justify the extra effort. (Or, perhaps I just stink at working with it!)
You do get a nice light reflection with real glass (when viewed at the right angle):
This wall has been weathered bottom up with the raw umber oil and then dry brushed with 3 light coats of cheap craft paint (raw umber, khaki tan and a light gray). After applying the “Quincy” decal I made vertical cuts where the boards meet. Then, aged it by making more vertical slits cuts and scratches to flake off some of the material. A fresh blade will give the best results–note the big chunk out of the left part of the “Q”. Ooops. Yeah, that’s right about when I figured out the sharp blade part!
Joel
July 2013
Amazing work Bill. Really beautiful.
Wes
July 2013
Bill that is some breath takingly beautiful work.
WOW
davej
July 2013
Bill that looks awesome, really like the technique on the wood.
Coors2u
July 2013
Amazing results.
Bill
July 2013 edited July 2013
Thanks for the comments, gents!
With the walls still in the flat, the instructions have you add some more details. Namely, the old signs. When it comes to these vintage advertising signs, two things make me crazy when I seem them on models: sloppy cut jobs and white edges from the paper. Either one of those will ruin the look of a structure–no matter how good the wood and siding look. They’re huge distractions, so I’ll share what I do to avoid those issues.
First, we need to cut the signs out from the paper sheet. I always use a straight edge and a sharp blade and avoid free hand cutting if possible. Circles (and complex shapes) on the other hand, require good ol’ scissors. No matter how careful I am, I’ve not yet been able to cut out a perfect circle. Probably never will! I usually end up with something pretty close but with a sharp edge here and there:
(By the way, I find it useful to look at the sign from the back side as well to see how “true” of a circle I got and spot other edges that will stand out when it gets mounted to the structure.)
I can see that there are a couple obvious spots that need to be trimmed away. Using a pair of scissors for small touch ups like this is futile. So instead, I take the finer side of a cheap nail file and carefully “sand” off the high spots of the paper. You have to make sure the paper sign is completely dry and that it hasn’t absorbed any moisture from your fingertips. The edges will sort of “mushroom” over on the edges if it’s even slightly damp. A couple light passes is all it takes.
This sign is about 3/8" and looks quite a bit better with the edges sanded off.
The stark white edges of the paper will SCREAM loudly if it gets mounted on the wall that way so they need to be toned down. There are several ways to do it–everything from craft paint to markers. Using just A&I alone still leaves the edges noticeable in my opinion, so I usually use a little thinned paint. In this case, I used the dark brown stain that the manual has you mix up for swiping strip wood. Since it has a lot of thinner in it, the white edges will get colored and the thinner gradually wicks into the paper carrying paint with it leaving a natural weathered look without hard edges. Just a quick touch with a brush of the thinned stain should do it.
Before:
After:
Since the signs included in the kit are pre-weathered, at this point they’re ready to be mounted. However, here are a couple extra steps I took with the signs to make them pop a bit more.
First, I dabbed on a couple rust colored weathering powders and swept them off in a downward motion, streaking the sign a bit:
Next, using a toothpick, I blotted on some raw umber oil paint around the outer and lower edges:
On top of the oil paint, I dusted on more chalks and weathering powders working from dark browns and oranges up to the Kevin O’Neil staple, Gold Ochre (231.5)
I went back and forth adding a bit more raw umber then some chalk; more raw umber, more chalk; until a nice crusty, flaky layer built up. This probably sounds like a lot of work but it actually goes pretty quickly. I cut out a whole bunch of signs and got them sanded to shape first. Then went through the coloring process above in an assembly line fashion and cranked 'em out in pretty short order. Here’s the final result:
I also took a tweezers and pinched random corners to make a sign look more corroded or, make it appear to have gotten bent when something was shoved against it.
A few more details on the walls and I’ll get the barn together, then it’ll be time to tackle the sagging roof!
KKarns
July 2013
Hey Bill, I wish I had your sign tutorial when I was doing my signs for the Backwoods Water Tank build. I think I handled the coloring of the edges, weathering, and the trimming OK but your building up of the chalk and the slight bending of the paper gives them a definite awesome 3D look that I didn’t get! Rats…next time I guess…
Am following closely and learning a great deal already Bill, thanks.
admin
July 2013
Very nice work thus far… attention to detail like this along the way adds up to a truly exceptional diorama. Thanks for posting your progress Bill!
Bill
September 2013 edited September 2013
Here are a few pictures of the other walls. The signs have been added and I toned down the boards with some light dry brushing: working from dark to light I again used a raw umber, tan and medium gray.
I decided to scratch build the doors so that I could get a more run-down look: gaps between the slats, more splits and cracks and damage along the bottoms. They’re also darker than the siding (brown chalks and alcohol). The man door is the metal casting included in the kit.
The awning is made from tissue paper. I put a couple creases in the paper (so that it looks like seams in the material) and colored it using medium strength A/I and a little olive green chalk. The green, I think, adds just enough color to break things up a bit plus it balances out the yellow on the two signs.
I added some scrape marks where the barn door rubs against the siding after repeated openingg and closings. I only did one side so far because I’m not convinved the coloring is right. The scrapes look a bit too new, perhaps? I also borrowed an idea from Dave Revelia’s model and added some simple shutters (oops. Pictures only show them on one side, but all the windows have them).
Bill
September 2013 edited September 2013
Next up is the sagging roof! Very simple and clever design: cardstock that’s folded at the peak. The sag is achieved by trimming the cardstock from left to right making it look like the peak is drooping a bit.
The roof is to be covered with tar paper. I added some exposed old cedar shakes in a couple spots to show that it had been re-roofed at some point. A couple rows were glued in place then roughed up with a blade and colored with chalk and alcohol:
For the actual tar paper, I had read about guys using plain old toilet paper so I decided to try it. I used cheap white TP that I stole from work and spray painted both sides Grimy black followed by a blast of Dull Coat. I used some dark and light brown chalks along with a little gray and yellow ochre here and there to streak and weather the paper then, let it all dry. Next, I cut them into strips about 3-4 scale feet wide. Those were cut into random lengths as I laid them on the roof. They were attached with a 50/50 water & white glue mix. I found I got some interesting results depending on how I used the glue. On some strips I dunked the tar paper completely into the glue. On others, I was careful to not get any on the top surface. With those pieces, I let them float in the glue mix until they were damp:
Then pulled them out of the little dish across the edge keeping the top dry (and free of glue) and allowing the excess to drain off:
It was damp enough to poke the vent hole straight through and add some wrinkles with a tweezers:
What’s nice about using TP is you get really natural looking tears. I got the best results by tearing the strips when they were totally dry, then putting them in the glue and into position:
I got lucky and found a few pieces that didn’t lay completely flat while the alocohol dried and, again, got a real natural looking wind-blown piece:
Here’s the completed roof–other than the ridge cap-- with a little better lighting:
Bill
KKarns
September 2013
Bill, the only issues I have are…the uhm..thingey needs…maybe you could …who am I kiddin, the thing looks fabulous! The roof is genius and you matched the amount of weathering that a structure with a sagging roof would have perfectly. I love the shakes poking through the tar paper and the texture of the paper with your method is great. Then there’s the shutters, beautiful…Ken
Joel
September 2013
Stunning work. looking forward to seeing this one in person. Great eye for colour and detail that pops out but still acts as a whole. I love it!
Jerry
September 2013
Bill that roof is beautiful. Great job.
Jerry
PaulSmulders
September 2013
Bill, the roof is awesome (as well as the walls and signs), well done. Always enjoy watching (and reading) about your techniques.
Paul
ironmountainlumber
September 2013
Bill, I am amazed at the techniques you present each time you post. The tarpaper looks old and beat up just like it should. Is the paper really fussy when placed on the roof or is it fairly easy to move around to reposition using this technique? Great work!
Jim Richards
Bill
September 2013
Thanks for all the nice comments, guys.
Ken-next update, I’ll show a bit more on how I color and texture the cedar shakes. The roof on the little storage shed is all hand cut cedar pieces.
Jim-the TP is really fussy and difficult to move if it’s completely saturated in the water & white glue. It shreds and gets stingy looking–not very realistic. It can turn into a huge blob. When I used that “float” method, the strips still had a bit of rigidity to them making it easier to adjust. You still need to use care in adding the creases and wrinkles, but some brands will have lines embossed in them (like Cottonelle, for example) which give a wrinkle effect.
Bill
September 2013 edited September 2013
I’m going to skip forward to the roof on the storage shed. The kit provides great laser cut shingles, but I’ve grown to love the look of real cedar shakes. The down side is that the process is quite a bit more time consuming. The cedar material is the same stuff that lined the inside of an old cigar tube. It’s really thin fragile stuff. I’ve never seen it sold in stores. The closest I’ve encountered is cedar cooking strips sold on Amazon and at some grocery stores but they looked to be too thick (at least for HO):
First, I take the roof card and hit it with a brown Floquil color thinned enough to not obscure the lines. The entire card needs to be painted so that any gaps won’t reveal the cardboard color underneath. After it’s dry, I sketch out the areas where the roof planks will be exposed due to shakes falling off:
Using a sharp blade, I carve out the cardboard deep enough so that the planks will fit in flush with the surface of he cardstock. The plank pieces are just scrap 2x10 or 2x12…size isn’t important nor is consistency of the plank widths.
I fill all the carved out ares with planks, then weather them to look pretty worn and rotten.
In a nutshell, a sheet of cedar is cut into strips of various widths (6"-16") with a brand new blade then, cross cut to a length of 24". You’ll be left with a pile of tiny shingles. Next begins the process of applying the little shakes. I lay a smear of glue (yellow carpenter’s glue seems to work best for me) about an inch or so across the bottom of the roof card. I stab an individual shingle with a #11 blade and position it on the roof. Using an awl or a pick, hold the shingle in place so you can remove the exacto knife.
I leave the planks exposed in a way that looks like wind damage or general disrepair with a few shakes here and there sliding down the roof. After all the shakes are applied, I let the entire roof sit overnight and allow the glue to dry completely. The next day, I come back and distress the shingles with a brush, pick and #11 blade. You have to be somewhat careful to just rough-up the shingles with cracks and splits and not pull them off the card completely. It’s kinda hard to see, but here’s the roof with all the shingles after distressing them:
Next, we’ll add color and weather them.
Bill
September 2013
Mike-
I believe those are going to be too thick and not scale correctly. The size I see listed is 10mm. The stuff I’m using is less than .5mm. The thicknesses are .011" and .018". You want micro thin printable veneer without paper backing. Here’s a close up of a sheet…cut them to width length wise; then cross cut with a pair a scissors.
And I know what you’re thinking: “how can he hold the piece in one hand cut it out with the other and still snap a picture?” It’s all fake:
Wes
September 2013
DAMN. That place needs some seroius TLC.
Keep up the great work Bill.
ironmountainlumber
September 2013 edited September 2013
The shingles give your builds a lot of personality and make them very unique! Very cool!
Jim
Mike Engler
September 2013
I don’t know how I will get to see this at the Expo if you are taking the time to sit around cutting individual cedar shakes for your model.
Bill, this is some really outstanding modeling, and some truly innovative weathering techniques. I went through the entire thread today and this is some great stuff.
Mike Engler
September 2013
The other challenge will be the vehicles. I’m going to need LOTS of them in various stages of disintegration. I’ve never built a single Jordan so why not dive in and build a dozen or two!!
There was a guy on RRLine who did a thread on building ten Jordans at once. He is in a nice home somewhere, but hasn’t been heard from since.
Bill
September 2013 edited September 2013
Ahhhhh MR Runner! You got me pegged: sitting around making slow forward progress–just like those Vikings of yours! (Now watch, the Gophers will probably hand it to my Hawkeyes this weekend)
Jim & Wes–good to hear from you. Let’s see if I can get this roof to look like it’s gotta be leaking!
Okay, with all the texture scribed in, I add some color using only chalks. Start with a bunch of mostly raw umber (408.5 & a little 408.7) plus some burnt umber 409.5. There’s no magic formula as to exactly which colors or how much of each. Stick with these earthy tones and you really can’t do it wrong! I throw on the powder liberally, push them around a little with a make up brush, then scrub them into the grain (up and down) with a stiff stencil brush. I then flood the roof with a medium solution of A/I and wash it all into the shingles really well. I think using A/I rather than straight alcohol makes the roof look older and rotting. Since the shed is modeled in disrepair, the roof will match the age of the walls (which is finished but no pics posted yet).
Next, a few highlights of gold ochre, yellow ochre, a couple spots of olive green and a touch of gray (adds to the look of decay) With a top to bottom motion, those also get blended in with A/I. Then I let the whole mess dry and evaluate the colors. I’ll go back and add more chalks to break up unnatural patterns or to just balance out and tone down the colors a little. Wash with alcohol again and let it dry.
Once it’s completely dry, it’s time to dry brush. This will tone the colors down even more and tie them all together. It also adds a little “pop” to the shingles. I used a dark gray, followed by a couple light tans (acrylics) for the dry brushing.
By the way, here’s a roof from the Twin Mills that was made to look less old and run down compared to this one. The difference is I used straight alcohol, mostly lighter raw umber (408.7) and fewer colors (no green and much less burnt umber and yellow ochre)
Next, I’ll get back in order and do the walls. I got a few Jordan trucks assembled, too.
Karl.A
September 2013
Roof looks great Bill, you just cant beat the look of individual shingles, and you have done them so well.
Karl.A
Joel
September 2013
Stunning work Bill. As usual, no surprises just steady greatness. Keep it coming.
KKarns
September 2013
Bill, Really nice tutorial on shingling and detailing a roof, awesome job. The colors and weathering are just gorgeous. So as far as you know, no reliable source for the material you use for the shingles? You mentioned the stuff you saw (cooking strips I think you said) was likely too thick. Ken
Bill
October 2013 edited October 2013
Karl, Joel and Ken–thanks for the nice words and encouragement.
Getting back to the walls on the storage shed. As I mentioned at the start of the thread, the sripwood was colored using black shoe dye with a hint of blue (Dr. Ph Martins Blue India ink). I think the proportions were 1 drop of blue for every 10 drops of Angelus Jet Black leather dye with alcohol. Some strips I let soak for a while; others got a quick in-n-out bath and that was it.
Once dry, I opted to use the toothpick method for creating knot holes. Both Karl & Joel have spelled out the way to do:
#306 RailRoad Camp - O Scale - Part One. Karl.A - O Scale Builds - SierraWest Scale Models Forum
Joel’s Lineside Shed - O Scale Builds - SierraWest Scale Models Forum
Try Joel’s tip on dying the toothpicks in mass to save a step. Also, I’d recommend going real easy on sanding the backs of the knots. It needs to be done in order for the strips to lay flat against the cardstock but they pop out with hardly any effort even when the glue is fully dried. That being said, here are the strips ready to be laid up on the cardstock:
I drew pencil lines to help keep the joints consistent. Those are 5 scale feet up from the bottom and 5 scale feet down from the top. It’s a bit hard to see, but I left just a tiny gap between each board and joint (about the thickness of an exacto).
After all the boards are in place, it’s a simple process of cutting each wall free from the cardstock (careful as to not slice off the stripwood trap on the side walls) then trim them to exact size. It may be worth mentioning that, other than window and door openings, I rarely use an exacto for cutting out walls. A single edge blade works just as well for me and they’re cheaper. I change out blades constanly so and I feel less guilty tossing out a 5 cent straight edge blade verses a 25 cent #11. Here are the walls cut off the card material…
Next, I added the windows, doors and trim followed by 3 light layers of drybrushing: raw umber, Barnwood and a light gray–all acrylic craft paint. Once happy with the color, I added the signs and assembled the walls followed by the roof. I chose to leave the white dry transfer decal off the side wall. I’ve got an idea for a little scene with a tire rack and parts stand that will most likely block the lettering.
For the little walkway, I made wear marks in the “traffic” area by shaving the board edges slightly–similar to how I scraped the edges of the barn siding. After gluing them in place and letting them dry, I went over the walk with steel wool. A little A/I touched on both edges tied everything together.
The roof looks much more brown and new in natural light than I anticipated, but I’m satisfied with the color match I got under layout lights. One thing I struggled with is the moss on the roof. Several of the reference pictures I looked at show it growing in the outline of the shakes like this:
But, this may be one of those things where the prototype doesn’t translate very well on a model.
That’s all for now…castings are drying as I type.
Bill
Joel
October 2013
Love the knotholes and the moss - particularly the painstaking attention to detail of having the moss grow only where there is a crack. Also not shaving or sanding down the knots makes some of the boards pop out slightly and you get a great effect of individual boards. Kinda like when Brett put varying thicknesses of siding into the original Blue Sky.
KKarns
October 2013
Bill,
You are a master at birthing a build that’s all your own and has such personal touches. The custom shingles…well we’ve already drooled over those on the main barn. The moss is really nice I particularly love the side with the signs as the moss has grown in and around the damaged roof where water and rot would have set in and looks so natural there. The other corner on the side without signs..mmm..but still looks good. Siding color is awfully nice. I also like Joel thoughts on the irregular siding thickness, two birds with…you know. Thanks for the link to the HO license plates. Good to have a parts bin with some of those. Ken
ironmountainlumber
October 2013
Hi Bill,
Really great explanation with the pictures you posted. Ken and Joel really sum things up with the personal touches you do that make each of your builds very unique. The overall look with the moss and knot holes is superb. I am courious how you knew to mix the colors you did for the board color and how you know what works well for dry brushing. Do you try things out first to see how it looks or just go for it ? For me mixing colors is very challenging and honestly I don’t know how to begin the process. It is a step in the modeling process I want to work on. I probably need a class called modelling for the color challenged 101 and have you teach it!
Jim Richards
admin
October 2013
Wonderful… simply wonderful!
Bill
October 2013 edited October 2013
Hi Jim-
Understandable that mixing colors can be a challenge. Initially, i didn’t know what to mix or experiment with. I simply followed the instructions in the Sierra West manual exactly. And I really mean that literally. My first kit of any kind was Essentials. There are pictures posted in the “finished SW build pics” and those are the results following the manual. However, if I were to build it again using the exact same recipes…it probably wouldn’t look exactly the same. And that’s good! You wouldn’t want all your building to look alike. Subtle variations in dilution, application, length of soaking time and even the batch of strip wood can account for a different look.
So arriving at using blue with the black ink is something I read about somewhere. I read on another forum about using gun blueing–the stuff used on gun barrels to protect them–as a coloring method. Then I found a list of different recipes that Mike Chambers wrote (I’ll post the link to that). From there it became a bunch of experimenting using coffee stirs. I mixed a batch using x drops of black with 1 drop of blue and some alcohol. Take 4 or 5 strips and soak them for different lengths of time, let dry and evaluate. Too light or not gray enough? Add them for another soak to make it darker; add a bit more blue to see if it gets grayer. Then I informally kept track:
(The weeds have nothing to do with this) In the upper right you can see my “notes”: 10 drops of black ink, 2 drops of blue and a 1/2 ounce of alcohol. There’s also a note to remind myself that the particular batch of stirs was dipped in the solution 3 times.
Also, if I see the results somebody got on a wall or a batch of wood, I’ll ask them to explain what they used and how. Then I’ll try it and see if I can get close. Other times I simply have no idea if it looks “correct”. If you go to the section in the Twin Mills build where I’m working on the roof for both the dynamite shack and the corrugated mill roof…I knew I did something wrong, didn’t know what exactly, and needed people to look at it with fresh eyes and help find some things to try in order to change the look.
With dry brushing…it’s pretty much the same thing. Most guys use a similar combination of colors that I used…I just liked the results using those particular three colors. I should add too, that many times I post the exact shade of chalk I used for something (gold ochre 231.3 let’s say) not just to share but primarily for my own reference–the thread becomes my own “recipe box”.
So, the short answer to your question is yes, simple experimenting and trial and error. But it starts by just giving it a shot. If you get stuck, Brett is extremely helpful! This is the absolute truth: My first SW kit I had to call and ask him which ‘stuff’ do you use to thin Floquil paints–alcohol or dio-sol? I just couldn’t grasp the difference! I felt awful for wasting his time with a total newbie question. His response? Don’t feel bad! His experience, knowledge and help are part of what you pay for when you buy one of his kits.
Don’t know where to begin? Try some of the stain recipes in Brett’s manual. Don’t get fancy. Just follow the directions EXACTLY. If you’re beyond that stage in your modeling, stray a little from his recipes, take notes on what you mixed, take pictures, and share your results here–good and bad! That’s how you’ll get better. At the end of the day, it may not be the perfect result or the exact look you were hoping for but…does it look better than when it was sitting unassembled in the box?
Hope that answers your questions a little. If not, I’d be glad to try to explain more.
Bill
Bill
October 2013
Thanks Brett–
Glad you like it. I think this is going to turn out really well and I can’t wait for you to see it. Probably ain’t gonna happen by the Expo, but I promise it’ll be worth the wait. I still am kicking around an idea for where to place a third structure, but I’m not “seeing” it. I’ll run some ideas by you early next week.
ironmountainlumber
October 2013 edited October 2013
A very big thank you Bill. Your explanations for my questions was extremely helpful and clear. I am finishing Essentials and totally agree the manuals are absolutely perfect ( I will be keeping them as part of a library for future reference). I have been following Bretts instructions to the letter and have results that I am very proud of and have learned a ton. When I am done the next step will try out the camera for the next build. I am always asking questions since I have no one to learn from locally. The forum here has been a marvelous resource to learn from and I appreciate everyone here. Brett has been great about calling and asking questions about how to do something when I have been stuck. Thanks for the many great pictures and explanations, it really helps us grow as modelers. Your right his kits look fantastic built and not in the box on a shelf.
Jim Richards
Bill
October 2013 edited October 2013
I spent some time getting started on the Jordan’s that will populate this little scene and messed around with different weathering techniques. The Mack truck was primed rust color then when dry, misted with hairspray. After that dried I gave it a coat of a pale yellow acrylic using an airbrush. Next, I used a stiff brush and a little water to get the chipping paint effect. The water dissolves the hairspray under the acrylic allowing it to “chip” off. From there I decided to try using oil paints to further weather the surface. Oils give you a whole new level of texture and control. The trade off is that they take a LONG time to dry. A week is not uncommon–in fact these may still be wet. I’m not sure if the finish will become less glossy or if I’ll have to hit the surface with dull cote. The ice truck wasn’t painted at all. That’s just the molded plastic color dulled down with oils. The colors I used were burnt umber and burnt sienna.
I also started working on the castings. The brick wall was colored with Floquil box car red, grimy black and some daylight orange muted with a little black. Once dry, I used an acrylic gray for the mortar. I wet the casting first with a mist of wet water so that it was damp, then thinned the gray a LOT (probably 5-10 drops of water to 1 drop of paint). If you touch your brush to the damp casting, the wet water will “pull” the paint mostly into the brick lines. Some will get on the surface of the bricks, but that looks pretty natural to me–kind of looks like lime leaching out of the brick plus it dulls the bricks down making them look older. I need to give them one more application as it looks like I lost some of the definition in the lines as the gray dried.
The concrete walls were painted first with Floquil concrete then, when cured, thinned Floquil Depot Buff. I ran into an issue with that step as the thinner started removing the concrete color down to the tinted resin. I’m guessing it really wasn’t cured all the way…who knows. I fooled around with so many other things I can’t remember exactly how I got to the final color of the wall. I tried some Polly paint, some chalk, some other paint, and on and on. Once I hit on a color that looked okay, I let the whole thing dry then weathered with AK enamels. I used a really dark track wash, a brown rust wash, and a lighter orange rust wash. You start by applying the dark streaks, let them dry for a few minutes, then remove some with a clean brush and white spirit. (I don’t know what the difference is between white spirit and mineral spirits but it seemed to work well). The white spirit removes some of the paint and also thins and blends the paint left behind. I repeated with the brown the the light orange in a few areas.
More castings to come!
Bill
Joel
October 2013
The colouring is superb! Nice subtle tones. Can’t wait to see it.
Jerry
October 2013
Bill nice job on those trucks. Brick and concrete walls great coloring.
Jerry
James
October 2013
Stunning work- every bit. I love your approach- a bit of research, envision it, a couple tests, then go for it! The water damage weathering and shake roof details in particular are so convincing. Love the concrete wall too. I’ve found some thin cedar veneer in a local store which I’m going to use for new shakes (O Scale) but probably too thick for HO. I’m a bit of a nervous nelly when it comes to cutting out signs- I’ve also experimented with using Microscale sign decals set with Micro-sol on various painted boards or very thin styrene sheet material as per Chuck D. Thanks again for posting the build process- it’s great when people take the time to do this.
Mike Engler
October 2013
Billy, the coloring on the trucks, and that of the brick and concrete walls is absolutely incredible. I’ve read how you did it twice, but your secret is safe from me as I don’t get it.
But do pick up the pace since I want to see this in my lifetime. I’m kidding, I know you will have it at the Expo. Can’t wait.
Karl.A
October 2013 edited October 2013
Superb colouring of the concrete wall Bill, the tones, colours, blending, textures all look incredible, fantastic work. Looking forward to seeing this in person to examine it more closely.
The brickwork also has a most natural feel and tone to it beginning to show through.
Karl.A
Bill
October 2013
Joel, Jerry, James, Mike and Karl–
I appreciate you following along and your comments.
James–I’ll be interested to see how you make out with the shakes. The add so much to the final look that you’ll probably never go back to laser cut. And wait til you see the reaction you get from viewers when you tell them you applied them one by one! Make sure to post some pictures for us.
Mike–I apologize for the ‘text only’ approach that I posted with those items. I’ve been rather lax in my picture taking lately. I could blame it on the wife swiping the camera but, nah…I’ve been lazy!
Which parts specifically need clarification and I’ll try to explain. I’ve got many more Jordan’s to build so I’ll be able to take pictures then. The walls are done so I’ll have to verbally explain. Or, how bout we work on a few at the Expo?
Karl–the detail in that little brick wall is really nice. Makes it easy to see where colors, highlights, shadows, etc. should go. The concrete sections are also rich in splits and cracks–a lot of fun to work with and experiment on.
ironmountainlumber
October 2013
Hi Bill,
The rust effects on the Jordans give a great illusion of a really old rusted and worn out vehicle.
The walls look fantastic too lots of personality in those castings.
I am really looking foward to seeing more of the build and more great modeling!
Jim
KKarns
October 2013
Bill, Great tutorial on the concrete treatment. I’ll be riding your coat tails on this one as I just primed Duluth’s concrete castings and will be weathering them up shortly. Yours turned out superb! Ken
PaulSmulders
October 2013
Bill, your work is amazing, pic’s and descriptions (tutorials) are perfect. Are you planning a work session at the Expo …? sounds like a great idea.
Paul
captsully18
January 2014
Bill, I am new to the forum and trying to get caught up on all of these great builds. I have already realized that, in my humble opinion, you are right at the top. Love this build of Quincy’s. Your attention to detail is inspiring, to say the least. I do have a question if you would consider an answer. Can you advise a source for the cedar that you use to make those fantastic shingles? I would like to give this a try. Thanks
David
Bill
January 2014
Thanks for the nice words, David. Just sent you a pm.
Ojaste
February 2014
Bill, I finally caught up reading thus build. I now have new repository of techniques to try on the next structure.
Thanks.
/Marty
Karl.A
March 2014 edited March 2014
As do we all Marty,
for one I’ll be referring back to this concrete technique in the future.
Thanks again Bill.
Karl.A
Bill
May 2014 edited May 2014
Time to get back to this little orphan! My intention from the beginning was to do something a bit different when setting up the diorama. Quincy’s is a kit that’s been around for over 10 years and built by many people, so a new spin on the layout was in order. But what and how?
The first thing I noticed recently was I built Quincy’s barn backwards:
See how I’ve got the wall with 2 doors facing the street side of the diorama in Brett’s version? That gave me an idea to set up the entire diorama as a mirror image of how it’s been built following the directions. I’d also been considering making the scrap yard and junk car section a lot larger and adding another structure.
I mocked up a tentative layout:
In discussing this with Brett, we’d talked about maybe adding one of the buildings from the Railroad Camp or from Main Street. But the more I mulled it over, I kept fearing it would look out of place–like I robbed one building from kit A and plopped into the middle of kit B. The only conclusion was to scratch build or kitbash what I was envisioning.
So I ended up combining the Logging and Tractor Repair Shop:
with the Truck Repair Shop from Railroad Camp:
The result is a 3-bay service garage. I kept the roof line of the Tractor Repair Shop and enclosed the left side making that portion 2 more service stalls. So two shallow bays on the left; 1 larger taller bay on the right.
Next, I’ll get into the treatment for the wood.
shay987
May 2014
Great idea ! Looking foward to see it being made.
LSNRwyAl
May 2014
Bill you are a great modeler with high standards. This will be awesome I am sure.
JohnM
May 2014
Bill, I am studying your techniques to try to use them in some of the other structures in the Shipyard. Thank you for getting back to this! My walls have ended up looking muddy from all the times I have been back over them.
Respectfully,
John
captsully18
May 2014
Bill, great to see ya back at it on this model. Looking forward to the things you are going to do.
Dave
Bill
May 2014 edited May 2014
Thanks for all the responses and votes of confidence, guys! Much appreciated.
The garage itself is framed out with 4x4’s…nothing complicated. For the siding, I wanted to try something Dave Revelia talked about at CSS last fall. He had a nice method for giving boards a rough sawn look (that’s how the boards would come straight from the mill after being run through a band saw. Little if any finishing). All the stripwood is lightly textured as usual with a wire brush. Then, each piece is scraped with a fresh straight edge razor. You hold the blade at 90 degree angle to the board and drag it with the grain. By squeezing the blade tightly and finding just the right angle, the blade will “skip” and vibrate as you scrape. To be blunt…it’ll make a fart sound when it’s positioned right! It needs to be done repeatedly on each board so that cut marks are close enough together. You’re left with the rough, band saw cut marks that are pretty close to the look of rough sawn wood:
Here’s a piece of 1:1 rough sawn wood:
This technique is probably a stretch for HO but I think I came close enough to be convincing. Again, it took me quite a few passes to get those cuts to appear really close together and random–which is key.
After texturing them, I used Silverwood stain followed by drybrushing with light browns, tans and gray acrylics.
With the initial texture and coloring done on the siding, I framed out the walls over the plan making certain to keep everything absolutely square. (One thing that I took for granted before was Brett’s crisp templates! In drawing the walls out, the thickness of one or two pencil lines is enough to make a noticeable difference in wall height or overall squareness.) Not a huge deal, but another thing to be vigilant about.
The side and back walls required windows. I picked up a ton of castings from a show that came through town. One vendor was a hobby shop going out of business who marked down ALL his detail parts 50% or more. I snarfed up everything that looked usable (even the guys ‘scrap box’) and found tons of little bits and pieces for this project–including some windows. This was another reminder of “these didn’t come from Sierra West”! Some of them (probably old Campbell windows) were beyond help…way too thick. Others needed some filing and sanding and were ready for the wall.
After framing these up, I boarded over just as I did on the front walls. Next up, a little more coloring and weathering.
Bill
May 2014
A couple problems I ran into…
- the siding got a lot darker than I had hoped
- I didn’t color enough stripwood for all the walls (I’ll explain that problem a bit later)
Here’s an example of the wall color after laying up the boards:
I wanted it to be closer to the color of the little shed which will sit next to the garage:
After a little thought, I decided to lighten the walls up with some light tans and gray acrylics in several dry brush applications. I lightened them up but left it a bit darker than the shed. That would also illustrate an age difference between the two. Hopefully, you can see a difference in this shot but I’ve got some other better examples further down.
I again added water damage to the bottoms of the walls by applying burnt umber oil paint, then flooding the area with mineral spirits and dragging it up the boards:
Once the mineral spirits and oil dried completely, I was left with this…and I HATED it:
Rather than a water damaged appearance, I got some kind of messed up mud look. It looks nothing like the previous result I got with the same technique on the main barn… probably because I had done so much addition drybrushing with the acrylics that it wasn’t soaking into the wood; just laying on the surface. The harsh line that formed needed to be softened up. I went back over the bottoms with clean mineral spirits which removed a bit of paint, thinned it out and blurred the line. Once everything dried, another round of drybrushing and I was right where I wanted to be:
Next up, windows!
JohnM
May 2014
Bill, this is beautiful and most of all instructive. Thank you very much for detailing what works and how you recover from situations you are unhappy with. It is really neat seeing plank on frame at this scale . . . keep with it!
Respectfully,
John
captsully18
May 2014
Yeah Bill, what John said! I really appreciate the info on how you overcame the mishap with your walls, I thought they looked good, but if they didn’t satisfy you they had to be corrected. I would probably have tossed the wall and started over. But now I know to keep working on it. Thanks and I really like your work.
Dave
captsully18
May 2014
Yeah Bill, what John said! I really appreciate the info on how you overcame the mishap with your walls, I thought they looked good, but if they didn’t satisfy you they had to be corrected. I would probably have tossed the wall and started over. But now I know to keep working on it. Thanks and I really like your work.
Dave
LSNRwyAl
May 2014
Fantastic Bill.
Bill
May 2014
John, Dave, and Alan-
Thanks for the feedback. I post my mistakes because:
-I make plenty of them
-there are usual ways to correct them
-it’s a reminder of what NOT to try on the next wall, roof, kit, etc.
I’m most pleased to read that I’ve inspired you to see through less than satisfactory results. Karl taught me that lesson back when I had the water fiasco on the Twin Mills (bet he remembers THAT call!) Mistakes are fixable.
Even if the wall looked good or “okay”, it would bother me every time I look at it in the future. I think that’s how all of us individually raise the bar. Honestly evaluate the work: does this look correct? Am I pleased with the result? Have I asked for help? Is this as good as I’m capable of?
If I answer “no” more than “yes”, then I still have work to do.
(But don’t forget…this is a hobby and we do this for fun!)
LSNRwyAl
May 2014
Agree Bill!
brownbr
May 2014
I liked the dark and muddy wall but to get it to match the other may be difficult. I might try lightly sanding with a high grit paper and see if that lightens it up.
I’m going to try the mossy roof technique. Looks great.
Coors2u
May 2014
Bill, I love the coloring and the texture on the wood.
djdutch
May 2014
Just jumped in over here, all I can say is woooow what a great build I have to do some catching up here I read it quick but saw some nice tutorials.
thanks for sharing
DJ
Bill
May 2014 edited May 2014
I wanted to revisit using microscope slides once again for the windows. They’re actually not the slides but the covers. You can find them on eBay for a few dollars. Search for “Microscope slip covers”. The stuff to get is between .15 and .17 mm thick.
Back on the first page of this thread I wrote about using them for windows. It was a lot of work simply because they’re so fragile. To mark and score the glass, I had been holding them in place with low tack painter’s tape. When it came time to remove the tape, the glass would usually crack (more times than not, in the wrong place).
I found a thread by Ken Hamilton who has a better, less frustrating way of working with the covers. He applies clear packing tape to one side of the glass and doesn’t remove the tape at all.
Ken suggests cutting the glass piece to size, then place it on the clear tape. Cutting the glass to size is the hardest part in my opinion, so I placed a full microscope cover on the tape first. I made sure to wear latex gloves and work on a perfectly clean surface. Any speck of dirt or dust on the glass will show as a huge bubble once the tape is laid down. Here, I’ve got 3 slip covers laid down on a piece of clear packing tape:
Then I marked the correct sized window with the carbide scoring tool.
With hardly any pressure, the glass will crack where scored. Next, I used an X-acto to cut through the clear tape and ended with a perfect piece. What’s really cool (as Ken shows in that link) are the break effects and bullet holes you can create. I got a bit carried away with this one, but you get the idea:
A light dusting of chalk on the glass side (opposite the side with packing tape) can be added for a dirty window effect.
brownbr
May 2014
That is very clever indeed. I will give it a try sometime
BrianM
May 2014
Bill, looks really good. However, do you know is there any risk of the packing tape discoloring over time?
JohnM
May 2014
Wow, that’s fantastic Bill!
Respectfully,
John
LSNRwyAl
May 2014
Beautiful Bill.
Ojaste
May 2014
Bill,
There are days when I just want to take a very long break from modelling and there are days, like today, when I read posts like this that make me want to stop reading and start doing. You have set a standard in persistence and high quality modelling that we all have benefitted from.
Thanks for posting Bill.
Marty
KKarns
June 2014
Bill…where are ya…did making the windows out of real glass put you over the edge? Have been patiently waiting for more progress on Quincy? Your stellar work here (rough sawn siding, real glass windows, scratch building, etc.) goes without saying…let me see your hands…ah…ha…just as I suspected…too clean! Ken
JohnM
July 2014
Yes Bill, we need to see what you are up to . . .
Respectfully,
John
Bill
October 2014 edited October 2014
…and without missing a beat, here’s an update!
Let’s see, I left off with the exterior walls and have moved on to the inside. On this garage, I want to have it fully detailed with vehicles, parts, repair areas and benches. Plus all the other “stuff” you might expect to find at an old service garage. The interior was sided with mostly 1x10’s or 1x12’s because that’s what I had on hand. I only finished the bottom half of the walls leaving the studs exposed on the upper portion. It feels prototypical and also gives a little flexibility and interest to how things will be arranged on the walls.
I also wanted to point out the nail holes…
They’re pretty subtle and hopefully you can see them. I finally came up with a solution to adding nail holes that I’m happy with. Pounce wheels have their place in some applications but are usually too square and out of scale to my eye. My free hand efforts with various pins and needles were sometimes good and often times so-so depending on how steady my hand was. I had an old set of drafting tools from a relative that included some very precise dividers. I can dial in the exact spacing appropriate for the size board I’m working on and then repeat that spacing over and over. Plus, unlike a plain old compass, the ends on these things are extremely fine:
Search for “drafting set” or “drafting dividers”. Just look close so that it has at least one pair with the needle at both points.
I also took a stab at scratch building some detail parts. Here’s a little cabinet made from scrap stripwood:
Next up is a board for holding tools. I’m pretty sure peg board wasn’t as popular back then as it is in shops today, so I made it from traditional lumber. Again, I used scrap material (various 1x or 2x). The tiny tools came from a vendor at the Finescale Expo. I positioned them on some blue painters tape and cut them from the sprue leaving them in order. Then they got some quick splashes of dark craft paint and a dusting of gray chalk.
After that, I cut out each tool “grouping” and peeled back the tape about half way so that I had a way to handle them and position them on the board.
After carefully applying a minimal amount of Canopy glue to the back of the tools, I placed them on the board and gently removed the remaining blue tape.
Then it was a matter of repeating the process with other similar tools, adding a little chalk here and there to show age and position the board on the wall.
More interior work next time. Sooner rather than later!
Bill
captsully18
October 2014
Bill, it is nice to have you back and posting. And you picked up right where you left off. Superb work and love the explanations on how you accomplished the work. Amazing stuff.
Dave
Wes
October 2014
Beautiful Bill.
I love how the tools came out.
James
October 2014
Great work Bill! And some great ideas/ techniques. I have some super-thin .15mm glass from PBL which I’m using to scratch build some F scale windows out of wood. I never dawned on me to use it for the SW kits too as an alternative to the plastic. I guess I thought it would look too thick but its as thin as the plastic sheets really. The PBL stuff comes in one inch squares which is a bit of a pain (pane?) in F scale, but makes handling easier, but would be large enough to cover most laser cut windows in HO and O scale kits.
Love the rough sawn/ band saw marks on the exterior walls too- that is ALLOT of work. Great technique for the nail hole pairs - I have several compasses/ dividers but never though of this! The tool mounting technique is ingenious too. And I agree- one does see photos of shop walls partially clad on the interior to allow for hanging tools and parts… it does allow for greater flexibility with benches and such.
James
October 2014
there must be some kind of archival (non-yellowing) tape available from bigger art stores, if that was a concern. But a yellowing window would be cool too.
Bill
October 2014
Dave, Wes and James-
Thank you for the compliments and for following along. Glad to hear that I’m explaining this in a way that is helpful. I try to write entries that are sort of like my own little recipe book so down the road I can remind myself how/what I did.
James, I’m not sure about the tape yellowing on the microscope covers. Brian mentioned that earlier as well. I’m going to run it by Ken Hamilton at the next Expo and see if he’s had any problem. I agree that even if it did yellow, it may add to the effect. Plus, there’s some chalk already dirtying up the glass making it less than crystal clear.
KKarns
October 2014
Bill, great post. Many really nice things to take in. Your idea on the interior wall being only partly sided is a great one. Love the cardboard boxes and the one with the Quincy label…nice. Also the overhead wood framing is genius and looks great and gives a really nice “feel” to the shop area there. Superb modeling as always and can’t wait to see how this thing moves along.
Bill
October 2014
Thanks Ken. The framing that you see up high is the beginning of a tire storage rack. I’ve got a pretty cool idea for tires that I’ll post shortly.
ironmountainlumber
October 2014
Hi there Bill. Welcome back. Everyone was missing seeing your posts. Fantastic build and great tutorials. My favorite part is still the rough sawn lumber on the building. Really cool that you can get that look. Looking forward to seeing how this all comes together!
Jim
brownbr
October 2014
The benches, tools and cardboard boxes all make the scene look realistic
Bill
October 2014 edited October 2014
Jim & Bryan-
Good hearing from you guys and thanks for the comments.
Ken and Bryan mentioned the cardboard boxes, so I put together a quick step by step. They’re pretty easy to make but require a little bit of precision so that that don’t turn out like this:
Here’s a pattern that works for me. The dimensions aren’t set in stone but it’ll give you a nice sized box in HO. (This one is slightly different than the pattern that I use in the S-B-S below, so don’t be alarmed.)
I print the pattern out on some brown craft paper (or if you’ve got, you could probably use a brown paper grocery bag. Cut it out using a straight edge and a new #11 blade. The black lines are where you cut; the gray lines are where the folds will go. Make sure to cut tight square corners.
The key to getting nice boxes comes down to how you fold the edges. I fold the horizontal seams first using 2 straight edge razors. One blade will go right on the fold line; the other is used to slide underneath the paper to bring it up so the fold can be formed.
I crease the fold using the back edge of the blade so that I get crisp perfect corners.
Now, fold all the horizontal edges in the same way.
If any corners didn’t get cut completely through, resist the urge to simply fold and tear the corner. Use an X-acto! Next, add a small amount of glue to vertical tab (left hand side in the picture above) and form the paper into a cube.
Then, fold in the bottom flaps and glue them. I use a scrap piece of square stripwood to get the corners and bottom as close to 90 degrees as possible.
That’s all there is to it!
JohnM
October 2014
Bill,
Thank you for showing us what you are doing. Unbelievable . . . no wonder you are the best of the best! Are you going to be moving steadily forward for awhile and hopefully showing us what you are doing?
Respectfully,
John
Bill
October 2014
John-
Thanks for checking in and the kind words. The plan is to keep plotting along now that summer is over. I’ll gladly share a few more ideas and tips along the way. I still have some interior detail work to do, then we’ll get the garage mounted on its floor and hopefully get a roof on before the snow flies! After that, it’ll be time to get a final arrangement laid out, build a ton of scrap cars and yard clutter, and add the scenery. I’d say another 3 or 4 months worth of work (that’s ‘bench time’ rather than actual calendar time.).
I saw you’ve been back to modeling too! I’ll get over and take a look at your shipyard soon.
Bill
sdrees
October 2014
Bill
Thanks for the details on making the cardboard boxes. I think that they add a lot. Your work is marvelous.
Steve
captsully18
October 2014
Bill, thank you for the tutorial. Answered all my questions. Cardboard boxes add so much to a scene. Already printed the patterns and have the brown paper bags. What a detail.
Dave
djdutch
October 2014
good too see you back at this build Bill and you make some amazing details in looks great and I will follow along
DJ
Bill
October 2014 edited October 2014
Steve, Dave & DJ-
Thanks for the feedback. I’m glad you’re finding this helpful!
On to the next detail: tires. I’m pretty excited to share this one because it really was an “ah ha” moment for me. I knew I was going to need a LOT of tires for several areas on this diorama. One feature I wanted to model was a tire display rack. I found several pictures for inspiration:
I’d tried making some out of black tubing, fuel line, and some other rubber hose material but none of it was good enough for a foreground detail. Then earlier this summer I spotted the solution… rubber O rings. I got a bunch from the hardware store and found these types to be pretty plausible for HO–
The only issues-- they’re too shiny, have no tread and are almost perfectly round inside and out. On the model, they looked more like inner tubes than tires:
The first step was to round down the outside edge so that it had the typical flat surface of a rubber tire. I got the best result by slipping about 5 or 10 of them onto a wooden dowel (one where they’d be snug but not so tight as to stretch them out). Then I roughed them up on my belt sander. I held the dowel with sort of a loose grip as I touch the O rings to the belt sander. That caused the dowel to spin in between by finger tips while scuffing up the outer edge of the O rings:
With the O rings still on the dowel, I drybrushed across the tread using craft paint in different shades of gray and tan.
This set looks way too white, so I simply spun the stack of O rings between my fingers and rubbed off some paint to tone it down. On some, I rolled the stack over the single cut pattern of a file to scribe in tire tread lines.
I made a 3 tier display rack using scraps of stripwood. Each shelf was made out of 4x4 while using a piece of 1/4’ square stock as a spacing jig.
The sides of the rack are 2x6 legs with horizontal pieces pieces of 4x4 to support the shelves.
I used angle blocks and low-tack painters tape during assembly to make sure everything remained square. Here’s how it came together:
The racks got a dusting of raw umber 408.5 and a little A/I. I added the tires randomly mixing up the different sizes. Here’s the end result:
(I should mention that the tires on the floor to the left aren’t O-rings. Those are metal castings).
Next up…a little more interior clutter.
Bill
KKarns
October 2014
Bill, Sweet! really, really nicely done. Exceptional modeling…I love the paste board box with the louvered hood piece stuck in…Ken
Coors2u
October 2014
Bill, that is speechless work.
Bill
October 2014 edited October 2014
Coors2u-thank you, kind sir!
Thanks Ken! I’ve been hanging onto that first picture of the old tire rack ever since deciding to build Quincy’s. Still debating over adding those horizontal pieces of trim on the front edges of the shelves. They would add a little pop if I painted them a faded/peeling white, but I kind of like the flimsy look that I got as it stands now.
admin
October 2014
great detail, wonderfully executed, loads of fun
Bill
October 2014
Thanks Brett! This really was fun…gotta love when a plan comes together!
captsully18
October 2014 edited October 2014
Bill, you are just a fount of ideas/inspiration. Excellent work. So glad you are back on this build. Looking forward to next installment.
Dave
djdutch
October 2014 edited October 2014
Nice bill I like the O rings for tires great idea lot of inspiration out here 
thanks for sharing.
DJ
KKarns
October 2014
Bill, I agree..I like the racks as is and think if you add anything it might make them a bit “clunky” looking. Great stuff…Ken
JohnM
October 2014
Fantastic, Bill . . .
John
Bill
October 2014 edited October 2014
Again, thanks everybody for your comments and for following along.
Another little detail I’ve seen in service garages is a selection of drive belts. I suppose most common would be fan belts but there are probably many other automotive belts (I know almost nothing about fixing cars!).
I looked around for a material that scaled down to something plausible: rubber bands from my kids’ orthodontist, plastic hair ties, elastic thread and some others. But what worked pretty well was shrink tubing for electrical connections:
I used several different sizes (1/8" up to 1/4"). I was able to shrink them down and get them to conform into a “figure 8” shape much like a fan belt. Any heat source will work (open flame, soldering iron, heat gun) but I used boiling water so that the piece would shrink uniformly. I shoved two pieces of wire into a length of tubing to form the loops (in this example, .035 piano wire). Then, I pinched the middle with some stripwood or tweezers will dunking the shrink tubing into boiling water. Hopefully, you can see in the second picture where I pinched the middle with a tweezers (left side). After pulling it out of the water it will retain the shape:
Then it was just a matter of slicing off tiny “belts” from the piece of tubing. A chopper works, but freehand with a straight edge blade was actually easier.
Depending on the size of the original shrink tubing and the thickness of the wire, I got a nice variety of belts for the garage.
I hung a bunch on the wall using a couple pieces of scrap stripwood and thin brass wire for hooks:
KKarns
October 2014
You’re the master at cool innovative ideas to get you where you want to be. Wonderful details and such a great concept for the belts. Your garage is looking fantastic, those oil cans are very cool. Nice , nice, nice…Love this stuff don’t we…Ken
James
October 2014
Absolutely awesome! That is truly inventive.
James
October 2014
I meant the tire rack (I was on the last page) … but the belts are awesomely awesome! I was going to say Vector-Cuts makes belts but these are just as good if not better… did you say this was HO?
James
October 2014
love all the cans too. Did you make decals for those?
Bill
October 2014
Thanks Ken & James-
The belts are a tad on the thick side for HO and in looking at the picture again, the single one on the bottom right is too long. But at viewing distance, they don’t seem to stand out or look out of scale.
The cans are tiny pop rivets with labels I printed off using this picture:
I thinned the paper out by sanding it down, then used diluted white glue to fasten to the rivets. I should also point out the soda crates under the bench. I scratch built a bunch but also made some by cutting rectangular blocks out of stripwood and slapped some labels to the outside. I found a website that has a tutorial on how to make them and also templates to print out the crate labels in several different scales:
captsully18
October 2014
Bill…what can I say? You are certainly an inovative modeler. Wow.
Dave
djdutch
October 2014
Great bill I have seen the trick with the shrink tubing, but never how to give them that nice shape.
I also am a fan of you oil cans really nice.
DJ
Joel
October 2014
Bill,
Can’t wait to see the whole thing come together. What you’ve done so far is outstanding. Not sure which I like better your upbeat attitude and creative genius or the incredible results.
Joel
Bill
October 2014
Joel!! Another SierraWest modeler back from the land of MIA! Thanks for the kind words…it means a lot! I’m looking forward to getting together again at the Expo.
Dave & DJ, glad you like these ideas. Hope you’ll give them a try.
I still have a few more interior details to add, but I’m gonna have to switch gears before long so I don’t get burned out! I needed another “parts bin” that will sit on the opposite wall from the first one I built back on page 6. This one needed to be about 3X as big as the first. I followed the same basic design that’s outlined in the Loco and Service Shop thread:
The bins are made out of 1x12 but I went with 1x4 trim on the front edge. I filled all the bins with various items from my scrap box; pieces of brass sprues, tools, washers, and a lot of wheel hubs I got from a vendor at the Finescale show. The bin is weathered with chalks–mostly raw umber 408.5 & 408.7, but also a couple splotches of black here and there. I got a cool “grimy” effect on the outside of the cabinet just by handling it with my slightly sweaty fingers. Rub back and forth a little and it looks like something that’s been collecting gunk in this shop for quite a while.
brownbr
October 2014
Fine and inspiring work. Very clever use of many everyday parts.
KKarns
October 2014
Simply wonderful work here Bill. This is going to be a killer Quincy piece when you get it finished. Parts bin is superb.
Love everything…well…except the water! Is that going to be the water modeling you’ll be demoing at the show? A floating garage…awesome…Ken:)
KCSTrains
October 2014
Bill, as you know, I am new to the site and my first kit was shipped this week (thank Brent for accomodating my travel schedule). You and Karl are an inspiration to me on what is possible with these kits. However, I have to be careful. I want to do what you are doing, but I don’t have the years of experience to back that up. Unless you guys say otherwise, I plan to follow Brent’s directions to the tee without venturing too far with these great ideas. In the meantime, I just need to catalog your techniques. Maybe I’ll call it the Bill and Karl bible for fine scale modeling. Thanks again for your amazing tutorials. Phil
captsully18
October 2014
Bill, the parts bin looks terrific. Weathering, various parts crammed in, very lifelike. I also like the head gaskets hanging on walls. Looks just like a salvage yard. Wonderful build.
Dave
Bill
October 2014
Thanks for the comments, guys!
Phil…welcome aboard. I’m humbled by your words and am certain you’ll love building your kit.
I would absolutely advise following the manual verbatim for your first build. Resist the urge to build out of order or stray from the instructions. It’s a recipe for success if you follow along. That was the best advice given to me for my first build.
Take advantage of Brett’s years of experience that went into designing the kit and writing the manual. There will be plenty of time to experiment and try new things, but for your first build it’s most important to develop solid skills that will be a foundation for your future modeling. You’ll learn new and different techniques but they’re all doable–no matter what skill level you’re at currently.
When you begin, make sure to start a build thread and post good pictures. Many of us will be following along and available to help out if you need it!
I’m looking forward to it.
Bill
Bill
October 2014
I glued all the walls together and I’m about ready to attach them to the floor. Before that, here’s a look around:
And here’s a few from the outside looking through the garage doors:
admin
October 2014
WOW
captsully18
October 2014
Wow, those guys are certainly more organized than I am. Are you going to light this build? I know nothing about lighting, but it would seem that with all that amazing detail lighting would be called for. Superb.
Dave
Karl.A
October 2014 edited October 2014
Phil, I would agree completely with all of Bills advice to you, and to any other modeler.
Brett’s manuals will guide and teach you everything you need to know to build the model as it looks in the pictures.
Every technique, every colour and every step that it took to build the pilot models in the pictures is detailed in the manuals.
Follow the manual. Not only is it a step-by-step guide of how the pilot model was built, it will also turn into a universal modeling guide for you that you can use in every aspect of your hobby and build your experience on.
Learn the techniques presented to you, (generally very little practice is required due to the excellent instructions and the three step rule),
Follow the manual and do exactly as it says, in the order presented.
Hundreds of hours are put into every manual alone, this includes detailing and explaining the techniques and sequences of each step for a reason.
I still have my first SierraWest manual on my desk from a build several years ago, and still refer to it on occasion.
Generally most questions and requests for help arise from NOT following the manual and deviation.
Sure there is a lot of great info and techniques out there from countless people who think they know better, and some do. But, follow the manual, learn how and why things are done the way they are. Then sit back and admire your work at the end of the build.
Along the way, you will have learned a lot from the instructions, one of which is confidence another is understanding. You will not have a better teacher than a SierraWest manual.
Karl.A
Looks nice Bill.
Bill
October 2014
Dave-
Removable roof and lights are in the plan. I’m in no way a lighting expert, but I’ll get some in there.
“WOW” and “That’s nice”. Brett and Karl have spoken! Do NOT get either of these two on the phone unless you’ve got plenty of time blocked out!
LOL
Thanks guys! I’m gonna get that floor done this weekend. (However, it’s gonna be 75 tomorrow. Might have to break out the skis for one last run!
Coors2u
October 2014
Bill, your just showing off now. I can almost smell the grease.
Wes
October 2014
Flip Bill.
That is just plain brilliant. What a reat job.
KKarns
October 2014
Alright Bill…spectacular work your attention and finish on the details is the amazing. I gots to know…what’s holding up the other side of the longer “hanging” tire rack, which by the way is an awesome feature? ..Ken
Bill
October 2014
Thanks for the kind words, guys! Much appreciated.
Ken-the missing support will get added later. I’m going to use a length of chain in place of the wooden support. Sort of a “quick fix” that the workers threw in to be done with it.
I can’t put it in until the supports above go in.
KKarns
October 2014
Knew there was a logical explanation as meticulous as you are! Chain will look great…
PaulSmulders
October 2014
Hi Bill, amazing work, just spent the last hour or so catching up, time well spent.
Paul
JohnM
October 2014
Bill, that is stunning . . .
John
Ojaste
October 2014 edited October 2014
I’m speechless! If I could do 1/10th of what you did I could die happy.
KCSTrains
October 2014
Bill, I have to keep reminding myself that this is an HO build. The details are beyond belief. Go ahead and admit it - you have a secret miniature elf that helps you paint the details.
MitchN
October 2014
Bill,
I do not have the time patience or creativity to do what you do but your work inspires me to be a better modeler. To make all the details, which most people could not see anyway, so convincing in HO scale demands an attitude where good enough is not good enough. Keep posting so you can keep inspiring me. Thank you!
Best regards,
Mitch
Bill
October 2014
Guys-
Thanks again for all the nice words. It’s very gratifying!
Before I let it all go to my head (and before anybody gets the idea that I don’t make mistakes) I wanted to share something here that Brett caught and I totally missed.
So… let’s try something.
If you go back and look at the last set of pictures I posted, can you see anything that isn’t quite right? It can be seen in 4 of the pictures but is most obvious in the last one. It’s one of those oversights that tells the viewer what they’re looking at is a model and not real.
Can you spot it? (I’ll point it out shortly)
captsully18
October 2014
Bill, the work is so intricate and wonderful to look at that I’m not sure. The only thing that stands out to me is the cog wheel ( watch gear? ) that is hanging on one shelf. How far off am I? I sure would like to see the vehicle that came off of.
Dave
Bill
October 2014 edited October 2014
That’s it, Dave! The gear is WAY too big and out of scale. I should have known that just because a detail part is “HO” doesn’t mean it will look right in all HO scenes. And, this is another reason I like posting builds and progress photos: you always get extra eyes checking over your work.
I keep a little HO figure that’s mounted on a popcicle stick on my bench to have as a reference. Obviously, I didn’t bother to use it in this case.
Yikes! Looking at it next to the figure it’d appear to be off a battleship or something!
Mike Engler
October 2014
Bill, that is some OK work.
captsully18
October 2014
Bill, I’m sorry that I noticed it and made the comment. Yes, it does look big, but it looks good weathered. Ok, so it’s not prototype. So what? Oh, yeah, it could cost a point or two in a contest. Oh well…
Dave
BrianM
October 2014
Bill, your attention to detail and layout of these mini sense is fantastic. I despair of ever getting even half way to your level of excellence.
Re the large gear - two old-time, very common machines used rurally that would incorporate a gear of roughly that diameter (based on your HO scale figure) would be a hay baler (square section bales) and a water well drilling rig. Both these used a pair of large gears driven from small pinions to slow down the input speed and drive the reciprocating motion.
So, if the business is supposed to represent only auto parts, then I agree with Dave’s observation.
However, if it handles all sorts of parts then I think the gear would be feasible (although in truth a little narrow across the tooth face) except that given the weight of those cast iron gears it would more probably be standing on the floor and leaning against the wall. Now if you really want to split hairs the teeth would still be loaded with old black grease gathering dust.
For me a much more difficult use case is the gear with very large (relatively) teeth lying on the top shelf under the hand wheels. I have not been able to come up with an application but there might well be one!
Mike Engler
October 2014
Bill, that is the best HO detailing I have seen in a long time. Some truly innovative materials for the parts bin, belts, tires, etc. I guess the gear didn’t bother me much.
Bill
October 2014 edited October 2014
The idea of keeping everything in scale is mostly my anal and impossible pursuit to replicate a scene perfectly–no “tells” or giveaways. Is it plausible? Sure…like Brian pointed out, it could be a gear from some type large machine, tractor or farm implement. But does it make sense? Nah. In an auto shop you wouldn’t expect to see that, so that’s why on my model, it needs to go.
Mike! Good to see you checking in and thanks for the compliment! Trying to find new and different materials that scale easily/better/perfectly is part of the fun of doing this!
Okay…on to the floor of the garage. I followed the same board pattern that Brett spells out in the construction manual for the tractor repair shed. In the kit, there are some areas that aren’t boarded over leaving exposed dirt (on the floor of the tractor repair side). Since the side walls are open, that would make sense. In my version, the building is fully enclosed and would probably have had a completed floor. So, I boarded it over 100%. I used 2x8 on the right side and work bench area and 2x12 for the floor of the two left garage bays. Just like in the kit, that adds a little variety and helps define those 3 areas.
After distressing all the wood, I used Hunterline Driftwood stain (mostly because I had some and hadn’t used it yet!) on all the planks. The 2x12’s got about 3 times as many coats of stain.
Another cool technique Dave Revelia shared at last year’s Expo was using shoe polish as a floor treatment. To bring out the grain and give the floor a grimy shop feel, I went over the planks with black shoe polish. Just a little dab of the paste kind (Kiwi) rubbed into the boards. I added more in the service areas where vehicles would park.
After that, I added a couple shades raw umber chalk–mostly along the outside edges.
Next, I rubbed fine dirt into the cracks between the boards. That helps make it look less like a gym floor and more like dirty work place. However, the dirt I use is real light and looked too clean. So I added a small amount of black weathering powder to a cup of the dirt. You can kind of see some of the original dirt in the lower right of these next two pictures. All the rest is dirt with weathering powder:
After dusting off the excess, all the dirt was glued in place using white glue thinned with water (50/50). I used my finger and smeared a light film over the entire floor. Here’s the end result after it dries:
The last step is to add some oil stains on the service bay floors.
KCSTrains
October 2014
Bill, I love your posts because you go into a lot of detail but at the same time you make it easy to understand. I’m really enjoying this build. I guess I’m going to have to compile these useful tips in a binder. I’ll call it “the Chronicles of Bill.”
Thanks again for your help on my build. Phil
BrianM
October 2014
Wow, Bill!
It’s interesting to me that rubbing in the dirt to fill the board joints along with the subsequent wetting to “fix” it did not obliterate the old oil stains effect you achieved with the shoe polish. The finished floor looks very realistic and your step-by-step description along with how you fixed things you did not like provides an excellent tutorial and one I’ll bookmark for future reference. Thanks!
JohnM
October 2014
Bill,
You are a wizard - as usual .. .. .. ..
Respectfully,
John
Bill
October 2014 edited October 2014
Thanks guys. I hope at some point you’re able to try this stuff out.
Here’s the last part–oil and grease on the floor. Repeatedly adding A/I in a splotch might work, but it wouldn’t show a build up of old and new oil spots. AK Ammo has a set of “Engine Oil” colors that work great for this:
However, you don’t need to buy that specific set. But it’s pretty convenient.
In a nutshell, the look of really old oil stains can be achieved by using a flat black color. Older grease and grime has a matte gray tone. And fresh oil spills are more brown and glossy giving them a wet appearance. All of these are enamels that I thinned with mineral spirits.
To start, I made large spots in each of the bays with a flat black that was thinned a lot (maybe 4 or 5 parts thinner to 1 part paint. It showed up, but not well in pictures. I followed that with a couple more applications but with less thinner:
Next, I added a layer of newer oil stains using a black-brown enamel that had more of a satin finish to it. I dabbed these on in small random blobs within the same area. When dry, it’ll look newer than the older, flat color previously applied:
Then came a layer of a gray color (AK calls it “Engine Grime”).
I kept building up layers like this adding them in with varying amounts of thinner. Finally, I topped it off with fresh oil stains (a gloss brown color). I used a really small brush and added the stains as tiny drips, dots, and irregular blobs. This is one of those things where it’s hard to remember when to stop–less is more.
admin
October 2014
I can smell the grease…
captsully18
October 2014
Bill, ditto what Brett said. I feel the need to get out the orange hand cleaner. Wonderful work.
Dave
BrianM
October 2014
Really, really effective layering, Bill. What a great “how to” description.
Ojaste
October 2014 edited November 2014
Bill, like what you have done here. But wouldn’t the oil stains shape be a bit more irregular? As if the cars were different in length and where the leaks came from? Or it leaked coming into the space? Would the tires trail oil coming in/out? How about leaks in the backend of the car? Something to think about.
Marty
James
November 2014
Truly cool- this is why I always say to people forget going to the art gallery - this hobby is where you see real creativity and artistry
djdutch
November 2014
Wow Bill, you made some great progress in a short time.
Your details are amazing and looking a lot like the details I have seen by Anders Malmberg.
It is this kind of detail that I have in mind for my speed shop, and because of that you are a great inspiration for me. Unfortunately I have a lot of other interests in H0 scale as well so the garage have to wait for a while.
Keep up the good work and I follow along
DJ
Bill
November 2014
Thanks for the feedback guys.
Marty–that’s a good catch on the oil spots. But, my fear was over doing it (which I did in the middle stall, so I left the other two alone) The oil stains should probably have more of an elliptical shape–closer to the one on the right. I’m going to have an engine on a pallet that’s being rebuilt and leaking fresh oil all over, and a vehicle in the other small bay. I may leave the larger bay on the right empty (or at least have no vehicle in it) but have it cluttered with various car parts: radiators, tires, fenders etc.
DJ–the progress actually took a long time and I’ve been slow to post and catch up. A lot of the small detail parts are the same as those seen in Malmberg’s garage.
brownbr
November 2014
I like the AK products also. They give a very predictable finish.
Nice job putting the stains right where they should be.
JohnM
November 2014
Bill, that is great. Special thanks for going through your step by step process. I really like the overall effect.
Respectfully,
John
ironmountainlumber
November 2014
Hi Bill,
I am not for sure what you will come up with next. The details you keep on coming up with and how to do them is amazing. Lots of thinking outside the box. Right now you are setting a very high bar for everyone that is modeling.
Great job.
Jim
Bill
November 2014 edited November 2014
Bryan, John, and Jim–
Thank you for the nice comments and for following along! Here’s one more SBS for the next part: garage doors. There are 4 10 foot doors for the two left stalls and 2 12 foot doors for the big truck stall on the right. I made the smaller doors out of 2x10 stripwood and modeled them to look used and abused:
I may have overdone it with the door on the left! The door on the far right is supposed to show signs of repair with the newer plank and support boards. I’m not sure if I like it. Thoughts? I can see already that I made a mistake on the bolts–those need to be on the left hand side where the hinge will be.
For the 12 foot doors, I used larger 2x12 planks and more solid framing in an attempt to illustrate how much bigger and heavier they are compared to the 4 smaller doors (and next to an HO figure). The process for building all the doors is pretty much the same. I start by distressing the wood, adding additional color to the bottoms, sides and split areas and arrange them in an order that looks good. A piece of double sided tape holds them to the glass as they’re lined up against 2 angle blocks:
Top and bottom frame supports are glued in place followed by the sides and middle.
The angled support is added next. After the glue dried, I drilled pilot holes for the NBWs and carefully secured them with a tiny amount of white glue.
I dusted the support pieces with some raw umber chalk (408.7) to age them a bit.
Next, I created some shadows and grime build up around the supports. Raw Umber 408.3 is a real dark brown–almost black color. I mounded it up in the shadowy areas then, using a fine tipped brush, added clean alcohol to the boards and let it wick up into the pile of chalk until the chalk was completely wet.
After the alcohol had dried completely, I went back and dry brushed everything with some craft paints (Folk Art Barn Wood and Light Gray in this case).
Finally, to bring the deep grain out a little more, I used a real fine tipped brush (10/0) and AK Dark Brown wash. I kept the paint pretty thin and since it’s an enamel it didn’t disturb or blend with the acrylic craft paints previously applied. I just touched the tip to the grain and let the paint wick into the recessed spots. Kinda hard to see the difference from this picture compared to the previous one.
I still need to add some sliding door latches to the inside and the hinges (made from thin plastic) to the back sides.
BrianM
November 2014
Bill ~ Thank you very much for taking the time to document this excellent SBS for the doors. It will be an extremely useful lesson/guide for everyone following your Quincy build regardless of the extent to which they wish to depict wear and tear on their own specific project.
Question on the repaired large door - I may be missing something but if you installed the bolts for the hinges on the wrong side then based on the small doors does the diagonal brace on the repaired door run the wrong way?
KCSTrains
November 2014
Bill, another great tutorial. Even though you are talking about old beat-up doors, the lessons learned can apply to just about anything. I’m traveling right now and can’t work on my project, but I can continue to learn by watching the other projects.
Thanks again. Phil
Bill
November 2014 edited November 2014
Phil-
Tomorrow’s Friday so hurry up and get home so you can get back the Woodcutter’s shack!
Question on the repaired large door - I may be missing something but if you installed the bolts for the hinges on the wrong side then based on the small doors does the diagonal brace on the repaired door run the wrong way?
You know what, Brian? You’re exactly right. Good catch!
Dang it! I had changed door locations once and had already flipped over and re-weathered the second door from the left. I got them in the order that I thought would look best but didn’t take into account how it affected the pattern of the angled supports. (In fact if you look close, you can see that door #2 was originally designed to be the other way…see how it’s really chewed up on the top):
sigh…
I just went and pasted the doors up in their locations on the garage:
This is one of those times where I’m gonna call it “close enough”. I think unless you were really looking for it, you’d never be able to tell that the pattern is in the opposite direction from door 1 to door 2.
BrianM
November 2014
Hey, Bill, I think the entire project is really fantastic and I enjoy reading about your building and detailing methods.
Now for some fun if a nitpicker comments on the variance to the doors just tell them that even back in those days good, competent help was hard to come by and the contractor paid to do the repairs was a no good rogue you had to chase out of town!
Bill
November 2014
Exactly!
About as hard as finding a good competent model builder!!!
Well, here’s one more illustration of how a fresh set of eyes can catch things that you miss.
Thanks again for your kind words, too Brian. Very much appreciated!
Bill
captsully18
November 2014
Bill, remember that the beginning of this build you told us that the “ol’ man” who owned this place was a true penny pincher. Well, he hired that “no good rogue” to redo the doors so what can one expect?
Seriously, I am loving this build 'cause I love derelict buildings. In fact, I wanted Scotia to be more derelict than it came out. I am proud of it nonetheless. I am picking up some great ideas from this build that I am going to use on my current build that I am not ready to begin posting yet. The work is going slowly. I’m old and slow. But this latest info on the treatment of your doors is wonderful and may be just what I need to get me over a hurdle. Thank you.
Dave
Wes
November 2014
Great work Bill. I kind of like the doors as they are. With them being the wrong way it kind of goes with the state of the rest of the building.
the colouring on the doors is wonderful, and your idea to stain the corners darker is an often overlooked touch that adds a lot of realism to a build.
Keep up the great stuff.
brownbr
November 2014
Great looking door.
JohnM
November 2014
Gosh Bill, that looks great! I had to look and look to finally realize what was being discussed on the doors. So - even after being told what to look for it was in my case still hard to find. I continue to admire your coloring and detail . . .
Respectfully,
John
Karl.A
November 2014
Terrific finish on the doors Bill, and the oil stains really set the scene and the base for even more (which I’m sure you have minutely planned).
Nice touch with the broken door brace/frame missing but the shadow/dirt outline still visible. It’s a great detail not modeled often and you did it perfectly.
Karl.A
KCSTrains
December 2014
Bill, I need more inspiration for my build. Any recent progress?? Phil
Joel
January 2015
Bill,
Just trying to catch up on your thread and you continue to set the bar. Amazing work. Hope to see it in the spring at the show.
Joel
James
January 2015
great doors- i like the mix of the new (repairs) and old wood, and the “ghost” of the former cross members etc. Details like that “tell a story” as Brett always says….
JohnM
January 2015
Come on, Bill . . .
John
Wes
January 2015
Yes Bill, whats taking you so long with an update buddy.
Bill
January 2015 edited January 2015
Yikes! Looks like I owe everyone an update!
First, some of you may be aware that my daughter underwent a pretty serious operation in early December. Both of my girls were born with scoliosis (curvature of the spine) and as the grew up, condition worsened. Spinal fusion surgery is what it takes to correct the issue and it’s not something any parent wants to see their kid go through. This is our second time down this road. The good news is that she’s 6 weeks post op and is doing great!
Okay, back to the task at hand. I’ve been doing a bunch of detail work trying to create various parts and pieces that would be typical of a salvage yard. I think I mentioned early on in this build that I wanted to capture that look of “organized chaos” often seen behind the “business” portion of a scrap yard. It’s always a disgusting mess, but everything has its place. To get it to the level I envisioned required casting a bunch of different car parts: hoods, doors, fenders, etc. That process continues as I learn and re-learn how to cast some of these parts.
The next hurdle was in the layout of the diorama. I don’t have an eye for composition but I plotted out the scene as best I could. It started out like this:
Then I got the great idea to straighten it out:
Nope. So, I tossed my hands up and asked for help. I ran it by Brett, Karl, Ken, and Jon Addison. Using advice from all of them, I finally got the “ah ha” moment where the scene clicked. Rather than try to fill such a large area, it’s been cut down to 24"x24". The buildings were again put at an angle and the topography will be built up so that the original Quincy’s barn will be elevated higher than everything else. That would put the garage at a lower elevation so as to not over power the barn. None of elevations are mocked up yet, but here’s what the’lay of the land’ is going to look like:
Again, this was one of those times where I could see something wasn’t right. But after my buddies all chipped in with some advice, it came together nicely. (teaching a blind man to drive would be easier!)
I need to go over some lighting options with Slim from Microlumina when I get to the Expo. That could affect what I do with trusses and roof completion. So I’ve accepted that I won’t be finished by March but I’ll bring it along.
Other than that, I’ve been getting materials prepped for a clinic, finishing up a little radio station and gulp starting to clean up my work shop. I struck a deal with my wife: I’m taking over a guest bedroom. In exchange, she gets to redo our office and rec room. She also gets to have an affair with Bradley Cooper if she ever runs into him. (Duh…I look EXACTLY like that dude so she gained nothing on that one!)
Two months until the Expo!
Coors2u
January 2015
Bill, that layout looks great. It really offers a bunch of mini scenes within the diorama.
KKarns
January 2015 edited January 2015
Tantalizing views there Bill!..those trucks look awesome from up here and your layout looks great and I think having Quincy proper up higher is going to kick it good. Look forward to seeing it at Expo and we’ll try not to spill crap on it as we oogle…Oh…hate to mention it but I think your dog may have up-chucked over by your crane..I’m just sayin…
Bill
January 2015
Ha-ha! Joke’s on you, Ken. We don’t have a dog. (It was probably the neighbor kid!)
KKarns
January 2015
Right…you don’t have a dog anymore you mean…and you gave it to the neighbor kid so he’d get sick over there…I’ll keep you straight. I assume you’re going to hand lay your track? Boy do I have experience hand laying track detail now from the Loco Shop dio. Over 550 individually placed tie spike heads in 1/87th scale…geesh. Love this stuff don’t we…
Bill
January 2015
Just went and saw your track work. Killer! Totally worth the effort. I didn’t hand lay on my previous models but I will this time around. It really makes a difference.
KCSTrains
January 2015
Bill, good to see you back and great news on your daughter. This thread has really taught me a lot about the process - even if you build a great model(s), you can really screw it up on the layout if not thought out properly. I’m busy on my castings, but will be posting my progress soon. BTW you guys are going to have to do heavy convincing to get me to hand lay track. Phil
djdutch
January 2015 edited January 2015
Bill I love your progress nice set up, can’t wait to see this come together.
DJ
JohnM
January 2015
Bill,
Thank goodness things worked well for your daughter. What an journey for the family . .
On another note, the diorama is looking great. What a difference between the initial layout and what you have morphed into.
We all look forward to your more visible presence.
John