thibaultron

Part_009 The second wall section is built almost the same as the first one, detailed in Part 008. So, I will mostly just show the sequence, and report major any differences. The first difference is gluing on another cherry blossom, to one step. Another difference between the two wall sections is that the front edge of the steps is detailed as chipped stone, rather than the straight edges of the previous wall. These edges may be more visible in the finished model. This wall has horizontal sills at the top of the right side of the wall. They are installed like the long stills, printed side down. These two pictures show the completed second wall. Now that the walls are built, it is time to install them in the scene. I had a problem with this! Even though the stream bed pieces, were located by the piling in the foreground, the edge the walls butt up against, over lapped just a hair into the area the walls slotted into the base! The manufacturer should have had me install the walls, then the stream bed. I did not want to risk cutting the bed, and possibly leaving a gap between it and the walls, so I took a long time carefully forcing the walls into place, tightly wedged against the stream bed. As you can see below, this caused the walls to not quite line up at the seam! I spent more time forcing them in line, then holding them while the glue I spread over the seams set. In the end, it turned out all right, but it was a pain. The only thing that I could not quite fix, was that the lower wall does not quite sit flat against the base at the left side, there was no way to clamp this, as between the sloped wall, the angle bracket under the base, and the railing base, there was nowhere for my clamps to hold. No matter what I tried, they all slipped off, it is only a very small gap, and is hidden by the streambed piece, and should not be visible, but it annoys me. After, the glue was holding, I clamped the seam as best I could and set the assembly aside, to fully dry. While waiting for the walls to dry, I started on the face of the bridge that crosses the stream. Below are the first set of parts that build this structure. The small gray tabs are used as keys to lock the larger pieces in alignment. Here the parts are assembled and glued, I spread glue over most of the back of the white piece, to keep it from delaminating in the future. This picture shows the back, with the locating tabs. I then added lots of clamps, and set it aside to dry. After the glue dried, I removed the clamps, and glued on the cherry blossoms. I would like to add that I have been using both the Spell Check and Grammer Check feature of Word 2013 (mainly because I forgot to turn off the Grammer Check when I recently loaded it onto my new computer), for these latest articles. What makes me bring this up, you ask? Well, many years ago with an earlier version of Word, I wrote and article, and used the Grammer Check, and hated the results! For instance, one sentence started with “Like the Craftsmen of old,…”. The Grammer Check came back and “yelled” at me for not using a gender-neutral term like crafters, or crafts person. The whole article was torn apart with similar criticisms. Well, I used Craftsmen for a specific reason, and most of the other check marks were just nit picking, similar ‘errors” not any real errors. So, for over a decade, I’ve had Grammer Check turned off. They seem to have updated the code, and all the things it now dings, are actual Grammer errors. Thank you, MS!.

Part_008 The next sections to be built are the retaining walls, with steps and railings, on the left-hand side of the diorama. The front most/lower section is built first. This is the section in front of the cherry blossom on the railing. Construction starts with the steps. In the instructions above, note part E47. It is shown with the printed side facing the page. The manufacturer helped the builder by printing a character in the tab area, to help you determine which is the printed side, after the step face is removed from the parts sheet (see picture below). They did this on all the step faces. Construction starts with the lowest step, and its internal support. Two views are shown of the assembly below. The white piece is the support. The second step is now installed. The step face and step were not sitting together, so I glued the joint, clamped it, and let it sit for a while. The face of the next step was glued on. This face will mate with the step on the second wall section, that is detailed later. After the face piece was attached, I assembled these parts to the retaining wall face. I glued the joints between the step section and wall piece. This picture shows the wall side of the assembly. If I could find my colored pencils, I would touch up the exposed tab. The kit box had a bag with three railing sections in it. Two of these are used for the two retaining wall sections detailed in this and Part 009. The third is used for a small section of these walls that extend past the front edge of the diorama’s “book” covers. The railing section in the top of this picture is the one that will be used for the wall section being built now. The top of the wall has a two part stone sill, with the railing mounting to the sills. The sill is two layers. The first layer is shown below, showing the print mark line. This side will go down, when installed. Here it is glued in place, with the piece for the top layer shown on the right. The top piece has a similar printed side marking, which also goes down, when installed. This photograph shows the finished wall/step section. One mistake I made was trying to install the railing tab into the top sill piece, before gluing both into the lower sill. The pressure broke the sill piece. I pulled the sill piece off, glued it to the lower one, and then pushed the railing tab into place. The railing tab extends into the lower sill and locks the two sill pieces into alignment. Before the glue set, I made sure the sills were lined up evenly to the wall, and the railing sat in line with the sills. Here is a shot of the inside of the wall assembly.

Part_007 This sub-scene is completed, for now, by adding track side details. The railroad crossing guard and the second cherry tree are added. I glued the branch to the tree at this point. Another cherry blossom was also glued on the ground. Here is a picture from the back. The assembly of the base of the diorama is the next step in the build. Construction begins with the rear support/battery box. I still plan to build a dedicated power supply for all these Book Nook dioramas, once I have finished them. This will be more difficult than first planned, as they do not all use the same voltage. The first kit used a 4.5V battery pack, and this one uses 3V. On the first kit, I did not permanently attach the pack, which was designed to be through bolted, with the nuts hidden from access when construction was completed. This kit has the pack captured in the base foot compartment, but can be removed from the bottom to install the batteries. I built it this way; I can always cut and extend the wires later. The battery pack holder/rear base support, is the first piece to be built. This is a straight forward box. The only real care that must be taken, is the get the angled tops of the ends oriented correctly. The other end wall is installed with the wires trapped in the slot, and the battery box placed with the On/Off switch at the bottom. This photo shows the assembled rear base, an angle bracket/foot that is attached at the bottom of the base plate at the front left side, and the base plate that the stream will be built up on. The etched lines running from front to back, outline the streambed. The rear base is glued on first Next the angle bracket is installed. The streambed under the clear ripple plastic water sheet, is made from three printed layers. The first layer covers the entire streambed. Two of the rear base tabs stuck up above the surface of the base plate, so I carved and sanded them flush. I glued the bottom/main colored sheet down, spreading the glue evenly over most of the bottom of the sheet. I then used lots of clamps around the edges of the sheet. Then I put a couple of weights in the middle. I let this sit over night to dry. The weights did warp the base plate a little, but not badly. I should have supported it from underneath. This picture shows the pieces for the final two layers. Here they have been glued on, and located by installing a piling. This picture shows the rippled plastic sheet set in place. As construction continues, other pilings will lock it in place. After the rest of the pieces that install along the shore are installed, I’ll glue the rippled sheet down in a couple of hidden spots. The next step is to glue many different sized “floating” blossoms to the surface of the water. I will wait as long as possible, to glue on the blossoms, to prevent them being knocked off as building progresses. The location of each blossom is marked by a small cross etched in the stream bed. The instructions also show the locations, as well as showing the part numbers of the various sized blossoms.

Part_006 Next, the exterior roof pieces are installed. First the main roof piece is installed. After gluing the center section, it is to be bent down along the slotted seams. Here is where I found a surprise! These pieces are not cardstock, but a lamination of two paper covers over some type of thin wood sheet! I went to bend the two sides down, and they resisted my gentle efforts. After I applied more pressure, the sides bent down with barely audible cracking sounds I applied some glue to the angled subframe sections, and held the leaves down until it grabbed. Because of the many-colored surfaces, I’ve been using mostly the clear Canopy Glue for the construction. An angled front roof piece is attached, next. This one also is bent down, once the center area is glued on. To ensure that these parts stayed in place, I ran a line of glue along the bottom edges of both parts, and a little in the seams between the main and front sections. I sanded the edges of the two top roof subframes smooth and even, in preparation to the next step. There is a long thin rim that needs to be glued along the length of this edge. The part is also slitted to bend around the corners, and follow the curved front of the roof. I had to carefully align the ends of the trim piece with the rear edges of the roof subframes, with the bottom edge even with the bottom of the roof subframes, and flat along the curved front edge. Quite a task to do before the glue hardened too much! Yes, you more skilled modelers are allowed to laugh, here! Now the power pantograph and the, I assume, radio antenna parts are assembled on top of the roof. First the pantograph base and the antenna are installed. The instructions show you the proper positioning of the horizontal parts, as well as a caution to make sure the pantograph base is in line with the roof seams. The paragraph parts are now glued on., as well as a cherry blossom that seems to be tenaciously clinging to the roof, of the moving tram! The headlights are installed. The final part of the tram assembly, is to glue two trim pieces on either side of the engineer’s door, I think to represent the grab bars, and a number plate, next to them. The track base is built next. I didn’t take any pictures of this, sorry. I got into the rhythm of putting it together, and forgot. Both lefthand ends of the rails broke off during the construction. I glued them on separately and sighted down the length of the intact rails to insure they lined up. There is also some sort of retaining wall behind the rails. The tram is attached to the base with two stand offs that are glued to the underside. The orientation of these standoffs is detailed in the instructions. If I remember the printed sides of them face the back of the scene. In the picture, below, you can just make out one of the supports, under the headlights. The next part will show the completion of this scene section, and the beginning of the base assembly, with the stream that runs from the back to the front, of the diorama.

Part_005 The next step is attaching the tram body, and the first roof layer. You have to do both at this time, in order to stabilize the body walls and insure everything is square. Once again, the unprinted side of the roof is place at the top. In the pictures you can see the slits that allow the corners to curve. The etched circle and two vertical lines on either side of the door, are location marks for details that are attached later. The rectangular cutout at the bottom right of the door, represents the door handle. I did not glue the roof to the body at this time. Later, when the next layer is installed, I glued all the roof assemblies to each other and the body. The tram windshield is solid in this model, but is not visible from the front viewing angle of the display. The next step is to install the front trim piece. This is also slotted to fit around the front corners. The rectangular outlines are where two headlights will be attached later. I had to realign this piece, as when fully seated against the base, the printed strip did not lineup with the one printed on the body. The slight gap is not noticeable from a viewing distance. There is a second layer of roof to be added. This part is where the substructure of the roof proper is built. Again, it is placed printed side down. The subframe is now installed. The tabs on the front and back supports are extra-long to fit into matching slots in the lower section. After the first part of the substructure is finished, the roof assemblies are mounted and glued to the body. In order to get the parts to mount flush, I had to clamp the assemblies, and let them sit overnight. This is a picture of the tram to this point, after the clamps were removed. Also shown are the next sub frame parts to go on. In the next section the visible roof parts will be installed, and a surprise will be revealed.

Part_004 The next part to assemble is another cherry tree. This is also a multi-layer assembly. This one has a branch sticking out of it at a right angle from the main trunk. The tree and branch are two layers, the printed wood side, and a printed cardstock back. The side with the hole in the trunk is the front. Here are the tree and branch with the multi-layer blossoms attached. I’m not going to glue the branch on, until it is time to mount the whole tree into the scene. Now starts the building of the tram car. Unlike the last diorama, the body of the car is made from one piece, not several. The body has several slits cut into the corners so that it can bend around the corners. This picture shows the body suspended over a parts box, to show the slits bending in a gentle curve. This model has clear plastic windows on the front side. I attached the window material with the canopy glue. After it grabbed, I went back with wet Q-Tip’s to clean off the excess overflow, from the “glass” surfaces. The underframe is the next part to be built. Notice in the picture below that the “Unprinted” side goes up. Both sides are colored, but the part number ID is etched on the printed side, so that goes down. Next the frame pieces are attached. Next the wheels are glued on. Lastly for this section, the steps. It was only later that I noticed that they are slotted too far forward. I think this it to clear the railroad crossing arm. The undercarriage is now flipped upright and the body assembly begone. First the wall that represents the interior is glued along the mid-line. I used a Sharpie to add some color to the plain wood finish people, supplied for this. I’m not sure why they didn’t print some color unto this but, they didn’t.

The accelerators can also mar clear parts.

I think what he is talking about is that CA fumes will fog clear plastic and acitate. I don't know how long you have to wait.

I will be continuing this soon. I have been busy with some family problems, which have, finally, been resolved, so less out of town traveling.

Mr. Color works with alcohol, based acrylics, like Tamiya, and Mr Color, not water based, like Vallejo.

I'm working on that era cannons now, the Bogards 1716. I'm in the process of developing the cypher. I have the slightly earlier Brown Pattern done. I don't know which your model would have carried.

Part_003 The diorama has a railroad crossing gate, and this is the next assembly to be built. Like the tree, the main body of the crossing gate is a two-layer part. A wooden front and a printed cardstock back. I glued the two together, and the assembly is shown in the two photos below. The upper photo is the front, the other the back. The lower photo also has the rectangular stripped box glued on. The next part needed, is also a two-part assembly. It is a sign with a directional, I assume traffic, arrow. With a mostly black double-sided sign, the raw light-colored edges stood out glaringly. I used a black Sharpie to color the edges. Next the two warning lights are attached. The part has circular outlines to aid in locating them. Next the two-part crossing arms were glued together, then glued to the pole. There are locating marks for both the crossing arms, as well as for the sign (see arrows). Here is a photo of the completed crossing gate. I did get the two-layer pieces a little off register, so I used a blade to trim then to match, on the edges. Looking at the picture of an actual Japanese gate, I see that, like in the US, they have shades over the lights. I may fabricate them before I install it. I used the Sharpie again, to extend the black stripes to the raw sides. With the large tip, it is not the cleanest, but from the distance, will look better than no stripes.

Part_002 Construction starts with four window assemblies. Four wooden frames are glued to printed cardboard backs. There are two sets, one with the bottom tab on the left, the other with the tabs on the right. The four panels are identical, so I picked the best side of each frame to be the front. The cardstock is printed on both sides, also, so I selected the best side of those four. The next part is a signpost with a roof over the sign. The construction is self-evident, the only thing to be careful of is that the textured side of the roof pieces is up. I did have to trim off the locating tab between one roof panel and the post, as the peak of the roof would not close with both tabs in place. This may be a problem in the future, as I had to trim off a tab on the next assembly also. The sign post only goes in one way, as the tabs are different sizes. The next item is the exterior compressor part of an air conditioner, that will eventually be mounted to a wall. The box is assembled with the front (outside face) panel and the four edge panels. Some care must be taken, as the parts are printed on both sides, so referencing the graphics in the instructions must be done. The bottom panel does not have different sized tabs to locate it, so I had to carefully look at the graphic. The panel that is the fan blades is glued inside the box, and two gray blocks behind that. The blocks represent the mechanical compressor parts. Here is where I had to trim off another tab on the rear most block. The block has an arrow etched on it to indicate the proper direction to mount it, but the tab that locks into the side panel does not line up! I cut off the tab, installed the piece, and then glued the tab into the side panel to fill the hole. Two supports are attached before the inside blocks are glued in place. Once again, I let my mind wonder, and broke the angled bracket off one of the supports. A little glue fixed the mistake. The next part is a multi-layer cherry tree. It starts with a wooden trunk, printed on one side, A printed cardstock backer is glued on the other side, to finish that side of the trunk. One thing to note about the instructions, if a part is printed on only one side the instructions indicate which is the printed or unprinted side facing you, by showing a square with either a blossom (printed side) or blank face. I’ve circled two examples in the picture below. For these parts where any excess glue would be seen, I used Canopy Glue instead of the yellow wood glue I normally use. The Canopy Glue is a high-quality white glue, specifically made to attach clear parts to other pieces, originally clear plane canopies to plastic models. It dries completely clear. I have also used it to glue parts to the bottom of clear cases. Several companies offer this type of glue, I’m using the one shown in the picture, because it was the one the local craft store carried. This is the original manufacturer of this type, but the other brands are just as good. This glue takes longer to set, though, so I leave the parts several hours to dry between layers. The glue also lasts a long time in the bottle. You may have to shake the bottle when you first start, like you would a bottle of paint. Several printed cardstock blossom layers are then glued to both sides the give depth to the tree. I had to take great care in orientating the blossom pieces, as there are location marks only for one of the several pieces. These pictures show both sides of the trunk. I spread the glue evenly over the entire surface of the cardstock side to ensure that there will not be any delamination in the future. I carefully scraped any excess glue off the edges, before it dried. I glued a cardstock blossom piece to one side of the trunk, then left it, blossom side up, to dry for a few hours. Once again, I spread the glue over the whole surface of the trunk where the blossoms attached, and used a toothpick to get rid of as much of the excess glue, as I could. Next, I glued the blossom piece to the other side. The first picture shows the glue spread on the contact surface of that side. The second shows the freshly attached part, with as much glue removed as I could. The difficulty of just getting the glue where needed, and not on other areas, is why I wanted the canopy glue for this. The last piece needed for the tree is a small blossom group to go over the section in the picture below where the circled branch area is shown. Here is the four-blossom group installed

I would stick a wood block between the head and table, and run the head down to lock the block in place, also. If it is really stuck, you might damage the ways (the piece the head slides on), or the head if you have to hit it hard. These are small machines.

The build on this will start in a week or so, I was concentrating on finishing a set of 3D printable cannon files, a few day side job, and family business problems.

Blomefield Pattern about 1787 STL Files Blomefield Pattern 6 Pounder 84 1_24 Size_99_39mm.stl Blomefield Pattern 6 Pounder 90 Full Size_2554_42mm.stl Blomefield Pattern 6 Pounder 102 Full Size_2873_90mm.stl Blomefield Pattern 9 Pounder 90 Full Size_2413_63mm.stl Blomefield Pattern 9 Pounder 102 Full Size_2873_90mm.stl Blomefield Pattern 9 Pounder 108 Full Size_3031_86mm.stl Blomefield Pattern 12 Pounder 90 Full Size_2553_49mm.stl Blomefield Pattern 12 Pounder 102 Full Size_2873_90mm.stl Blomefield Pattern 18 Pounder 108 Full Size_3031_86mm.stl Blomefield Pattern 18 Pounder 114 Full Size_3183_60mm.stl Blomefield Pattern 24 Pounder 108 Full Size_3031_86mm.stl Blomefield Pattern 24 Pounder 114 Full Size_3183_60mm.stl Blomefield Pattern 32 Pounder 114 Size_3183_47mm.stl Blomefield Pattern 12 Pounder 108 Full Size_3031_86mm.stl

OK, the NRG class today starts an hour later than I thought, so here is the Blomefield info. These are the only sizes I had drawings for. Blomefield Pattern about 1787 Graphics 6 Pounder 84 6 Pounder 90 6 Pounder 102 9 Pounder 90 9 Pounder 102 9 Pounder 108 12 Pounder 90 12 Pounder 102 12 Pounder 108 18 Pounder 108 18 Ponder 114 24 Pounder 108 24 Pounder 114 32 Pounder 114

A story I heard, about 50 years ago. I worked in a defense industry, designing military radars. Gray is a very difficult color to mix consistently between batches, even commercially, Well a high ranking officer got a bug up his rear, and decided to check one type of equipment color as compared to the official paint chip he had. Sure enough none to the field equipment matched, and he went into a tirade! He demanded all that type of equipment be repainted, to match the paint chips he handed out! He said he would be back in X amount of time, and check again. Dire consequences were promised! Well the time came, and he returned. All but one of the equipment at the various locations failed, but one! Afterwards, the other locations call the successful one and asked how he had managed to match the paint chip he was given. He told them he repainted his chip at the same time he repainted the equipment!

I will be posting the Blomefield Cannons later today, or tomorrow. I have to create the Brown Pattern Cannon graphics, so they will be posted later this week, the STL files are finished.

Spanish Cannons 1718 Pattern STLs . Spanish 5 Pounder Cannon 1718 Pattern Full Size_1642_27mm.stl Spanish 9 Pounder Cannon 1718 Pattern Full Size_1880_92mm.stl Spanish 12 Pounder Cannon 1718 Pattern Full Size_2214_83mm.stl Spanish 16 Pounder Cannon 1718 Pattern Full Size_3009_77mm.stl Spanish 24 Pounder Cannon 1718 Pattern Full Size_3353_46mm.stl

Spanish Cannons 1718 Pattern Graphics. I did not include the barrel length, as I only had drawings for one of each size. The Royal scroll and the cannon name scroll are on the barrel, but I will admit that the cannon name is the same for each STL, rather than individual names, as on the real cannon. I could only find one good photograph or drawing of this feature to trace. Yes the larger size cannons did not have the box structure at the trunions. No, I have no idea why. The handles are my best attempt at a Sea Monster motif. 5 Pounder 9 Pounder 12 Pounder 16 Pounder 24 Pounder

The Armstrong-Fredricks Cannon STLs - Part 2 Armstrong Fredrick Pattern 12 Pounder 102 Full Size_2890_31mm.stl Armstrong Fredrick Pattern 12 Pounder 108 Full Size_3060_30mm.stl Armstrong Fredrick Pattern 18 Pounder 108 Full Size_3099_59mm.stl Armstrong Fredrick Pattern 24 Pounder 108 Full Size_3080_94mm.stl Armstrong Fredrick Pattern 24 Pounder 114 Full Size_3252_13mm.stl Armstrong Fredrick Pattern 32 Pounder 114 Full Size_3252_13mm.stl Armstrong Fredrick Pattern 32 Pounder 120 Full Size_3423_31mm.stl Armstrong Fredrick Pattern 42 Pounder 114 Full Size_3234_00mm.stl Armstrong Fredrick Pattern 42 Pounder 120_Full Size_3404_26mm.stl

The Armstrong-Fredricks Cannon STLs - Part 1 Armstrong Fredrick Pattern 3 Pounder 54 Full Size_1542_39mm.stl Armstrong Fredrick Pattern 4 Pounder 66 Full Size_1885_16mm.stl Armstrong Fredrick Pattern 4 Pounder 72 Full Size_2056_47mm.stl Armstrong Fredrick Pattern 6 Pounder 72 Full Size_2056_47mm.stl Armstrong Fredrick Pattern 6 Pounder 78 Full Size_2227_92mm.stl Armstrong Fredrick Pattern 6 Pounder 84 Full Size_2399_24mm.stl Armstrong Fredrick Pattern 6 Pounder 90 Full Size_2570_56mm.stl Armstrong Fredrick Pattern 6 Pounder 96 Full Size_2742_01mm.stl Armstrong Fredrick Pattern 6 Pounder 102 Full Size_2913_33mm.stl Armstrong Fredrick Pattern 6 Pounder 108 Full Size_3084_78mm.stl Armstrong Fredrick Pattern 9 Pounder 84 Full Size_2368_81mm.stl Armstrong Fredrick Pattern 9 Pounder 90 Full Size_2538_15mm.stl Armstrong Fredrick Pattern 9 Pounder 96 Full Size_2707_35mm.stl Armstrong Fredrick Pattern 9 Pounder 102 Full Size_2876_55mm.stl Armstrong Fredrick Pattern 9 Pounder 108 Full Size_3045_75mm.stl Armstrong Fredrick Pattern 12 Pounder 90 Full Size_2550_32mm.stl

The Armstrong-Fredricks Cannon Graphics - Part 2 12 Pounder 102 12 Pounder 108 18 Pounder 108 24 pounder 108 24 Pounder 114 32 Pounder 114 32 Pounder 120 42 Pounder 114 42 Pounder 120

The Armstrong-Fredricks Cannon Graphics - Part 1 3 Pounder 54 4 Pounder 66 4 Pounder - 72 6 Pounder 72 6 Pounder 78 6 Pounder 84 6 pounder 90 8 Pounder 96 6 pounder 102 6 Pounder 108 9 Pounder 84 9 Pounder 90 9 Pounder 96 9 Pounder 102 9 Pounder 108 12 Pounder 90