The Shipyard at Foss' Landing (Diorama) by gjdale (Grant) - FINISHED - SierraWest - Scale 1:87 (HO)

[BobG]

The barnacles are amazing, Grant!

[gjdale]

5 hours ago, Papa said:

Have you ever done a kit from Fine Scale Miniatures? I wonder how you would compare them?

 

Thanks Ron. No, I have never done a FSM kit. I'm not actually a railroad guy - I'm just doing this kit 'cause it looked really cool!

 

I can certainly recommend the Sierra West kits. They are top notch quality and the instructions are first class. They are also well supported with their own forum and the kit designer/producer provides first class after-sales support and will look in on any build logs on that site to offer encouragement/advice along the way. He has also recently introduced 3-D printing to replace some of the castings in his kits.

 

And yes, every single one of his kits would make an excellent stand-alone diorama as well as being part of a railroad layout.

[gjdale]

The Derrick Dock Storage Shed

This little building is a gem. It is made up by gluing strip-wood boards (prepared as per previous boards, but with a little extra greying to show a more weather-beaten look) over a carboard substrate. However, some clever design here creates a “trap” to assist in gluing up the walls. 

 

In the following photo you can see some scrap-wood guides tack glued in place along some scribed lines. These will help to form the “trap” on the front and rear walls. In the lower part of the picture, strip-wood boards are being glued over the side walls.

 

 

Here are the completed walls. The front and rear walls are upside down to show the “trap”. A door has also been constructed for the front wall, complete with rusty handle made from a tiny piece of brass wire.

 

 

Here is a shot of the completed front wall, with door in place and rusty hinges added. The hinges are laser cut board that have been painted and then dusted with rust-coloured chalks.

 

 

The building is then assembled and the roof added. The roof is made up with some “tar paper”, this time grey in colour, and with some light streaking added once in place.

 

 

 

Some additional interest is added by placing some detritus on the roof. Here I’ve used some scraps of wood, a coil of rope, and a couple of chain links made by bending, soldering and blackening some brass wire.

 

 

And here is the shed placed temporarily on the Barge Derrick Dock to give a better idea of scale (it really is tiny!).

 

 

The Upper Yard Storage Shed will be next…

[Old Collingwood]

Love these  Laser cut  kits  mine was from a company caller  Sarissa  Models  - 

 

OC.

 

https://sarissa-precision.com/

 

[Papa]

11 hours ago, gjdale said:

 

Thanks Ron. No, I have never done a FSM kit. I'm not actually a railroad guy - I'm just doing this kit 'cause it looked really cool!

 

I can certainly recommend the Sierra West kits. They are top notch quality and the instructions are first class. They are also well supported with their own forum and the kit designer/producer provides first class after-sales support and will look in on any build logs on that site to offer encouragement/advice along the way. He has also recently introduced 3-D printing to replace some of the castings in his kits.

 

And yes, every single one of his kits would make an excellent stand-alone diorama as well as being part of a railroad layout.

It sure is a cool building!   I no longer have trains.  I finally realized that it was building models that i liked not running a railroad.  😀

[FriedClams]

Great progress Grant!  That is a sweet little shed, love the hinges.

 

Gary

[gjdale]

Thanks OC, Ron and Gary for your kind comments, and once again to all the "likes". Moving right along....

The Upper Yard Storage Shed

This is another little gem of a building. Its construction starts in much the same way as the Derrick Storage shed just completed.

 

 

Once the basic walls are completed, a new style of construction is introduced by the addition of thin vertical battens at the join between each plank. The effect is quite convincing.

 

 

Each of the walls now gets its own level of detail.

 

The Left Wall is left plain, with the exception of the addition of a window (not shown in this photo).

 

 

The Rear Wall gets some double doors, complete with split boards, rusty hinges, and a locking bar/latch. It also gets a coil of rope that is actually a metal casting – cleaned, blackened, painted and chalked.

 

 

The Front Wall gets an entry door, a mail box (a resin casting, painted and chalked), and a sign.

 

 

And finally, the Right Wall gets a window and another sign.

 

 

The walls are then glued together using the “trap” method as with the previous building, and a tar-paper roof. The roof also gets a stack – another casting that is cleaned, blackened, buffed, and epoxied in place. This was quite tricky to do due to the weight of the metal stack. I literally had to hold it in place until the epoxy started to set up. Here are a few shots of the completed building.

 

 

 

 

 

That completes the Upper Yard Storage Shed. The Saw Shed is next…

 

 

[Old Collingwood]

Loving these  new additions  Grant,   what  scale  is  this  again?     will you be adding  figures mate?

 

OC.

[gjdale]

Thanks OC. The scale is 1:87 (HO), as it says in the title 😉

 

I will probably try to find some suitable figures to include in due course - but that is a long way off yet.

[Glen McGuire]

That small building looks fantastic, Grant.  The split in the board and the uneven ends on the double doors are very nice touches.  Were those spelled out in the instructions or did you do some artistic kit bashing?

 

[gjdale]

Thanks Glen,

 

The split board is more or less copying the example in the instructions -  not spelled out, but I liked it so I went with it. The uneven ends are more an indication of my poor abilities - just happened to work out in my favour this time! 😁

[mtaylor]

Just a big "wow" from me at this point.   It's really impressive that the resin pats look like old wood.  

[pwog]

So cool! Looks great! 👏🏻👏🏻👏🏻

[Egilman]

3 hours ago, gjdale said:

...but I liked it so I went with it. The uneven ends are more an indication of my poor abilities - just happened to work out in my favour this time!

In my not so esteemed opinion, the first part is more accurate than the second part... In my experience, when you like what your doing, the abilities come along for the ride....

 

The muse never lies brother.... 

[king derelict]

It's all wonderful but the shed door with the split boards is just brilliant

Alan

[Canute]

Great job, Grant  The weathering is outstanding and those doors are super. 👍

 

One trick/tip for the stacks is to glue a piece of wood under the hole, let it dry and then drill a hole the size of the part peg into thru the roof. Make sure it's not visible from outside.

[gjdale]

Thanks Mark, Paul, Elmer, Alan and Ken.

 

Ken - I’ve been thinking on this issue as I’ve got a few more stacks to put on the other buildings. I like your idea and had been thinking along similar lines myself. The parts don’t actually have locating pegs, so I would have to create some by drilling small holes into their bases and inserting some brass rod. Then I could do as you have suggested. It might be a little tricky to get a piece of wood into the underside of the roof, but I’m sure it can be done. I’ll have a good look at this before inserting any more stacks. Thanks for the input/suggestion. 😊

[gjdale]

The Saw Shed

The Saw Shed is quite a complex build and is very delicate. Ultimately, it will include a great deal of detail – but that’s a little way off just yet…

 

We start with a template upon which we build two identical walls. As this is a destructive process for the template, I scanned and printed two copies so that I could build the two walls simultaneously.

 

 

As can be seen from the dimensions on the template, the framework is built up from 3/64” (1.2mm) square stock. We start by using some double-sided tape to stick down a scrap-wood straight edge and the four upright posts.

 

 

Then we add the header and the braces (the braces are 0.020” x 5/64”). A cutting guide for the braces can be seen at the top right the template drawing.

 

 

The wall is then removed from the template, a floor joist positioned on a fresh version of the template and the wall is glued on top of the floor joist.

 

 

Cross members are then added to one of the walls, inverted (ie we’re adding the top cross braces). A tricky business to be sure.

 

 

The second wall is then attached – even trickier….

 

 

And the bottom cross braces installed on top of the floor joists (since the walls are inverted, these will be below the floor joists once the walls are turned right way up).

 

 

The assembly is then turned right way up and the remaining floor joists are added.

 

 

Decking is then added on top of the floor joists – a relatively simple, though still delicate task. I worked from each end to meet in the middle and cut the last few boards to fill the gap. I have deliberately allowed a few gaps to appear in the decking.

 

 

Next, we are provided with a cutting and assembly jig for making the roof trusses – a clever and convenient inclusion.

 

 

 

A couple of scrap-wood guides are tack glued along the laser scribed lines to ensure that both the lower cross brace and the top brace are positioned exactly right. Once dry, they are removed from the jig and a second top brace is added to the opposite side.

 

 

Here are the four roof trusses completed. The gap at the top is to receive a ridge beam.

 

 

The roof trusses are then installed atop the cross members.

 

 

The glue is still wet in this photo. Once cured, the ridge beam will be inserted. Then we start on the roof and the internal details…

 

 

 

 

 

Edited January 30, 2023 by gjdale
Photo placement

[gjdale]

I don't know what happened to my previous post, but the system seems to have randomly dumped extra copies of the photos at the end of the post. I tried editing the post and deleting these, but they came back again. Can one of the mods please help?

[ccoyle]

6 hours ago, gjdale said:

I don't know what happened to my previous post, but the system seems to have randomly dumped extra copies of the photos at the end of the post. I tried editing the post and deleting these, but they came back again. Can one of the mods please help?

 

Hi, Grant. I checked your photo bin. There's 13 images in there with unique file names and 13 in the post, so it looks like nothing is technically amiss.

[robdurant]

2 hours ago, ccoyle said:

the system seems to have randomly dumped extra copies of the photos at the end of the post.

If you upload images to the "drag files here to attach" section of the post box (rather than dragging them straight into the text, and then you don't actually insert them anywhere in the post text, they will be added to the end of the post. In your post it looks as though you uploaded 13 photos, but only added some of them into the text - perhaps you deleted the others from the text - and so it added them automatically at the end of the post. To avoid this, you need to manually remove the images you have uploaded but aren't using from the "drag files here to attach" bit at the bottom before you click "submit reply".

 

With that said, I enjoyed seeing the extra photos, so thank you for including them

 

Rob

[gjdale]

Thanks Chris and Rob.

 

Rob - you were exactly right. I must have been in a bit of a hurry when I was inserting the photos into the text. I've been back and edited the post so everything is now where it should be. 😊

[Egilman]

You must have been a old style carpenter in a former life Grant... Gorgeous looking pole barn framing, the plate ties, (ceiling joists in a house) rafters and collar ties all are authentic to what the real things should look like.... (simplified for scale though)

 

Beautiful work my friend....

[gjdale]

The Saw Shed (Continued)

A minor update today. The Saw Shed Ridge Beam has now been installed.

 

 

Our attention turns, temporarily, to the shed roofing. The Saw Shed is roofed with corrugated iron sheeting. The kit provides some corrugated aluminium siding and some instructions on how to prepare this.

 

Here is the raw kit material – two strips about 8 inches long by 1 ½” tall.

 

 

The first task is to cut this into strips about ¾” wide.

 

 

Now the fun part….

 

To achieve an aged and rusted look, the aluminium is treated with Ferric Chloride PCB etchant solution. Yes, nasty stuff, but quite safe if proper precautions are taken – and the instruction manual is quite emphatic about this!

 

The method is to dunk a piece of aluminium into the Ferric Chloride solution with a pair of long tweezers. The instructions say that after a few seconds the piece will start to bubble. I found that it took a good couple of minutes for any reaction to start, but once it started it was very quick! Once it does start to bubble, it is removed from the solution and dunked in clean water to stop the chemical reaction. The longer it is left to bubble, the more of the aluminium gets eaten away. I experimented a little bit to produce some with heavily frayed edges. I will use these judiciously to represent some more rusted/worn panels.

 

Here are the pieces after the “mad chemist” treatment.

 

 

These will eventually have rust coloured chalk applied before being installed, but for now they are put aside.

 

The next task will be creating the Saw Table – a mini-project in itself….

[wefalck]

How will the saw be driven? Seems to call for a horizontal steam-engine ...

 

I love this project. These wooden buildings have a lot of character!

[gjdale]

1 hour ago, wefalck said:

How will the saw be driven? Seems to call for a horizontal steam-engine ...

 

All will be revealed…..stay tuned…..

[Canute]

Waiting to see how your sheathing turns out. We have real barns around here roofed with that stuff and they develop lots of character with the galvanized metal rusting out. You've got a great start with the etching.

[gjdale]

There are a lot of pictures for this update, so I'll spread this across two posts...

 

The Saw Shed (Continued)

 

We now turn our attention to the Saw Table. Once again, it is built directly onto the provided template. I have to admit, I was not happy with my first attempt at this and scrapped that before starting again. Here is the commencement of the process – the Table Top glued up.

 

 

To help keep the legs aligned, I transferred their positions onto a large piece of scrap wood and using a second piece of scrap, clamped the tabletop between the two before attaching the legs on the first side.

 

 

The table was flipped and the second set of legs attached. Here is the end result – much happier with this version.

 

 

Sides were then added. To provide some support to the somewhat fragile assembly, I clamped it in a small vise with a piece of scrap of a convenient size for support.

 

 

Here it is with all of the sides attached.

 

 

The saw blade and an end plate are provided as laser cut pieces. These were painted with AK 11210 (Natural Steel) and then dirtied up with a bit of dark rust coloured chalk powder. In the picture below, they are each held on the end of a toothpick – just to give an indication of size!

 

 

 

The next task was to clean, blacken and buff all of the metal castings and brass rod required for the rest of the saw table and shed.

 

 

Some additional planking is added to the underside of the table and the blower unit epoxied in place.

 

 

Continued next post...

 

[gjdale]

Continued from previous post...

 

The saw blade receives a small brass rod “axle” and is then epoxied in place. At the same time, the end plate is glued in place and another shaft inserted through it. It is supported on a block on the underside of the table and as a drive wheel attached at the outer end.

 

 

The end plate also receives a Feed Handle. This part is truly tiny. I dropped it on the carpet twice and was lucky to find it again both times!

 

 

Returning to the top of the table, the rollers are now epoxied in place.

 

 

With the Saw Table now complete, it is permanently attached to the floor of the shed – positioning is indicated on the template.

 

 

Next, we add some decking to the attic space to support the electric motor and drive shaft.

 

 

The electric motor is installed, along with the drive shaft, two pillow blocks mounted on scrap timber supports, and the driven wheel.

 

 

Some special material is provided for the drive belt. All that is required is to cut a 1/16” wide strip, paint it and attach it to the two drive wheels. 

 

 

Two lamps are hung from a support beam to complete the internals of the Saw Shed.

 

 

Next up we return to the roofing…

[Old Collingwood]

Wow  ths  is  insane  and  fantastic  -  loving this  detail  you are  putting into  this  Grant.

 

OC.