Billy 1938 by Keith Black - 1:120 Scale - Homemade Sternwheeler

[Keith Black]

11 minutes ago, Coyote_6 said:

Just wow.  Such clean work - you're really doing Billy justice.  Very nice.

 Thank you very much, Steve. 

[Keith Black]

 Thanks to everyone for the likes and comments.

 

 

 The stern is starting to take shape. I set the windows about 0.05" too high but I'll have to live with it. Billy's name board's width is okay but the height needs to be lowered about two feet. It's easily removable and made so as i'll need to remove it to add the lettering. I'm a pretty good painter but I can't do lettering for beans. 

 

 Attach, remove rinse and repeat is all part of the process on the stern as it is so complicated. 

 

 Question....... in the enlarged loops, are those heavy cardboard or porcelain signs? I"m not going to try and replicate them, it's just a question to satisfy my curiosity. Thank you. 

 

 Thank you to all for being part of the journey.

 

   Keith

[wefalck]

Perhaps neither, but sheet-metal ? At that time die-pressed semi-relief sheet-metal ads were common. The design was added in form of decals and then burnt-in, as was done for porcelain.

[Cathead]

Keith, on the houseboat/barge, aren't those windows?

[wefalck]

Good point 😉 Could be just printed calico-curtains.

[Knocklouder]

I thought the same thing, looks like curtains,  🤔  As far as painting goes,  we are in the same boat  , good painter, not so good lettering  But  print them to the right size and mod-podge them on. Kinda like  make your on decals. Just a thought. Or make a stencil  and spray it on.

Bob  M.

Edited Tuesday at 06:47 PM by Knocklouder

[Keith Black]

37 minutes ago, wefalck said:

Perhaps neither, but sheet-metal ? At that time die-pressed semi-relief sheet-metal ads were common. The design was added in form of decals and then burnt-in, as was done for porcelain.

The type of signs is unimportant, it's, are they signs?  

 

25 minutes ago, Cathead said:

Keith, on the houseboat/barge, aren't those windows?

 Yes they are, Eric. But going back to the press wright up, Engel's boat had been damaged in a flood and Billy was his ticket to getting the boat down south to make repairs. It looks to me like they are signs put in as temporary replacements for damaged windows. I think ole Engel was a scavenger so putting in signs as a temporary fix seems plausible. 

 

23 minutes ago, wefalck said:

Good point 😉 Could be just printed calico-curtains.

 They don't look like like curtains to me, Eberhard? They could be but the window shades in Billy's windows are plain Jane.

[Keith Black]

6 minutes ago, Knocklouder said:

I thought the same thing, looks like curtains,  🤔  As far as painting goes,  we are in the same boat  , good painter, not so good lettering  But  print them to the right size and mod-podge them on. Kinda like  make your on decals. Just a thought.

Bob  M.

 I've got some letter transfers coming that will work but they aren't exact, Bob. i've never done the mod-lodge thing so I'm a bit leery about trying to learn a new skill though that's a bit lame. 

[wefalck]

If it's black on white, heat-transfer paper for laser-printers could be another route. Play around with the lettering on a graphics program until you are happy with it, print it onto the transfer-paper and iron it on. The paint underneath, of course, has to be sufficiently heat-resistant. In principle it works also with ordinary printer paper, but the heat-transfer paper gives off the toner completely, while printer paper always retains some.

 

[Geordie Tyne]

They could be wooden signs that he has scavenged to close up broken windows to keep the elements out.  Maybe Engel found himself near a reclamation yard and found old shop or advertising signs that suited his purpose. 

 

Regards

[Keith Black]

50 minutes ago, wefalck said:

If it's black on white, heat-transfer paper for laser-printers could be another route. Play around with the lettering on a graphics program until you are happy with it, print it onto the transfer-paper and iron it on. The paint underneath, of course, has to be sufficiently heat-resistant. In principle it works also with ordinary printer paper, but the heat-transfer paper gives off the toner completely, while printer paper always retains some.

 I've never printed my own, have thought about it but never attempted it, Eberhard. 

 

38 minutes ago, Geordie Tyne said:

They could be wooden signs that he has scavenged to close up broken windows to keep the elements out.  Maybe Engel found himself near a reclamation yard and found old shop or advertising signs that suited his purpose. 

 Geordie, I think every junkyard in Pittsburgh was Engel's oyster. 

[Cathead]

Honestly I don't see anything that looks like signs. The patterning looks like anything from curtains to plywood to cardboard, with arguably the distorting effect of refraction in glass in a blurry image.

 

As for lettering the stern, have you considered dry transfer letters? They're straightforward to use, though require careful alignment as you have to do each one separately. But you're no stranger to careful small-scale work. Most come in sheets of all letters, which can be annoying, but in your case that means you  have lots of spare letters to experiment with before using your precious B-I-L-L-Y. Woodland Scenics makes a wide variety of different fonts. Same things I used to letter the storefronts in my railroad build.

[Keith Black]

3 hours ago, Cathead said:

have you considered dry transfer letters

  I have a sheet in route from Woodland Scenics that I ordered yesterday, Eric. As I mentioned to Bob, they're not exact but they'll be hundreds of times better than what I could do by hand. 

 

 As far as the windows go, you're correct, Eric. The windows could be treated any number of different ways and we'll leave it at that. 

 

 Thank you, Eberhard, Eric, Bob, and Geordie for you input. 

[Cathead]

Sorry, Keith, I missed that you'd said that already.

 

Also, an idea occurs to me. I have a sheet of printed signs left over from the last  model railroad building project mentioned on my log. They're on cardstock and quite nice. I could easily slip some of these into an envelope to you if you wanted a few of them for this project. I could see doing some window coverings as plain and a few as signs just to add to the creative quirkiness, since we're none of us sure exactly what he used. Wouldn't cost more than an envelope and a stamp. Here's what the sheet looks like, most of these would be appropriate for the 1930s:

 

[Keith Black]

1 hour ago, Cathead said:

Sorry, Keith, I missed that you'd said that already.

 No problem, Eric. 

 

1 hour ago, Cathead said:

Also, an idea occurs to me. I have a sheet of printed signs left over from the last  model railroad building project mentioned on my log. They're on cardstock and quite nice. I could easily slip some of these into an envelope to you if you wanted a few of them for this project. I could see doing some window coverings as plain and a few as signs just to add to the creative quirkiness, since we're none of us sure exactly what he used. Wouldn't cost more than an envelope and a stamp. Here's what the sheet looks like, most of these would be appropriate for the 1930s:

 

 How very kind of you for the offer, Eric. I may not do the barge and canal boat and if I do the signs would need to be close to the window sizes. Should I decide to build the barge I'll revisit this with you in a PM. Thank you again. 

[thibaultron]

Cardstock for printers is about 0.011" thick, or about 1 3/8 thick in 1/120 scale, so you could use that as the sign, and just print the lettering on it. You can buy acid free cardstock, so it would not yellow on you, and would not need to be painted.

[Keith Black]

11 hours ago, thibaultron said:

Cardstock for printers is about 0.011" thick, or about 1 3/8 thick in 1/120 scale, so you could use that as the sign, and just print the lettering on it. You can buy acid free cardstock, so it would not yellow on you, and would not need to be painted.

 Thank you for the idea, Ron. 

[Keith Black]

 The name board height has been corrected.  I tried doing the lettering freehand, I've gotten close but not there yet. 

 

  Keith

[wefalck]

… but quite congenial!

[Keith Black]

18 minutes ago, wefalck said:

but quite congenial

 Thank you, Eberhard. 

[Jim Lad]

I suppose you've thought of printing the name on paper and pasting it onto a more solid backing?

 

John

[Keith Black]

1 hour ago, Jim Lad said:

suppose you've thought of printing the name on paper and pasting it onto a more solid backing?

 John, thank you for the idea, Bob @Knocklouder suggested the very same earlier. Depending how this looks when I cry uncle I may give the printing idea a shot.  

[tmj]

8 hours ago, Keith Black said:

The name board height has been corrected.  I tried doing the lettering freehand, I've gotten close but not there yet. 

Looks pretty good to 'me'! What is it that you don't like about it?

How's about posting a repeat image of ol' Billy so we have yours and 'his' close by to look back and forth at? 

[Keith Black]

3 hours ago, tmj said:

Looks pretty good to 'me'! What is it that you don't like about it?

How's about posting a repeat image of ol' Billy so we have yours and 'his' close by to look back and forth at? 

 Thank you, Tom. It's just not 'there' yet, you know what I mean.

 

 

 

 

 

[Jim Lad]

6 out of 10. You won't succeed unless you apply yourself (to quote one of my teachers from long ago)! 😄

 

John

[Paul Le Wol]

Keith, maybe you could try making the  L s  a bit heavier. Looking excellent!

[Glen McGuire]

I agree with John and Bob that printing on paper and then applying would be a good solution.  You've got 2 different fonts to deal with and the lettering on the original has sharp lines which will be hard to duplicate freehand at this small scale, especially the serif font of the "Pittsburgh, PA".  I believe you could easily create a graphic with the lettering on slightly weathered/off-white background for printing.  You could even add that faint dividing line that runs thru BILLY if you wanted to get crazy!

 

I'm also wondering what causes those wrinkles near the top.  It almost looks like a stretched canvas that's not quite tight enough - like how my bed looks after I put the sheets on it!  That's the cool thing about these projects of yours - trying to figure out what's going on by just studying these old photos.

 

[GrandpaPhil]

Make sure you seal the paper on both sides with a clear sealant to protect it.

[kurtvd19]

Just coming aboard a long way into this build.  Very interesting as usual.  I love the one of a kind builds you do Keith.  

As to the wrinkles at the top of the aft sign, I think they might be paint blisters almost ready to flake off.  Can't be a fabric - the line through the name is a separation gap between two boards - in my opinion.

Kurt

[tmj]

What about making water slide 'decals' of the letters on your computer/printer?

Edited Friday at 07:56 PM by tmj