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Reply to "Continuing Saga …"

Okay… I reloaded all of those pictures. It almost takes as long to reload as it does to write the post in the first place.

Today I have a ton more. Like I said, working on many aspects at once creates a lot of pictures. Each time I glue something with Titebond, I have to let it sit about 1/2 hour before de-clamping.

Today's production included finishing the pilasters and crane rail support installation on the left inner wall. I also cut, shaped and installed the upper supports for the roof trusses.  I assembled the very slick laser cut railing for the gantry. I started sorting massive numbers of windows and figuring out my process. I pulled the clamps off the first gantry rail assembly and J-B Welded the other one, which will be cured tomorrow. And I tried the left wall's fit next to the floor and found two problems, both which offer some challenges.

I finished up adding the pilasters to the left inner wall, then glued on the 8 gantry rail supports. To make sure that these were level with each other I used a straight edge and periodically checked a reference location between the straight edge and the top of the 2nd level window openings. It didn't very more than a few thousandths.

The pilasters were keyed to the reference line I drew at the bottom accounting for floor thickness. BTW: I re-glued the end pilasters with their correct 1-wall-thickness offset.

EH Left Inner Pilasters In

EH Aligning Gantry Supprts

While this was drying, using the new piece of 3/4" pine I bought last night, I cut pieces that conformed to the contour on the template pieces that I had cut. These templates came in handy! The bottom side is tapered for clearance of the gantry, and I put that new belt/disc sander to work. I was this particular part that I bought that machine for. At first I thought I would have to rough the stock off with the big belt, but the disc did just fine. It made a mess and I work a dust mask and goggles to keep from ingesting all that fine sawdust. 

I set the miter gauge to match the template's angle and in a couple of passes took off all the stock.

EH Sanding Truss Supports

After this I used the shop vac on the machine, the room and me. I don't have a dust collector system.

I used the template itself to set the gluing distance for the 14 truss supports. Notice that the gantry supports skip every other pilaster.

EH Truss Supports Setting

After all were glued I weighted them all at once with a big level and some gravity inducing items.

EH Gluing the Truss Supports

I will flip this over tomorrow and add the pilasters on the outside and that wall will be completed.

While this was drying I assembled the 3-part gantry railing. When I drew this I wasn't sure if it would be too delicate to cut, but Stephen used a good laser board and the details came out perfectly. It is a 3-layer sandwich. The center layer has the lattice and the outer two are duplicates that give it depth. This was cut on self-stick material and it went together very nicely. This will be painted "equipment yellow" after the gantry is assembled.

EH Gantry Rail Parts

EH Gantry Handrail Built

I set this aside for later...

I opened up all the window frets and will spray paint them while still in the frets. These too are self-stick. Lots and lots of windows, but assembly is really slick and Stephen has included pre-cut acetate too. Much less work than my previous buildings.

EH Lots of Windows

When the wall was dried enough to handle I set in in place adjacent to the finished floor and found two areas of concern. The most egregious is the floor ending up being 1/8" too short. I hate when stuff is TOO SHORT. That 1//8" number is suspicious telling me that I took one wall thickness to much off the part design. Remember, the laser never lies. Any measurement error is all mine. Darn! I will splice material on and it will be okay.

This is one end in its proper position.

EH Floor Fit Other End

Here's the shortfall.

EH Floor too short

The second problem is the gaps that were under the gantry supports. Something ain't right! But my gluing job was almost perfect as seen in this image.

EH What's not level

But look at the alignment on the truss supports… Notice, I've tried on the gantry track rail. It lined up nicely.

EH Truss Supports align

Here's the problem… The ground ain't level… just like the real world. There is a dip in the platform under the yard tracks in this location.

EH Track isn't Level

I can't bring the floor up to join the buttresses since it raises it too far above track height and the big O'gauge flanges will ride up on the floor. I can shim under the buttresses so the gluing surface will be intact and let the floor follow the terrain. There's one other option which I will explore. This is an L-girder layout. I may be able to adjust the cleats and risers holding up the yard platform. I don't know how much give there is since there's some plastering in the area, but it's worth a try.

On another topic, my Kalmbach special issue on the resurrection of UP 4014 arrived yesterday and it's a terrific book. Seeing all the things that UP's steam crew did to make that engine alive again was nothing short of miraculous. A note of interest. UP's shop is world class, but to turn and quarter Big Boy's massive drivers they shipped them off to the Strassburg RR's steam shop who has a wheel lathe large enough to service 1940's loco's drivers.

I also did one more thing. I've volunteered to do a soldering demonstration for the Military Modelers Club of Louisville. I've been soldering photo-etched parts which is not something that many folks do. I also have perfected hand soldering those tiny surface mount LEDs. These are both topics of interest to plastic modelers.

Attachments

Images (13)
  • EH Left Inner Pilasters In
  • EH Aligning Gantry Supprts
  • EH Sanding Truss Supports
  • EH Truss Supports Setting
  • EH Gluing the Truss Supports
  • EH Gantry Rail Parts
  • EH Gantry Handrail Built
  • EH Floor Fit Other End
  • EH Floor too short
  • EH What's not level
  • EH Truss Supports align
  • EH Track isn't Level
  • EH Lots of Windows

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