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Trainman2001 posted:

Well guys... I spent time on SketchUp this morning and did some surgery to selectively compress (us O'scalers are good at this) to keep the flavor of that elegant building, but reduce its volume so it fits in my village better and here's the new look.

Bronx Bldg Shrunk Ver. 1

I removed the 3rd story with all its windows and reduced the length by removing one set of windows and getting rid of the side door which wasn't part of the 1870 version anyway. I think it looks pretty good. What do you guys think? You can disagree. 

It would take less time to laser cut with one full set of windows missing, and the wall size reduced over 30%. I see that the mansard roof texture got switched. It should be slate fish scale shingles like the side roof. It only has one chimney since two looked like over kill.

I'm going to mock this up too and see where it fits.

And I'm still going to build Nighthawks.

Much better. A question (NOT a criticism): Does the architecture fit with the locale? But then it's your railroad, so does it really matter? It's been 35 years since i lived in KY (Lexington), and a significant amount of product from Buffalo Trace may have deadened more than a few brain cells.

There are a lot of neat victorian buildings in lots of KY towns. Maysville, a neat little river town southeast of Cincinnati,  has buildings that look just like this one. The town in Pennsy where were lived had buildings from 1600s thru 1890s, all within a stone's throw of each other. I'm leaning towards a Victorian small town, but then my whole layout is an anachronism. I have an 1870 distillery with modern material handling equipment, and Victorian train station next to a state-of-the-art electrical substation, and then there's the refinery. If I like how it looks I'll build it.

Here's a Maysville building. Notice the eyebrows over the windows.

Maysville KY 3

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  • Maysville KY 3

So... taking all the comments into consideration, I quickly chopped the existing mockup to make a reduced-size Bronx Victorian structure. And it works nicely. In fact, it's perfect!

Resized Btronx 1

I think this is my preferred position. The two stories are a little taller than the adjacent structures, but this structure typically had 12 foot ceilings and the others look like 8 foot ceilings. But it's not overpowering and reducing the length keeps the alley way next to the chocolate shoppe, or track clearance in the first location. I think Nighthawks would go where that DPM corner store is temporarily located. I'm going to make that into an appliance store and have a Miller Engineering "Zenith TV" neon window sign for it. Next step is to change all the laser cut working drawings.

Small Bronx 2

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  • Resized Btronx 1
  • Small Bronx 2

And now for something completely different...

Last week our Kenmore Elite dishwasher's control panel (purchased in 2011) ceased working... dead as a doornail. We went to Lowe's on Saturday and bought a new GE dishwasher, but will be delivered in about 2 weeks. Then on Sunday, I bumped the Kenmore and the "Cancel" button lit up. All the buttons worked! So... I stopped hand washing dishes and we did a load in the machine. Then yesterday, when I walked by the dishwasher to the sink the floor felt funny. My shoe caught on the hardwood. When I looked I saw (with horror) that the floor boards were cupping leading out from the dishwasher. The floor had gotten wet underneath.

Then I went down to the train room. The dishwasher sits directly over the town. Because I had put Tyvek on the ceiling to keep out the dust and brighten the place up, no water had hit the layout, BUT, there was a significant bulge sitting right over the center of town that was obviously holding water. And what water that did escape (the floor had clearly gotten wet) had come down directly over the gap at the back between the three bridges and not a drop had hit the layout. WHAT LUCK!

The plumbers came today, checked it out and sure enough, the dishwasher was leaking directly from the motor housing. The assumption is that the leak caused the electronic problems, and not the the other way around. When the buttons went back on we were second-guessing ourselves about buying the new one, but after the plumbers left we realized that we probably should have seen this leak before.

The Big Lead 1The Big Leak 4

I put cardboard Teepees over any tall object that could get broken from the drop cloths. I chose the thinnest, biggest and cheapest they had at the hardware store.

I used a big Rubbermade tub to catch the water. Also luckily, there were big flat, non-built areas in town that were under the water "blister". We perforated the Tyvek with an Xacto knife and the water drained in a controlled manner.

Catastrophe Averted

Ironically, if we had gone to the expense of finishing the basement and putting in a dropped ceiling, it would have been much worse, since the dropped ceiling tiles would have disintegrated and collapsed right onto those delicate and irreplaceable buildings.

Whew! Don't like when this stuff happens. Of course, living in Louisville and not getting flooded or a wet basement, I really can't complain.

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  • The Big Lead 1
  • The Big Leak 4
  • Catastrophe Averted
Trainman2001 posted:

And now for something completely different...

Last week our Kenmore Elite dishwasher's control panel (purchased in 2011) ceased working... dead as a doornail. We went to Lowe's on Saturday and bought a new GE dishwasher, but will be delivered in about 2 weeks. Then on Sunday, I bumped the Kenmore and the "Cancel" button lit up. All the buttons worked! So... I stopped hand washing dishes and we did a load in the machine. Then yesterday, when I walked by the dishwasher to the sink the floor felt funny. My shoe caught on the hardwood. When I looked I saw (with horror) that the floor boards were cupping leading out from the dishwasher. The floor had gotten wet underneath.

Then I went down to the train room. The dishwasher sits directly over the town. Because I had put Tyvek on the ceiling to keep out the dust and brighten the place up, no water had hit the layout, BUT, there was a significant bulge sitting right over the center of town that was obviously holding water. And what water that did escape (the floor had clearly gotten wet) had come down directly over the gap at the back between the three bridges and not a drop had hit the layout. WHAT LUCK!

The plumbers came today, checked it out and sure enough, the dishwasher was leaking directly from the motor housing. The assumption is that the leak caused the electronic problems, and not the the other way around. When the buttons went back on we were second-guessing ourselves about buying the new one, but after the plumbers left we realized that we probably should have seen this leak before.

The Big Lead 1The Big Leak 4

I put cardboard Teepees over any tall object that could get broken from the drop cloths. I chose the thinnest, biggest and cheapest they had at the hardware store.

I used a big Rubbermade tub to catch the water. Also luckily, there were big flat, non-built areas in town that were under the water "blister". We perforated the Tyvek with an Xacto knife and the water drained in a controlled manner.

Catastrophe Averted

Ironically, if we had gone to the expense of finishing the basement and putting in a dropped ceiling, it would have been much worse, since the dropped ceiling tiles would have disintegrated and collapsed right onto those delicate and irreplaceable buildings.

Whew! Don't like when this stuff happens. Of course, living in Louisville and not getting flooded or a wet basement, I really can't complain.

Myles,

Consider yourself VERY VERY lucky.

Yes... there's was a lot of luck and then the right reaction. I always turn off the main water inlet to the house whenever we're going away overnight or longer. We've had four water catastrophes which were all random and could all have done untold damage had they occurred when were weren't home. 

1. The bottom of a humidifier opened one clip and the sump flopped sideways opening the inlet valve without anything shutting it off. The house was already sold and it soaked through the utility room wall into the family room and soaked the carpet. It was a townhouse built on a slab so there was no basement to get wet.

2. A washer hose let loose early on a Sunday morning. I came downstairs to the sound of water spraying. It put about an inch of water on the Armstrong Sheet Goods vinyl flooring and some got to the basement, but I was there and could shut off the water before it got to the rest of the house.

3. The water inlet line to a water softener pulled out of its compression fitting and was spraying the entire basement...all my tools, but I didn't have a railroad yet so it didn't do anything REALLY serious.

4. The nylon nut on the water inlet connection under the toilet tank in a second floor bathroom cracked and was involved in an uncontrolled release of water that got through the floor and started cascading out of the light fixture in our master bath that lies below. Again, we were home and I was able to shut off the main, get a plumber and get it fixed.

Any one of these events if they were to continue for days without anyone intercepting them, would have done ridiculous damage. There are many cases when a second floor leak takes place and runs for days and takes apart the first floor. The house has to be gutted to repair the damage. It also precludes a pipe freezing in the house from wrecking the place when it thaws out when no one's home.

So... It takes a couple of seconds to turn off the water. 

About 35 years ago, while we were away for a week at Disneyworld, a hot water pipe burst and sprayed water across the room, hitting South Plastiville on our large layout. My brother, who was watching the house for us, discovered it. He repaired the leak but did not tell us about it so as to not spoil our vacation, but instead turned the damaged area into a disaster scene.  Two Lionel cranes held the track suspended in the air. Every emergency vehicle he could find on the layout and the kid's toy box were at the site as well as all of the sidewalk supervisors from Plasticville.  A Wheebles helicopter hovered over the scene. It was hilarious. Fortunately a new Life-like grass mat was all that was needed. 

Glad to hear you kept the damage to a minimum.

Earl

 

 

  

Whew, close one.  (yep, still with you...I've just been lurking quietly again )

  In winter of 2011 I was visiting around town and knocked on a pals door. Looking around while waiting for the door to be answered, I looked down at his neighbors basement window.

  There was water coming off the cement sill andbeing winter, I stepped off the porch for a better look and realised water was flowing out from around the window frame. 

  The basement was now a huge aquarium and they weren't due home for another few weeks so we made calls.

   The power company killed the electrical and gas, the city shut off the water, and the house was not opened, just wrapped up tight with a giant yellow& black "ribbon" and a "No Occupancy" sticker stuck to the door. Ice busted out the windows after a few days, foundation cracked and the house began listing.  The owners abandoned the home, the city pumped it dry and razed it and filled it, but not till a mid summer block meeting..... at city hall. My buddy bought the lot at auction for the nicer garage and yard expansion. 

  The third home where a neighbor's misfortunes allowed a cheap expansion of his own mansion. He still hasn't taken down the fence though. I tore my diaphram, he had a heart attack, but the hot rods are safely stored

About 6 years ago my Wife and I bought our retirement home in a different state. (South). The house has a crawl space under half and a walk out basement under the other half. We packed up the house after labor day the following year and headed home. We came back down over Christmas and the first thing I did is turn on the kitchen faucet to get some water. Nothing. Dag... I headed for the basement and from under the garage door came a steady flow of water into the back yard and down the hill. From the water bill we estimated the main line in from the street let loose under the house about 3 weeks before we got down there. The crawl space filled up and overflowed into the basement which directed the water under the garage door and out; luckily, I guess. Again, Luckily, since we had only recently bought the house there was very little in it since we were doing major renovations. I turned the water off at the street and called a plumber. He discovered the coupling between the main water and the house plumbing system blew off. Further investigation showed the limiter valve at the street which is supposed to bring the water pressure down to a useable 42 psi was set at its max of 150psi. The plumber couldn't believe it didn't rupture our entire system. All fixed and no inside water damage. Just a heart stopping water bill for those three months. Obvious moral. Turn the water off whenever you're gone for more than a day.

Thanks for all the kind thoughts.

On another front, I've been experimenting with ways to build the Nighthawks Cafe without any laser cutting. I've purchased all the different windows from Grandt Line and Tichy, plus the doors. I've got all the drawing modified for hand making, and I'm trying to figure out the best way to use Masonite or MDF for the walls. I did an experiment using a Dremel with the router attachment and a 1/16" carbide bit, plus a piece of wood set up as a fence to guide the router cut. The test was marginally successfully. While the fence worked, I had to be very careful in guiding the device so it didn't wander away. I also have been thinking about how to set up the fence so it's very secure, but easily adjustable. I have a colleague who has a CNC router, but they've recently moved and I don't think his shop is set up yet. Also, I'd have to learn to use additional software to create the cutting program. 

I'm also considering doing it the old fashioned way; using styrene for the walls and cutting the window openings with a razor knife either punching them directly out, or using the snap-and-glue method where you slice and dice up the walls, removing the window spaces and gluing the rest back together. I used this method when building the Victorian Station and it worked well. Besides, the walls are getting covered by Plastruct embossed brick sheeting which actually covers the entire wall without any splicing. I'll keep you abreast of any developments.

Meanwhile, work on the Essex continues apace. I've been working to finish the island with all that soldered brass scratch-build and Photo-etched stuff. It's been a challenging job. I paint and rig all this before fastening it to the deck.

Essex Island Status

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  • Essex Island Status

Checking in again...

Glad I kept the plastic sheeting over the city until the new dishwasher was installed and checked out. I went to remove it last week after the dishwasher install, but noticed water in the Rubbermaid pail and on the plastic sheeting. We had the plumbers remove the old dishwasher and waited over two weeks for the new one to be delivered. Meanwhile, the stop valve under the kitchen sink that was "shut off" after the old dishwasher feed line was removed was actually leaking a a little bit. Just enough to wet the area under the sink AND to seep down the pipe and come out of the basement ceiling onto the layout AGAIN. All is now dry and I'm going to remove the sheeting and run trains again.

I'm still working on the Nighthawks design to make it a DIY project without laser cutting. I've adjusted all the exterior dimensions so it is no larger than 6 inches wide and deep so I can cut two sides out of a single sheet of Evergreen 6 X 12" stock. Further I thought about having the two turret cones produced by Shapeways and redesigned the geometry  for 3D printing. I sent them the converted-to-STL SketchUp drawings and was ready to pull the trigger. It would cost $44 for hi-res acrylic printing. That cost is not out of line, but then I thought about how to make it in my shop for $0. It's about 2 inches in diameter and height. My challenge was my little Taig lathe. It isn't really a wood lathe and I can't grab a four-sided wood chunk in its 3-jaw chuck. I thought about how to approach this and came up with a solution. I will create a square blank (which is now being glue downstairs). I will drill it in the approx. center and then glue in an appropriately sized dowel which will go into a 3-jaw chuck. I will carve off as much stock as possible before putting it in the lathe and then using a sanding/grinding bit in the Dremel and grind off the wood as the lathe is turning. This way I won't have to use wood turning tools (which I don't have) nor use a wood turning tool rest (which I also do not have). Should work. Here was the set up screen on Shapeways.

Screen Shot 2018-03-18 at 3.38.36 PM

Another possibility would be to make it out of Scuplty hardening clay.

A third possibility would be to make it out of modeling clay, make a silicone mold and then resin cast it. That's not a cheap solution since the resin materials are not free.

There's a dense foam called Renshape that makes a great carving foam and is available at https://www.freemansupply.com/...g-and-styling-boards

I believe it is NOT inexpensive.

I'll keep y'all posted.

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  • Screen Shot 2018-03-18 at 3.38.36 PM

Thanks Mark!

So... I'm ordering a sample pack of Renshape from Freeman. It's $25 and gives chunks of all different densities of their structural foam and other pattern making materials. Considering the small sizes of the pieces we O'scalers make, that sample pack could be all I need.

Meanwhile... I decided to see if I could make the turrets from wood. I have wood and I have a lathe (although not technically a wood lathe) and figured "what have I got to lose". The glued up block was really a bunch of angular cutoffs from layout frame building so first I had to knock off the angles on the chop saw. The first time I tried to cut it, it promptly flew off the back of the saw table. It was a tall piece (almost 3" high) and hand holding it was stupid and dangerous. Didn't get hurt other than surprise. I then clamped the block against the fence with another piece of longer stock held with a c-clamp. This worked well and I had a cube of solid wood very quickly. 

I found the centers on each end and drilled one end in the drill press to accept a piece of 1/2" brass rod. After inserting the rod I soaked the end with thin CA so it was very secure. I sawed off the square sides to reduce the overall shape to sort-of an octagon using a Japanese style thin-blade hand saw.

This I COULD chuck in my lathe. I also drilled the tail end for a tailstock spindle to stabilize this big chunk of wood. I took it nice and easy using a metal working carbide bit to gradually knock off all the high spots and create a true cylinder. I then proceeded to gradually reduce the diameter of the small end tapering it to the large 2" end. I did 2-hand turning which is always fun. I moved the carriage feed with my right hand and wound out the cross feed in an ever increasing speed to create a cone with some curvature built in.

When it was near net shape, I used the Dremel with a sanding drum while the lathe was turning to create the final shape. I had a template of the turret that was drawn in CorelDraw which I printed out and pasted to some illustration board. After using the Dremel I hand sanded the turret to smooth finish.

The last thing I did was move the piece further out of the chuck and face the back side so it was true to the cone AND reduce the brass plug diameter to 3/8" to make less metal to part off. I used a hack saw to cut it off since there was limited room to get in there with a part-off tool.

NH L Turret Composite

The process to create the small bottom turret was the same, but easier since I didn't have to glue up the block and had less wood to remove to create the octagon. Here is a picture of what it looks like after the 2-hand turning.

NH S Turret 2-hand Turning

Again I cut off this piece using a hack saw, only this time the plug was aluminum. After finishing, the small turret looked like this.

NH S Turret Turning Fin

There was a scratch in the large turret that I filled with Tamiya filler putty and then sanded smooth in the lathe.

NH L Turret Filled

Here are the two turrets fitted with ball bearings that I conveniently had in an old film bottle in one of my drawers for years. I had two of almost the perfect size. I'm going to coat them with Tamiya clear color coat so they'll look like mirror balls. I epoxied the balls in place and will let dry overnight.

NH Turrets Complete

To refresh you memories, here are both turrets in building on SketchUp.

NH Turrets Drawing

The turrets were the most challenging part of this build (IMHO), so having them done first really relieves some stress. The rest of the build is more straight forward and is a repeat of other kinds of builds that I've done. In practice, these kinds of architectural details are shingled with shingles of decreasingly smaller size as the diameter shrinks going up. I've had thoughts of buying Rusty Stumps HO and N scale shingles to do it, but it's a lot of $$$ just for a few fractions of inches of shingles, so I may cut my own out of the straight Rusty Stumps O'scale shingles I have in my stash.

Another wrinkle is the lower current is embedded into the building's corner. I may be easier to cope out the building to let the turret nest into it, then try to cut out a quarter of the wood turret. It's not the wood that the trouble. It's the big aluminum pin embedded into it that will be harder to cut, AND there's no convenient way to hold it. Since I had a cutting template of the shape, I can trace it onto the building and simply cut out the profile.

 

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  • NH S Turret 2-hand Turning
  • NH S Turret Turning Fin
  • NH L Turret Filled
  • NH Turrets Complete
  • NH Turrets Drawing
  • NH L Turret Composite

Since I'm waiting for some new lighting effects for the Essex, I decided to continue working on Nighthawks and made a significant dent in the process.

I finished editing all the CorelDraw plans to make the adjustments needed to create a 6" X 6" d structure which included changing the Mansard roof pieces, all the floors as well as the walls themselves. I then printed all the pages out in duplicate. I trimmed the images to their exterior lines and them sprayed them with 3M 90 spray adhesive. It's their high-strength product AND does eat into styrene so I wouldn't recommend using this. It was the only one that I had so I used it. 3M77 is milder and is less aggressive. The X'd out windows are last minute changes. The center windows are where the chimney chase will be, and the left window is being eliminated since it will be into a turned stair well.

NH Pattern Glued

After sticking the drawings onto the styrene I cut them out using a #11 Xacto and then using a MicroMark corner cutting chisel. Before I decided to use the chisel I was cutting a "X" from the window corners to make it easier to break out the window center. This works, but the corner cutter is better.

NH Window Cutting

I tested each window opening with the two sizes of windows going in the structure (Tichy and Grandt Line) and they fit nicely, based on the drawing accuracy based on measuring the actual windows before doing the drawings.

NH Window Fit

Here's the corner cutter. A couple of taps with a soft-faced hammer does the trick. You have to be careful aligning it in the cut window edges.

Corner Cutter

I got all the windows cut without difficulty.

I then added the Plastruct brick sheeting. The first piece was on a wide section (walls are two lengths: full width and full width minus 2X wall thickness.) All I had to do was pay attention to brick alignment AND gluing on the correct side. This embossed brick sheeting has the right side and the wrong side.

After the second wall section was cured under some weight, I realized that I had glued on the brick sheet wrong side out. Doh! While it was pretty well cured using Testor's tube cement, I was able to manhandle the sheeting off the styrene wall. The wall broke at a narrow section, but it was an easy fix. I then used another piece of brick stock and redid it. I was hoping to not scrap any brick stock since I didn't want to use pieces. I then glued up another two walls and DOH! again, I glued another wrong side out. I couldn't believe it. Really? Two brick pieces scrapped! Give me a break. I then had to piece sheeting on two walls. I tried to make the seam as inconspicuous as possible. I left the sheeting overlap the walls and trimmed them after curing. During cutting the edge of one of the front pieces I had the tip of my left index finger hanging a little over the edge of my metal straight edge and almost trimmed the tip of my finger off... close, but not quite. And since I'm on a blood thinner, it did bleed pretty well. I bandaged it up tightly and got back to work. By the end of the session I got all four walls bricked. Openings were cut out after walls we cured. 

NH Walls

I was going to leave the brick sheets unpainted except for mortar and picking out random bricks for different coloring, but, the two packs of bricks sheets have different shades of brick red, so I'm going to have to paint the entire sheets. I can now pick any color I want. The bottom four feet should be a field stone foundation. I need to decide how to approach that. I can leave it brick all the way, but a stone foundation would add interest. Any suggestions on the best way to approach this?

Tomorrow, I start planning an executing how to join the walls and cut some floor plates. I could have cut the windows using the "snap and glue" method like I did with the Victorian station since the brick sheeting would hide all those glued seams, But directly cutting the windows worked okay.

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  • NH Pattern Glued
  • NH Window Cutting
  • Corner Cutter
  • NH Window Fit
  • NH Walls

I have used the X cut and snap out method in the past, but I like the looks of that corner cutter.  Twenty-five years ago or so, I tried the snap and glue method on a clapboard station I was building, following instructions in a Model Railroader magazine, but I just couldn’t get the seams to look like the author’s.  I abandoned the project and still have pieces of the job in the spare parts box to remind me of the frustration.

JerryG posted:

Fascinating.  I loved reading that.

I always wondered why those 5 inch turrets were firing at aircraft.  I think my model had 40 Bofors mounts and thought the 5 inchers were too big a shell for planes. 

As mentioned, for anti-aircraft duties the 5" shells that were used had proximity fuses and exploded at certain altitudes, sending flak over a wide area, which is what downed the aircraft. Different types of shells with different capabilities were employed, depending on what the targets were, be it shore bombardment or anti-ship or whatever. My late father-in-law was a gunners mate on a Fletcher class destroyer in the South Pacific during the war and told me about their gunnery methods. These ships also were equipped with 20mm and 40mm anti-aircraft guns.

They probably would have used armor-piercing rounds if they had to fire at steam locomotives. 

Last edited by breezinup

Our 5" shell technology was unique and very effective. Now Russia and China are touting hypersonic. We've been messing with that for years, but haven't operationalized anything yet. Sounds to me like we're going to repeat the 1960s and 70s when we freaked out by the Soviet Mig 25 Foxbat and created the Fs 14,15, 16 and 18, only to find out that the '25 was fast and that was it. It was built with steel, not titanium, had engines that failed after a short time, was not maneuverable. In other words, we really overreacted and it cost us $$$$. We're going to do it again.

By "hope", you mean that I give mere mortals permission to screw up occasionally since I do it so regularly? I've said it before, I screw up when I'm rushing. I don't know why I was rushing yesterday, but I just wanted to get as much done as possible before all the lighting stuff comes for the Essex. My orthopedic surgeon son in law noticed that I tend to work too fast. He tells me to slow down. He's right! He's also one of the top surgeons in Louisville so I should listen to him.

Work continued today on Nighthawks...

The building now has four sides.

Using a surface gauge, I scribed the location of the 1st and 2nd floor plates. For the first floor I'm probably going to use 1/8" Masonite, but will go with foam core for the 2nd since it won't be supporting anything. I then glued 1/8" square stock on these lines. I was careful to not put them where other structures were going.

Since my walls are only about 0.050" thick and are supposed to be brick (about .180" scale thickness) I decided to pack out the window spaces inside. Some .125" evergreen strip stock did the trick. I measured the opening length and set the Duplicutter to that size and chopped off the long pieces. After I glued these in I cut shorter pieces for the narrow edges. I test fit the two different windows sizes in each opening as I went along so I've got very nice, tight fits. All reinforcement pieces and the packing are the same thickness (1/8") so I can install interior walls if I so desire. I don't think I'm going to do any interior detail on the second floor. I did this in Saulena's and you simply can't see in from the layout edge. It was fun, but a waste of time. The main floor is different  since there's that big curved window...

NH Window Packing

It was time to join the sides and then I found another booboo that I made. I knew I needed brick sheeting to extend out over an edge so the white substrate didn't show. Only trouble was that I picked the wrong set of sides (long sides) to extend the substrate. It was the short side that needed the extension. So I cut the extensions off and will deal with the substrate on another day.

I first tried using a picture framing miter clamp to hold one set of edges and my corner clamps for the opposite end, but it was working well due to the internal bracing getting in the way so I used the corner clamps exclusively for the rest of the building.

NH Glue Up 2

The white plastic plate was there to add some more rigidity to the clamp surface on the flimsy front piece. You can see the white edge. Since I'm painting the whole building the white won't show.

I have to modify the front corner under the curved glass since this is not brick, but is a framed up structure. I made the curved backing piece out of a piece of 1/8" Plastruct ABS. I squared it up and scribed a 1" radius curved. I cut it out using a jeweler's saw and trued up all the edges hand sanding on the Precision Sander. I cut off the bottoms of the front window wall and then re-glued them to the curved piece.

NH Curved Frt Mod1

NH Curved Frt Mod 1A

I test fit this assembly where it's going to be. It needs some more work since it going to sit behind the brick wall. Furthermore, I'm going to make this lower window wall a scale foot higher.

NH Curved Frt Mod 2

I'm redrawing the building on SketchUp while construction is progressing to get a handle on any challenges. Making this curved piece was just one of those challenges that needed addressing now, not later. I didn't want the window sill to be at floor level. I will also raise the top another scale foot also. I have to be conscious of the upper works and not cut the space down too much. I did some more work on the turret's mating scheme to the rest of the building. If the turret was an actual living space, there needed to be a passage from the attic to it. I didn't have such as a space on the original design.

Hight Hawks progress

For the stone foundation I'm thinking to create a thin, carved veneer using Sculpey. I printed out a scale sized piece of this pattern (downloaded from the Podium rendering add-in for SketchUp). Sculpey is very brittle in thin sections so I think I'm going to embed some window screen into it before heat hardening it.

 

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  • NH Window Packing
  • NH Glue Up 2
  • NH Curved Frt Mod1
  • NH Curved Frt Mod 1A
  • Hight Hawks progress
  • NH Curved Frt Mod 2

All right, I missed something.  Every picture of Nighthawks I have ever seen shows a bit of space above the left hand side of the Phillies sign above the big window indicating to me that it is a one story building.  Have I only seen part of the Hopper painting, are you combining this with another building, or (this is probably the answer) have I not been paying attention?    I am thinking you explained yourself back there somewhere, and I can't find it now, so I'll just ask for clarification.  

 

Mark Boyce posted:

All right, I missed something.  Every picture of Nighthawks I have ever seen shows a bit of space above the left hand side of the Phillies sign above the big window indicating to me that it is a one story building.  Have I only seen part of the Hopper painting, are you combining this with another building, or (this is probably the answer) have I not been paying attention?    I am thinking you explained yourself back there somewhere, and I can't find it now, so I'll just ask for clarification.  

 

You are correct.

I suspect Hopper took some architectural liberties; it's hard to believe that a one-story cafe would be stuck out on the corner, especially since the other buildings in the painting are two-story..

It probably was a 1-story structure, and he did take liberties. Hopper was an American Impressionist and therefore represented objective reality in not-so-objective ways. The perspective of the building is a bit off. The counter and the building seemed to be triangular and yet it was most likely a square street corner. It is said that he chose this angle to better show the two characters sitting with their coffee. Incidentally, those two are purported to be Hopper and his spouse. So, yes, I'm taking this one-floor odd-shaped impressionist image and pushing it into a real-world four-sided multi-story building. It's model railroading impressionism. 

nighthawks_by_edward_hopper_1942

The lighting appears to be florescent and vey uniform. There are round, wooden bar stools, and I already have the coffee urns and cups (resin from Westport Modelworks). My biggest challenge is going to be trying to make the figures. I've downloaded a primer on how to sculpt figures using Sculpey and it appears to be straight forward (famous last words). The trick is to build a basic shape on an aluminum foil armature, fire it to make it solid, then add the next layer of detail, fire that, and so one. In this way, you're not trying to make a finished product out of very unstable clay. When I did my "Wallace and Gromitt" figures for the B-17, I didn't know this trick and kept messing up previously shaped and unstable clay trying to add another detail.

My grandson used the instructions to shape his "Old Man and the Sea" diorama and it worked pretty well. So I'm game. Instead of trying to make a Hopper and wife, I might attempt to make a Myles and wife. That would be a trip! I did a perspective mod on Corel PhotoPaint and straightened the "Phillies" sign so I can make a decal of it. It's missing some parts which I had to estimate. Notice the wall thickness at the far end of the window. It's a masonry building.

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  • nighthawks_by_edward_hopper_1942

I believe, still, that the Nighthawks cafe is on the ground floor of, at least, a two-story building. There is, in the painting, a stout pole, ribbed, maybe cast iron, that could be intended to support an overhanging second story. See the painting "Drug Store"

http://media.overstockart.com/cache/data/product_images/overstockart_2378_1437784882-570x650.jpg

Look at the painting "Night Windows" 

http://3.bp.blogspot.com/-hP2IT2qdNyg/UrTHuIerECI/AAAAAAAABKU/g-JZHRM-Lu4/s1600/Hopper---Night-Windows-2318-26488.jpg

The curved corner could match the curve of the cafe window.

I agree that modeling the cafe almost has to be modeling impressionism!

Did I mention that I'm a Hopper fan?

This is a good discussion. Notice above the sign that you can see part of the brick building across the street, so at least that part is one story. I'm shoehorning it into a nice two story victorian style building just for fun. This design appeared in a May 1957 Model Railroader mag that I got from my uncle in the 1950s. I wanted to build the kit since then. I don't let go of ideas easily... It was built old school with strathmore board, brick paper and thread for window mullions. 

Even with a shortened session (exercise day), I did make some interesting progress. I finished framing up the lower curved front structure minus the outer decorative framing. I needed to pack out the curve to bring it level with the outer surface. I did this with three layers of .040" X .125" styrene which was thin enough to make the curve and glue solidly. I could have avoided this step id I would have notched the ABS piece to drop the front pieces back so the curve was flush with the facing, but I didn't think of that until today and that ABS piece was solvent and CA cemented in place and it didn't want to budge.

NH Curved Front Forming 1

It was still about .010" lower so I added a piece of thin styrene sheet which did the trick.

NH Corner Forming 2

With the surface ready, I then sheeted the whole curve with 0.015" styrene which gave a perfectly smooth surface for further framing appliqués to detail this portion of the window area. I test fit the piece here and you can see the nice, regular curved front that's perfectly square.

NH Corner Fit Trial

I needed to reinforce the top edge to make it stiffer and give more gluing surface so I laminate some 1/8" square stock on the top straight edges, and used the thinner piece laminations to handle the curved portion. Here's what that looked like.

NH Curved Frt Inyernals

Before I did anything else it was time to make the 1st floor plate. I found a piece of Masonite that was exactly the correct width (5-5/8") which I chopped sawed to the other interior dimension (5-15/16").

NH 1st Floor Plate Fitting

I laid out and cut the corner curve and notched out the other corners to clear the corner reinforcing pieces and then tried the floor panel with the window piece to see how it fit. I glued two 1/4" square lugs at the window sill base for a glue point and reinforcement to put the curve back into the building.

NH 1st Floor Trial

Back to the sill. I didn't have any more sheet styrene, but I have a nice big sheet of 1/16" aircraft ply which I used to layout and cut the first layer of the wide window sill. The will be a couple of other pieces that will go here to shape and captivate the clear styrene which will make the large curved window.

NH Window Sill 1

And a bonus. I was looking (and didn't yet find) my Rusty Stumps stair making kit, I found a bunch of sheets of MicroMark O'scale stone wall textured, adhesive backed detail sheeting which is now going to make the stone foundation for the building. At least that's today's plan. I had forgotten that I bought this at least 5 years ago. It might be a bit large, but it looks pretty good. I will have to figure out the best way trim the top.

NH MicroMark Stone Wall

All the LED supplies arrived today, so I'm going to do one more day on Nighthawks and then it will be back to the Essex. Some of these materials may find their way to Nighthawks. I bought adhesive copper foil to provide invisible conductors for lighting the flight deck and it will also work well in buildings. I also bought tiny, wide angle, surface mount LEDs that would provide vey uniform lighting to the ship and the cafe.

 

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Images (8)
  • NH Curved Front Forming 1
  • NH Corner Forming 2
  • NH Corner Fit Trial
  • NH Curved Frt Inyernals
  • NH 1st Floor Plate Fitting
  • NH 1st Floor Trial
  • NH Window Sill 1
  • NH MicroMark Stone Wall

I'm having second thoughts about the MM stone sheets so I went to the LHS, bought more Evergreen and ordered some Plastruct embossed stone wall sheeting. They had several different patterns. The one I chose has fairly even courses so it will look good when cut to the 3 scale feet height.  That and the rest of my errands today left me with  just about an hour in the shop. It was a very encouraging hour.

For starters, I took the suggestion of one of my faithful readers (Ken NJ) to to make a curved window out of 1/8" acrylic. I had some remnants laying around from building the Missouri's showcase. I found one undamaged chunk that was just the right size. I measured the window space minus the thickness of the two window sills and scribed a line with the digital calipers. I then used an acrylic scriber to engrave a deep groove in the piece to enable breaking on the line. I clamped the straight edge to the work piece since you have to scribe it over and over and over to make it deep enough to break correctly. I thought it was deep enough and tried to snap it and got a half of the piece separated leaving a jagged chunk still attached. I went back and deepened the remaining groove and it broke clean leaving just a little bump that I took off with the belt sander and then cleaned up the edge with the NWSL True Sander.

NH Window Scribing

The plan to bend the acrylic started with shaping the corner of a 2 X 4 to the required curve radius. I chopped off most of the stock with the chop saw and then sanded to the curve line with the belt sander. I clamped this fixture to the workbench and then clamped one half of the acrylic to this.

NH Curve Fixture

I used my Top Flite Monokoting heat gun to heat the bend zone and move the free end around the curve. After two tries I got it pretty good. There's a little spring back, but it's not excessive and it will glue in place well.

NH Curve Result

I tried it in the space before cutting it to the proper length. I used the ply window sill to mark the final length, marked it, squared off the line, cut it long in the scroll saw, sanded it closer with the belt sander and then final hand sanding with the True Sander. The fit is very good.

Here is the test fit before final length cutting.

NH Curved Window bent

Theres a little distortion at the bend, but I think it's acceptable. I'm sure bending thin styrene clear sheet around that bend would have its own problems to contend with.

The final thing I did today was run a test using the newly obtained copper foil and surface mount LEDs. These little packages put out a huge amount of light with a wide dispersion... perfect for interior lighting. I put the copper foil onto a piece of scrap acrylic. The contact points are on the bottom of the LED with a separation between anode and cathode of about 1mm. So I taped the two copper strips about that far apart. Tinned a tiny spot on each side, held the LED down with tweezers and then heated the foil next to the package and it settled down in moments and was done. I tested it with my 12VDC power source with a 470 ohm current limiter and boy! you can't believe the light output with no heat. I find LEDs still like magic...light with no heat almost seems against nature. And these things are cheap! ($0.29 each). They come in a little plastic sleeve all attached together with a piece of clear film across the top protecting and holding the LEDs in place.

SM LED Test

This has got to be the coolest way to illuminate buildings or hangar decks of aircraft carriers without big clunky lights hanging down. The copper foil can be painted over so it could be almost invisible. I new about the copper foil since it's been used for doll house lighting for years, but it lacked the tiny LED light sources. I wish I did this when I lit the distilleries and all the other building on the layout. Learn something new every day. Today I learned two new things. Again, the value of taking the time an posting all these massive details comes back in learning and skill improvement... and I'm 72!

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Images (5)
  • NH Window Scribing
  • NH Curve Fixture
  • NH Curve Result
  • NH Curved Window bent
  • SM LED Test
Last edited by Trainman2001

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