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Comments
Thank you for the compliments and for following along. Glad to hear that I'm explaining this in a way that is helpful. I try to write entries that are sort of like my own little recipe book so down the road I can remind myself how/what I did.
James, I'm not sure about the tape yellowing on the microscope covers. Brian mentioned that earlier as well. I'm going to run it by Ken Hamilton at the next Expo and see if he's had any problem. I agree that even if it did yellow, it may add to the effect. Plus, there's some chalk already dirtying up the glass making it less than crystal clear.
Jim
Good hearing from you guys and thanks for the comments.
Ken and Bryan mentioned the cardboard boxes, so I put together a quick step by step. They're pretty easy to make but require a little bit of precision so that that don't turn out like this:
Here's a pattern that works for me. The dimensions aren't set in stone but it'll give you a nice sized box in HO. (This one is slightly different than the pattern that I use in the S-B-S below, so don't be alarmed.)
I print the pattern out on some brown craft paper (or if you've got, you could probably use a brown paper grocery bag. Cut it out using a straight edge and a new #11 blade. The black lines are where you cut; the gray lines are where the folds will go. Make sure to cut tight square corners.
The key to getting nice boxes comes down to how you fold the edges. I fold the horizontal seams first using 2 straight edge razors. One blade will go right on the fold line; the other is used to slide underneath the paper to bring it up so the fold can be formed.
I crease the fold using the back edge of the blade so that I get crisp perfect corners.
Now, fold all the horizontal edges in the same way.
If any corners didn't get cut completely through, resist the urge to simply fold and tear the corner. Use an X-acto! Next, add a small amount of glue to vertical tab (left hand side in the picture above) and form the paper into a cube.
Then, fold in the bottom flaps and glue them. I use a scrap piece of square stripwood to get the corners and bottom as close to 90 degrees as possible.
That's all there is to it!
Here's a page of some box patterns I made that you can print out:
https://drive.google.com/file/d/0B1OCPZGuoVw9OWM4azdxOTUteGM/view?usp=sharing
Thank you for showing us what you are doing. Unbelievable . . . no wonder you are the best of the best! Are you going to be moving steadily forward for awhile and hopefully showing us what you are doing?
Respectfully,
John
Thanks for checking in and the kind words. The plan is to keep plotting along now that summer is over. I'll gladly share a few more ideas and tips along the way. I still have some interior detail work to do, then we'll get the garage mounted on its floor and hopefully get a roof on before the snow flies! After that, it'll be time to get a final arrangement laid out, build a ton of scrap cars and yard clutter, and add the scenery. I'd say another 3 or 4 months worth of work (that's 'bench time' rather than actual calendar time.).
I saw you've been back to modeling too! I'll get over and take a look at your shipyard soon.
Bill
Thanks for the details on making the cardboard boxes. I think that they add a lot. Your work is marvelous.
Steve
Dave
DJ
Thanks for the feedback. I'm glad you're finding this helpful!
On to the next detail: tires. I'm pretty excited to share this one because it really was an "ah ha" moment for me. I knew I was going to need a LOT of tires for several areas on this diorama. One feature I wanted to model was a tire display rack. I found several pictures for inspiration:
I'd tried making some out of black tubing, fuel line, and some other rubber hose material but none of it was good enough for a foreground detail. Then earlier this summer I spotted the solution... rubber O rings. I got a bunch from the hardware store and found these types to be pretty plausible for HO--
The only issues-- they're too shiny, have no tread and are almost perfectly round inside and out. On the model, they looked more like inner tubes than tires:
The first step was to round down the outside edge so that it had the typical flat surface of a rubber tire. I got the best result by slipping about 5 or 10 of them onto a wooden dowel (one where they'd be snug but not so tight as to stretch them out). Then I roughed them up on my belt sander. I held the dowel with sort of a loose grip as I touch the O rings to the belt sander. That caused the dowel to spin in between by finger tips while scuffing up the outer edge of the O rings:
With the O rings still on the dowel, I drybrushed across the tread using craft paint in different shades of gray and tan.
This set looks way too white, so I simply spun the stack of O rings between my fingers and rubbed off some paint to tone it down. On some, I rolled the stack over the single cut pattern of a file to scribe in tire tread lines.
I made a 3 tier display rack using scraps of stripwood. Each shelf was made out of 4x4 while using a piece of 1/4' square stock as a spacing jig.
The sides of the rack are 2x6 legs with horizontal pieces pieces of 4x4 to support the shelves.
I used angle blocks and low-tack painters tape during assembly to make sure everything remained square. Here's how it came together:
The racks got a dusting of raw umber 408.5 and a little A/I. I added the tires randomly mixing up the different sizes. Here's the end result:
(I should mention that the tires on the floor to the left aren't O-rings. Those are metal castings).
Next up...a little more interior clutter.
Bill
Thanks Ken! I've been hanging onto that first picture of the old tire rack ever since deciding to build Quincy's. Still debating over adding those horizontal pieces of trim on the front edges of the shelves. They would add a little pop if I painted them a faded/peeling white, but I kind of like the flimsy look that I got as it stands now.
Dave
DJ
John
Another little detail I've seen in service garages is a selection of drive belts. I suppose most common would be fan belts but there are probably many other automotive belts (I know almost nothing about fixing cars!).
I looked around for a material that scaled down to something plausible: rubber bands from my kids' orthodontist, plastic hair ties, elastic thread and some others. But what worked pretty well was shrink tubing for electrical connections:
I used several different sizes (1/8" up to 1/4"). I was able to shrink them down and get them to conform into a "figure 8" shape much like a fan belt. Any heat source will work (open flame, soldering iron, heat gun) but I used boiling water so that the piece would shrink uniformly. I shoved two pieces of wire into a length of tubing to form the loops (in this example, .035 piano wire). Then, I pinched the middle with some stripwood or tweezers will dunking the shrink tubing into boiling water. Hopefully, you can see in the second picture where I pinched the middle with a tweezers (left side). After pulling it out of the water it will retain the shape:
Then it was just a matter of slicing off tiny "belts" from the piece of tubing. A chopper works, but freehand with a straight edge blade was actually easier.
Depending on the size of the original shrink tubing and the thickness of the wire, I got a nice variety of belts for the garage.
I hung a bunch on the wall using a couple pieces of scrap stripwood and thin brass wire for hooks:
The belts are a tad on the thick side for HO and in looking at the picture again, the single one on the bottom right is too long. But at viewing distance, they don't seem to stand out or look out of scale.
The cans are tiny pop rivets with labels I printed off using this picture:
I thinned the paper out by sanding it down, then used diluted white glue to fasten to the rivets. I should also point out the soda crates under the bench. I scratch built a bunch but also made some by cutting rectangular blocks out of stripwood and slapped some labels to the outside. I found a website that has a tutorial on how to make them and also templates to print out the crate labels in several different scales:
http://blog.modeljunkyard.com/2014/01/18/vintage-soda-crate-templates-download-scales-1-5-6-8-10-12-16-18-25-32-43-64-87/
Dave
I also am a fan of you oil cans really nice.
DJ
Can't wait to see the whole thing come together. What you've done so far is outstanding. Not sure which I like better your upbeat attitude and creative genius or the incredible results.
Joel