The Yard Office: Update: 6/17/24: Major Progress

[Peterpools]

THE YARD OFFICE

FOS SCALE MODELS

HO SCALE

With the Fletcher turning into another mojo killer and my mojo floundering more and more, I was at my whist’s end and almost out of any hope of rekindling it. My brother a few years back started to build a model railroad and asked for my help in building some structures for his pike. Before coming back to scale modeling, I also was also a long time model railroader and loved building craftsman structure kits.

I purchased a few kits and all just sat in the stash for a good long while. While feeling sorry for myself, my brother got me off my rump and to start cracking on a structure kit for him and so I did.

I first needed remember how to actually build multi media structure kit in HO scale and decided the best way was to just get going and work things out as I went – and so I did.

The Yard Office is a small kit and after hours of work and weathering the basic wood wall portion of the structure is done, in CSX colors for my brother pike.

Next up is working on the hydrocal plaster walls and then when completed, joining the two major assemblies together and then getting to work on the roof. 

So far, my mojo is back and I’m looking forward to bench time and not an ounce of frustration. Since most of the forum members aren’t into structures, I’ll just post a few cell phone images of my progress. BTW, the loading dock is only being test fitted to make sure it actually fits up against the office walls correctly – posts and framework are up next on my build schedule.

THE KIT SHOWN ON THE FOS SCALE MODEL WEBSITE

Now my progress to date:

The basswood walls built, castings added, weathered and assembled:

Cleaning up the four hydrocal walls. A few nasty air bubble being dealt with and then is time to get down to construction, painting, castings, details and weathering. .

 

 

[ScottsGT]

That’s awesome!  I wasthisclose to jumping into O scale model railroading at my last home. New place just doesn’t have nearly the room.  Now the wife did suggest an outdoor train, hanging from the bottom of our screen porch where our hot tub and patio is at.  But that’s no fun. Can’t build buildings, etc with a hanging track. 
 

This post reminds me I need to go buy a sheet of plywood and cut it down to put our Lionel Christmas train set on it.  I finally figured out a perfect place to display it last year.  I can build it out with a few buildings and Christmas scenes.  Just store the 4X6 ply with the track attached in my storage building off season. 

[Landlubber Mike]

That looks fantastic Peter!  I tend to bounce around a lot on my various builds as mojo wanes, so I completely understand.  Glad you found something to pique your interest back up!

[Spitfire]

Now that is looking really tasty, I am always fascinated by Dioramas containing buildings or other such structures and really admire the work that goes into building them.

When we see model railways on our travels it is always the countryside, buildings or other accessories that fascinate me, probably more than the trains themselves.

Cheers

Dennis

[Peterpools]

Scott

A model railroader at heart for sure. Love O scale myself and my last layout was On30 - O scale narrow gauge - long time ago.

The outdoor handing railroad sounds pretty cool and you never know what or where it will lead - same with the Christmas layout.

🚂

 

[Peterpools]

Thanks, Mike, sure looks like we're cut from the same mold. After months of knocking myself out, trying to find and alternate build and a way of getting the mojo working again, it was in my stash and 'past' all the time. So far, a ball of fun and can't stay away from the bench - just finishing this amount of work in such a short period amazes me.

After the structure is competed, there will be more light weathering, looking for the used but not abused look railroads worked to keep their equipment, rolling stock and buildings in good shape.

🚂

 

 

[Peterpools]

Thanks Dennis, and very much appreciated. I've always had a soft spot for trains and model railroad and now I hope to combine it with my modeling.

Since the structure is destined to be located on my brother's layout, I won't do a base or weathering now but rather on the railroad itself, once the structure is in place and its new home.

 

[DocRob]

I always felt, that military modelers are best suited to weather trains and buildings on railroad dios, Peter. Many of the model railroads look factory fresh and lack reality to my eye. Your work with the shack looks very lived in and will be a great add on to a railroad dio.
Nice to see something different here.

Cheers Rob
 

[Peterpools]

Thanks so much Rob. Feels good to add something new to the forum and learn new tricks along the way. I've always been a weathering guy when it came to model railroading and just the opposite with aircraft modeling. Maybe my structure modeling will work its way over to future aircraft builds and I'll start to add some weathering to them now.

I normally never take nor use cell phone photographs for my updates but just wanted to do this update asap. The images are a bit on the light side and the walls are actually a bit more weathered then then appear in the photos.

Next update, I'll be back to shooting with my Nikon, focus stacking for sharpness and getting the images to better reflect the actual work. 

🚂

 

[CANicoll]

Peter,  Excellent that you found another outlet for your awesome creative skills.  The work so far looks amazing.  I don't know how you work back and forth between plastic, wood and whatever Hydrocal is.  I can see how the skills will translate, but for now, looking forward not just seeing your progress, but also you amazingly detailed write-ups about your process.

[JohnB]

That looks good Peter. Hope you get your modeling mojo back in high gear! 😃

[Peterpools]

Thanks Chris

I've was a model railroad for decades and actually built a few model railroads back in the day. The hobby encompasses so many disciplines and you learn so many skills from woodworking, electronics, wiring, building the actual railroad, motive power, rolling stock scenery, to of course mt favorite part: structure building. When my interests changed and I moved onto scale modeling, most of the skills I had learned over the years seemed to transfer well. Now, I'm back to doing what I enjoyed most in model railroading: structures and diorama, which mesh so well with my modeling. Best of all, my mojo is back and I'm enjoying bench time again.

Hydrocal is a plaster that is used in model railroad for scenery and craftsman structure kits. Resin is replacing the hydrocal in a good portion of those type of kits today for numerous reasons is used for brick and masonry walls. Downside of hydrocal: messy and very fragile. 

I'm doing cartwheels that the guys are interested in my structure builds and I'll go a bit more into techniques as I proceed with the Yard Offcie. .

BTW, I have my eye open and I'm waiting for the new Arma 1/48 P-39 - going to be my next aircraft build for sure.

 

 

 

[Peterpools]

Thanks John

It's up and running and in what us seniors surely would call; Hight Gear.

 

[Peterpools]

BRICK WALLS AND THE GRANITE FOUNDATION

UNDERWAY

It’s been an incredibly long time since I tackled a set of hydrocal walls (basically a soft plaster) and to reach this point in the build, a boatload of time, including oodles of hand brush painting. The four walls are built up and basically finished on the flat, with the windows, doors and signage added as well as the first stages of weathering. Additional signage has been ordered (I need to buy a small office color printer as my photographic printer just isn’t suited for this) as well as additional detail castings from various vendors, to help add more ‘life’ to the structure – just not enough supplied with the kit.

First up was to sand and true up the inside faces of all four walls, as well as the two sidewall casting ends. There were a good number of air bubbles in the castings (large and small), which I filled with thinned-out DAP Spackle and when dry, re-scribed the brick and motor lines. The bricks on the walls are supposed to be aged and somewhat in a random pattern, well worn and stained from all the engine exhausts and oil fumes in the yard and I wanted to keep that look.

Then I primed the walls with Mr. Surfacer 1200 heavily diluted and when dry, went to town dabbing on the three initial acrylic colors for the base layer, replicating the random weathered and worn look of old brick. Acrylic craft paints were used:

Napa Red, Toasted Terre Cotta and Dark Brown. Then I followed up, brush painting what seemed like hundreds of individual bricks with Tamiya: Red Brown and craft paints: Napa Red, Terra Cotta. and Bark Brown.

The all the basic wood work and concrete were initially painted Tamiya FX55 Deck Tan, as the base color for additional weathering. Twill was the old go to color but isn’t available any more. 

The Granite Foundation was painted with Tamiya light gray and followed up with a wash of Model Air Nato Black. The mortar was a wash of Tamiya Nato Black.

At this point all the mortar was added with heavily diluted Tamiya XF 55.

Dry brushing is still to come.

The windows are a killer for sure: two laser cut mullions per window, needing to be primed, painted and weathered and then clear acetate needed to be cut for each sash and glued in place. Of course, being hydrocal the window openings weren’t very square and gluing the windows assemblies into place was easily a high cuss factor.

At this point, the four basic walls are ready to be joined and added to the wooden portion of the Yard Office. From here comes a lot more weathering, waiting for the additional castings to arrive, the roof and load platform are ready to be built up and added.

I’ve been finding myself sleeping little and at the bench way more then normal, including into the wee hours of the morning and the lack of sleep is creeping in. Oh, has the mojo returned.

 

[Spitfire]

They look fantastic, I am most impressed.

Cheers

Dennis

[Peterpools]

Thanks, Dennis, so very much appreciated.

So far rediscovering structure kits is proving to be the mojo builder I needed and will be a nice alternative build to aircraft modeling, keeping things fresh and wanting to be at the bench as much as possible.

 

 

[HubertB]

Looking good Peter, although, if it is a yard office at the age of steam, one could argue for even more soot.
I have in mind the images of the soot the fuel-burning US Navy supercarriers were depositing on everything, including the Tomcats and Intruders on deck. coal-burning locos would do the same in a yard, IMHO.

Hubert 

[Peterpools]

Hi Hubert, very much appreciated. 

The Yard Office is destined for its home on my brother layout which is set in the late 1980 - 1990, (CSX) and his layout is all diesel. The structure's weathering will continue as I proceed with the build, as I tend to weather structures in stages, and this is only the first stage. I try not to go too overboard, and don't want to overdo it as a lot of model railroaders tend to in my humble opinion. While railyards, no matter what the time period, are sooty and dirty places, railroads tried to maintain their equipment and facilities as best as they could within limits. 

Of course, since the structure is going on my brother's railroad, I always leave it up to him as how much weathering to do. 

 

[CANicoll]

Peter, that looks absolutely amazing!!! the detail work on the bricks is just perfect - looks JUST like the real thing!  I keep going back and looking at those photos.  Wow, super impressive - you are a man of MANY talents!

[Peterpools]

Thanks Chris, your comments are so greatly appreciated.

I do enjoy building these types of kits as they allow for a different type of creativity, with for me the emphasis being on how I feel the structure would have appeared after time in its natural environment. Different as compared to our reasoning of how we add weathering to a model. Just my thoughts but for me, a huge mojo builder and the fun is back. 

[DocRob]

Fantastic Peter, first, that you found your mojo back and second, enrichen our forum with something new. The walls and windows look fantastic and I take mental notes, as I have some plaster cast dio buildings in my stash. I will follow close and hope for many happy hours to follow for you during the build.

Cheers Rob

[belugawhaleman]

Nice Work Peter! The only model railroad stuff I have is a couple

of live steam locos. One is a live steam loco made in the early

1950's by Cranko of New Zealand. It runs on lionel track and

Uses a four wick alcohol burner. The other is a freelance gas-fired

Loco I built myself.....runs on 45mm LGB track. Always interested

in seeing RR stuff. Thanks for posting!

[Peterpools]

Thanks Rob, so very much appreciated. Yup, the mojo is back and in full swing - thank goodness for that. So glad you're onboard for the rail journey and enjoying the build. Back in the day, I predominately built HO and O scale craftsmen structure kits from basswood and hydrocal, as both have always been my favorite mediums to work in. Hydrocal brick and masonry walls are more work as they need a lot of clean up and getting them to have the proper look takes time and an artistic eye, which you surely have. 

Looking forward to you tackling and working your magic on a few plaster structures down the road.

 

[Peterpools]

Paul

Much appreciated and your model RR live steam sounds awesome. Would love to see some photos of your equipment.

 

[belugawhaleman]

1 hour ago, Peterpools said:

Paul

Much appreciated and your model RR live steam sounds awesome. Would love to see some photos of your equipment.

 

Thanks, not a model RR just a couple of locos and some track. I

Here's a Video of mine of the Cranko o gauge live steam loco

Running on some Lionel track. The coaches were made by

Hafner. They are there just to slow the Loco down. The Loco

Is powered by two single-acting oscillating cylinders. The 6

drivers are quartered and are driven using side rods. The cylinders can be reversed using a rotary valve between the cylinders.