Time to relax?

Whilst the wiring the that I described in some previous posts is finished on the baseboard the original ballasting that I did some time ago was never finished (not unusual for me) and to be blunt, some parts were not as I would want them to be. That was partly down to the fact that the baseboard was in place on the layout and I could not reach very well. With the baseboard away from the layout I had the perfect opportunity to put right what is wrong and finish the project. Now ballasting is not the most exciting job to do but it can be relaxing so I have had a few hours of soothing work to relax me! And you do see some progress although I will need to wait for the dilute PVA glue that I spread over the top to dry before doing anything else! That should give me some more time to relax or do some jobs on Mrs. Woody's list!

That swear jar is becoming rather heavy!

It is back to wiring on the fourth baseboard of My Last Great Project model railway layout and I am pleased to say that it is done! Well just about. I just need to attach the chocolate box connector to the baseboard and harness the wiring runs together but that is it! The point motors are all installed and working despite me wiring two on the crossovers in the track back to front but that was easily solved after trying to work out for two hours what was wrong! That swear jar is becoming rather heavy! It is amazing how sometimes the most obvious can be so difficult to spot as I often inform Mrs. Woody as she enquires about progress with her 'For me to do list'! 

These two chocolate box connectors will eventually take the wiring to the yet to be built control panel. The great thing about these are they are robust and easy to join and take apart.

Maybe the swear jar contains enough for a custom built control panel?

Another butterfly moment!

Just as I predicted yesterday, I had another butterfly moment and although there is still wiring to finish on the baseboard I decided to make a start on the profile boards! some 3mm ply was used and it was a job and a half to mark everything out so that it matches up to the other already in place boards as well as the scenery modules already constructed. However, the initial job is done.

I just need to paint them grey now! When that will happen is open to debate given my current butterfly mood but at least it is all progress!

It is a bit like keyhole surgery!

Wiring continues on My Last Great Project layout with the point motors having been fitted which is never an easy job. Basically you have to feed the actuation pin from under the baseboard and try to get it through the small hole in the tiebar of the point. It is a bit like keyhole surgery! You then have to ensure that the motor will actually work the point and then mark and drill holes through the mounting plate of the motor into the baseboard and screw it in position. A third or indeed a fourth hand would be useful! However, success eventually came about with all eight now in place.

Further back ache and contributions to the WMD swear jar have seen six of the eight motors actually wired up.

There is still a lot to do once the wiring is finished including things on the surface of the baseboard including profile boards and tidying up the ballast as well as thinking about the scenery. In my butterfly mood at the moment of fliting randomly from one job to another who knows what tomorrow may bring!

A butterfly moment!

In one of my butterfly moments of fliting from one thing to another, I have put aside the oil depot kit for a while to allow me to get on with the wiring of the final board of four on My Last Great Project layout. There is some logic behind this in that I would rather get this job done whilst the warmer weather is with us. Nothing worse then dealing with wires in a cold room! 

The big clear off from the board of rolling stock and yet to be attached scenery saw the board on its side.

A few cobwebs and dust were apparent, must get a new cleaner! However, having already wired up three boards, this last one didn't show anything that I had not already dealt with previously.

A few hours saw the wires connected to the wiring modules which just need to be screwed in place and connected up to the chocolate box connector. 

Next up is fitting the point motors and wiring them up and then the profile boards for the scenery need to be cut, painted and fitted to the back edges of the board. It may be a long while before I get back to that oil depot kit!

Plastic Part Panics!

Building this Ratio Oil Depot kit has been very laid back and relaxing for some reason which makes a nice change from my usual plastic part panics where some calamity strikes meaning hours of searching for a lost elusive but critical part or trying to unglue a wrongly located part getting finger prints everywhere from wet glue, etc, etc! Hopefully this trend will continue to replicate itself in future builds. Somehow I doubt it though! Anyway, back to the oil depot and a relaxing time adding some etched dial faces to the various pipes and painting said pipes sees the project move on. Not too much more to do now!

On a different note, I have mentioned the classic K6 phone box on this blog before. They are very iconic and since they have been removed from the streets many alternate uses have been found for them including as garden tool sheds, green houses, showers, community book swap centres, and many other things including as a drinks bar. Prices of these phone boxes is high and you need about £2500 for a good one which means you seriously want to own one if you pay that. However, whilst out with Mrs. Woody, who was listing up products for future jobs for me to do, I saw this.

Obviously not a real K6 phone box but never the less neatly done as a bar for inside use. Probably a lot easier to get in a room then the real thing and not being cast metal, won't fall through your floor either! Price wise? Well less than a real box but you still really want to have a phone box bar if you are willing to pay.....

Just hope Mrs. W hasn't got any ideas from that!¬

It now looks like this....

I have hawe moved onto the various pipes for the oil depot. Not much to see really but valve handles added and awaiting painting.

You may have noticed the two etched handles in the above photo which were tiny when compared to this etch for the catwalk along the top of the tanks.

Cut out from the fret and put into my bending tool....

It eventually looked like this....

And after some airbrushing, like this.

Things are moving on even if slowly and it is interesting to look back on photos to see how things have changed. And that is the same with the local canal which I visited whilst out on a bike ride. A few weeks ago it looked like this....

but despite the lack of rain during August it now looks like this....

Just wish I could make rapid progress like that on my jobs! No doubt so does Mrs. Woody!

Anyway, a local swan seems to like what has happened.

Another relaxing hour!

Another relaxing hour (hope Mrs. Woody does not read that!) with some Panzer Light Rust colour paint saw the brickwork on the recently constructed bund painted and the coping stones got a stoneish colour on them too. As with most of my brick painting, I then mixed up some darker and lighter colours to randomly highlight individual bricks. More relaxation!

With that done I then used a wash of dilute grey paint to settle into the mortar joints on the bund and the office building. This also subdued the overall brick colour making it look waethered.

I think that looks OK, but then again I would!

Bund!

In todays World, every potential large container of a hazardous product needs a bund around it in case of leaks. The idea is that the product is kept contained within a sealed area so that it doesn't leak into the ground and can then be dealt with to make it safe. Oil depots are no different. However the Ratio kit dose not have such a thing so I have to construct my own. If I was constructing a real bund it would probably be referred to as a cauldron! 

Anyway, as it is a 4mm scale bund, my constructional capabilities are not at risk of leaks. A visit to the ever well stocked WMD Stores soon had suitable plastic card and embossed sheet on my workbench. This was cut to the size to go around the supplied kit base.

Coping stones were added and then it was time to prime the bund.

Rattle can grey primer was soon drying out ready for some top coat.

It all gets clear!

Moving on with the oil depot kit, the window and door have now been fitted to the office and look in keeping with the structure.

Obviously the fitting of these would make the building cosy only if the window had some glass. The kit says use the clear packaging that it came in to glaze the window but I find that method can look a bit odd so I opted for my now normal approach of  Glue and Glaze. It didn't take long to apply and although at this early stage it looks a white mess things do improve!

To this when it all gets clear......

And I think that looks really realistic - but then I would!

A relaxing hour or so, just don't tell Mrs. Woody!

Spending a relaxing hour or so, just don't tell Mrs. Woody, I mixed random darker brick colours and picked out individual bricks on the oil depot office. It does give a more realistic appearance to the walls. I also did the same to the ridge tiles on the roof.

A relaxing half hour, just don't tell Mrs. W, saw individual slates on the roof picked out in slightly darker shades again making it look a little more like real life.

The oil tanks themselves have been airbrushed in a matt black so I just need to paint the concrete block bases. The windows and doors to the office have also been painted up ready for attachment to the office. All in all very relaxing!

Adding some colour!

Having got the office of the oil depot primed in grey from its original red plastic colour, it was time to paint it red! Only this time the red was a brick shade using the rust colour from the Panzer paint range.

Also achieved has been the attachment of the supporting bases to the two oil tanks. Hopefully they all look level when the kit is finished!

Next job is to randomly paint individual bricks a slightly darker colour on the office so that it does look like real bricks rather than a painted wall.

Put a roof on it!

The hut to the oil depot now has its roof built. Still not glued on for painting reasons but at least the 4mm workers will have a dry place to shelter in bad weather! The two tanks now have their end caps attached and are all smoothed down to get rid of the joint lines. I need to think about getting some paint on the hut  and getting the tanks built up with the rest of their parts next.

Etched parts in a model building kit?

Very surprisingly, the kit for the oil depot didn't stay long on the shelves of the WMD Stores! It is now on the work bench so a quick look at what is in the box. It all looks well moulded with parts for the two tanks, bases and he accompanying hut.

What I did not expect was this....

Etched brass parts in a model building kit! However, their inclusion is actually welcomed and the parts are fairly large so should be fairly easy to get a hold of and bend to shape - I hope!

Initial building has seen the hut walls and tank halves glued together.

There is a depressed seam line in the tank halves that cant be sanded out without deforming the round shape of the tanks so a bit of acrylic putty has been applied. It will need a day to go off before I can sand it and then will still need a little more!

Ratio oil depot kit.

Back to my Last Great Project Layout and with the fueling point just about finished I need to have a source of fuel for it to dispense. I could have gone for the easy option and just worked on the assumption that where ever the fuel was stored was off the layout. But I did see this kit.

This looks ideal and as you will no doubt have deduced is now part of the WMD Sores inventory awaiting construction! When and how long that construction will be is one of those unknowns!

Almost silent Sunday!

I will keep this post short and just term it as an almost silent Sunday and let the picture do the talking of the progress made!

I bet Mrs. Woody would like me to do more silent Sundays!

Sometimes plans just don't work out!

 Sometimes plans just don't work out. You can see in the photo below that the base of the fuelling point is just too wide to fit between the sleepers. I could just leave it and have a lopsided structure but no, I had a plan!

All I needed to do was raise the base above the sleepers. That was the plan! So out came some balsa the same thickness as the sleepers and I made a base for the base! The only problem was that trying to get a loco onto the fueling point, the loco now collided with the base. So it was onto plan B. That involved lifting the glued track and swinging it a couple of mm out.

 

With that done, the base now fitted between the sleepers and locos no longer collided with it.

So now it is place all I need to do is ballast the track. That is a job for another day.

Fade to Grey!

The diesel fueling point is coming on but I went back a step and took the canopy off (I had not glued it so that was easy) and dusted off the base with a thin coat of light grey paint to fade the concrete coloured paint and weathering - just like that hit from Visage, Fade to Grey! I then redid the drainage covers with some dry brushing of brown to highlight the rusty metal and a  wash of black to pick out the recesses.

Yep! That's fade to grey!

What colour is concrete?

After a few days of other things it is time to get back to the diesel refueling point for my 00 gauge Last Great Project layout. I usually prime parts off the sprue or when they are built up but I decided just to blast everything with rattle can grey primer. This was fine for the base and on the other parts it at least highlighted the various moulding lines that I would need to deal with.

Whilst the grey primer is a nice shade of grey, the base is supposed to be concrete so that got airbrushed with a coat of concrete colour paint. 

I am never sure what colour concrete is supposed to be! Looking around I see everything from a beige to a grey and many shades between. I am guessing some of the variation is down to the mix and origin of the materials used and some of it down to the age of the concrete itself. What is sure though, is that regardless of age, materials or mix, this base is far too clean for a refueling point so it will be weathered and then it may get misted with some grey paint just to tone the finish down.