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  • But, don't you think you should have checked with the town planning board or zoning commission BEFORE spending the money for permits???? LOL!!!!!

    I agree with Gun Grape on this - the building overpowers the adjacent structures. However, I'm sure the owners of the café are just fine as it would lower their A/C bills in the summertime!!!

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    • Dealing with City Planners

      Well guys... I spent time on SketchUp this morning and did some surgery to selectively compress (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.

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      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%. It only has one chimney since two looked like over kill.

      I'm going to mock this up too and see where it fits.
      Last edited by Builder 2010; 21 Feb 18,, 03:08.

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      • Yea, that looks more fitting for the space intended. Good revision!!

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        • Looks great!

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          • Updated Mockup Trial

            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!

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            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.

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            • Nighthawks Cafe: Some Turret Work

              I've been redesigning Nighthawks so I can produce it all in house without any laser cutting. One of the biggest, if not the biggest challenge I foresaw with this building is the conical-curved upper and lower turret roofs. I was actually thinking about having them 3D printed by Shapeways and could have had it done for $44 out of hi-res acrylic. I sent in the drawings and got the quote, but decided to see if I could make them in my shop before spending more money.

              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 cutoff 2X3s 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 live center 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.

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              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.

              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.

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

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              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.

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

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              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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              • Nighthawks Cafe: Work Begins in Earnest

                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.

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                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.

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                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.

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                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.

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                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.

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                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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                • Nighthawks Cafe: Putting up the Walls

                  Copper foil arrived! Still waiting on the LEDs and the 39 ohm resistors. So...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...

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                  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.

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                  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.

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                  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.

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                  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. I was able to isolate that hallway side and make a pattern of the intersection between it and the curved Mansard roof. It's a tricky fit since it's coming at the curve at an angle. SketchUp lets you do things like this.

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                  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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                  • Nighthawks Cafe: Creating the Curved Window Sill (Part A)

                    I have 8 pics so it's a 2-parter...

                    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.

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

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                    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.

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                    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.

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                    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").

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                    • Nighthawks Cafe: Creating the Curved Window Sill (Part B)

                      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.

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                      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.

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                      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.

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                      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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                      • Originally posted by Builder 2010 View Post
                        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?
                        Late to the game reading these posts. Yea rubber stamp works.

                        If you want to buy found these.
                        https://www.hobbylinc.com/cgi-bin/s8...PZ&tag5_i=1020
                        https://www.micromark.com/Flexible-S...8aAvQzEALw_wcB

                        Make your own
                        https://www.pinterest.com/pin/373728...50869/?lp=true
                        https://marionswiss.blogspot.com/201...ral-stone.html

                        Try using Sculpey clay, available in Michael's or Hobby Lobby or other craft store. Roll it flat with a rolling pin to your thickness, say 1/8". Use a something on the outside of the rolling pin that is the thickness you want the wall. Make the rock area oversize to cover any shrinkage when it is heated. Grab a tool and start making the outline of the rocks. You'll have to play and practice to find the right tool and get the right technique down. Before putting it in the oven cut the wall square and measure the length and width. Heat it in the oven and see what happens. If it does not come out flat, start over and sandwich it between something then heat it again. Measure the LxW and see if it shrank. If it does shrink, you can leave it oversize going into the oven and trim it after it is hard. Paint and glue to the building. I never did anything like this, but this is what came to mind instead of buying it outright. And you added another technique to your masterful toolbox for another project.

                        Or

                        Take 1/8" Masonite with a small round head grinding bit on the Dremel and outline the rocks.

                        I have a technique for a curved window unless you already know what you're doing there.
                        Last edited by Ken_NJ; 23 Mar 18,, 14:53.

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                        • All great ideas and thanks for going the extra mile to get the URLs. What are your thoughts about the curved window? While I'm relatively there re: figuring how to do it, I'm open to suggestions since I haven't started and it's not too late to change direction. Re: the thin section Sculpey, I'm thinking about putting window screen as a mesh to help the clay stay flat, stabilize and strengthen it. It's vey brittle in small sections.

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                          • For the window get yourself the thinnest acrylic sheet, probably 1/8 inch. Take a 2x4 or other suitable size piece of wood, and add the curve of the window on the corner so it mimics the inside portion of the window. Have both ends of the 2x4 longer than the finished product will be. Clamp the acrylic long side to the block and the workbench with the shorter end extending out far enough to cover the curve and the short side piece. Heat the acrylic where the corner will be with a heat gun. Use a block of wood to force the hot acrylic around the curve. The acrylic may turn foggy but it will clear up when it cools. It also may have a tendency to curl near the edges of the curve. Trim all four sides to size. Maybe its over engineering. For me its pretty simple.

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                            • NH: A Fruitful Hour

                              I have some of that lying around. And I have a heat gun so I'll give it a try. (Written earlier today)

                              After the hobby shop stop where I bought more Evergreen and ordering some Plastruct embossed stone wall sheeting, I had just about an hour in the shop. It was a very encouraging. First of all I took the suggestion of one of my faithful readers (Ken NJ) I tried 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 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.

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                              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.

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                              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.

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                              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.

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                              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.

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                              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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                              • Excellent! Glad it all worked! I had not doubt!

                                You should be able to work that spring out with a bit of work and ingenuity.
                                Last edited by Ken_NJ; 24 Mar 18,, 14:01.

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