06-02-2014, 05:19 AM
Incidentally, here are the brick sheets I made mention of
Made by the UK company, Wills, they need no strengthening which, unfortunately, makes them difficult to cut.
The sheets are also rather small so plenty of joints to contend with (drain pipes and cables are our saviours here) and the bricks (even for 4mm scale),a little on the large side. In their favour (and why I've chosen them) they have plenty of 'deep' mortar courses which lend themselves to this sort of thing
Experiments with ordinary ready mixed tile grout to represent areas of 'high' mortar and random 'rendering' for wont of a better expression. They also show my attempts to represent the concrete lintels of the original. The shorter one is okay but too proud; the longer is more what I'm after and is only just proud of the brick. Created using masking tape and then gentle sanding before the tape is removed to reduce height and create a little 'texture'. It's also been attacked at the ends with a scalpel to remove some of the grout of the perpendiculars, to create the rougher shapes of the original. Parts have also been 'darkened' with a very thin wash of matt black enamel. This will also work with other colours for mortar and concrete. Most of the mortar will just be washed in, as usual, with a thin wash of a suitable mortar colour, with only a few 'raised' mortar areas as described, and the brick itself will be washes to represent the orange brick with chipped white wash and red masonry paint of the original. I'm hoping it will work and will practice on the Wills sheet, which has already been primed with an acrylic spray primer, shown in the above photo. I will post developments as they come.
Finally, I've decided to build another crossbuck!!!
As far as I can tell, in the Patch area, these appeared singularly however, I've reason to believe that elsewhere they appeared in pairs (or more), so will build a 'friend' for it.
Rather than repeat the first, I've noticed that there was a second type like this <!-- m --><a class="postlink" href="http://www.dpdproductions.com/photos_rrgallery_rathole/11c.jpg">http://www.dpdproductions.com/photos_rr ... le/11c.jpg</a><!-- m --> which had a round (metal) post rather than the square wooden of the first. Presumably, they were an updated version of the first and replaced them when damaged/vandalised etc.
I'm going to use this excuse for mine which I also wish to show as having sustained damage. So, rather than use the wooden arm as in the picture above, I'm going to replace it with metal arms as in this <!-- m --><a class="postlink" href="http://www.dpdproductions.com/photos_rrgallery_rathole/04d.jpg">http://www.dpdproductions.com/photos_rr ... le/04d.jpg</a><!-- m --> which will be easier to demonstrate.
How will I do this? Simple: use brass again for the arms and 'anneal' it in the flame of the gas cooker to make it more malleable.
I've already made a start:
If you look closely, you can see the 'soot' marks left on the brass arms by the flame. Problem is, they bend far too easily now. They will be soldered up and joined to the post again with solder. The post btw is the some of the copper tube left over from wire-in-tubing used t operate the points. It will be cut to size when everyting has been soldered up.
And that's it for now. I hope you find this of interest, but please tell me if I'm boring you; sometimes I don't know when to stop
jonte
The sheets are also rather small so plenty of joints to contend with (drain pipes and cables are our saviours here) and the bricks (even for 4mm scale),a little on the large side. In their favour (and why I've chosen them) they have plenty of 'deep' mortar courses which lend themselves to this sort of thing
Experiments with ordinary ready mixed tile grout to represent areas of 'high' mortar and random 'rendering' for wont of a better expression. They also show my attempts to represent the concrete lintels of the original. The shorter one is okay but too proud; the longer is more what I'm after and is only just proud of the brick. Created using masking tape and then gentle sanding before the tape is removed to reduce height and create a little 'texture'. It's also been attacked at the ends with a scalpel to remove some of the grout of the perpendiculars, to create the rougher shapes of the original. Parts have also been 'darkened' with a very thin wash of matt black enamel. This will also work with other colours for mortar and concrete. Most of the mortar will just be washed in, as usual, with a thin wash of a suitable mortar colour, with only a few 'raised' mortar areas as described, and the brick itself will be washes to represent the orange brick with chipped white wash and red masonry paint of the original. I'm hoping it will work and will practice on the Wills sheet, which has already been primed with an acrylic spray primer, shown in the above photo. I will post developments as they come.
Finally, I've decided to build another crossbuck!!!
As far as I can tell, in the Patch area, these appeared singularly however, I've reason to believe that elsewhere they appeared in pairs (or more), so will build a 'friend' for it.
Rather than repeat the first, I've noticed that there was a second type like this <!-- m --><a class="postlink" href="http://www.dpdproductions.com/photos_rrgallery_rathole/11c.jpg">http://www.dpdproductions.com/photos_rr ... le/11c.jpg</a><!-- m --> which had a round (metal) post rather than the square wooden of the first. Presumably, they were an updated version of the first and replaced them when damaged/vandalised etc.
I'm going to use this excuse for mine which I also wish to show as having sustained damage. So, rather than use the wooden arm as in the picture above, I'm going to replace it with metal arms as in this <!-- m --><a class="postlink" href="http://www.dpdproductions.com/photos_rrgallery_rathole/04d.jpg">http://www.dpdproductions.com/photos_rr ... le/04d.jpg</a><!-- m --> which will be easier to demonstrate.
How will I do this? Simple: use brass again for the arms and 'anneal' it in the flame of the gas cooker to make it more malleable.
I've already made a start:
If you look closely, you can see the 'soot' marks left on the brass arms by the flame. Problem is, they bend far too easily now. They will be soldered up and joined to the post again with solder. The post btw is the some of the copper tube left over from wire-in-tubing used t operate the points. It will be cut to size when everyting has been soldered up.
And that's it for now. I hope you find this of interest, but please tell me if I'm boring you; sometimes I don't know when to stop
jonte