P5se Camelback's 2010 Summer Structure Challenge GERN Plant

[P5se Camelback]

But wait ... there's more ...

The Machine Shop where new parts are fabricated, as necessary, to maintain all of the machinery in proper working order. The Flux production levels must be maintained at pre-ordained levels to produce the quantities of the different grades of Flux required by area businesses.

We start with the four walls and the initial fitting of the view block (prior to being painted flat black.)


The architecture of the building screams machine shop but the roof cries "not a chance, Klutzer, not a chance! Look at you!"

So a new roof is the next order of the day. Measure, score, snap, scrape the edge then file smooth ... do that twice and then set up a couple pieces of strip to begin to get the desired angle working, then we're soaking the joint with Plastruct Plastic Weld and pressing the two sides together, followed by leaving alone for an hour or so to "set up" or harden.


Once the joint has hardened sufficiently, the roof is turned over, supported on a couple pieces of strip styrene selected to give the desired roof pitch. The ridge joint is then soaked again, this time on the top side and a piece of 0.030" x 0.030" styrene strip is pressed into the ridge with an old palette knife ... it gets almost like paste after it's soaked with the solvent but when cured and hardened, the joint is very strong. At that point, a couple of judicious swipes with my scraper and the joint "goes away." (I made the scraper by grinding off the file teeth on a jewelers edge file and honing that little sucker first on a shapening stone with some light oil and then on a straight razor hone, followed by a couple passes on a leather strop ... I'll put it up against any store-bought scraper! It's been in some of my photos ... I ground a hollow edged chisel on the end of it.)


This roof will in all likelyhood be either tar paper with tarred seams or corrugated metal ... unless someone has a really bright idea that will look right at home on this style of architecture.

O.K. ... now I've really got to get back to shingling Packaged Product Shipping's roof!