Thanks Wayne, Gus. Gus, the platform is built from styrene. If you look near the bottom of page 5 of this thread, you will see one section unpainted. I wound up not using this particular one as I needed to change dimensions and method to match railhead height. I've included two photos from a Lackawanna book I used for inspirtion for this scene.

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Ramp????...Ladder?????.....Where?
I see an excellent steam loco, but nothing else.

Thanks 88. A few pages back you mentioned how with the removal of a few locos the roundhouse scene looked abandoned. Today I went for a walk, a half mile or so from my house is abandoned trackage for what once was a iron foundry where nails were made. There was a small turntable and all that remains is the pit, here are some pics from this morning.

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That turntable must have been removed some time ago, because those trees in the pit are kind of big.

Yeah, it's been awhile! I can't remember what I read about when the foundry closed up. It was built in the late 1880's if I recall correctly. 10 years ago or so there were remnants of small ovens built into a hillside on the other side of the river and historical markers with data about the area. Vandals destroyed the markers and time has destroyed my memory! The foundry and the Morris canal were the reason for Boonton's existance back then. Here are two pics of the bridge over the river to the foundry, also taken this morning. Hey, if our get together in June goes well, perhaps we can get together again sometime and I'll walk anyone interested around the area, and maybe run some trains.

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I've built and painted some interior details for the powerhouse office. The first two pics were taken on my workbench before the roof was in place. So it is lit pretty well. Unfortunately, once I added glas to the windows and inserted them in the wall and added the roof in place on the layout, you could no longer see much inside. So I had to add lighting, and the second 2 pics show the result. I have some work to do to seal the light leaks around the windows. And I still need to add window sills and other details. But I'm pretty happy with things so far. I find it difficult to get eacat precision openings in masonry walls for the windows. Wood buildings are easier since the window castings mount from the outside. Oh well, if I insisted on perfection, I would have to leave the hobby!

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Last photo will be on next post, I guess I reached the limit.

One more photo:

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Looking good Gary!!!!

I hate making custom window openings in brick walls, especially the thicker ones like Walthers and DPM, but sometimes you have to. My technique is, instead of trying to do a flush mount as it looks like you've done, I mount the window on the inside. If needed, I will add a little more to the outside frame of the window, especially if I am cutting one down. Obviously this requires a little extra work on the inside of the window if the interior side is visible, but it really works well in compensating for the inevitable "oops's" in the window openings.

cheers
Val

Lookin' good, Gary.

Another suggestion for hiding the gaps is to install window sills (as you mentioned) and stone lintels over the tops of the windows. To seal gaps along the sides, use Evergreen quarter-round or strips, in an appropriate size, applied over the gaps, on the outside of the structure - the prototype often used trim called brick moulding just for this purpose.

Wayne

Thanks Val, Wayne. Quarter round strips huh? I'll check that out. Val, I don't quite understand what you mean, would it be possible for you to post a photo?

Val, have you seen the thread about the get together at Steantown? Any chance you can make it?

jglfan Wrote:Thanks Val, Wayne. Quarter round strips huh? I'll check that out. Val, I don't quite understand what you mean, would it be possible for you to post a photo?

Sure thing Gary.

On the benzol plant I had to change the some of the standard Walthers modular windows from 5 rows of windowpanes to 3. As you can see, the Walthers window has a wider edge, which I re-created from some very thin styrene strip. The mullions are not quite as thick as these outside frames, and my very thin styrene was a perfect match for the slight inset.



What you're seeing in this photo is the front side of the window. I didn't bother cutting down the extra panes, because I'm not showing the interior of the building.

This shot, shows the standard modular window above, and the modified window below.



Here's a side view, which shows how the windows are inset in the openings, as opposed to flush mounted with the outside of the wall. This is simply a matter of gluing them to the inside of the walls. The opening is slightly larger than the window itself, and that's where the extra wide frame helps hide any spaces.



Not sure if the photo's explain it properly. Maybe this diagram will help.



Brick structures seem to always be done this way, whereas wood structures often have framing around the window that is actually sitting on the surface of the outside walls.

About the Steamtown get-together -- I would love to come but I don't have a @#&^ passport.

cheers
Val

Thanks Val, I get it now. The Tichy windows I use are .040 thick, so I could edge glue .040 styrene strip to them to accomplish what you describe. Now that I'm thinking about it, the way I prepared the windows was to glue clear styrene "glass" to the back of the window casting, cutting it a bit larger all around to make a flange to then apply glue to and insert the window from inside. If I had painted the clear styrene black in this flange area, it would have blocked the light. I am going to see if I can remove the windows and try this. It really wasn't so noticable until I installed the light.

I had pondered the possibility of using something like appropriately colored spackle in one of those syringe applicators to apply filler. This would be a last resort type fix, what are others thoughts on this?

Are you sure you need a passprt to visit the US? Last year when I travelled to Montreal for a concert, the music forum I read had threads about this issue, tho it was US citizens travelling to Cananda and back. I recall seeing it mentioned that people traveling by car did not need passports, tho it does make it easier. I can't verify this, as I had my passport so it was never an issue.

Thanks again.

Personally I would use putty to fill the cracks cuz i'm lazy!!

As to the passport issue, since June 1/09 even coming in by car you need one. That even applies to US citizens returning from Canada.

Val

Looks real good so far

jglfan Wrote:Hey, if our get together in June goes well, perhaps we can get together again sometime and I'll walk anyone interested around the area, and maybe run some trains.

Sounds good to me, See you on Saturday

As for the passport issue, June 1st, 2009 was the implementation date for all modes of travel to the U.S. However, local news has been running features on this lately, and it seems that the "rule" isn't necessarily a rule that will be enforced just yet. I think that it's very generous to give all the would-be Canadian terrorists a bit of a grace period.
Actually, they interviewed U.S. border officials who stated that most people without passports would likely be allowed in, probably until the end of the year - they'll be issued with information brochures about the restrictions.

Silly me, knowing that I'd be visiting friends in the U.S. this summer, and figuring that the "rule" would be in effect, I plopped down my $87.00 (plus the cash for the photos) on a Thursday afternoon in January. The following Monday morning, my passport, ugly picture and all, was in my mailbox.

From the interviews shown on TV, it seems that most Canuckleheads crossing already have passports, but many Americans don't, and are rather upset that they'll have to get one - that's for them to be able to get back into the U.S. after a vacation in Canada.

Wayne (never much of an admirer of any government, anywhere)