Mount Union Re-Development Committee

[Craig]

Beautiful craftsmanship as always Rick!!  It is even more impressive in person!!

[RickBacon]

Next up, the depot.  I'm thinking a brick structure with brick pilasters and a metal seamed roof.  A second story turret houses a railroad management type office.  I think the turret will help visually balance the 20 scale foot height difference between the tracks at this point of Mt Union, but not overpower the scene like a full 2 story building. An operators bay window faces the Antioc & Dover tracks on the aisle side and will support a train order board that will be used to issue instructions for A&D staging adding a little variety to layout operations. Deep over-hanging roof eves and an extended stand alone roof will shelter a cement platform.  A team/LCL track will have a boxcar door height dock on the back side.  This dock will help visually transition the middle of the scene from A&D "ground level" at front to A&O "track level" at the back and break up the long retaining wall along the upper tracks. Of course, construction will be primarily styrene and all scratch built. 

Here is the front wall so far...

[RickBacon]

Its been awhile!  I have finished my N scale project and am back in the O scale world!  Time for some updates on the Mount Union depot. 

Basic .040 layered styrene with brick sheet and styrene "stone-work".  All the doors are scratch built in place and the windows will be modified Grandt Line castings that I have modified to resemble inset type windows used in a stone or brick structure. I'm getting close to finishing the basic structure, with nearly all the brick work completed.  Lots of small architectural brick details to be added to really bring out the 3D texture of the overall structure.  I think all the variations of depth in the brick work keeps the eyes moving and really sell the story that this is a classic brick structure. 

Thankfully the brick sheets greatly speed up the process.  I can only imagine the pain it would be to carve or place each individual brick!  Ask David about his award winning C&O tower...!

 

[Bob]

Ooh. I can't wait to see it when finished!

The 4 fake chimneys add a castle-like look to the station. It will be a photographic focus both from the front side and also from a train camera from rear track side.

[RickBacon]

Only select areas of the Mount Union depot have a visible interior; the second-story office space and the trainorder operator bay. The second-story office space is two rooms and an enclosed stairwell. The back office appears as an unfinished space with plaster and lathe walls with exposed studs. The front room has a hardwood floor with wainscoting and plaster wall separated by a chair rail. The first floor trainorder bay has a tile floor and the same wainscoting and plaster wall. All these wall and floor finishes are photo textures I made from photos I scrounged from the internet. I modify them and scale them using MS Office software and print them on photo paper with my inkjet printer.
The trainorder bay is built as a “cassette” that is fully finished and detailed before being inserted into the main structure from the bottom. Straightforward styrene assembly forms a box the size of the room.  A door is scratch built out of styrene as is the chair rail detail. The walls are finished with photo textures.

[RickBacon]

Here is the photo texture ready for printing.

[Craig]

Looking great Rick. 

Are you printing these textures on flat card stock?  Or something different?

[RickBacon]

Thanks Craig!  I print on glossy photo paper. To my eye, the photo paper has a much sharper image.  The glossy finish is killed off with a light spray of Dullcoat or dead flat spray after the textures are mounted to the model.

Several years ago while wandering through a thrift store, I spotted an un-opened box of 8.5 x 11 photo paper with a ridiculously low price somewhere in the single digits!  It's a bulk package for commercial printing, something like 1000 sheets!.  I have no problems running it through my HP ink jet printer using knock-off cartridges.

All the photo texture interiors and signs in Mount Union are printed on it! The white enamel interior walls of the Dave's Diner model are actually this photo paper without anything printed on it. I skipped the flat spray so the walls would be shinny.