Large Scale Central

M&K Sugar Mill

Modeling
#101

Update:

Much planking:

The small gaps you see are intentional. I plan to extend the roof a bit to cover the loading dock, gluing the “roof beams” directly to the loader roof. Then I’ll plank over the rest of the foam. In the meantime, I can glue metal sheets along the narrow strip between the loader and mill, finishing both sides, and prepping to metal over the roof. Naturally, my other green bottle of DAB 3.0 whatever was NOT, in fact, the gutter sealant, so a hardware store run is again in order. Whatever the heck it was (some sort of self-leveling crack sealang), it ran like thin pancake butter…but it did glue the loader shed roof to the foam! Read the label next time, Mueller…

I used scraps from my father-in-law’s donation to make a beam that ran lengthwise along the mill, resting on the window sills. Using Bill Barnwell’s idea, I ran copper tape along each side, soldered some LED-s to it, ran the wire into the shed, soldered it to copper tape on the shed roof, and wired the lot to a battery clip. Before you ask, yes, I did do this before gluing on the roof! Results are below:

Not exactly material condition DOG ZEBRA or even CIRCLE YOKE for that matter…I am thinking of finding some dark cloth or plastic and hang it as a black-out curtain to the inside of the mill’s roof to keep light from leaking. Errors of cutting and placement early in the project have come back to haunt me. Were I to do this roof over, I would’ve carved a groove in the inside face of the foam for the roof material to rest in. Lesson learned…

Overall, though, I am excited to be over the hump. With the roofs in place, I removed all the material I had been storing in the mill’s interior and - GASP! - even started putting some away! There is still a month of building, fixing, painting, etc. ahead of me, but this project has psychologically moved into the “finishing” vice “building” phase.

Updates as required!

Eric

#102

#103

Update:

The latest push involved planking up the loader shed and metaling over most of the front of the mill:

(https://bn1303files.storage.live.com/y4mHkm3SaEDCEwt3AePQ74ZTnnpwdewimjtdizElSUbzPQqeBsg6uqT9AqktyYxunwAIifX_WcWc2zh348Tptzh4y6ME29hzg_A87OQXqS4P3zoxgw4jpUXiHgQEzFctVTxcAz3SZEPsjuAtvCXl4a7w4Xvp_tZFMwUsTbEt46DqMU1Onm_v19bf6Kb7X-pxxOI?width=660&height=495&cropmode=none)

By jove, it looks more done than not! The beams extending from the roofline will get vertical supports and metal roofing. Rain and sugar do not mix well, even simulated in 1:24-ish PLAYMOBIL scale! I still need to craft the “fake” door, but all materials are on hand. Hopefully, I can turn-to on that this weekend. I am not sure if I have the aluminum to go the distance when I start metaling over the roof. I will have to stock the fridge with appropriate raw materials. Hmmmm… So many choices, even here…

I am starting to look towards how to finish this. The wood will get a coat of TiteBond III to seal it. Then I have to think about weathering. Colored prints show the light colors for the metal siding, with relatively heavy rusting to a near red-brown in the “valleys” of the roof and lighter rusting on vertical surfaces. I am not sure I should use a latex wash or successive coats of spray paint, using a cloth in either case to wipe off the raised ridges of the metal. The wood will get a variety of earth tones, with some black smudges as appropriate where the trains passed through the shed.

I have to get this in place at Pu’u’oma’o (Green Hill) by Thanksgiving. I feel a few days of “iron horse 'flu” coming on if that deadline comes to quickly…

  • Eric
#104

Eric Mueller said:

Update:

The latest push involved planking up the loader shed and metaling over most of the front of the mill:

(https://bn1303files.storage.live.com/y4mHkm3SaEDCEwt3AePQ74ZTnnpwdewimjtdizElSUbzPQqeBsg6uqT9AqktyYxunwAIifX_WcWc2zh348Tptzh4y6ME29hzg_A87OQXqS4P3zoxgw4jpUXiHgQEzFctVTxcAz3SZEPsjuAtvCXl4a7w4Xvp_tZFMwUsTbEt46DqMU1Onm_v19bf6Kb7X-pxxOI?width=660&height=495&cropmode=none)

By jove, it looks more done than not! The beams extending from the roofline will get vertical supports and metal roofing. Rain and sugar do not mix well, even simulated in 1:24-ish PLAYMOBIL scale! I still need to craft the “fake” door, but all materials are on hand. Hopefully, I can turn-to on that this weekend. I am not sure if I have the aluminum to go the distance when I start metaling over the roof. I will have to stock the fridge with appropriate raw materials. Hmmmm… So many choices, even here…

I am starting to look towards how to finish this. The wood will get a coat of TiteBond III to seal it. Then I have to think about weathering. Colored prints show the light colors for the metal siding, with relatively heavy rusting to a near red-brown in the “valleys” of the roof and lighter rusting on vertical surfaces. I am not sure I should use a latex wash or successive coats of spray paint, using a cloth in either case to wipe off the raised ridges of the metal. The wood will get a variety of earth tones, with some black smudges as appropriate where the trains passed through the shed.

I have to get this in place at Pu’u’oma’o (Green Hill) by Thanksgiving. I feel a few days of “iron horse 'flu” coming on if that deadline comes to quickly…

  • Eric

Eric some cans of VB will solve all your problems by a. giving a supply of aluminium and b. keeping the flu under control.

Although the after effects may make it difficult to get an accurate build as you would probably overcome the “iron horse” flu and come down with “brewery” flu…

#105

Gap,

I fear “iron horse 'flu” will be unavoidable. I’ve scheduled it for Monday-Tuesday. Usually, a good bit of garden therapy, coupled with some train running and model building is an effective cure. Alas, though, VB is not to be found on the Sandwich Isles!

Eric

#106

Day 1 of “Iron Horse Flu.”

I delayed therapy today to trace down minor electrical faults on my '72 COUGAR, all of which guarantee I cannot pass inspection. Time to call my mechanic…

Turning to treating my affliction, I attacked the concept of “door.” I had glued crafsticks to a thin sheet of basswood last night. Today I framed it and glued it to the side:

A similar one is opposite to it on the inside of the shed. Tomorrow, I’ll make some “rails” top and bottom to make it look like this slides open left and right. A pair of staples should suffice as handles. I hope to also cut the simple framing for the roof over the loading dock. Then all of the wood will get a coat of TiteBond III.

I am waiting for a guillotine-style paper cutter before getting serious about metaling over the roof. I may, however, lay things out to see how much raw material I will need to create…all part of therapy for “iron horse flu,” of course!

Eric

#107

suggestion: make the door stand out a bit with 45 degree cross braces, maybe making an ‘X’

#108

Day 2 of “Iron Horse 'FLu:”

First, Tim, that would’ve been brilliant…Too bad I forged ahead too soon to see your post! Might be hard to back-fit now, as you’ll see!

I must be getting somewhere, as I am starting to get help again on this project. Kid-zilla helped me make the frames for the dock’s roof, spray paint the underside of some metal, and glued little braces into place on the framing:

Kid-zilla also helped to place a rail above the door, make some rollers from 3mm grommets, and paint some metal scraps I later bent into hangers.

Oldest Son got into the act later and helped me place some scrap craftstick to represent door handles, using the handily available Sugar Cane Ninja to place them at the right height:

I abandoned the idea of using staples for much the same reason I am not sure I can put in the diagonal bracing. Putting in the frames made that door hard to reach! Anyway, the Sugar Cane Ninja will let you see our whole door up close:

You can just make out the rollers on the top. Again, this was a detail that I thought was needed for those just curious enough to look under the roof.

After that, I smeared TiteBond III over all the wood. It’ll get a second coat tomorrow. With naught else to do, I actually cleared tools, craftsticks, clamps, etc. from the lanai! Another sure sign of progress! Only metal work materials and TiteBond III remain in the work area. The project as it currently stands looks like this:

Only the roof remains before I can weather and place it! Speaking of which, colored prints show roofs rusted nearly read and sides less so. I am thinking a heavy wash with acrylics with a good wipedown or the raised ridges. I rejected spray paints out of an abundance of caution for the foam core.

Updates as progress dictates!

Eric

#109

How hard would this be too add ?

#110

@Sean, now I have an excuse to build a standard gauge extension! In all seriousness, in the “grand do-over,” I would’ve focused on the plantation and implied connection to a common carrier with some tracks to nowhere in the mill area. On the other hand, had I gone that route, I don’t think I’d have build the shared experiences we have enjoyed and continue to enjoy.

#111

@Tim: Regarding the issue of contrast…I think I will weather the walls more than the doors to make the latter stand out. I’ve one more coat of TiteBond III to go (yard needed mowing…) before attacking that issue. I have found thinned india ink is a wonderful weathering product for popsicle sticks. I’ll give the walls a good, heavy wash, and the doors a much lighter wash, if any, as though they have been replaced at some point in the recent past. Thanks again for drawing my attention to the issue.

#112

Upate:

Kidzilla and I have about half the roof metalled over with concrete hollow tile tops holding it in place. It worked best applying adhesive to the panels, then mashing them in place. Even at that, there will be glue blobs to rub off. We are on track to have the roof done by the end of the weekend. I think I have enough metal to finish the job, so mass creation of raw material will not impede production.

A bit of trim on the roof, place it, weather it, and pau! All that will be left is a lifetime of adding outbuildings, engine service shops, vignettes, etc.

Pictures to follow when the concrete slabs are gone.

Have a great weekend!

Eric

#113

Uggghhhhh…What should have been the weekend that brought everything together met a setback with, of all things, glue…All I had to do was glue metal to plastic. The gutter flashing simply would not set, and things were peeling off, so I grabbed E6000, walked away, and, 24 hours later, found that most of the little metal sheets had wandered. I grabbed my contact cement to tack things down, only to find that my attempt to use a weight to hold metal in place had caused the roof to sag. No good words… (http://largescalecentral.com/externals/tinymce/plugins/emoticons/img/smiley-yell.gif)I jostled it all together, made a metal seam piece, and got things fairly well glued down on the loader area. There will be some glue to rub off when everything does sit! Kid-zilla inspects the work below:

I attacked the other side of the roof with E6000, walked away, and saw things had wandered again! Then it struck me. As the glue dried, it contracted, and consequently buckled things out of position:

Back to the hardware store for contact cement to fix this. Sigh… I’ll use some scrap metal (of which I now have a lifetime supply) to cap the roof. The plan for the stack area is to cut quarter circles from four plates and glue them in place. This weekend’s setbacks precluded making the styrene trim for the sides. The whole thing is going to look more warped and worn than I wanted, but, then again, maybe the mills touched up some of those long ago prints…

If I am brutally honest, this would be a “failure” if it were going to be any closer to the viewing area than it will be. I think if I rust the bejeezus out of those roof panels, it might still be OK.

I paused and decided to actually run trains, something that I hadn’t done for a while while wrestling with this roof. I even cleaned, sorted, and stowed around my work area, which was at least proof that progress is, in fact, happening. Someone, however, did not get the message I wanted to watch trains chase their tails as I sipped a beverage. “Bubbles” ended up in a gondola:

…where she apparently relaxed more than I did: Video - Bubbles Rides the Rails. At any rate, she seemed to enjoy her experience much more than our new chickens, appropriately named “Annie” and “Clarabelle”: Video - Chicken Run Hawaiian Style.

You need evenings like this to make hiccups in projects worthwhile!

Have a Great Week!

Eric

#114

#115

now it looks natural all that shifting and sliding worked in your favor looks great and is enormous

#116

I have not had any issues with E6000 moving after I set it, but I do try on the roofing to have something to clamp or weight it down while the glue dries , maybe the weighted coconut will have to be employed to help hod things in place. I do know that i have always tried to have the things being glued horizontal ( or close to it)

#117

Gents, thanks.

Pete, that has been the big takeaway from this project: glue things to the core while you can lie them flat then weight them in place (we have lots and lots of coconuts!). The other lesson has been: buy more clamps! We got away with gluing to vertical surfaces in the past, but those were smaller projects. Interestingly, the wood-on-foam stuck just fine with the relatively viscous TiteBond III!

Live and Keep Learning!

Eric

#118

Update:

I realized I needed new strategic direction. The closer I got to “finished,” the more I was seeing a collection of mistakes instead of a coalescing whole. Yesterday, I decided to place the mill on the railroad to really get a sense of how it will look and to clear the lanai to make taking it back even more difficult. Like in theater, there comes a time you just have to do the full run through and see what you have.

They day began by masking off the windows and dock to allow for a second coat of paint on the metal. The boys joined me with surface preparation, helping me pick and scrub off all the glue runs and blobs then took turns applying gray primer:

After letting that dry, it was time to prep the location in Pu’u’oma’o:

The two buildings in the back (gifts from my very handy and creative father-in-law) had to move. We also had to scrape and level the ground to ensure the mill would sit evenly:

This step took quite a bit of trial and error, as the tracks had to fit just right to allow a cane train to pass through the loader or a locomotive to spot a box-car at the loading dock. Komaka Iki (Little Thomas) ground out his gears, and I didn’t want to hook up track power. Luckily, we have anothr much - and deservedly - maligned battery powered LGB m2075 Christmas Thomas (a missile sponge awaiting full rehabilitation) that worked as a stand-in:

After this, we reconnected all the track. Naturally, move one track, move half the loop. Much jiggling and repositioning occurred ober about 1/5 of the railroad to get the tracks to reconnect and the electrons to flow.

Our new supervisor, Opal, looked on:

Opal, a rescue pup, joined us on Wednesday. I wanted to name here Ho’omaluhia (Peace, in honor of Armistice day) or Kolonahe (Gentle Breeze, to reflect her temperament). I lost. We all, however, gained.

Back to the project at hand, I leave with the three primary viewing angles:

  1. From the lanai…
  2. From the grill area…
  3. From the Valley of the Nap… Note, if you are actually engaging in a nap, all you can see and hear are trains rumbling over the bridges. This absolutely augments the value of the nap.

The plan now is to weather the mill in place and add details as we go. It needs a ramp to the loading dock, stairs to that door, maybe a big “M&K Sugar” on the stack (not really a Hawaii thing, but it would be cool!), a water tower behind it, etc. I also need to make an outbuilding with a switch to allow us to turn the loader track on and off the same way we can the loading dock track. Looking further along, I want to really industrialize this area with engine service items for fuel, water, and sand. Those, of course, will be separate projects!

I’ll update this thread as I weather this thing. I intend by and large for nature to take its course, but I’ve observed that aluminum roof panels give nature a run for its money, so I am going to help the metal along a bit. I am going to start with a dark wash of black over everything including the wood. Then I’ve really got to figure out how I want to “rust” those metal panels, especially the roof. The mill, as an anchor project, will never be done, but I will consider this thread complete when we finish the weathering.

Thanks to all for the advice, encouragement, and good humor (“humour” for you, GAP!). Now, I am going to apply that wash, put power to the rails, relieve the 'fridge of some cooling burden, and enjoy a Hawaiian afternoon!

Aloha,

Eric

#119

Looks great, Eric! I suspect that every one of us looks at our creations and immediately notices the stuff we screwed up on. It just adds character!

#120

I LIKE!!!

looks like a well worn industrial building - which was the intent.

Those grinding gears on Thomas…eee…

Hopefully you got spots picked out for the displaced buildings.