Hi,
Well yesterday I managed to get the last of the major structures (although minor in itself) completed on the first section of the L&T Branch.
The structure is an unloading shed for plastic pellets used in the forming of parts for the Appliance Manufacturing Plant, there are still some minor pieces to be added like a series of storage silos for the various primary colours of pellets, piping for conveying the pellets from the unloading shed to the silos, compressor unit, and various detail parts.
This build was fairly straight forward in that the main structure being a Pikestuff Kit (Modern Small Enginehouse) are not that difficult to build apart from the odd bit of trimming required to get sections to match. The difficult part was getting the structure to join the curved backdrop.
This section of the layout has a 45 degree curve and required about a 1/2 of the structure to form to this curve. Firstly the structures walls and opening were made, as it only requires two sides to be completed, I then positioned this against the area that I wanted it to be and marked out it's position on the backdrop and subroadbed for reference..
Then I cut out a piece of paper that formed the 90 degree angle of the front and side wall of the structure and formed the curve along the backdrop, this the forms the reference for the cutting of the roof later on.
One issue that I was faced with was securing the backdrop side roof to something that would stop it from dropping or sagging after time. Being on a curved backdrop required a little lateral thinking, so I added a piece of double sided tape to the backdrop in between the front wall and side wall. To this I added a piece of square styrene tube that I formed to the backdrop curve, this then formed the support that was needed for the roof to sit on.
The tape will also be used for adhering a photo insert of the internals of the pellet unloading area later on. Once the support was in place it was a matter of constructing the roof sections and trimming them down to fit each section and the curve of the backdrop.
Once each section was glued and allowed to dry, I placed the paper template over the roof section and marked out the curve and scored the line with an Exacto knife and removed the waste. Some trimming was required as I allowed a little in case the the template was out as the Pikestuff roof's have a very small pitch to take into consideration.
Finally I added the rooftop ridge vents and powered extraction fan, as mentioned before a few more minor additions to be added along with detail parts & lighting and the structure will be ready for painting and weathering.
This has been yet another enjoyable build and easily done in a full day from start to this stage, I'll post some more photos as we progress.
Cheers,
Jas...
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