Those of you who've seen photos of my track attempt will know that there's very little room on the table for much more than the track itself. But that doesn't stop me from wanting to try my hand at other things, specifically buildings. This is the beginning of a wooden garage that will not grace the track, but will become part of a separate but related diorama.
The building itself is a hybrid based a little bit on this weatherboard garage (which frequently houses a Porsche Cayenne)
And a bit on this corrugated iron one
First job is working out the size of the garage if it were full size. The first picture is just big enough to get a car through the door and still be able to exit the vehicle. But, you'll note, it's not long enough to get a 4WD in and close the door. I want my garage to be single bay but big enough to be able to park any of my slot cars in. Looking on the slot car shelf, the longest car I had (at the time) was the Pioneer Mustang. Not really a huge car. But, as I do have a 1:32 scale F100 I figured if I can house this in the garage, most 1:32 cars will fit no problem. Another thing I kept in mind when designing the garage was the size of materials. The classic measurement that continuously turns up is the 8' x 4' sheet (2440 x 1220 mm for we youngsters
)
With this measurement in mind I went about making a template out of cardboard.
The door opening is scaled from 8' x 8'. The side wall height is also 8'. Length of the edge on the gable is, you guessed it, 8' to allow for the size of corrugated iron.
Having made two sides and two ends, I taped them together and thought I'd test the size against both the truck and a scale person.
The size seems believable. So it's onward.
The template was disassembled and adjusted slightly. A small window added to the end wall (2' x 3' or 600 x 900mm) and another of the same size added to the side wall together with a personal access door.
The frame is being cut in spruce. 5 x 6mm for top of frame and 5 x 5mm for uprights.
Test fitting pieces for back wall frame.
From here the lengths cut for the frame are stained to give them the old wood look.
I stained all the pieces before gluing them together. Gluing prior to staining is likely to cause patches of pale wood as the glue usually repels stain. To colour the wood I have used artists acrylics making a mix of 2 parts raw umber, 1 part ultramarine blue and 1 part black. Because I wanted this to be a clear stain rather than an opaque paint I added an equal quantity of clear glaze medium to the paint. The paint is applied with a brush, left to penetrate for a short while and then wiped back with a soft cloth. The two pale pieces of wood in the lower right of the photo are unstained.
When dry I was quite happy with the colour of the wood, but I still didn't think it looked old. So, I attacked the stained wood with knife and scraped it haphazardly to roughen the outline a bit. In some instances I also scraped the wood with a saw blade to roughen it further.
Any pale wood that was bared from the scraping was touched up with a bit more stain mix. In the photo above the two pieces of wood on the right are stained but not scraped. The four to the left have been fully 'aged'.
Once dry the frame walls can be assembled. Frames for the individual walls were glued together using PVA glue. Then the four wall frames were glued together using C23 (balsa glue) which forms a stronger bond and sets faster.
Here I must apologize. I had intended to keep the step by step images going. But I'm afraid I got a little carried away and the next thing I knew I had the frame completed.
Alas, not only were the walls completed, but I realised I had not taken any photos of the roof trusses as they were being created and assembled.
The trusses are again made with spruce and stained prior to gluing together. The battens are strips of balsa also stained with the same mix.
Closer detail of the roof frame.
The roof frame will just sit atop the wall frame and will not be glued so that it can be removed if required.
The fully assembled frame.
And from the access door side.
The frame will later be clad with weatherboards cut from balsa. And the roof will be corrugated iron made from corrugated craft cardboard. But more of that some other time.
Cheers
Embs
The building itself is a hybrid based a little bit on this weatherboard garage (which frequently houses a Porsche Cayenne)
And a bit on this corrugated iron one
First job is working out the size of the garage if it were full size. The first picture is just big enough to get a car through the door and still be able to exit the vehicle. But, you'll note, it's not long enough to get a 4WD in and close the door. I want my garage to be single bay but big enough to be able to park any of my slot cars in. Looking on the slot car shelf, the longest car I had (at the time) was the Pioneer Mustang. Not really a huge car. But, as I do have a 1:32 scale F100 I figured if I can house this in the garage, most 1:32 cars will fit no problem. Another thing I kept in mind when designing the garage was the size of materials. The classic measurement that continuously turns up is the 8' x 4' sheet (2440 x 1220 mm for we youngsters
With this measurement in mind I went about making a template out of cardboard.
The door opening is scaled from 8' x 8'. The side wall height is also 8'. Length of the edge on the gable is, you guessed it, 8' to allow for the size of corrugated iron.
Having made two sides and two ends, I taped them together and thought I'd test the size against both the truck and a scale person.
The size seems believable. So it's onward.
The template was disassembled and adjusted slightly. A small window added to the end wall (2' x 3' or 600 x 900mm) and another of the same size added to the side wall together with a personal access door.
The frame is being cut in spruce. 5 x 6mm for top of frame and 5 x 5mm for uprights.
Test fitting pieces for back wall frame.
From here the lengths cut for the frame are stained to give them the old wood look.
I stained all the pieces before gluing them together. Gluing prior to staining is likely to cause patches of pale wood as the glue usually repels stain. To colour the wood I have used artists acrylics making a mix of 2 parts raw umber, 1 part ultramarine blue and 1 part black. Because I wanted this to be a clear stain rather than an opaque paint I added an equal quantity of clear glaze medium to the paint. The paint is applied with a brush, left to penetrate for a short while and then wiped back with a soft cloth. The two pale pieces of wood in the lower right of the photo are unstained.
When dry I was quite happy with the colour of the wood, but I still didn't think it looked old. So, I attacked the stained wood with knife and scraped it haphazardly to roughen the outline a bit. In some instances I also scraped the wood with a saw blade to roughen it further.
Any pale wood that was bared from the scraping was touched up with a bit more stain mix. In the photo above the two pieces of wood on the right are stained but not scraped. The four to the left have been fully 'aged'.
Once dry the frame walls can be assembled. Frames for the individual walls were glued together using PVA glue. Then the four wall frames were glued together using C23 (balsa glue) which forms a stronger bond and sets faster.
Here I must apologize. I had intended to keep the step by step images going. But I'm afraid I got a little carried away and the next thing I knew I had the frame completed.
Alas, not only were the walls completed, but I realised I had not taken any photos of the roof trusses as they were being created and assembled.
The trusses are again made with spruce and stained prior to gluing together. The battens are strips of balsa also stained with the same mix.
Closer detail of the roof frame.
The roof frame will just sit atop the wall frame and will not be glued so that it can be removed if required.
The fully assembled frame.
And from the access door side.
The frame will later be clad with weatherboards cut from balsa. And the roof will be corrugated iron made from corrugated craft cardboard. But more of that some other time.
Cheers
Embs