Building Currier & Sons by South River Modelworks Pt.2

The pictures I am going to share aren't new. I've had them for about two weeks. I tried to write it but every time I sit down to do it I start falling asleep. Is that a sign of an old age?
I didn't exactly follow the instructions building this kit. The instructions call for adding the vents as one of the last steps but I added them before even gluing the brick building to the base. The reason is that the vents are heavy and I have to ship this kit once built. Therefore, I want them to be very well secured. Had I done them last I would have had only a little bit of glue holding them. Now in addition to the glue on the joining surfaces, I have wire that is glued into the vents. Each wire has a piece of wood glued to the end of it and the wood is glued to the wall. I hope that is enough.
I have been working on this kit for quite some time and I am already eager to do something else. Good thing about large kits is though that they give greater sense of accomplishment when done but the road to get there is long...

Building Cundy Cannery by Bar Mills Pt.2

I've had quite unproductive month when it comes to the model building. The real life got in the way for the most part. I have managed to finish the cannery though. It was fun medium size project. Everything came together more less OK. The brick foundation was a little pain. It is all in the  material that folks at Bar Mills use. The bricks come off easily and I had to glue them back, if I could find them. Next time I will apply wood hardener over the bricks in a hope to keep them in place.
With this note, I conclude my very short mini series on building the Cundy Cannery.

Building Currier & Sons by South River Modelworks Pt.1

Since yesterday I mentioned the other kit I should reveal what it is, I suppose. It is Currier and Sons by South River Modelworks and the part of the kit I was working on was the lumber storage shed. Everything was going smoothly until it was time to glue on the roof and it turned out to be too small. I didn't cut it out from one of the card that the roof piece was printed on. Instead I cut it out of the piece of cardboard I had. I made it exactly the same size as printed but the printout was wrong. Cutting new isn't a problem but I have to complete all of the painting and weathering steps. That takes time.

Building Cundy Cannery by Bar Mills Pt.1

It has been nearly a month since I finished the Graves kit. Have I been working on something since then? I have. I don't take breaks unless I travel. I mean extended breaks. After working on a model for few days I take a break but usually for no more that 3 evenings.
So... The next kit on the plate is Bar Mills Cundy Cannery. Actually, I started it while still working on the Graves. I needed to fill my lunch break modeling slot and the cannery was a good candidate. Majority of parts were wood or laserboard, no plaster and very little of resin. I was supposed to start working on another kit but it had plaster parts and because of that it was workplace incompatible. The cannery is coming together quite well and I may have finished it by now if not for the window vents and those few resin parts that had to be done at home. I switched to another kit for awhile with an intent to finish part of that kit before going back to the cannery but I then hit a road block and I had no other choice than to work the cannery again. It should be smooth sailing from now on.

Campbell Supply Co. Pt.1

Today I am feeling like giving up my beer adventure. I have noticed that some of the bottle caps of the beer I bottled two weeks ago are bulging. It looks like I have created few beer bombs. I don't know if it is an infection, incomplete fermentation or too much of the priming sugar. Since not all caps are bulging I am thinking it may be the infection or I didn't mix in the priming sugar in well enough and there was more sugar in some of the bottles. And everything was going just fine until the temperature went up from 68 to 74...
The Campbell Supply kit is one of the kits that has been started by someone else. I don't buy started kits intentionally. This is one of the cases when I don't pay attention to the pictures or the auction description. It wasn't too bad though. The roofs had been cut out but the rest of the parts were in sealed packages except for the office door. It is possible, it may have been shipped by the manufacturer that way. Since I own few other Campbell kits, I borrowed the door and made a copy out of laserboard. I have run out of steam building this kit though and I am posting this just as an illustration to my unfinished kit list.

Super Trees and AeroGarden Pt.1

I have enough of Super Tree material for at least a decade, but little scientist/farmer in my head is still wanting to grow it. I think, I have mentioned before that the weather in Georgia is not suitable for the plant. It likes milder temperature. Higher temperature makes it to mature too fast. The only option is to grow it indoors. I have tried that too but without good light source so the end result has always been less than acceptable. This time I am using AeroGarden unit. I didn't buy it just for the purpose of growing the Super Trees though. I thought I would grow sage and other herbs for my tea. I am not sure why but my herbs didn't do too well. They were fine for a while but then rotted at the base and died. Then instead of planting other herbs I decided to give STs a try. They started sprouting nicely, but then all but one died off. The one that survived though has turned into a nice plant and has also moved into the neighboring space. Hopefully, it will keep going.

Building Graves Elevators by Bar Mills Pt.5

I admit, I have new distraction. Back in NYC I saw few stands at the markets selling beer making kits and that reignited my interest in home brewing. I have always thought that some semi-serious
equipment was needed for that. I turns out that 1 gallon batches can be done without investing too much so I bought a starter kit and several beer making mixes. So far I have completed one batch, bottled two, and last night I brewed the fourth. This whole deal doesn't impact my modeling because I do it when I usually don't build models. However, it impacts my blog. It seems my brain is preoccupied with beer recipes, ideas for the brews, etc.
Bar Mills kits go together relatively fast and smoothly but not the Graves. It is quite difficult kit and it was clearly rushed to have it out before Christmas. Despite all that, I think I did a decent job on it. Would I build another one? No way. Don't get me wrong though. It is fine to build it once but two would be way too excessive.