Project Update: Slim's Dogs & Burgers by FOS Scale Models

I have had this kit staring at me from a shelf for past few months. I was up to good start but then I got myself into confusion of what I really wanted to do with it. Then one day I was installing pharmacy from Raglan Road window "glass" and remembered that Slim's needed few last ones added too. Then I found time to glue stucco addition to the main structure. Well, not very much but at least there is some movement. Also I think I have gotten myself out of confusion. I am waiting for some detail piece to arrive from China within next couple of weeks. I hope it will fit well and will be neat addition to overall look.

Project Update: Raglan Road by Bar Mills

I have been steadily working on the pharmacy building since last update. Since I am changing it to candy store I have run into some sort of an issue. The kit comes with pharmacy signs that look like etched brass laminated on some black plastic. However, I needed them to be candy store signs and I wanted similar golden look. There were several options but they didn't look viable. I could do the same thing Bar Mills did, i.e. photo etch but I didn't have a set up required to do it. In addition, was not familiar with material they used. I could print the signs on ALPS printer but I didn't have an access to it. I knew there used to be some office/art supply store in California that sold silver paper for ink jets. I am pretty sure they sold gold paper too but at the time I wasn't much interested in it. I was looking into this because I wanted to build some paper models that had bare metal surface and there was no way to do it other than print on silver paper. Anyway, as far as I remember the paper was reasonably priced but shipping cost was very high. I wasn't going to pay $30-40 for some 50 sheets of paper I wouldn't have much use for. Then I was going through Games Workshop paint left over from my son's figure painting times. Among others I found gold paint and thought what if I painted area on regular paper with gold paint and then printed sign. I wasn't sure if ink would stay where it should or bleed. The result of my experiment can be seen in the picture below. I think it has turned out good enough to be used on the model. However, I wish black color was a bit more solid.
Although the pictures show the porches incomplete but at the time of this writing the are finished. That was quite pain in the neck to install them. This task has taken me three lunch breaks. That is roughly 2 and half hours. After this I already can see the light at the end of a tunnel. I would like to finish the kit before Christmas but I don't have much time left. Quite few lunch breaks will be spent doing other things than modeling over next few weeks...

Tar paper roofing tips

When I started this blog I promised to offer some tips in addition to project updates. I haven't lived up to that promise have I. Some number of tips are sprinkled across all posts but only one post so far exclusively dedicated.
Here are some tar paper roofing tips. They come from my experience and reflect my opinion. Your mileage may vary.
1. Don't use Polyscale paint to paint paper. It has some kind of binder that makes paper stiff and hard to work with. Plus it is a waste of money. My favorite are craft paints. They cheap, dry flat, come in variety of colors and shades. Most importantly they don't stiffen the paper.
2. Prime paper before painting. I use black or gray automotive primer. Most of the time I use black. You can be a bit sloppy when painting paper if it is primed. Let black color show up a little. It adds some character. White color showing through however would be very unrealistic.
3. Most of the time I use paper that comes with a kit but occasionally I need extra. I have used black notebook paper on few buildings but then I have discovered masking painters paper sold at Home Depot in 12 wide inch rolls that I cut to 3 inch wide rolls with a saw and use in home improvement projects. It is thin and brown. When painted forms uneven surface that gives roof some extra character.
4. If roof is flat don't bother cutting tar roofing into strips. Glue entire sheet, scribe lines with a knife and paint tar lines.
5. I weather roofs with combination of oil paints and weathering powders. I use Dr.Ben's powders but any other should work as well. It is multi-step multi-day process. Sometimes skip one or another step depending on effect I am looking for. First, I place small dots of white oil paint and using flat brush dipped in turpenoid drag paint down. Special care needs to be taken to make sure streaks go straight down and don't curve. When I am happy with result I let it dry for a day. Then I repeat streaking this time using dark brown paint. After letting it to dry I apply weathering powders. I stipple, brush them on to create some random pattern. I start with white color, then use greenish black (Dr. Ben's Brunswick Green?), following with brown. After I am done with powders to mix everything I apply black oil wash. It isn't exactly black. It has some brown tint in it. I make it by mixing Ivory Black oil paint from Reeves set and turpenoid. Please note that Windsor & Newton Ivory Black isn't same color. W&N doesn't have that brown tint. However, it can be added by mixing in some brown paint. After wash dries occasionally I go over with weathering powder if I find some areas I don't like. Final step is adding rust around metal roof objects such as vents and some soot black around chimneys.
Happy roofing!

What's in the box: Panzera's Delicatessen & Canavan Law by FOS

The last one in the series. Who is M.Canavan?

What's in the box: Zepeda's Shrimp Shack by FOS

This one was offered as freebie few months ago with purchase of kits worth $50 or more. Since then it has been seen being auctioned on eBay and going out for $50-60. Next time I am  definitely getting freebie whenever I like it or no. If I don't may cover the cost of paid kit.

What's in the box: Green Dragon Chinese Restaurant by FOS

I haven't done any WITB posts in a quite some time. Lets fix this. First up is Green Dragon Restaurant by FOS Scale Models. Like with my previous post I am not going to make any comments. The picture is all you get. I'll make comments about content and quality later when I build particular kit. This one may be coming up very soon. The idea is to build street diorama primarily of FOS kits possibly with some scratch build pieces. I don't know yet what kits will go into this and what arrangement will be. I'll just build few kits and then see what fits the best. Candidates are Green Dragon, Rothman's, Hokum, King Jazz, Panzera's Delicatessen, Jimmy Dee's Bar & Grill, The Pub Crawl. Porthole would be nice but it is OOP. The Green Dragon possibly is the first of the bunch  because I have some detail piece I am anxious to use.

Project Update: Pop Gracins by Bar Mills

Yesterday Bar Mills released their newest Bar Mills Moose issue. They announced very short run of Sokol's Mattress. And guess what. My blog received record single day number of hits. Thank you, Bar Mills! In my opinion their kits have best value for money for those who like to build. However, modelers who are looking to quickly populate their layouts with structures may be disappointed. It takes time to build each kit. Most of them aren't complicated at all only have quite a number of detail parts.
Pop Gracins is no different. It was quite easy to build and it took a bit longer than I originally anticipated. However, there is nothing new. I always underestimate time needed to build a kit. The hardest part in this kit was billboard on top of the garage. Bar Mills likes to use plywood for sign base. Bad part about it is that if it warps then it is hard to impossible to make it flat again. If the part has invisible back side it can be braced. Unfortuantelly, roof top signs have both sides visible. Some of them have supports with relativelly large gluing surfaces what allows to keep sign straight. Pop Gracins has very skinny supports. Anything I tried didn't hold on so I made new sign base out of chipboard. I like chipboard. It can be straightened out with fingers if it warps.
Over all it is neat little kit which I had previously discounted as uninteresting.

Project Update: Raglan Road by Bar Mills

I am working on the third structure in the kit - the pharmacy. It won't be pharmacy after I am done. I will change it to candy store. I have most time consuming part done i.e. shingling the walls. Although the walls are white and could have been left unpainted I covered them with light over spray of white paint. I believe that seals the paper and makes it easier to weather. Unsealed paper would soak stain in and if the stain was too dark it would be practically impossible to make it lighter. With sealed paper I can use clean turpenoid to wash off or dilute and spread around heavier wash.
I have been asked what I have used for painting the factory. It is Sherwin-Williams custom made paint. I took a piece of paper, painted it with Floquil CN Gray, and asked folks at  Sherwin-Williams to color match it. Why I didn't use Floquil you may ask. I can't stand smell of it. I very quickly get headache. Had Testors had acrylic version of CN Gray I would have used it though. Now I have whole pint of paint what is enough to last a liftime. I am adding picture of the sticker from the paint jar for everyone who would like to have paint of this color.

Project Update: Raglan Road by Bar Mills

I must be world champion of last step procrastinators. It seems it should be other way around. Less is left higher motivation should be to finish last few steps. I always find something else to do instead. Anyway, couple of canceled practices and accumulating number of unfinished kits in my modeling room have convinced me that it is time to take that last step. The result is completed factory building. I am pleased how it turned out. It is going to its owner next week and I am getting chunk of my precious modeling space back.

Project Update: Raglan Road by Bar Mills

I haven't posted a single Raglan Road update in two months!!! I have been working on it all this time. I have almost finished the factory. I took it back home few weeks ago to do final weathering but haven't done it all yet. The pictures are coming once I am through. It will be quite big step from what I have posted two months ago.
I have been working on other structures as well but the result is hardly noticeable. The reason for that is that I did little bit of this and little bit of that. I was about install Sinner's Salvage windows but realized that they were wrong size. There were actually windows for the pharmacy. I had no other windows left. I believe the kit has exchanged hands few times and somewhere along the line some windows have been removed. I ordered new set of windows and moved on to Hubcap Heaven. Then I realized that it had its windows missing as well. I switched to the pharmacy. It had one sheet of parts missing. Nonetheless, I continued working on it, i.e. shingling the walls, until windows for Skinner's Salvage arrived. I have been working on it ever since occasionally adding few rows of shingles to the pharmacy walls so I don't go insane doing it all at once.

Project Update: Wicked Wanda's by Bar Mills

It is Halloween time. Time to bring up to life some dead projects. I hope I will be able to go all the way this year and finish the project. The diorama is taking up very valuable space on my modeling room floor and collecting dust. Also although I am very careful about it it is all possible that our cat may get into the room. That most likely would result in some damage to everything that is on the floor. It is time to finish the diorama and exchange it for some cash.
I had just installed the fence before I put diorama on back burner. I wanted an outhouse and a dog house in the back plane which I planned to scratchbuild. After many months of procrastination I bought doghouse kit from Vectorcut and scratchbuilt the outhouse. I don't have any problems designing, engineering and scratchbuilding things. The bigest problem for me is determining dimensions. It seems all it takes is googling it up. Many times it works fine. However, in case of dog house I got this table of dimensions based on dog breed. Having no knowledge of different breeds meant more research and trying different variations to find out what looks best so I decided not to follow this path and purchased the kit. I think it looks pretty nice. After installing outhouse, doghouse and shed I planted tufts, weeds and such in the back while I had good access. Then I installed Wanda's. Now I need to add grass and tufts around the building and add details and little people. Sounds like not so much...

Project Update: Pop Gracins by Bar Mills

I have new project to report. It is Pop Gracins by Bar Mills. Well, it isn't exactly very new. I removed parts from the sheets back in August but due to all work on Truck Stop I didn't progress any further. With Truck Stop out of the way and sense of guilt I have put some serious effort over past week. The result is that I am quite close to finishing the kit. It won't happen this week due to coming weekend being busy but next week most likely Thursday of Friday I should be done. It means I will be able to squeeze out only two posts out of it...

Project Update: Truck Stop kitbash based on EF13B by RailroadKits.com

The last few modeling sessions felt more like work than fun. I needed to finish the diorama and ship it to Lancaster, PA before start of Model Railroad EXPO. Therefore, I felt quite a bit of pressure. The second I finished it I dropped all tools, walked out of the modeling room and watched TV for the rest of the evening although I could have done some work on other projects. I still haven't finished vehicles for the diorama. I started weathering them but had to stop because it became evident that I had to give more time between steps for paints to dry and cure. For that reason one of the pictures shows tractor trailer with blue masking tape over its windows.
Now that I am free I can probably push forward few other projects. Well, I am not exactly free. I have to finish weathering vehicles for the Truck Stop but with long drying time between steps I'll have plenty of time for something else. Perhaps I'll be able to do blog updates more often. I have few "What's in the box" posts to do as well as few reviews which I haven't done in a quite some time.