Building Green Dragon kit by FOS Pt.1

When it comes to the lunch breaks, I am having some chaotic phase right now. I don't have a single project that I can work on for few weeks straight. If you remember, I have about 30 unfinished projects but none of them qualify as full time lunch break project. They all need something that can be done at home only. I am trying my best not to add any new kits to the shame list so I am working on one kit for a day or two until I hit an obstacle, then switch to the next. It works for the most part but one day it failed and I had to dig into my box of shame. I ended up pulling out FOS Green Dragon Restaurant. It had all walls painted and weathered, the windows installed. I don't remember why did I put it on the back burner but I remember the reason why I started. It was one of the guilt builds after I bought a number of FOS kits. The intention was to construct it quickly and use it later as part of larger diorama. I wanted to extend it a little by adding a dragon sign and a pigeon coop. I added the dragon. I used a charm which I got off of eBay. The pigeon coop is still under consideration. It all depends if I have enough room on the roof. Also I had a happy accident while applying a "painted" sign. I messed it up and after I removed it there was some ink left that resembled faded sign. I decided to leave it as is instead of gluing another sign over. That kind of summarizes the past.
Looking into the future, the intention this time around is to do one structure diorama. I already have an idea for the figures and I am determined to go all the way. However, if someone approaches me with a reasonable offer to buy just the structure, I don't think I will decline it.

Building Graves Elevators by Bar Mills Pt.4

I keep track of all completed kits and so far I have built 60+ of them. Today I had courage to count all of the unfinished. I came up with about 30. That is some serious effort wasted unless I turn them into finished models. I may need to make a shelf of shame and put them all there.
The Graves is taking the shape. The visible progress may slow down over then next week or two because I need to build first several sub-assemblies, like the elevators, the fire escape, etc., and clean up and paint the resin castings. That is the part of the process with very little feedback and somewhat demotivating. I am hoping I won't grab another kit from the shelf and start it. I have done that on several occasions.

Building Graves Elevators by Bar Mills Pt.3

Few years back I obtained the Bar Mills Money's Plumbing kit. Since I am model builder and not a collector, I opened the box. To my disappointment there was no dry transfer included. The instructions mentioned the fact and the explanation was given that it was due to the difficulty of application. It has been in the back of my mind ever since. After I saw that Graves had three and even more intricate dry transfer signs I was very worried. Mess up one and the look of the building isn't going to be the same. It turns out I worried for no reason. It was repetitively easy to get the signs off the carrier sheet and onto the wall. It is all possible I had no problems because the transfers were new though. Perhaps the story could have been different have I had old ones. I guess the moral of the story is, build your kits, don't keep them in the boxes until dry transfers go bad.

EXPO 2016 kit - Olson & Furlow Tex-Mex Bar & Grill Pt.3

Yesterday Bob Van Gelder sent out an email announcing sale of two complete sets of the kits he had produced over the years. They sold before I even had a chance to open the email and that was for over 11k per set! Bob said he was selling them at the market value but in my opinion they were priced 10-30% above it. He deserves the bonus though and I am glad I am not the one who is paying.
On another note, guess what? I finished Olson & Furlow diorama earlier this week. I enjoyed building it but there is an end to everything and it is going up for bid on eBay this Sunday. Hopefully, it will find good home and will be enjoyed by someone else as diorama or possibly as part of a layout.

EXPO 2016 kit - Olson & Furlow Tex-Mex Bar & Grill Pt.2

Finally, I have something from 2017. I don't have much say about the process. All came together just fine. Now it is time to do the diorama.

Building Graves Elevators by Bar Mills Pt.2

The Graves is expected to take over as main lunch break project after the EXPO 2016 kit. I have done some work on it since the last update though. For the "stucco" here I used the Sandstones textured paint that I acquired several years ago and which is OOP now. I applied it with the paintbrush.
It took me two attempts to do the GRAVES sign right. The first time I used a sponge and that didn't work out. The it so happened that I was going over the instructions of one of the FOS kits which had  stencil for making a wall sign just like the GRAVES. The instructions recommended using stiff paintbrush and dabbing the paint. Then I remembered that in search for the perfect paintbrush for painting the walls I had bought some stencil paintbrushes. It turned out that I already had right tool for the job...

Company House by American Model Builders Pt.1

This is another filler project I have been working on in 2016. I am converting it into the company office and I am making it more detailed.

EXPO 2016 kit - Olson & Furlow Tex-Mex Bar & Grill Pt.1

Happy New Year!
I don't have anything of this year yet but I have been working on EXPO 2016 kit before the holidays and have some photos to share. The kit was designed for the EXPO by FOS. I have had my hands itching since the time I got it in April of 2016. Since then I have spent quite some time trying to decide how to do the "stucco". Included in the kit was "standard" water putty. I had nothing against it but I wanted to try something else. I had 3 different Liquitex textured paints that I bought long time ago. I had tried them before but I wasn't happy with the result. This time I used palette knife instead of the paintbrush and ended up with more dense finish that resembled stucco much better. The one that I picked for the kit, I believe, is called stucco.