While Waiting for Delivery ...

[Jim Banner]

While waiting for some 0n30 rolling stock to arrive, I thought I would see if I could still scratch build in 0-scale.  This is only the second building I've done in 0-scale since 1955 but it was a whole lot of fun.  The board-on-board siding is 1/4" wide stir sticks over a Baltic Birch plywood frame.  I don't know what type of wood these stir stick are made of but it is a delight to work with and it reacts well to iron acetate aging treatment.  The muntins had me puzzled for a while as I usually use styrene solvent welded to polycarbonate glazing.  The solution was narrow strips of birch veneer, the iron-on kind with factory applied hot glue on the back.  It stuck well enough to the window glass and I am pretty sure it is going to stay there.  While this building is only 16 ' square (4" x 4") I think several of these plus some half tents and perhaps one or two more substantial buildings would be a good start on an early town.

[Tim]

Jim

Nice work, old but not run down.
And a horse rail.

What is it going to be?  A barber shop, assay office ?

Tim Anders
Souderton, PA

[Jim Banner]

Thanks, Tim.  I see lots of models of buildings looking as if they were built in 1890 and viewed in 2008.  I admire the work that went into aging them to look just like what we see on historical railroads today.  But I wanted this building and the whole town to look as if it were built in 1890 and and viewed in 1895.  Wood was cheap, paint was a luxury.  Two layers of wood (board-on-board) was just about as cheap as board and batten and a bit warmer in the cold Canadian winters.  I spent one winter in an annex built board-on-board and the snow used to leak in onto my bed where a crack in one of the outer boards lined up with one of the gaps between the inner boards.  The walls were bare studs on the inside - no insulation and no sheathing.  But it was toasty warm inside, even at -60 Farenheit outside.  Anyway, that is the feeling and the style I am trying to capture, unpainted wood exposed to the weather for a few years, long enough to go grey but not long enough to rot.  The doors and window frames are painted because they are harder and more expensive to replace, but another layer of boards is cheap and easy.

I was thinking this first one might be a gun shop.  Not big enough for a saloon and not impressive enough to be a bank.  I plan to build more, and I like your suggestions.  So the next one will be a one chair, one man barber shop and after that an assay office.  Model railroading has become a lot more fun.  And I don't even have the trains yet!!

[japasha]

Yes, Paint was a luxury in the boomtowns. I've always wanted to do a town painted red like in "High Plains Drifter."

Bill Bradford Models offers some very nice kits for blocks of buildings like yours