Home Page › Forums › Modeling the Missouri Pacific, Texas & Pacific, etc › HO Scale › Steps to Building a Mopac laser depot kit
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June 19, 2016 at 6:03 pm #5771peggyrothschildParticipant
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Here’s the various steps to building wood laser cut depot:
Tools; hobby or Exacto knife, 200 sand paper, 0000 steel wool, pencil, ruler, gap filling ACC glue, Elmer’s wood glue. Hobby primer, white paint for modern Mopac depots or Colonial Yellow and medium brown for pre-1960 depots. Here’s a link to MPs painting standards http://mopac.org/prototype-information/bridges-and-buildings/20-mopac-building-paint-standards-1910-1982Lay out the building and trim pieces on some newspaper and spray with a model primer. I recommend using Tamiya Fine Primer. This hides any grain in the wood and when dry the primer is dry lightly go over the pieces with 0000 steel wool to remove any fibers.
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After the primer is dry you can build the basic structure. Two issues I came across is the ends of the depot weren’t cut properly. The waiting room end needed to be narrowed and the freight room end needed one end modified as you can see in these photos. The depot’s footprint is 16′ x 50′.
[attachment=44:2kmm9x0x]image.jpeg[/attachment:2kmm9x0x][attachment=43:2kmm9x0x]image.jpeg[/attachment:2kmm9x0x]After getting the walls cut and glued I started adding the trim pieces. The trim pieces already have a glue backing. Peel off the paper backing and just stick the trim to the structure.
Since my final depot will be white I can add these pieces now. If the depot was going to be yellow and brown you would paint the base building yellow. Then paint the trim brown before gluing the trim. This goes rather quickly as the trim is are in one piece. The wide straight piece goes on the bottom. I use two kinds of glues when building laser kits. The initial glue is ACC. My local hobby shop Hobbytown USA also sells an excellator in a pump bottle. Once you put down the glue you can hit it with the excellator and the glue sets up immediately.
I then go over the interior joints with Elmer’s wood glue for added strength. As you put down the framing around the doors and windows make sure the frame is centered horizontally and vertically in the opening. If not move it in place so the windows and doors look right when they are added. If you get the trim off, borrow your wife’s or SO’s hairdryer and go over the trim with a warm or hot setting – this will soften the glue on the back of the trim and you can move it to where it better fits.
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As you can see the basic building and trim goes together quite quickly. Laying down the shingles and making up the windows is where the time goes on building a depot.
Sub-roof glued together. Make sure the scribed part is facing down. [attachment=35:2kmm9x0x]image.jpeg[/attachment:2kmm9x0x][attachment=34:2kmm9x0x]image.jpeg[/attachment:2kmm9x0x]
Trim is finished; I had to make some cuts on the freight door end trim to get it to fit and used some small scraps from the trim pieces to complete the front of the bay window. [attachment=33:2kmm9x0x]image.jpeg[/attachment:2kmm9x0x]
[attachment=32:2kmm9x0x]image.jpeg[/attachment:2kmm9x0x][attachment=31:2kmm9x0x]image.jpeg[/attachment:2kmm9x0x]I picked up some Tamiya Flat White and will spray the building, windows and doors next. Once they are dry I’ll glue them in the interior with wood glue. ACC will fog the clear plastic windows[attachment=30:2kmm9x0x]image.jpeg[/attachment:2kmm9x0x].
Building the roof. Mark on the bottom scribed piece which end is the waiting room and which is the freight room. This will ensure you don’t get the tabs wrong or the roof facing the wrong direction. Just for added insurance, write on the larger roof pieces which faces the waiting room so the chimney opening is in the right spot, you don’t want the pot belly stove heating the freight room and not your telegrapher/agent or passengers.
As you glue down the four roof pieces do not glue the pieces to the tabs or to the interior bracing of the roof. This allows the roof pieces to be slightly movable so its easy to line up the joints. Also don’t glue the bottom of the roof to the flat ceiling part; you’ll do this as one of your last steps so it sits flush on the top the walls. I use ACC gap filling glue and the excellator pump bottle for building the roof; the excellator allows the glue to set up immediately (Hobbytown has both) in stock. Once you are satisfied that the roof pieces are uniform file down any high areas where the ACC dried in the joints so the roof surface is smooth. Then go over the ACC’d joints with Elmer’s wood glue for additional strength. You don’t want these glue joints coming apart as you lay down the single strips and the Elmer’s gives you this added insurance.
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Once the wood glue has dried take a metal ruler and mark off a number of horizontal lines as reference points for adding the shingles. These aren’t were the singles necessary go but they are to ensure the shingles maintain a straight line as you put them down.
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[attachment=25:2kmm9x0x]image.jpeg[/attachment:2kmm9x0x][attachment=24:2kmm9x0x]image.jpeg[/attachment:2kmm9x0x]Rick Eckert emailed me saying the bay window did not have trim on the corners. The kit erroneously has trim on the sides so I assumed it would on the front too. I removed the pieces with a new single edged razor blade and puttied the seams; sand and paint this area to match the rest of the corners.
[attachment=23:2kmm9x0x]image.jpeg[/attachment:2kmm9x0x][attachment=22:2kmm9x0x]image.jpeg[/attachment:2kmm9x0x]The windows are next. I like to make the glazing two separate pieces so the windows look to be double hung. The addition of the Windows goes pretty quick as there’s so few to do. The two small windows in the bay window are a trick to get in but not too bad. Just remember to add Elmer’s white glue so you don’t accidentally push the Windows into the interior while handling the depot during construction and in the future.
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Windows and doors are in[attachment=18:2kmm9x0x]image.jpeg[/attachment:2kmm9x0x][attachment=17:2kmm9x0x]image.jpeg[/attachment:2kmm9x0x].
Tackling the shingles:
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Making up the station sign boards. I use Excel and Arial font 10 high and print off on regular paper This is very close to the MP lettering and scales out to the right height. Cut out the station name and place on one of the three sign boards in the kit. I then sand the top and bottom of the board so everything is straight. For the boards framing around the sign use Evergreen 1″ X 4″ strips ACC’d on to the top, bottom and both sides. Mark in pencil the center of the depot end (12′) and mark the center on the sign on top of the frame and ACC in place.
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