Elmer Lane 6 - Some Roundhouse End Walls

 DB continues:

As mentioned previously, the printing out of the 'window panes' (an Excel spreadsheet, using the latest technology) onto acetate in my $60 laser printer has been an iterative process. 

My roundhouse segments are a little wider at the far-end-walls than the scaled prototype, because of the Kato Turntable's broader track exit angles. My initial plan, and the first set of 'windows' that I successfully printed a week ago, had the spreadsheet drawn up to look like the prototype in terms of the numbers/sizes of the three casements of panes, and then I added a bit of plain 'wall' either side of the windows to pad things out to the needed 7cm width of each segment end wall. 

The roundhouse side wall (built an episode or two ago), was then made more or less to match those windows in total height, but laid out more or less like the prototype.

Today, comparing my 'padded end wall' printouts with some pictures of the glorious 'wall of glass' that the back of the real Elmer Lane roundhouse was, I decided to redraw the spreadsheet. Damning the prototype plans to rivet-counter hell, I made the back glass 6 panes vertically (to match the sides), and then basically filled the back wall width as much as practical with glass. I think this more closely captures the feel of the real thing. You will probably have seen pictures of steam locos nosed into these end walls. For example on page 27 of Linesider #7, or page 36 of A West Coast Engineman by Ian Tibbles among others.

So after a bit more trial and error, I had a sheet of acetate scaled and printed that looked ok up against the side wall I've already built. As with the side windows, this was Dullcoted on the inside (opposite the laser printed squares which are on the outside.)

From the previous session, I had enough leftover painted 'corrugated' bits already cut to the right height, so cut out four back wall segments out of the acetate sheet to make up. 

For the bit 'above the windows', which on the real thing is also made from the corrugated material, but on the model will be almost completely hidden under the eaves of the roof, I just used the dark stained stripwood rectangle pieces, again contact glued on to the acetate wall. 

Then the corrugated pieces were glued on the bottom, all with Ados F2 contact cement, the choice of a precision new generation of modelling neanderthals. And it smells good. 

I let this set for a generous two or three minutes before flipping the walls over and adding vertical 'beam' pieces on the edges of the interior out of the smallest (maybe 1.5 or 2mm square) stripwood that had been pre-darkened. I wondered if this would be enough to keep the windows flat or whether I'd have to add two extra pieces of strip in the middle to stop the windows bowing, but they seem OK at the moment.

These were also weighted down. Then it was simply a case of adding the window sill and the vertical bits out of red-painted plastic strip, which I almost immediately ran out of and had to paint more and hang it to dry mid-session. 

I reckon this don't look too bad, and with the acetate segments guiding my way, it didn't take long to make them up. When its assembled for good, I will put a 'filler' bit of red plasticard strip in over the top of the window join, as mocked up over the top-right join below (it will be cut to size):

I've blacked the edges of the corrugated stuff and stripwood with a Sharpie, so I'm hoping I won't have to fill those joins at all when the walls come together, but we shall see. I'll have to modify some of the reinforcing stripwood by bevelling a bit off at the join between the side wall and the first end wall so they mate up nice and close.

So that's four segment walls done in a couple of hours, and I have another 8 or so cut out of acetate. If I have a total of 15 or 16 segments in the roundhouse, I probably only need to make up another 6-8 of these as the rest will be 'around the back' away from prying eyes. Plus there were three 'workshop extension' segments on the prototype plus one that had a door, so these could all just be solid wall. We shall see as it comes together.