It felt weird not having posted anything at all for over four weeks. We got a lot of snow recently and my son's week-long break from school sort of required all of my attention and focus on him. Beyond that I had to play catch-up, but I am back now and I aim to keep this blog alive!
Thus far, not many people have discovered this little page, but I intend to provide enough useful information to make it worthy of your frequent visits. While the material covered will be targeting beginners, you may find a few useful posts and ideas even if you have passed beyond the entry level. Very soon I will begin reviewing building kits that I put together myself, so please be patient with me as I am trying to create a "template" that will make future reviews easy for me to write and interesting for you to read.
Let me begin with a very tiny review of a kit that I built several weeks ago and made available on eBay for sale. At the time of this writing it is still available, and if you are interested you can find it if you search for "HO Scale Built-Up Kit - Model Power Burlington Mills Factory" - item number 151239623028. In the photos below you can see the finished product, minus the signs, which I didn't glue on purpose; the buyer may have a different use in mind. I used acrylic paints and the colors are very close to what the unpainted kit looks like.
Admittedly, I could have done a better job with the roof "accessories", but that would be an easy fix for someone who has basic skills in building kits.
I think that the right side (relative to the front; seen below) turned out nicely and fairly realistic. I decided against the recommended plans because I wanted to have one side store window only. The rest could be used as storage and therefore the need for windows diminishes; you don't want the thieves to break directly into your storage room :)
A couple of "aerial" shots of the buildings showing the rear, left and right sides of the finished kit. Probably it would have been a great idea to use ballast on the roof, but maybe next time I will consider that.
The rear of the building is pretty realistic, I think. What most of us would expect from an industrial-looking urban structure. Yes, I said "urban" because of the store front.
Once more, the left side of the building (photo below). A little deviation from the original plan, but it looks better, I think. Again, sealed windows on the ground floor provide additional safety, in my opinion. Maybe an adjacent single-story building could be considered, possibly with a small alley.
The above kit was purchased as part of a 3-kit bid on eBay. No, it wasn't 3-kits-for-the-price-of-one, but it was a decent deal. Along with one more identical kit, I now have four of them in my possession, although I intend to keep two of them and sell the other two. My choice of colors will be different next time.
Model Power did a good job providing a nice and easy to work with building kit. In some cases I had to use a file to smoothen the edges, but this is the case with many kits. Once I did that, everything came together easily. I feared that the stairs were going to be a little more challenging, but at the end they turned out to be easy to assemble. Let's now look at the steps taken to assemble and paint the kit.
Step 1
The very first thing I did was to soak all the parts in warm water and soap; a highly recommended step for ALL kits, sealed or otherwise. Let the kit parts dry very well before you do anything with them.
Step 2
Ran a thin light color (close to beige) wash to accentuate the details and crevices of the structure and create the mortar lines.
Step 3
Dry brushed the exterior, thus highlighting the brick walls and add some depth to the building.
Step 4
Primed the smaller parts, including the window frames, the base and the roof; this could be done after Step 1, actually. From assembling another kit, I found that it is hard to do the mortar lines if everything is primed, but this depends on the material used. More on that in the future. Also, I took care not to prime areas where glue needed to be applied.
Step 5
Painted all the smaller parts (i.e. staircases) with the color of my choice, which was very close to the original. In the future, I will need to re-work this step because I think the results will be better if I glue the parts together, then prime and paint them (see Step 10).
Step 6
Glued the window frames and added the "glass". The latter is nothing more than regular see-through plastic that comes with a variety of things, like toys, cake/cookie boxes, etc. I sprayed the clear plastic sheet beforehand with matte finish to create a glazed window effect and used a regular adhesive to place it behind the windows. I have to admit that the inside of the frames made it a little hard for me to glue the windows easily because the surface was a little "raised" instead of being completely smooth, but once the glue dries there is no problem. Also, glue helps enhance the "glazed window" effect and since it dries clear don't be afraid to spill it all over. Stay clear from the exterior walls and outside frame, though. Don't bother with Clear Parts glues if you used the aforementioned plastic as glass.
Step 7
Painted the roof dark gray and the base lighter gray, but you can use your imagination and paint them with colors that make more sense to you. Just try to be consistent with the sidewalk color if you plan to use your building on a layout.
Step 8
Glued the walls and roof together - the front consists of two parts: store front and the top two floors. Paid extra attention to ensure that there were no gaps in the corners and base of the building. Model Power seems to have done a good job because I didn't have to try hard to keep the pieces together. No visible gaps to speak of, except for the base. In this case I needed to do a little filing in a couple of spots.
Step 9
Assembled the roof components and glued them on the roof. Remember that the roof is exposed to the weather conditions a little more than the rest of the building, so weather it accordingly prior to adding the roof components. As part of this step, I weathered the exterior of the building. I added a darker tone in the areas underneath the windows, as well as the side pipe (better visible in the last photo).
Step 10
Lastly, I put together the fire escape ladders and added them to the building's facade.
Lessons learned
As usual, there are lessons to be learned from assembling this kit and they all apply to other kits.
Thus far, not many people have discovered this little page, but I intend to provide enough useful information to make it worthy of your frequent visits. While the material covered will be targeting beginners, you may find a few useful posts and ideas even if you have passed beyond the entry level. Very soon I will begin reviewing building kits that I put together myself, so please be patient with me as I am trying to create a "template" that will make future reviews easy for me to write and interesting for you to read.
Let me begin with a very tiny review of a kit that I built several weeks ago and made available on eBay for sale. At the time of this writing it is still available, and if you are interested you can find it if you search for "HO Scale Built-Up Kit - Model Power Burlington Mills Factory" - item number 151239623028. In the photos below you can see the finished product, minus the signs, which I didn't glue on purpose; the buyer may have a different use in mind. I used acrylic paints and the colors are very close to what the unpainted kit looks like.
Admittedly, I could have done a better job with the roof "accessories", but that would be an easy fix for someone who has basic skills in building kits.
I think that the right side (relative to the front; seen below) turned out nicely and fairly realistic. I decided against the recommended plans because I wanted to have one side store window only. The rest could be used as storage and therefore the need for windows diminishes; you don't want the thieves to break directly into your storage room :)
A couple of "aerial" shots of the buildings showing the rear, left and right sides of the finished kit. Probably it would have been a great idea to use ballast on the roof, but maybe next time I will consider that.
The rear of the building is pretty realistic, I think. What most of us would expect from an industrial-looking urban structure. Yes, I said "urban" because of the store front.
Once more, the left side of the building (photo below). A little deviation from the original plan, but it looks better, I think. Again, sealed windows on the ground floor provide additional safety, in my opinion. Maybe an adjacent single-story building could be considered, possibly with a small alley.
The above kit was purchased as part of a 3-kit bid on eBay. No, it wasn't 3-kits-for-the-price-of-one, but it was a decent deal. Along with one more identical kit, I now have four of them in my possession, although I intend to keep two of them and sell the other two. My choice of colors will be different next time.
Model Power did a good job providing a nice and easy to work with building kit. In some cases I had to use a file to smoothen the edges, but this is the case with many kits. Once I did that, everything came together easily. I feared that the stairs were going to be a little more challenging, but at the end they turned out to be easy to assemble. Let's now look at the steps taken to assemble and paint the kit.
Step 1
The very first thing I did was to soak all the parts in warm water and soap; a highly recommended step for ALL kits, sealed or otherwise. Let the kit parts dry very well before you do anything with them.
Step 2
Ran a thin light color (close to beige) wash to accentuate the details and crevices of the structure and create the mortar lines.
Step 3
Dry brushed the exterior, thus highlighting the brick walls and add some depth to the building.
Step 4
Primed the smaller parts, including the window frames, the base and the roof; this could be done after Step 1, actually. From assembling another kit, I found that it is hard to do the mortar lines if everything is primed, but this depends on the material used. More on that in the future. Also, I took care not to prime areas where glue needed to be applied.
Step 5
Painted all the smaller parts (i.e. staircases) with the color of my choice, which was very close to the original. In the future, I will need to re-work this step because I think the results will be better if I glue the parts together, then prime and paint them (see Step 10).
Step 6
Glued the window frames and added the "glass". The latter is nothing more than regular see-through plastic that comes with a variety of things, like toys, cake/cookie boxes, etc. I sprayed the clear plastic sheet beforehand with matte finish to create a glazed window effect and used a regular adhesive to place it behind the windows. I have to admit that the inside of the frames made it a little hard for me to glue the windows easily because the surface was a little "raised" instead of being completely smooth, but once the glue dries there is no problem. Also, glue helps enhance the "glazed window" effect and since it dries clear don't be afraid to spill it all over. Stay clear from the exterior walls and outside frame, though. Don't bother with Clear Parts glues if you used the aforementioned plastic as glass.
Step 7
Painted the roof dark gray and the base lighter gray, but you can use your imagination and paint them with colors that make more sense to you. Just try to be consistent with the sidewalk color if you plan to use your building on a layout.
Step 8
Glued the walls and roof together - the front consists of two parts: store front and the top two floors. Paid extra attention to ensure that there were no gaps in the corners and base of the building. Model Power seems to have done a good job because I didn't have to try hard to keep the pieces together. No visible gaps to speak of, except for the base. In this case I needed to do a little filing in a couple of spots.
Step 9
Assembled the roof components and glued them on the roof. Remember that the roof is exposed to the weather conditions a little more than the rest of the building, so weather it accordingly prior to adding the roof components. As part of this step, I weathered the exterior of the building. I added a darker tone in the areas underneath the windows, as well as the side pipe (better visible in the last photo).
Step 10
Lastly, I put together the fire escape ladders and added them to the building's facade.
Lessons learned
As usual, there are lessons to be learned from assembling this kit and they all apply to other kits.
- Prime everything except for the exterior walls, unless you use chalk pastels for the mortar lines. I missed to prime the door in the rear of the building and the store front, which made it harder for the acrylic paint to stick well.
- Assemble the fire escape ladders and then prime them; keep the stairs separate, though, and only "install" them at the end.
- Spray the building a couple of times with matte finish, but leave some time between the two applications. I didn't apply any finish, in case the buyer prefers to do other things to the building, but chances are you will want to apply matte finish once you are done.
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