A swimming pool is certain to add interest to your layout
A swimming pool is not something you see on every layout. Lighted from below, it attracts your attention immediately, and it is so unique that I gave it a central location on my layout. The people you see in the water are 1:48 scale white metal figures by Arttista. The people standing around the pool are1:43 scale by Preiser. But you really don’t have to build a large community pool to use this technique. This method can be used for a backyard pool, a fountain or any small body of clean water.
Time and Difficulty
This swimming pool is easy to make, but will probably take a couple of days to construct.
What You’ll Need
foam core board
hot melt glue
a sheet of blue translucent acrylic, slightly textured
a small white LED or light bulb
heavy card stock
poolside figures
poolside graphics
Build a Box
For the pool structure, cut a rectangular pool deck to the dimensions of your overall pool area (pool opening and surrounding pavement) from foam core board., My deck is 6″ x 9″. Cut an opening in the pool deck the size of your pool. My pool is 4″ x 6″ (a scale 16′ x 24′). Cover the entire opening of the pool deck with the blue plastic sheet. Cut four pool walls, and construct an open box that will fit within the dimensions of the pool deck opening. In the center of the back wall, make a small hole for the bulb. Place the pool deck on the layout board and mark the dimensions. Cut a hole in your layout board slightly larger than your box dimensions and glue the box inside. Alternately, you can glue the box underneath your pool deck and fit it inside the hole., with accurate measuring and cutting, you can glue the foam core box flush inside the pool deck opening. Hot glue holds well and you only have to tack it; the foam core is not very heavy. You don’t have to worry about small gaps, you can cover the foam core deck with an optional heavy card stock “deck pavement”.
Pave the Pool Area
Cut heavy card stock to make the pavement around your pool. Cut an inner opening the size of your pool. I would make a the outer dimension a minimum of four feet (one inch scale) for a home walkway or up to six feet (3/4″ scale) for a commercial/public pool. Twelve feet (3″ scale) makes a good-sized area for sunning. For finishing details, you can add figures, a cooler, beach towel graphics, a fence, and wooden decking. Then pour yourself a Piña Colada and enjoy your new pool.
A stack of fire wood is a simple detail that can be repeated in numerous places on you layout, and yet they will never be out of place, and it will never seem like there are too many. A stack of fire wood works nicely beside any residence, a campground, or an outdoor business, like a produce stand or flea market,
Time and Difficulty
A super-simple project that can be completed in a few minutes.
Select Hardwoods
The best looking fire wood is made of real wood. There are two criteria I look for a natural wood twig to use for firewood. First, a tight grain and second, an outer layer that looks like tree bark. A tight grain is necessary so the the cut wood retains its solid, wood-like appearance. Some twig varieties will fray or split on the ends giving an unacceptable appearance. The second quality is a nice outer bark. Not only should the outer layer look like actual tree bark, but it should not fall off when it dries.
I have found three plants varieties that produce tight-grained non-fibrous twigs with an outer layer that resembles tree bark. The three varieties I recommend are:
Maple
Dogwood
Azalea
The twigs of the Azalea and the Dogwood (right) have an amazing looking bark that looks very natural and to scale.
The Dogwood tree produces twigs that can be split open to look exactly like split logs.
Once you’ve selected the wood, use a jig to cut it to length. Wider pieces can be split, just like real wood. Use carpenter’s glue to stack and secure your woodpile.
The Bachmann Brothers plastic company began producing the O-scale Plasticville small gas station in 1950. Its initial production spanned the years 1950-1954 and it was reissued again in 1967. The assembled structure measured 8 ¼” long x 2X ½” deep and 2 ¾” high. That’s a scale depth of 10 feet. A typical American automobile is 14 ½ feet long and the average single car garage is 12′ x 22′, so you can see that the small Plasticville gas station is severely under-sized. In fact, a scale car or truck is about 4 ¾ inches long; 2 ¼ inches longer than the bay. Additionally, the station’s bay doors are too narrow and the roof to low to look real. This article tells how I remedied those problems.
Time and Difficulty
The goal of this modification is to make the garage bay large enough to accommodate a 1:43 – 1:48 scale car or truck and give the station a more realistic appearance overall. This project will take moderate model building skills and a day or more to complete.
What You’ll Need
A Plasticville small Gas Station
a hobby or razor saw
a ruler
a jeweler’s file
1/8″ thick foam-core poster board (10″ x 10″min)
razor or hobby knife
white or Carpenter’s glue
Tacky Glue (see recommendation)
hot glue gun and glue sticks
Styrene sheet with concrete block texture (see sources)
Clear Plastic sheet (can be cut from discarded blister packs)
Grandt Line 18-pane Factory window (optional)
strip styrene, 4″ scale width
clean fine sand
aluminum foil, cut to 2 x 3 inches
18 volt GE-1813 incandescent bulb and socket or L.E.D.
18 volt grain-of-wheat bulb and shade
printed graphics (see link at the end of this post)
resin-cast detail items
white chalk paint
glossy enamel paint in your station’s color
light grey or tan flat acrylic paint
Building Modification
Begin by cutting the front wall of the gas station apart between the entrance door and the first bay door. Be sure to cut all the way through the wall as vintage Plasticville material is usually quite brittle and does not snap cleanly like modern styrene.
Measure from the outside wall to your cut. Carefully transfer the measurement to the roof and rear wall sections and cut them as well. Set aside the office walls and the short section of roof to reassemble the office. You could potentially use the front and rear walls of the garage section and just cut new side walls and roof, but I decided to cut an entirely new garage bay from foam core board.
After cutting the front wall, you will find the name “Plasticville” is split between the two sections. Take a jeweler’s file and remove the raised letters “Plasticville” from above the door on the front wall.
Build A New Bay from Foam Core
To construct a new scale 17′ x 22′ scale bay for the station, cut the following pieces from a sheet of 1/8″ foam-core posterbord:
Two 4 ½” x 2 ½” panels for the front and rear wall
Two 5 ½” x 2 ½” panels for the side walls
One 4 ½” x 5 ½” roof panel
Use Tacky glue to attach sheets of textured Evergreen Styrene to the wall panels. Trim to fit. Use Tacky glue or hot glue to assemble the four wall panels together to make a box 4 ½” x 5 ½” box 2 ½” high. I painted the block walls a chalky white. Cut an opening for a Grandt Line Factory Window in the side wall of the garage. If you do not have a Grandt Line window, you can cut a donor window from a Plasticville airport hangar or a Plasticville Bank. Again, be sure to cut all the way through as Plasticville material is brittle and will not snap cleanly like modern styrene.
Glue a scale 4″ band of strip styrene horizontally about one-third the way up the wall as a construction detail. Paint it with a glossy paint. I painted it a contrasting glossy red. Recess the roof section about 1/8″ from the top of the box, and glue it into place. Cover the roof top with white glue and sift on a layer of fine sand to resemble roofing gravel. When it dries, paint it with light grey or tan acrylic paint to both color it and seal it down. Hint: do not use black or dark grey for the roof; it should appear sun-faded.
Modify the Bay Doors
The stock red Plasticville garage doors are too narrow for O scale, so use a razor saw to trim the edges and join the two garage doors into a single, wider door. Glue a strip of styrene across the back side of the joint to reinforce the junction and keep it straight.
Reconstruct the Office
Turning your attention back to the office, file off the window tabs that hold the cardboard window insert. Use Tacky glue to glue together a frame of 4″ scale strip styrene and glue a piece of clear plastic to the inside of the opening. Glue another piece of clear plastic to the inside of the door opening. Use Tacky glue to cover the inside roof portion with the aluminum foil. This will help distribute the interior lighting later. Print the graphics sheet (see the link at the end of this post).
Cut out the interior wall graphics and glue to the side and rear walls. The sheet includes wall calendars, signage, and both a wooden floor and a tile floor graphic for you to choose from. When everything is dry, glue the office together with hot glue.Paint the office with chalky white and a gloss color to match the bay.
Cut a large hole in the side wall of the foam core garage bay where the office will attach. This is to let light into the bay. Attach the office to the garage bay section with hot glue.
Lighting
Here you have a choice of lighting. I used a single GE-1813 type, 18 volt incandescent bulb in a bayonet base to light the interior. I hot-glued the bulb base on the ceiling between the office and the bay so the lamp would light both interiors. Alternatively, you could use two white LEDs with a current limiting resistor (see my article on lighting with LEDs).
Drill a small hole in the front bay wall directly over the center of the door opening and fish the wires of a grain-of-wheat bulb with shade through to the inside. Again, you could use a super-white LED for this. (A super-white will throw a spot of light on the ground in front of the station). Solder or tape the leads to the wires that connect in parallel to the GE-1813 bulb, or other LEDs, and run the wires for both lamps down the inside corner of the back wall. Secure with hot glue. You can leave the wires bare for the connection, but I recommend you build an electrical junction instead.
Add Finishing Touches
I painted the layout base where the garage bay would sit a concrete grey and dripped some blackish-brown wash on for oil stains. I glued the checkerboard graphic to the base where the office would sit. In front, I placed a surplus tire from a model kit mounted in a frame built using scraps of styrene. I glued a resin-cast tool cabinet (of unknown manufacture) to the side of the office. I reused the Plasticville oil cans, but scratch-built modern fuel pumps. I glued pump graphics to the face of the pumps. I added resin castings of oil drums, boxes and tires to the back, and added foliage and weeds to complete the station transformation.
The Graphics for this Project
This PDF File includes all the graphics used in this project.
The toy company, ERTL, makes a highly detailed 1947 International truck cab in their Vintage Vehicles Series. The model features a die-cast metal frame and body, free-rolling plastic wheels with rubber tires, and clear plastic windshield and headlight lenses. It is quite easy to find one for sale and not terribly expensive. I have only seen it offered in bright glossy yellow with glossy brown fenders.
1947 International K-12 Semi-Cab by ERTL
The ERTL truck is a very nice model and makes a great foundation for a work or farm truck on an O-scale layout. But fresh out-of-the-box, the truck is shiny glossy new, which is never the case with an actual work truck.
Time and Difficulty
The goal of the modification is to make the ERTL truck more realistic in appearance. Commercial vehicles usually see rough treatment during their service life. The modified truck will be no exception. Time and use have aged the paint, and the fenders are no longer the smooth sweeping curves that left the factory. It will be fitted with a custom-made stake bed to allow it to haul a work load. The bed project takes one afternoon and requires moderate skill. The body repaint takes two days and requires intermediate skills with a rotary tool .
What You’ll Need
An ERTL die cast 1947 International K-12 Semi-Cab
resin-castings (oil drums, gas cans)
wooden cubes, 1 inch square and smaller
1/8″ – 1/16″ wood strips
carpenter’s glue
rotary tool with sanding, grinding and polishing bits
isopropyl alcohol
paper towels
Age-It wood stain or black ink wash
flat paints in various colors
paint brushes
masking tape
Modify the Truck Body
There are two steps to modifying the body: aging the body and repainting. The aging process entails adding signs of wear to the body. The evidence will be dents in the sheet metal, and maybe loss of a side mirror. It is entirely up to you and requires a little skill with a rotary grinder and a good eye.
Customized with a stake bed
You can’t just take a hammer to cast steel models and create dents. At best, the blows will do nothing, and at worst you will crack the casting. Dents have to actually be cut into the metal with a coarse grinding stone. With a grinding bit in your rotary tool, begin grinding each dent into the fender or sheet metal. You’ll have to remove quite a bit of material to make a realistic dent, but be careful not to grind all the way though the casting or your dent will become a hole.
This step may seem strange, but once you have given the dent the rough shape you want, switch to a polishing bit. Coat the bit with polishing paste and polish the dent down to a mirror-smooth surface. Clean with alcohol and a dry paper towel to remove the polishing paste and prepare for paint. Cover the windows, tires, wheels and headlight lenses with masking tape and paint the truck a light, flat color. Light colors look best because, just as in real life, dark colors tend to fade over time.
Build the Truck Bed
Because the Semi-Cab doesn’t come with a bed or trailer, you’ll need to build one from scratch. The bed boards should be be between 3″ and 12″ wide. The bed itself should be between 48 and 66 full scale inches wide. I don’t typically measure the bed width; I just make sure it completely covers the dual rear tires. Cut the bed boards to length and lay them out side-by-side. Use Carpenter’s glue to secure two or three more sticks perpendicular to the boards to hold them in place.
Use Tacky glue or cyano glue to fasten two thick wooden sticks to the metal truck frame. Paint or stain all the wood surfaces with flat paint, Age-It or an ink wash. You can glue resin castings, small wooden cubes, and thin jewelry chain onto the bed for additional interest.
Finishing Details
Once the truck body has been painted, remove the masks and prepare for final detailing. From the top down:
Paint the cab marker lights with flat silver (or leave the body color) and the lenses bright amber.
Consider removing a headlamp.
Paint unnaturally bright plated parts with gloss silver to tone them down.
Consider a rust-colored wash and other weathering techniques.
Add resin-cast or hand-made detail items.
The ERTL International semi-cab is a fine O scale truck model right out of the box, but with a bit of time and effort, the looks of the truck can be transformed into a realistic representation of a road-ravaged commercial workhorse.
