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| My grain elevator Penny Model built in '74 |
I’ve always been fascinated by Challenge Publications’ Railroad Modeller magazine that was published in the ‘70s. Back then the first issue I saw was Jan ’74, and the last was May ’74. I never saw any again throughout the ‘70s. A few years ago I acquired what I think is a complete set of Railroad Modeler’s entire run, and it’s been great to be able to read them ‘on demand’. Recently I decided to go through the entire collection again. This time around their Penny Model Project series caught my interest.
Back in the day I built the series’ grain elevator model that appeared in the Feb ’74 issue. It turns out E. L. Moore’s Clarabel Hotel was also in that issue, so that was an exciting month for me :-) What I didn’t realize then was that the grain elevator was the first of the magazine’s Penny Model Projects, where according to the editor, each model is designed to be built for under one dollar total cost and still achieve the look and scale of a custom built structure. It turns out that $1 in 1974 is about equal to $5.25 today.
From my reading it looks like there were 10 articles in the series, where most were written by Ron Tarjany. Here’s the list of articles I’ve found, and, as always, if you know of any I’ve forgotten, please let me know:
Build a Paper Grain Elevator; Rudy Ruckert; Feb ’74
Constitution Savings & Loan; Ron Tarjany; Sept ’74
Railroad Storage Sheds; Ron Tarjany; Dec ’74
New England Vintage Storeroom; Bill James Jr.; Jan ’75
A Different Water Tower; Ron Tarjany; Mar ’75
1930’s Gas Station; Ron Tarjany; July ’75
Industrial Warehouse; Ron Tarjany; Feb ’76
Gold Mine; Ron Tarjany; Nov ’76
Handcar House; Ron Tarjany; Apr ’77
Box Car Freight House; Ron Tarjany; Sept ’77
There’re a variety of structure types and materials involved in these projects, but one aspect that is constant throughout is the structure walls are drawn as one continuous strip on a length of moderately heavy cardboard, with the wall corners scored for folding. In some cases other materials were glued over the cardboard superstructure to provide a finished surface, and in others the cardboard was left as is and just painted. The grain elevator was one project in the ‘just painted’ group.
The folded cardboard wall strip method wasn’t new to the Penny Model Project, and has been used by many other model builders. John Allen used it in his engine house project that appeared in the October, November, and December 1948 issues of The Model Craftsman, and I have no doubt it predated that famous series.
There were also other Railroad Modeler projects that made use of the cardboard wall strip method that didn’t appear as Penny Model Projects. Two of the more interesting ones were Mark Henley’s Big Tujunga’s Tiny Depot and Depot at the Crossing that appeared in the Jan ’78 and Feb ’78 issues respectively. The cardboard wall strip method of structure construction seemed to be something of a minor house style at Railroad Modeler.
One of my favourite model railroads, John Olson’s Cielo Logging Co., appears in the Jan ’74 issue. In the article Mr. Olson mentions how he built the layout’s structures: Most are made from artist’s illustration board about 1/16” thick. I use standard techniques, most from early articles and early progression model building before the plastics and other media were available I use those because the go together fast. I do them on a drafting table with a sliding parallel and you can build a structure in four to five hours, whereas it takes that long now to put together a plastic kit by the time you’re done painting it and adding a few details…All the buildings are good “foundation” buildings to which details and finishing aspects can be added later.
I’ve wondered what his use of the phrase early progression model building meant. Looking around, I think he was referring to applying something like the cardboard strip method where the structure is built up in a progression of steps and layers on the strip and then folded - or maybe cut out, reinforced, and then assembled - into the building prior to final finishing. I suspect walls of 1/16” artist illustration board couldn’t be folded into a structure, but would need to be cut out, possibly reinforced, and then assembled. One common feature of these models appears to be that interior detailing wasn’t a priority, and most seem to be closed boxes. Although, the models do look good.
Compare this to the more-or-less standard E. L. Moore method where each wall is cut from balsa - possibly two pieces for each wall with their grains at 90 degrees - and built up until a ‘kit’ is obtained where the individual components are glued together to make the building - his articles often featured a ‘kit’ photo of the walls prior to being glued together. A typical E. L. Moore project claimed to take 2 weeks of spare time, but an Olson project was claimed at 4 or 5 hours. However, a Moore project was likely a more complete model, often with an interior.
Another apparent variation on the progression / cardboard wall strip method are Doug Leffler’s classic wooden buildings and rolling stock built up from various thicknesses of Strathmore Bristol board. He explains his method in Modeling with Strathmore in the July ’73 issue of Railroad Model Craftsman, and you can find a number of excellent projects in these RMC articles of his,
CNR Wood Caboose, Feb ’72
Branchline Station; Aug ’72
Multi-purpose MofW Car; Jan ’73
Building a Tool and Section Car House; Feb ’74.
In those projects the superstructures are made from 4-ply Strathmore Bristol, and after a certain amount of layout and finishing on the drawing board, the walls are cut out and reinforced prior to assembly.
Overall, it looks like the Penny Projects were based on creative simplifications of an older, but quite effective technique for making model buildings. Good for a young beginner like me at the time to get a start. Even if his efforts weren’t that good, at least a complete model resulted in short order :-)
I never subscribed to folded cardboard walls. It's essential to have square corners and correct wall lengths and I think folding corners prohibits this. It may save some time gluing walls together, but Elmers dries quick enough to keep the project moving.
ReplyDeleteI agree. On the models I've tried the method, I've used thin cardboard which minimizes material bunching in the corners when folded. I was looking through Chris Pilton's Cottage Modelling for Pendon last night as the models in that book use the cardboard wall strip method. Prior to folding he carves out a V on the inside surface of a corner prior to folding so a square folded edge results. I think I would have trouble mastering that technique.
DeleteWow, I agree it's sounds difficult to cut v grooves in corners. I've never even pictured folding into the cut side; I always thought they meant folding away from the cuts. Folding in- you get bunching, like you said. Folding out- you get an open-air channel in the corners with questionable wall lengths.
ReplyDeleteWith fully cut sides, you still have to subtract 2 wall thicknesses from the side wall lengths. BUT, if you stack the like-length walls above another on the cardboard (or illustration board or whatever), you're assured they're the same length even if it's not precise to the plans.
It's definitely cleaner and more precise to cut individual walls. I've used the wall strip method on Cal's Cabbage Co. (HO), and a couple N scale builds (Dilly's I folded & Bert's I cut the walls). The cardboard was thin in all, but the folded ones did have bunching issues, although small ones)
DeleteI use similar fool-proof methods on windowpane making. I don't rule the windowpanes onto the glass material until I make an inside tracing of each window-- one per wall, if possible. That way, the outer edge frames match each particular window... even if they're not exactly the same. But then I draw parallel horizontal panes across the wall window-template so as the window frames match, so do the basic group of windowpanes along the length of the wall.
ReplyDeleteFor years, I was happy a thin brush and acrylic paint for window panes. Over acetate from discarded packaging. It does work; I'd first tape the acetate over the personalized window template (made from the wall opening tracings) and hold a steel straight edge parallel to the lines in a 45 degree angle, resting on the work surface. A starter practice stroke to get the paint flowing, then across the acetate surface. Worked great!
Until it aged 20 years. Then the cheap acetate turned yellow. You've seen "mint on card" collector toys? Try keeping that acetate clear; I can't! So now I've got white paper window shades and white window signs behind my "glass".... which turns everything white (behind it) into yellow. Can't fix it now.
Or, to rephrase that:
Won't fix it now. "Yellow looks fine," he says with clenched teeth.
Rereading my post above, it's ironic that I claim I use "fool-proof" methods. Yeah, like yellow "glass".
ReplyDeleteI have a few models from the old days and I think I'm going to have a close look at their windows to see how they've aged.
DeleteIt seems that Ron Tarjany was a prolific writer in his day. I would love to read some of his articles on building from paper. I was introduced to Tarjany by reading his Trackside Structures, Vol. 1, 1979. I have built several structures from this volume.
ReplyDeleteI am still fascinated with the idea of building from pager and have several of these type of structures on my workbench right now
Great post.
Thanks for the kind words! You're right, Ron Tarjany was quite prolific and did far more than most of the Penny Model projects in RM. RT, along with Mark Henley and T. E. Stephenson seemed to have a lot of interesting projects published in RM back in the 70s. I'll have to see if I can find a copy of that book by RT - thanks for the tip!
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