Reconnecting the Ocean Park module

The Ocean Park module has been hanging on a wall in the basement since late last March. Back then I thought that around September I'd take it down to begin preparations for Christmas showings of the layout. That was all scuttled. I haven't assembled all the modules since last March. So, for no other reason than to see if all the modules could be reconnected I got Ocean Park off the wall and got to work. 

I was happy to see it connected just fine. There wasn't any warpage to any of the pieces. Last time I ran it the loop got its power from rail joiners from the Ocean Blvd line. Even though I had  soldered power leads to the loop I hadn't attached them to the main track power. That'll be the first job as I don't want to continue to rely on rail joiners at the module boundary for power.

Waiting

Waiting for the Ocean streetcar at the Mortimer subway station.

Customization gone very wrong

From that to this:

I was searching through my old spares box and came across the parts of a Lesney Mercedes-Benz 220SE that I had tried to 'customize' sometime back in the '70s. However, unlike the Maserati Mistral, I didn't have all the parts, and the ones I did have were pretty far gone. In a spirit of restoration - or maybe just being full of spirits :-) - I decided to superglue together what was left, and that improbable vehicle was what resulted.

It was -20C here last night. Driving around in that Mercedes would give new meaning to 'cool ride'.

Reviving an early project

It's hard for me to believe, but I did this little quasi-kitbash close to 12 years ago. The post documenting the completion of this project was the 13th one I published at this blog. Here I am 1,500+ posts later doing a little bit of clean up and revision on it. How time flies!

It has been sitting on a shelf for a few years gathering dust. I haven't made use of it recently as back then I had attached a permanent base that included a parking lot and chunk of sidewalk. That configuration didn't work on my new layouts. So, I decided to remove the 'permanent' base, salvage the figures and accessories, and fix up the building so it didn't need the base. That wasn't hard and only required a styrene 'concrete' slab be added under the front doors, and some ground-level sidewall repair to fill slots where the kit's base attached. After that work, and some serious dusting, it's ready to once again be part of a layout.

This is a test, this is only a test

I've got a number of big building projects in mind that involve large and elaborate facades of cut stone. I'm leaning towards using the old construction technique of building up facades with cardboard layers, but before diving into one of those intimidating buildings I thought I'd try out some of the methods on a smaller project.

I did a little of this sort of experimenting on the Thrifty's project, but it was much uglier than the big projects I have in mind. The old Art Metropole building on Yonge St. has features more in line with the styles I want to build, so I thought I'd try to make its facade as a test.

These days I think the Art Metropole has a payday loan company at street level and subdivided offices above. I'm going to back date the building a bit to be closer to that historic image I found on the internet. 

I've started on drawings. Over there is the first, but I think the middle windows need some adjustment. 

Full moon last night, so this is an auspicious start. I better get filled up on coffee! 
 

Steinberg on Ocean Blvd.

I spent some time fiddling with placing Steinberg's along Ocean Blvd. One thing's clear: I need to outfit the store with some sort of interior given that huge expanse of glass on the facade.  

Thrifty's is open for business!

Cold weather, snow, and a lockdown have helped me keep building. Over the weekend I took the opportunity to finish Thrifty's Yonge St. store.

Although they can't be seen in the opening photo, there are 2 dormers on the upper floor. It's some sort of mansard roof up there, along with 2 arched top dormers facing the street.

My dormers are based on window castings from Tichy Train. The ones I had in my spares box had many more mullions than the prototype, so most had to be cut off. Once that was done, two vertical mullions were cut for each window frame from 0.010" thick styrene and glued in place.

The dormers were laid out on 2-ply Strathmore Bristol board. These are basically the structural backings for each of the windows. 

The angles for the dormer side walls are measured from the drawing.

The dormer side walls are folded up once each piece is cut out. I used a scriber to etch the fold lines before cutting out the pieces.

 

The window frames were glued to the dormer walls, and then the complete assembly was glued to the wall on the uppermost floor. These units were painted black and outfitted with clear plastic windows prior to installation.

The semi-circular dormer roofs are cut from 3x5 card. You'll notice that these dormers are not exact replicas of the prototype. They're simplified representations. As they're not the focus of the model, I didn't feel like spending much time on them, and that entire area on the prototype is painted black, so there wouldn't be much to see anyway.

I papered the upper floor wall with self-adhesive block paper from Micro-Mark as I thought it had a nice texture that would work well up there. The problem turned out that the texturing was a little too subtle, and was mostly obliterated once painted flat black. Live and learn. 

The upper edge of the main wall was built up from pieces of card and balsa. Once all the elements were glued in place the whole thing was painted flat black.

The decorative fence along the top of the facade is made from Atlas' HO-scale keyhole fencing from my spares box. I'll replace it if I come across something a little more decorative - and cheap :-)

The interior is a picture of a jeans store interior I found on the internet - it isn't representative of the Thrifty's store in the '80s.

On many other builds I'd have separate light boxes for the main sign and the interior. This time I decided to use 'ambient' light and simply put a light on the underside of the roof and have it illuminate both areas.

Last year I bought some LED button lights from Amazon for the Canadian Press complex. I had one left and stuck it to the underside of the roof. It has a built in battery and an on-off switch. It'll conk out one day and need replacement - we'll see how long that takes.

One obvious problem with this approach is that the sign's interior structure, along with some internal balsa stiffeners cast a shadow on the inside upper part of the main sign, so illumination is not quite uniform. Doesn't look too bad, but it's not perfect.

I didn't spend anytime detailing the sides or back. As mentioned in a previous post, they were just covered with brick paper so they didn't look too odd.

Well, that's that. It didn't take as long as many projects I've undertaken, but it wasn't as fast as I had hoped. Small steps I guess.

PCC fleet emerges from the car barn

I spent a lot of time last week testing the PCC streetcars. Usually prior to Christmas I get them all out in preparation for our annual party, which includes hauling the layout modules up from the basement and running them in the living room. No such thing last Christmas. But, I got the urge to run trains last week so I pulled the streetcars out. Prior to check out I installed trolley pole ropes on them all so they'd look like they were running properly under the wires on Ocean Boulevard. In one streetcar I finally installed a TCS DCC decoder that had been on my shelf for 4 years (!) waiting for this day - luckily, the streetcar and its decoder ran flawlessly. Lubrications were done, wheels were cleaned, loops were run, and in the process I reacquainted myself with the various DCC functions on each. They still need exterior ad cards and a little mild weathering, but at least they're ready to run on the layout and look pretty for scene photos.

The Origins of The Dictionary of Non-Existent Model Railroad Terms*

Rare pre-production review copy of 1st ed.

It might be hard to believe, but there once was a time - over 60 years ago now - when The Dictionary of Non-Existent Model Railroad Terms was itself non-existent. The dictionary has gone through three editions and innumerable printings since its first release on Boxing Day, 1959. Since then it has been a fundamental reference work about model railroading’s more esoteric terms, ideas, and literature.

The decision to publish the dictionary was hatched in early 1959. In January of that year the four editors at 30 Squares’ forefather, 4 Squares**, got wind that the TMRC at MIT might soon publish their own model railroading dictionary***, and thought that 4 Squares’ long delayed plans for publishing one dealing with the odd and hidden aspects of the field might be overshadowed by the work of that illustrious institution.  

At the time, the DoNEMRT existed only as a set of 3x5 cards that the editors had collected over the course of many years. On each card was a word or idea that they thought had some significance to the field, which although not uncommon, were nevertheless not generally recognized in the literature of the time. Some cards noted findings from magazines, pamphlets, newsletters, and books, others were records of ideas from conversations and folkways. Sometimes cards, in the form of postcards, were mailed by readers and associates noting things that should be included in the dictionary. All the cards were housed in a massive wooden cabinet in the Railtorium.

After many meetings, the editors decided to embark upon what they much later referred to as their moonshot program****: convert the cards into a manuscript and publish the dictionary by Christmas 1959 - they missed by one day, but that’s another story. Luckily a rather famous crooner and closet model railroad fanatic of the time covered the project’s costs when asked to finance the great undertaking. It allowed the four editors to embark on doing it their way. Regrets? They had a few, but too few to mention, and the dictionary was off to the printers by Labour Day. 

And the rest, as they say, is history.

*Fine print: This history is completely fictional and has no relation to any person, place, or thing living or dead. Any similarities or synchronicities are purely coincidental and likely figments of the imagination ; )

**It’s thought that the name, 4 Squares, was something of an homage to the Dave Brubeck Quartet, who would later in 1959 release the legendary album, Time Out; however, where exactly the name 4 Squares came from is a subject of much controversy. Refer to Lew Voltz’s definitive history of model railroading’s punk era, Gluestick Traces, for the full story.

***The TMRC Dictionary was published in June 1959. It was rather idiosyncratic to the club, but was highly significant in that it introduced the terms ‘hack’ and ‘hacker’, which were important terms in the early days of computer technology, and as we know, continue in general use today.

****In September 1962 President Kennedy committed the US to landing a man-on-the-moon, and it was later that month that the editors of the newly reorganized 7 Squares***** company assigned a name to what they had done back in 1959.

*****Some say the name 7 Squares was in honour of the Mercury Seven astronauts, and what was to be a brief sortie into all things to do with model rocketeering. Again, refer to Gluestick Traces for details**.

Horse drawn milk wagon, Toronto, 1930s (?) or 1940s (?)

No streetcars or hints of streetcars in this photo, although I was rather surprised by it. It's a Silverwood's horse drawn milk wagon and milkman making their rounds somewhere in 1930s or 1940s Toronto. I speculate the photo was shot by my uncle, near the family home on Leroy Ave., probably in the early 1940s or late 1930s. The milkman appears to be caught mid-stride. The horse looks a bit dejected, or maybe is just resigned to its job. Toronto is looking rather bucolic in this picture.

Vacationist

Vacationist: A model builder who works on projects while on vacation.

Usage: The kit’s balance of detail and straightforward construction made it a vacationist’s dream project.

Source: The word was first used by Gladys “Butch” Grabert in her July 15, 1951 Model Trains article, An Athearn Reefer: This new Athearn refrigerator car kit is an excellent one for the beginner or vacationist. It gives the modeler plenty to do and at the same time requires but a minimum of tools. The most thorough demonstration of what it means to be a vacationist is presented by Bill Hoffmann, Jr. in his October 1972 Traction & Models article, Vacation with Hoffmann. In it Mr. Hoffmann describes his 1971 family vacation in the mountains of Alpine County, California, where interspersed with trout fishing, mountain climbing, and other family-type activities he managed to build 11 O-scale P.E. 800 Class cars outside their cabin on a very rustic looking 2’x4’ table over a 3 week trip.

from The Dictionary of Non-Existent Model Railroad Terms, 2nd ed., 1999.

Just There: Lessons from streetcar scenes in Winnipeg

I'm always impressed by the detail in old black-and-white photos. Scanning them and enlarging the resulting images seems to always yield interesting details and surprises. 

Over the past few days I've posted a few images of Winnipeg's Portage & Main that my uncle shot in the 1940s. Each included a streetcar, so I decided to blow up the streetcar section to see what there was to see. Over there on the left is the intersection of Portage & Main with a streetcar on each thoroughfare.

And here are a couple of streetcars on Portage, obscured by automobiles and pedestrians, but still clearly visible.

And finally, here's a streetcar just peeking out of the left side of the image near The Bank of Hamilton on Main St..

I think what's important in all three is that they include streetcars not by deliberate choice, but because they happened to be there when my uncle was shooting pictures of other things that interested him. They were an everyday part of the world in that era, so naturally they're just there. It's that feeling of 'just there' that I'm looking for in my model photos. Just there if I'm looking out of an office window. Just there if I'm walking across an intersection. Just there if I'm going to the bank. Just there.

Notes on transfer tape

I've had a few discussions and email exchanges with Martin and others about transfer tape. I use it a lot these days, but I'm a bit cavalier in my writing about what it is and how I use it. I thought I'd write this note to elaborate a little.

I first learned about 3M's transfer tape in an excellent article by Brooks Stover called Scratchbuild a Small Factory that appeared in the May 2013 issue of Model Railroader. In it he shows a picture of how he made S-scale self-adhesive siding using transfer tape and card stock. That got me thinking, so I went and tracked down a roll of 3M transfer tape. Since then I've used it a lot, although I'm no expert on it. I can't say for certain why it's called transfer tape. The best I can figure out from cursory internet searches is that the name derives from the idea that this tape allows one to transfer decorative finishes to a structural substrate - but don't quote me on that. 

I buy it from Deserres - an art supply chain based in Montreal with a store here in Ottawa - in 1/2" and 3/4" rolls, where each roll has 36 yards of tape. 

The rolls are reverse wound, meaning that unlike regular household sticky tape, the glue is on the 'outside' of the carrier. That plaid wrapper on the roll protects its gluey surface from sticking to everything it touches. And believe me it will, stick that is. The adhesive is quite strong and fast grabbing.

In the photo I'm rolling out some tape on a piece of card. Notice the plaid wrapper above and to the left of my hand. Don't discard it as you'll need to put it back on the roll to preserve it once you've applied tape to something.

That brown paper is the tape's carrier, and underneath it, stuck to the card, is the adhesive. Usually once I've applied a piece of the tape to something, I burnish it to make sure it's evenly stuck down.

When you're ready to stick something to the tape, just peel off the carrier to expose the adhesive. You can see what you're left with is just a thin strip of very sticky adhesive - there's no carrier film at all as is the case with regular double-sided tape.

I've used transfer tape in a number of projects including: trimming the Grizzly Flats depot, holding down track on the EVRR, installing external elements on the Thomson high-rise, creating the roof on Steinberg's, building the facade of the Canadian Press complex, siding the the Rocky Ridge depot, and more recently, holding together the basic structure on the Thrifty's project.

No doubt there are many other uses for this material, and there are certainly better application techniques out there that I haven't heard of, so this post is hardly definitive. But, so far I've found this to be an excellent adhesive that has allowed me to bond dissimilar materials and tricky pieces with precision and little mess. I'm looking forward to learning more about what it can do.

The Bank of Hamilton building, Winnipeg, 1940s (?)

This magnificent structure is The Bank of Hamilton building on Winnipeg's Main St., along Banker's Row. The Heritage Winnipeg blog has this to say about the building: Started in 1916 at a cost of $400,000 and completed two years later, the building was the most lavish branch in Canada constructed by the Hamilton company.

And is now standard with these Winnipeg photos, there's a streetcar peeking out of the lower left. I don't think my uncle was particularly interested in streetcars, but I think they show up in all these photos simply because the city was busy and there were a lot of them on the streets. They were just another mundane feature of everyday life.

Top writers in the HO field

I saw this list shoved down in the bottom right-hand corner of the April '52 issue of Model Trains. I assume it was an advertisement of some sort - weakly disguised as content - regarding the writers that Model Trains featured. Regardless, it's an interesting list of names of writers and modellers from that early post WWII era. Some I recognize, some I don't and should look into. No E. L. Moore yet as he didn't publish anything until 1955, although two of his friends, Bart Crosby and Bill Rau, are there.

Another view of Portage & Main, Winnipeg, 1940s (?)

Another view of the intersection of Portage & Main in Winnipeg. Over on the right side of the image is a better view of the facade of the Canadian National Railway building. Over on the left - somewhat obscured by automobiles and pedestrians - are a couple of streetcars.

A sign for the Mortimer subway entrance

As I contemplate and build street stuff for the the layout, one important piece of missing stuff is a sign noting the presence of a subway entrance at the Mortimer station. All the street level subway entrances of the TTC have them, so to me if one wasn't at Mortimer, something was wrong. I had some parts lying around, so I decided to give it a try to make one for the Mortimer station entrance. 

I started with an N-scale street lamp, breaking off the decorative plastic lamp cover to expose its small incandescent bulb. 

The front and back signs are cut from photos I took of the real thing. There are various styles in use, and I chose one of the older ones that lent itself to easy model making. The signs are glued with Weld Bond to pieces of thin, clear plastic. The outer surfaces of the signs are smeared with a thin coat of Weld Bond.

The signs were then glued to the top of the post so they surrounded the bulb. Several applications of Weld Bond were used to fill the gap between the signs.

Once dry, the entire piece was painted with aluminum coloured acrylic paint.

When lit with a 9 VDC battery, the sign's lettering is readable, although all the pictures I took just show a blob of light. I likely need to lower the voltage, and fiddle with my camera settings to get a decent photo.

Will the heat from the bulb melt the Weld Bond holding this thing together? I don't know. I suspect if the voltage is low enough, this might not be a problem, but time will tell.

The two street level photos in this post gave me a good vibe, even though the lit sign doesn't present too well. The size and spacing of items along the street, as well as the buildings, look about right. Although, the environment is a little too clean, and all the street stuff has yet to be added.

September 1971

In the early and mid '80s I used to pick up The Model Builder magazine when I could find it on newsstands. I particularly liked the free flight balsa builds by Walt Mooney. I didn't build any, but I admired his articles and drawings. When I discovered that Digitek Books was selling a collection of scans of the entire print run I bought a set.

One surprising thing was the first issue was dated September / October 1971, and September 1971 was also the date on the first issue of Railroad Modeler. And both were published out of the Los Angeles area: MB from Santa Anna, and RM from Canoga Park. Interesting coincidences. However, both had different objectives: The most prominent feature of The MODEL BUILDER will be up-to-the-minute news according to MB's editor, and Our main theme with RAILROAD MODELER will be to show you how to enjoy model railroading with the products available in your hobby shop according to RM's editor. Yes, and both editors referred to their respective magazines in all-caps - I guess that was the convention. Given these coincidences, I'm looking forward to whatever lies ahead.

Portage & Main, Winnipeg, 1940s (?)

A photo taken from high above Main St in Winnipeg looking towards Portage Ave. circa sometime in the 1940s, although I can't be certain about the date. 

That large dark building originating on the right is The McIntyre Block. Towering above the block, near the centre of the photo, is The McArthur Building on Portage. Near the intersection is the Canadian National Railways building, which looks rather modern compared to its neighbours.

And in this photo, unlike a few others I've posted, you can see streetcars on both Portage and Main, and not just track and overhead wire :-)

Thrifty's box

Building up the walls and gluing them into the basic box structure that is Thrifty's was rather fun. I think it's because I haven't built a model from card and wood in awhile, and the change from plastics was refreshing.

Some preparation was required before the walls could be assembled.

The window and door frames in the entry were cut from a piece of 2-ply Strathmore 500 series Bistrol board, as was the entry's roof. The side walls are pieces of 4-ply. 

Prior to assembly the entry pieces were blackened with a Sharpie pen. At this point, as you can see in the photo, there is a roughness to some of the window frames that had to be cleaned up with a sharp knife. 

Once that was done, a piece of thin clear plastic was used for the glass and attached to the back of the window and door frame with transfer tape.

The entry was then built up and glued into place in the front wall opening. 

On the left side of Thrifty's, the prototype photos show some sort of recessed area. It isn't clear what it is, but I interpreted it to be a door, maybe to an office or stairs up to the top level. I built up this recessed area from balsa strips and card, using a simple Tichy Train casting for the door.

One other thing I should point out about the facade is that originally I tried to fold the sloped roof face - where the dormers are attached - into shape so the facade could be made from a single piece of card. It turns out the topmost 1' strip on the roof face had to be cut off from the facade piece for the front wall to accurately attach to the side walls - the 4-ply card was just too thick to get a crisp crease that would allow the lower roof fold to fit gap-less to the side walls.

The walls required reinforcement. I have a lot of balsa strips in my scrap box from projects I intended to start, but never did. Those 1/4" square pieces were bought a few years back with the good intention of using them to build a 1/24 scale model of E. L. Moore's Cal's Lumber Yard. It got as far as cutting one wall from Gatorboard, but then was overtaken by events. Anyhow, it left me with some strips of balsa, a few of which I cut up and Weld Bonded to the inside walls of Thrifty's as stiffeners.

Although Weld Bond was used more-or-less everywhere to stick things together, when it came time to glue the walls into a box, I used 3M transfer tape. That stuff grabs fast and there's no mess. I figured I'd give it try on holding the walls together.

Over on the right I'm showing a piece of transfer tape applied to a side wall end edge. When ready for assembly, that piece of carrier paper is peeled back to expose the glue strip. 

The nice thing about transfer tape is there's no potential for mess during assembly, and the bond is basically instantaneous, so there's no clamping and waiting for glue to dry.

You can see in this image some brick paper on a side wall. Both sides and the back had brick paper glued on before building up the box. I used Superquick brick paper as it's quite thin. 

And that's that for the basic structure. I'm thinking of having a go at the dormers next.

Creed Furs, Bloor St., Toronto, 1940s

I believe this is Creed Furs on Toronto's Bloor Street circa the 1940s. I think my mother worked there as a seamstress for awhile although I can't put any dates on it.

Usually with these old Toronto photos I say something like, "and here you can see the streetcar track and the overhead wire", but they're nowhere in sight in this photo :-)

Bloor & Yonge, Toronto, 1940s

A view of the northwest corner of Toronto's Bloor & Yonge in the 1940s.

I speculate that there was something about that overloaded truck in the middle of the intersection that caught my uncle's eye - I think this photo was taken by my uncle, William Henry Wood. It looks like there are people hanging off the truck - one looks like he's wearing a soldier's uniform - and many others are stuffed in the back. The commotion seems to have also caught the attention of a fellow crossing the street. As well as the speeding truck, you can also see the old Pilot restaurant, and just make out the streetcar track and overhead wire.

A drawing and walls for Thrifty's

When I do a drawing for a model building its purpose is to help me understand the sizes, shapes, and positioning of the various items that make up the structure. It isn't meant to be a work of art, or to be complete.

I'll often do two drawings like I did here: the first one is rough and is to help me figure out what will be included in the model, and the second is a more properly scaled and sized layout. On the second one I've positioned the plastic mouldings that I'll be using to check their fit.

I do pencil drawings only because they give me a sense that I understand the project when I'm done. I don't get that feeling from a CAD package. It's just a personal thing.

I wanted to do things differently for this project for no other reason than to have a change, so I'm making this model primarily from card instead of plastic. The walls are cut from Strathmore 500 series 4-ply Bristol board. I bought a few sheets of Strathmore 500 series in various thicknesses on a trip to the US back before the pandemic as I haven't seen this material for sale here. The photo shows the walls being laid out in a long strip on the 4-ply.

Given the thickness of the material, I decided to cut out each wall in order to build them into a box instead of scoring the wall edges and folding the strip into a box. I don't think the folding method would produce sharp corners with material this thick.

The next step will be to add reinforcements to the inside wall surfaces, and to build the pieces into a box.