The HQ gets a removable roof

I think roofs are odd things in HO scale buildings. In real life down here at ground level we often don't see much of roofs, and when we do they usually aren't the main attraction.

On a layout we observe our little HO world like giants. We're confronted with acres and acres of roofs in all their glorious detail. The sight of all those roofs should make it clear that we need to configure our layouts so they stand near eye level.

Ok, that's my pre-coffee rant, and my my way of saying why I don't like to spend much time on roofs.

Now that's out of my system, with coffee in hand, let's look at the HQ's roof.

The roof trusses were glued to the underside of the roof. This takes a bit of careful alignment because the kit's roof is non-removable, and is installed by first gluing the trusses to steel columns inside the building and placing the roof panels on top.

The trusses need to be spaced so that they will go around the outside of the elevator shaft. 

You can see that I had to notch the roof's corners so the assembly wouldn't interfere with the building's corner pilasters. I think I the notches are a little too big, but they're not visible.

Along the ridge I glued on a strip of 0.010" styrene, and off to the side is a Walther's air conditioning unit from their roof-top accessories kit. The a/c is placed so it's directly above the elevator shaft.

I often add air conditioners so I have something to hold onto when I'm removing a roof, and that's why I added one to this project. The a/c is attached to the roof panel with plastic solvent, so when dry it's solidly held in place and can resist handling.

Lighting is from two LED strips that have been stuck in channels built up from 0.020" styrene sheet. The short strip is located at the front, and in retrospect I should have made it as long as the one at the back. The wire leads snake down the elevator shaft and out through a hole in the building's floor.

To finish off this side the roof panels were brush painted with some gloppy white acrylic to improve the interior's reflectivity.

The roof's outer surface was first base coated with Revell's Aqua Color Tar Black, and when dry, several layers of thin washes of Tamiya's XF-1 Flat Black, XF-80 Royal Light Gray, and XF-49 Khaki were applied. The chimney, also from Walther's roof-top accessories kit, and a/c were based coated with flat aluminum before applying washes. 

I make no claim to this looking realistic, and I tend to let the paint move and settle as it wants to. I'm more concerned with achieving an interesting pattern more than anything else.

The lighting isn't too bad and one can see inside fairly clearly. 

Argh, I see I haven't set the roof's front edge properly. That'll need a little touch-up painting along the edge and some adjustment.

Not much more to go to finish this. There're a few interior detail parts I need to order, but I think I'll finish off some inside wall detailing on the upper floor while I wait for delivery.