Harry P.

It's one of those dollar bills that's shrinking all the time...

Apparently you don't pay very close attention... I've posted tons of my models over the years. Cars, trucks, and a whole lot of "other" stuff.

I have this 1/6 scale Apple Krate by Xonex. It's not a kit but a fully assembled diecast. They also made a Pea Picker, a Lemon Peeler, etc. I found it on ebay a few years ago for $75. It's very detailed... and since my parents refused to buy me a real Krate back in the day, this is as close to one as I've ever gotten!

Not busy building. Busy photographing. These were all built anywhere from several months to several years ago.

Here's an interesting bit of information (at least it's interesting to me!)... The way the wheels on these wagons (and on the stagecoach I posted in another thread) were made is ingenious. First they cut a hub on a belt-driven lathe, usually out of oak or some other hardwood (ash, hickory, etc... remember, back in the 1700 and 1800s forests were much more plentiful and various species of tree much more common than they are now)... then each individual spoke was shaped (the spokes are never "straight" but have a taper to them, and often they change shape from square at the hub end to circular at the rim end as they also taper... shaping the spokes was a job for only an experienced wheelwright). Anyway... the individual spokes were then placed into the hub, spaced radially, and the rim sections, called "felloes," (usually six sections per wheel with holes bored into them to receive the spoke ends) were placed onto the spoke ends. This was all done on a jig with the wheel being assembled in a horizontal position. But what actually held the felloes and the rest of the wheel together was the iron "tire." A blacksmith would form a strip of iron into a hoop, and "forge weld" the ends together to form a continuous, round iron strap. (Forge welding is the process of heating the metal on the forge to close to melting, then literally hammering the pieces together and actually fusing them together until they become one. Forge welding, or "hammer welding," was the earliest known method of welding). The hoop was then heated to expand it, and then placed over the wooden "felloes" that made up the rim... then water was poured onto the hot iron "tire" so that it contracted and literally shrank and formed itself tightly around the wheel's circumference, holding everything together. The trick was knowing exactly how large to make the tire hoop, and knowing exactly how much it would shrink when it was doused with water, so that it would tightly hold the wheel assembly together when cool.

I never keep track of how long I spend building a model. I never could figure out why some people do that. I mean, in the end, it takes as much time as it takes, right? So what does it matter how long it took? It has no relevance to anything (unless somebody is paying you by the hour to build a model for them!) Anyway, that's why I don't keep track of time... it's irrelevant to me. Plus, I rarely sit down and work on any one model start to finish. I'll work on a model a few hours today... another one a few hours tomorrow... then not do anything for a week... then go crazy and work several days in a row... then nothing for months, etc. So that makes it even harder for me to guess how long it took me to build any particular model. I'm not complaining about you asking me... just explaining why I don't keep track. But to answer your question, if I had to guess, I'd say this one probably took me 60-80 hours or so. Somewhere in there. About 7-10 eight hour work days (if I actually worked that way! )

You should see what I pay for some Pocher kits. This bus was a relative bargain!

This is a 1/10 scale "Barcelona" taxi. The basic brougham design was actually developed in the US around 1880, and the taxis were exported to Cuba. Eventually the design found its way to Europe, where they were used on the streets of major European cities like Barcelona in the last years of the 19th century, just before horses were replaced by autos. Details varied from one maker to the other, but the basics were the same: an open driver's compartment and a closed passenger compartment. Here's a photo of a typical real one: And my model... again, laser-cut wood, cast white metal, photoetched brass, brass rod... and in this case I scratchbuilt a fancy velour-upholstered interior and seating. I also added the rooftop rails, that's not included in the kit. The driver's seat was upholstered in a diamont tuft pattern (technique described in my "Doctor's Buggy" thread): And the brake system was scratchbuilt because there wasn't one included in the kit:

It's mainly laser-cut wooden parts. The wagon builds up plank by plank, prettty much the same parts breakdown as the real thing. The "iron work" (brackets, straps, etc.) are either cast white metal or photoetched brass parts. There are tiny brass pins that simulate bolts, and tiny laser-cut cardboard square "nuts" (this was in the days when nuts were hand forged of iron and were square... six-sided nuts didn't exist yet). The brass pins that simulate the bolts would have had square heads in real life... the instructions tell the builder to squeeze the pin heads into a square shape (fairly easy to do because the brass is fairly soft). The biggest problem is the time involved. There are hundreds of individual pins ("bolts") that you have to form a square head on if you want realism. And then the pins, along with any photoetched brass parts that represent strap iron, have to be either chemically "blackened" or painted a dark grayish black to simulate iron (not bright, shiny brass!). Each wheel spoke has to be carved to a taper by hand... again, time consuming and very tedious, but necessary if you want the wheels to look "right" and not toy-like. And the "canvas" top covering has to be cut out of cotton material (they supply the material and patterns), then the pieces glued together (or sewn together) along the seams, then "lashed" to the wagon with thick thread that represents rope.

Where did you get the scale Torx head screws?

It's kind of involved, but if you take it step by step it's not too hard. Ok... let's assume I'm doing the buggy's seat back. 1. Cut a piece of 1/8 thick balsa to the size of the seatback (I'll explain why balsa later). 2. Glue a piece of medium thick cardboard to the balsa and trim the edges to match the balsa piece. I use the cardboard that they use as a backing piece on yellow legal pads. 3. Take a piece of foam (I found pieces of foam padding in the sewing section of Hobby Lobby. It comes in various sizes and thicknesses, I bought a piece about 12 inches square by 1 inch thick)... cut a small piece to the size of the seatback, and about 1/4 inch thick. Thickness depends on the scale you're working in... the larger the scale, the thicker you'll want the foam. 4. Cut a piece of whatever material you're going to use as the upholstery slightly larger than the balsa seat back. You'll want enough material to be able to make "flaps" that will be glued to the back side of the balsa piece. 5. Spread some contact cement around the edges of the upholstery piece (on the back side, of course!). Spread the contact cement so that it covers the area of the upholstery material that will be folded over and attached to the back side of the balsa piece. It's not necessary to put any cement on the center area of the upholstery material. 6. Spread some contact cement on the balsa side of the balsa/cardboard seat back piece. 7. Now the tricky part. Let the contact cement on the upholstery material and the balsa seat back become dry to the touch. Now lay the upholstery piece face-side down on your work surface... add the foam padding piece centered on the upholstery piece, and finally place the balsa seat back on top, glue side up. Now, working along one of the long sides of the seat back, fold the upholstery "flap" up and over the balsa piece, gluing the flap down smoothly onto the balsa surface. 8. Now more tricky parts: With one long side of the upholstery glued down, gently press down on the balsa piece, compressing the foam padding... and while maintaining the pressure, carefully fold up the other long side "flap" and glue it smoothly down along the balsa piece. You get one chance with contact cement... once it makes contact, it's done, so you can't reposition the upholstery piece. You have to get it right the first time! I glue the cardboard to the balsa (step 2 above) to strengthen the balsa... without the cardboard, the balsa piece might crack when you press it down to compress the padding. 9. What you have now is the balsa seat back with the upholstery piece glued to it, and the padding in between... with the short sides of the upholstery piece still unglued to the balsa seat back. Now you cut slits into the upholstery piece at the corners (I cut 3-4 radially spaced slits per corner), then pull each small "flap" back around to the back side of the balsa seat back and stick each flap down one after the other, trying to create a "neat" corner. Once I get all the corner flaps stuck down, I usually flow come CA glue over the surface on the corners, to "lock" those corner flaps in place. At this point you have a seatback that has been upholstered, with padding. If you did it right so far, the upholstery will be smooth and wrinkle-free in front. Now to the diamond tuft part... 9. Take a wide piece of masking tape (large enough to cover the entire seat back) and place it onto a glass surface (or on your cutting mat). Lay out the locations of each button. You have to decide how many rows of buttons the piece will have... take the height of the piece and divide by however many rows of buttons you want... in the case of the doctor's buggy I went with five horizontal rows, but the actual number will vary with the size of the piece you're upholstering. Lay those horizontal lines out on the tape, then on each line mark where each evenly-spaced button will be located. Remember, you have to "stagger" the rows of buttons to get the "diamond" effect. Now take the tape and place it on your upholstered seat back. 10. Now take a common sewing pin and push it into the upholstery and through the balsa/cardboard seat back, about halfway through... leaving about 1/4 inch of pin still sticking up off the surface. Repeat for each button location until you have a pin stuck into the upholstery at each button location. 11. Carefully pull off the tape, leaving the halfway inserted pins in place. 12. Now, using needlenose pliers, gently pull each pin from the back side, until the pin head compresses the upholstery a bit. You want the pins to create that diamond pattern. Make sure all the pins are pulled through the same distance. That's easy to check by just placing the seat back on a flat surface, pin points down, and seeing that all the points touch the surface. The friction of the cardboard and balsa agains the pin's shaft will keep the pins in place. I use balsa for the seat back instead of basswood, because the pins are easier to push through the balsa. Basswood is much harder and denser, the pins might bend rather than push through the wood. 13. Place a good sized plop of CA on each pin shaft where it sticks through the balsa seat back. Let the glue dry thoroughly, then snip the excess length off, close to the surface. Recheck the front of the piece to make sure all the pins are compressing the upholstery about equally. Push any pins that need to be embedded further and reglue from the back side. That's it. You should now have one completed, upholstered and padded seat back. Obviously the pins are bare steel. I painted the doctor's buggy seat parts with black acrylic craft paint after the pins were in place. It's much easier than to paint each individual pin head separately beforehand... although if you wanted the upholstery to be one color and the pins a contrasting color, you could paint the pin heads first, then do the upholstery. Finally... the material I use to do upholstery is a leathery looking cloth-backed vinyl. It's very soft, very flexible, and has that embossed crinkly pattern that looks almost exactly like real leather. I found the material in the sewing section of Hobby Lobby. I bought a yard... that's enough to upholster dozens and dozens of model seats. It can be painted any color to create any color "leather" you like.

That's really cool... but I can't help but think it would have looked even better with a white roof (to complement the wide whites)... Looks like you highlighted the grooves in the foiled areas somehow? Nice touch, it gives a more realistic depth to those areas.

I have more!

Anyone who's ever seen a western has seen one of these. They originated in the Conestoga Valley near Lancaster, PA (Amish country) in the mid 1700s. They were the "moving vans" of their day. They were shaped with angled front and rear ends and a curved floor to keep cargo from shifting when traveling over steep or rocky trails through the Appalachians on the way westward. Families piled everything they owned into one of these wagons and took off for parts unknown in the west, to lay claim to some land and start a new life. Here is a (restored) real one: These wagons varied in detail from one maker to the other, but they all looked basically the same. Some were painted, some were bare wood... it was up to the owner. My model is a 1/12 scale version, again made up of laser-cut wooden parts, cast white metal details, photoetched brass, and hundreds of tiny pins, nuts and "bolts" (not threaded, for looks only). The parts breakdown pretty much copies the real thing... individual wooden planks, ironwork, all held together with hundreds of pins, nuts and bolts. It's a pretty big model, as you can see by the can of paint... Again, paint is acrylic craft paints, thinned down to give a weathered and worn appearance. The "canvas" top is cotton fabric, dyed to look like canvas, and painted with a watered-down white glue to give a realistic "sag" between the support hoops. Out back hung a trough that was filled with food for the "engines"... these were big, heavy wagons that when fully loaded needed a team of anywhere from 4 to 12 horses to pull! In the photo above you can see the iron strap "tires." They are strips of cardboard painted with a dark metallic gray craft paint. I think they look exactly like real iron straps. The rest of the "ironwork" (both cast white metal and photoetched brass) was painted black... Also note the axe that was held by brackets up front. The settlers needed firewood every day for cooking (and for heat at night in the winter), so an axe was an essential part of the wagon:

Exactly right.

I have a few more that I'll be posting. I've just now gotten around to posting them, they were all built some time ago. This ambulance is the latest one, I finished it several months ago.

That body has some weird twists and bends to it. And you're right about the "some guys won't like the giant wheels" thing...

This ambulance was introduced into service late in the war, replacing previous models. It was called a Rucker ambulance, having been designed by Gen. D. H. Rucker. It was state-of-the-art at the time. Here's a shot of a real one: My model is a 1/16 scale version, made by the same company that makes the stagecoach and the doctor's buggy that I posted in other threads, so again, mostly laser-cut wood pieces, along with cast white metal parts (mostly the suspension pieces), brass rod, tiny nails, nuts and bolts, and in this case a large sheet of cotton cloth that you use to make the side curtains and the roof. I painted the model with thinned down acrylic craft paint, to give it a worn and slightly weathered look. I doubt these things had a high-gloss fancy finish! I also used a black wash to bring out the details. All of the cast metal and brass parts were painted black. The roll-up side curtains and roof are cotton fabric supplied with the kit that I dyed to give it a slightly yellowish-brownish "canvas" look. On the roof, I pieced together the various panels that make up the top covering (they give you cutting templates for each panel) and glued the panels together along the seams with white glue. Then I brushed a mixture of white glue and water on the top to create a realistic "sag" between the wooden roof arches. On the inside, the ambulance could accommodate soldiers either sitting up or lying down, depending on how the various hinged upholstered panels were configured. If the seatbacks were folded up, they acted as a flat surface for two soldiers to lie on, in a sort of "upper bunk" layout. When the interior was configured that way (upper and lower berths), the louvers on the sides of the ambulance allowed for airflow to the men in the lower berths: At the front left was a large water barrel: And on the right side was the braking system: Soldiers were loaded in through the opening tailgate that had spring-loaded latches: The red cross and "US" markings are decals. For the crosses, I first painted the panel white, then sanded the red cross decal while it was still dry and on the decal sheet, to give it a slightly weathered look, then applied it to the white painted panel. For the "US" marking, the trick was applying the decal to the rough wooden surface without it "silvering." I first painted the panel with Future, then applied the decal onto the wet Future. Once dry, I sprayed Dullcote over it to knock down the gloss and make it look as if the letters had been painted or stenciled onto the wood.

What a nice change of pace... a member who actually takes criticism to heart without being all "offended!" Congratulations on your adult-ness! I wish we had more people like you here. BTW... I only commented on the headlight pins because it's obvious to me that you have exceptional skills. Your craftsmanship is absolutely top notch, your paint and foil work is about as good as it gets. All you need are a few small "tweaks" in your building style, but believe me, you have the skills!

Thanks, Charlie. I can never look at a plate of ziti again...

Love it! Beautiful! And as good as it is, that interior is just over the top. Probably my favorite part of your model.

Actually it is very much like that, only at a smaller scale. The wood pieces are joined with mortises and tenons, finger joints, etc. It's pretty amazing when you think of the engineering that goes into making the laser-cut pieces.