Jabulani Station - Part 8

The supports for the canopy are made from styrene.  This is the only styrene I have used so far in the construction of the building.  The uprights are 2.5mm "H" beam, tied into a horizontal strip of 2mm by 2.5mm styrene strip.  I cut the uprights to height and glued the assemblies together using a scale printout as a template.

I sprayed the support assemblies with grey automotive primer, and then gave them a coat of chocolate brown acrylic. 

The three support assemblies were then glued in place with Scotch brand Quick-Dry adhesive.  The uprights are slightly askew, but hopefully I will be able to square them up once the footings are in place and the whole is attached to a base.

I haven't quite decided on the method of making the footings for the uprights.  Initially I was going to cut individual footings from styrene and add them during assembly of the canopy supports, but I am now toying with the idea of casting the footings from resin.

Jabulani Station - Part 7

With the station building canopy in place, the next step is the roof itself.  This is again made with a sub-roof of 1/8" foam core board.  I didn't worry much about gaps, as that would be covered by the corrugated metal sheathing.

The edges of the roof were built up using 1mm cardstock to get the correct roof width and to handle the variations in slope at the corners of the canopy.  Strips of pastel paper were cut to a scale 8 inches in width and applied to the roof edges, and the whole was covered over with simulated corrugated iron.

The roof was then weathered using a wash of lamp black oil paint to bring out the detail of the corrugations.  The wash also stained and hid the white edges of the paper "corrugated iron".   Select "panels" and streaks were brushed in with rust-colored washes, and the whole was dry-brushed with a lighter tint of oxide red (sort of an oxide "pink").

Now on to the canopy supports, which will be one of the few parts of the model made using styrene.  I used to work exclusively with styrene, but I've found paper construction to be much more versitile and forgiving of error.

Jabulani Station - Part 6

Because of all the angles involved, the roof has turned out to be a little trickier than expected.  To ensure that I had adequate support during construction, I made a sort of jig to hold the entire building securely, with false walls to provide support for the canopy, and spacers with the correct roof slope. 

I very carefully and mathenatically worked out the lines and angles of the canopy sections, cut them to size and did a trial fit.  Of course, as you can see, I was way off in opposite corners.  That's what I get for not paying careful attention to squareness when first gluing up the walls.

So I eyeballed the fit as best I could and glued the canopy pieces together at the corners.  I then gave the whole canopy a shot of flat black spray paint above and cream below.  The whole was then glued to the walls.

Strips of pastel paper a scale eight inches wide were glued to the roof edges to represent the fascia boards. 

The canopy is covered with the same ribbed paper as the walls, but this time painted with spray can red automotive primer.  For the ridge caps I used a sheet of pastel paper, cut to a scale eighteen inches wide, and formed a slight ridge down the center by running a ballpoint pen along the back, using a sheet of styrene corrugated sheet as a guide. 

With the "corrugated metal" sheeting and the ridge caps in place, the slight variations at the corners where the walls weren't square is hardly noticeable. 

There is a bit of curvature in the front canopy, due to slight warping of the foam core board where the glue was applied.  Hopefully that will be taken care of when the supporting columns are glued in place. 

Next step is to attach the roof of the building itself. 

Jabulani Station - Part 5

Doors are built up from 2mm cardstock and pastel paper, painted with different shades of chocolate brown.  Strips of pastel paper are cut in various widths from a scale 2 inches to 9 inches.

The strips are applied to the 2mm cardstock to form the door jams and the rails and stiles of the doors. 

The two front station doors are paneled, while the rear parcel room doors are plain flat doors.  When complete, the doors are inserted in the opening from behind and glued in place.

The next step is to fit the roof, which will be somewhat tricky, and I haven't quite figured out what the plan is. 

Jabulani Station - Part 4

For windows, I print a template to scale and tape a sheet of clear plastic over the template.  The window is then framed in using various sizes of drafting tape for the muntins.  The narrowest tape I've been able to find is 1/64 inch, which scales out to a little less than 1 inch in 7mm scale.

 

 

The tape comes in black, white, blue, red, green and yellow, but not brown.  So to finish off the framing I painted a strip of masking tape chocolate brown and cut strips a scale two inches wide.

 





 

Once the tape is laid down, I paint the whole thing with clear acrylic (Pledge "Future" floor polish) to ensure the tape is securely bonded to the clear plastic.  Unfortunately, in a house with five cats, I always end up with a stray hair bonded to a window pane here and there, but I still find this step necessary for the overall durability of the window.

 

Once the clear acrylic has dried overnight, the window glazing is cut to the size of the window openings, and they are inserted into the openings from behind. 

 

I did have a bit of trouble with the ticket windows.  The strips of tape were so thin that the brown paint kept separating from the masking tape.  But with a little extra patience they finally came together.

Next step will be the doors for the building.

 



Jabulani Station - Part 3

The next step in building the Jabulani station building is framing in the window and door openings.  For this I use Canson Mi-Teintes pastel paper, which has one rough side and one relatively smooth side, and comes in a variety of colors.  I used "Felt Gray".  Using pastel paper for wood siding and planking is a tehnique stolen from Troels Kirk, who uses this method on his Coast Line Railroad. 

The rough side of the paper is painted rather messily with two different shades of chocolate brown, allowing some of the texture and gray color of the paper to show through.  The gray parts left exposed appear as areas of peeled paint when strips (planks) are cut.

The strips are cut a scale four inches wide.  They are then cut to length to form the framing and casings for the windows and doors, and are glued in place using PVA glue.  The window sills are cut a scale six inches wide from strips of 1mm thick cardstock. 

For me, this is the most tedious part of construction, and it is a relief when all the openings are completed. 

The pastel paper technique is used best when creating a wood-sided structure.  I use three different colors of grey paper painted generally the same color with a dab of grey or brown paint here and there.  Again, here is a picture of a wood-sided building I completed a couple of weeks ago.

The next step in the process is to get the windows glazed.

Jabulani Station - Part 2

As I mentioned previously, I have used different kinds of corrugated iron products made specifically for model railways.  All have been good for specific applications, but for the station building at Jabulani, I want something more seemless -- and cheap. 

I settled on a sheet of ribbed scrapbooking paper that comes in one foot square sheets for 99 cents, at the local Michaels craft store.  Although the ribs are spaced slightly smaller than would be accurate for O scale, it was "close enough", and cheap enough, for my purposes.  Since it was a bright metallic aquamarine color, a shot of grey primer toned it down to reality. 

The sheet was cut into strips the height of the station building walls, in this case a scale 10' 9", and applied using Elmer's (PVA) glue. 

I let the glue set up overnight, and then cut the window and door openings.

South African Railways steam era station buildings were generally painted in a combination of cream walls and chocolate brown trim and doors, with white window mullions.  Roofs were painted with red oxide. 

To paint the walls, I used Floquil Poly Scale "TH & B Cream", very liberally lightened about half-and-half with Poly Scale "Reefer White".  When dry I coated this with a thin wash of lamp black oil paint, and then dry-brushed with white.

 

The next step will be to add the window and door frames and casings, which will be cut from watercolor paper.