Zett's Union Station - Update 02/26/13

Wow! Really nice progress. Thanks for sharing.

Outstanding Zett.  Was wondering if you were still progressing.  Looks beautiful, keep up the great work.

 

John

Zett this looks GREAT! This is the first time Ive ever really looked around on this section of the forum. Looking forward to your updates!

Thanks Louis!

 

Well my goal was to have the brickwork scribed and completed by the end of Thanksgiving weekend. As usual I just did not have the time to work that I thought I would. The good news, as of today, is that I am half way finished. Yes my fingers hurt. I am very happy with this method and think it looks pretty good. Its slow going but a little Christmas music in the background makes it move a little faster. Heres a few shots:

 

 

 

 

 

I have just begun starting work on the back side. Next I have to figure out how to color the brickwork. I dont think it should be too difficult to obtain a realistic shade.

 

The brickwork around the station level of the platform has been changed a few times based on the pictures I have observed. I decided to go with the basic brick platform because it is something that will work for every period, even though today the platform is made up of hexagon brickwork.

 

Here are some pictures I used for reference, some neglect is visible below... 

 

 

Oh the glory days of the GM&O and Santa Fe... to go back in time for just one day...

 

 

You can see the very simple brickwork layout. I love the decorative lighting posts and the semaphore signals.

 

 

Heres a final shot showing the Union station at what appears to be its worst. This is before the restoration in the late 90s. Thank god that the city got it cleaned up because it appears below that it was steeply headed to the point of no return. Pay no attention to the gang graffiti below. The best part of my job is catching punks that have no respect for property, especially my train station.

 

Ok update time. I took off almost the entire month of December and planned on spending a lot of time on the station. After reality sets in a lot of time was taken away from me, and pretty much the entire month of December I would say I spent only a few hours working on the layout.

 

My father-in-law passed away on December 5th from cancer at 62 years old. This was a pretty devastating event for the family, and even though you know its coming, it is still horrible when it comes. My father in law always got a kick out of my train hobby and even joked about it when he gave a speech at my wedding in October of 2011. He was an amazing carpenter and if you have watched my youtube videos, he is the one that came up with and built the cover that goes over one of my basement window well openings. He helped me frame the basement, drywall, mud and tape, paint, and his last trip over in November he helped me lay a 10 foot piece of foam roadbed. He had a few Lionel trains as a child, but his collection was damaged and he never returned to the hobby. I was looking forward to rekindling that interest, and I think I definitely had him headed down that road.

 

About a year ago he gave me an old ZW, which I believe is the only thing he had left from his collection. It was dropped and badly damaged, and was overall in horrible condition. I am having this refurbished and cannot wait to add it to my layout. I have not told my wife, this addition will be revealed when I have the 'grand opening' of the train layout, which will hopefully be this year.

 

Ok, back on topic. I finally completed scribing brickwork into the platform yesterday. Overall I lost track of how many hours this took to complete, but I am going to guess close to 20. I dont know if I work slow, or what but I am happy with the results.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

I have not figured out how I will paint these as of yet. I am going to stick with a brownish tone because old brick looks brown, but I have to add some variance. After a coat of color if I wash with a grey all of the scribed lines should pop out a little and look quite realistic. Its not perfect, but when the scene is completed, your eye will catch the platform bricks, and be drawn to the overall scene. I think that it was worth the time and it looks much more realistic than just purchasing plastruct brick. I was just at the hobby shop yesterday and am very happy I took the time to go this route. 

 

Moving on, I added my first police car to the layout. I plan on adding 1 to 2 police cars a year until I have a model of every Joliet car I can find a picture of. The first car I added is a mid 2000s model Ford Crown Vic, which is the type of car I drive at work. It will eventually be connected to a switch that will turn the lights on and off. This was made by a guy named philip, you can check out his youtube page which is under his username 01bluebusa. Here is a video of the car after he completed the job:

 

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=oPps9x1dBKE

 

The next car I am going to have made will probably be a 1970s squad, and after that a 1950s. It will be really fun to change these cars and the layout of the Union Station depending on what era of trains I am running.

 

 

 

 

 

 

The police car is 1:43 and really works nicely with the scene. The police figures are Bachman O scale and I think that they match the car perfectly, so I was overjoyed by that. I have to do some painting on the figures to change some things. I am also going to add a few details to the car, such as a spotlight and some antennas, and a pushbar.

 

The trees you see are from JTT Scenery

 

http://www.jttmicroscale.com/v...ategory.asp?DirID=79

 

JTT is new to me. My local hobby shop Walts just started carrying their product and I think they look very realistic. For the photos above they are just temporarily standing there. I am going to add more detail to the sidewalk before I install them permanently. Of course, they will be removable. I cant take winter or fall pictures with green leaves on the trees so they will need to be swapped out depending on what time of year it is.

 

I have some trim so I am starting to complete work on the main building. Also I am starting to detail the interior. This is a fun project, I cannot wait to be finished and move on to the next one!

Zett:

 

That looks great!  I'm now reinspired.

 

Rob

Zett:  Best wishes with your family/extended family, these matters are always difficult.

I like what I'm seeing with the brick scribe.  Working with particle board the brick scribe opens a lot more area than the large block scribe previously posted. This type of material tends to absorb moisture, even in a relatively dry environment. It will be interesting to see how you seal and complete the brick walkways.   I like what I see.  Mike CT 

Thanks mike and zac. I was thinking of spraying it with a primer but I am not sure yet. I guess I should make a few test pieces so I don't destroy all that work.

That whole project is just OUTSTANDING! and all those hours of scribing.........

Zett,

Those bricks just look SO right for this project. I guess you may want to weather them some, but please don't overdo it and ruin the subtlety.  The look is close to perfect already. 

 

Cheers,

Wow, just some great work!

 

Thanks for posting

Ok update. I started working on the interior of the ground floor of the station. I decided to complete the interior of these rooms because of how large the windows are. If you are looking at the front of the station I think that adding some interior lighting, figures, and finishing the floor and walls will ad a lot of realism.

 

Here are some photos I took for the project:

 

 

 

 

 

 

And here are some shots of where I am at on the interior. I started with the flooring. The tiles lined up perfectly with the ground floor exterior wall windows, So it looks like I took correct measurements. I started with spraying the base color of a red/orange, and the rest is being completed by hand.

 

I took the pictures before all was dry. Some of it looks sloppy because I still have to go back and detail. After the detail is finished I will apply clear coat, and then add a wash to blacken and bring out the tile lines. This should clean up a lot of the imperfections. The squares are so small, its very hard to do by hand. 

 

The main red/orange color right now is way too orange. I think I am going to have to go back and repaint that portion. Hopefully I will complete this portion of the interior, of what is the still existing ticket room and the past baggage area, this weekend. The baggage area was sealed off from the ticket area years ago.

 

 

 

 

 

For the experts, suggestions, and tips, and comments are always welcome. Keep in mind this is still my first scratch build project.

Wow that is real dedication!  Yes, the orange is a bit bright.  Not sure if a blackwash will be enough to demote it, but still, it's a beautiful effect, and a real commitment to staying true to the real station.

When I did the floor of my station, I simply printed the marble tile pattern onto full-sheet self-adhesive labels, and affixed these to matteboard and glued it down.  Yours is much more realistic!

This is an epic project - thanks for keeping us updated.

John

I like the idea of a wash to bring out the mortar/grout detail.  Grout colors were common but most is/was Grey.  Your pictures seem to indicate a black or redish grout, I've seen both. 

Exceptional

Mike 

Wow that is real dedication!  It's a beautiful effect, and a real commitment to staying true to the real station.

When I did the floor of my station, I simply printed the marble tile pattern onto full-sheet self-adhesive labels, and affixed these to matteboard and glued it down.  Yours is much more realistic!

This is an epic project - thanks for keeping us updated.

John

I hope this makes Jon's website with the thread of Great O scale Stations!

I plan on adding it to John's webpage when I am finished. Its because of Johns project that I decided to do interior work.

 

Ok i am almost finished with the interior main room tile. All I have left is to add a clear coat and then a wash and its done. I had to repaint everything I already did because the red/orange I used was much too bright. You can see some seam lines below, when I install them and stick them down inside the station I will add a little more paint that will cover those gaps.

 

 

 

 

Heres two pictures of the flooring inside the station. I threw a light inside just to get an idea of what it will look like at night.

 

 

 

Bottom is almost finished. Next i add a ticket counter, and then some interior support pillars which should be a quick task.

 

Getting closer to the finish line!   

Ok folks, I have made much progress over the past week.  Here are some quick crummy iphone photos before I go to work. Sorry, ran out of time.

 

 

 

 

They looked like they were in focus when I took them... Anyways The trim on the lower level exterior is finally finished, all but a few of the keystone pieces which have a higher level of detail. It may be hard to see what is new, but there is a decorative half round added towards the base, just below where the window openings are. The final piece above the windows have been added. This piece extends to the top of the upper level platform and will be tied into the balcony.

 

 

I have primed and then sprayed a base coat of textured sandstone on most of the station. I believe this is a good point to start weathering. All of the carved details are still very defined after three coats. In fact I think it brought them out. In the below picture you can see that the lower roof construction is underway. It is black foam board that I attached fine black sandpaper to, with rubber cement. In the future I will have to add some weathering and finer details.

 

 

Below you can see where I began adding trimwork around the waiting room exterior doors. Soon construction will begin on the overhang.

 

 

Below you can see where I am working towards the top with the trim. I am just a few pieces away from getting to the top, and then I can construct the roof. If you can compare the below picture to the building, you will see that I am still missing the block details that go around the top. That will take a while...

 

 

 

Any suggestions on proceeding with finishing the exterior would be greatly appreciated. I have never done this before and would like it to have a realistic look. This paint color was the closest that I could find, and think that with some weathering the building will come to life. I want the exterior finish to look exceptional so any help in this area is greatly appreciated.

 

Not pictured because I ran out of time, I scribed brickwork on the interior walls in the ticket counter area. The ticket counter wall is completed and ready for the ticket window details. Once lighting is added inside I think it will add a very nice touch. The interior floor which was shown in a previous post is almost ready to be glued to the base. After that I will be securing the interior walls to the base, and adding the decorative support columns that will be inside this area. After that is completed the bottom floor interior is pretty much complete.

 

Ok folks I am out of time for today. Oh I did have a disaster about a week ago. I was carrying the main section of the building upstairs to work on the trim. I tripped and fell. The main building top broke into 5 pieces. Luckily it broke on the seams so I just had to reglue them. I got away with a scary mistake, luckily it only set me back about 4 hours.

When one sees something as nice as this it's really hard to come up with the right words that don't sound corny!  This is one great, well researched, well executed, museum quality masterpiece!  Thank you for not only producing a great piece but for also taking us along on the trip!  Russ

Incredible work!

 

Peter

Zett

Your Union station is definitly a candidate for the O gauge Passenger Stations Hall of Fame.

 

You might want to consider a HunteLine gray wash applied with a 1/4 inch paint brush and then wiped off. The wash will get into all nooks and crannies giving them depth and definition.

An airbrush can then be used to produce the vertical weather streaks.

 

http://factorydirecttrains.com...neweatheringmix.aspx

Zett,

Top Shelf and Well Done!

Chugging away on the main room details. The walls in the pictures below are still freestanding, so if they dont look like they are standing up straight, they probably arn't. 

 

 

 

First picture shows the ticket counter windows. I still need to add the security bars.

 

 

 

Here is a shot looking in from the outside window.

 

 

And a few more shots of the real thing.

 

 

 

 

I still have to weather and detail the walls so they are not just a plain grey. Also I am going to highlight the ticket window details with a fine point gold pen, and a fine point black pen. The wall/block details are actually crudely scribed in. Once the wall is weathered these details should pop. After interior lighting is installed it should look pretty good. Most of these details will not be seen, other than what will be visible by looking into the station windows.

 

For each building I am thinking of putting together a little book, or maybe a slide show to put on a tv when guests are over, that will show these details, as well as a history of the structure.

Just beautiful!!  I love these kinds of builds and you are doing a wonderful job....I would love to see it in person!!

 

Alan

Zett,

Fantastic job.

 

Alan Graziano

Incredible detail you've put into that station Zett!

Thanks for the kind words everyone. The most rewarding part of all this work is sharing it with others.

 

I dont have an update to post today but I thought I would share a few pictures I took with my Iphone. I had some time the other day on my lunch to walk around the station after a fresh snowfall.

 

 

 

Zett - I have been greatly enjoying your craftsmanship on this station. These are the posts that make the forum so enjoyable. Thanks for keeping us up to date.

 

Art 

Thanks Art that means a lot coming from you. Later this year I plan on having an open house, most likely an afternoon after the Dupage train show, it would be great if you and your son could come. However you have to bring your MTH Metra cars so I can get some pics of them next to the station.

Hi Eric

 

    When you decide the date please let me know. I would love to admire your accomplishment. By the way, open house is the 16th.

 

Ray Marion

I/A wash would be my vote as well. Take it easy at first--starting with very dilute mixtures. Your grand building calls for subtlety.  Note also that ink is available in many colors. I usually keep spray bottles of both black and brown washes. Using a bit of both adds depth and texture.