Wednesday 20 January 2016

Revised Terraced Houses...................



Right, this is the last model that I’m going to build, before I get myself up into the loft and start my layout. These are the new revised T022a Terraced Houses from Scalescenes. I’ve built the old version a couple of times already, including a row made up into the shops, with the burnt out chippy. I’ve not built the row any longer than four houses up until now. I’m going to make the row eight houses long. I may even put them together on an incline. Time will tell.
They are of a total new construction method, and in my opinion, much better than the old version. There’s the addition of back yard walls with outhouses and front garden walls. They are built in two houses per section, and as I said earlier, could be easily configured to be installed on a bank.
First I like to cut out and mount all of the windows onto acetate, ready to be fixed to the relevant walls.
 
Now here is where the walls and floors that make up the interior structure come together. They are much better than the old version. Inter-locking sections, that’s much stronger and stable. Top tip, keep a small piece of 2mm scrap card to use as a gauge and check that the slot is wide enough when cut out. This makes it much easier to fit the sections together without damage to the walls, if the slots were too tight.
 

  
Gluing the interior walls to the main wall in sections, again adds rigidity and strength.
 
The small sections of the exterior walls come next. Two sections, with one of them having an interior wall incorporated.  
 
When the main wall is added, there is an extra layer which is slightly wider than the outer wall, and this layer has the drain pipe on. So when glued together, the drainpipe can’t be knocked off.
 
Now to build the front wall. Exactly the same as the rear walls. I have to ask you to look at the curtains. On a previous build, where there were curtains, I put them all in place all random and uneven. My wife informed me that “No self-respecting, house proud woman, would have uneven curtains.” She would straighten all of the curtains on a morning when they were opened. So I did as I was told and straightened all of the curtains. That’s me told!!
 

Once the walls are in position, it’s time for the ceilings, incorporating the guttering.
  
The end gable wall comes together at this stage. Again with incorporated drainpipes.
 
That’s as far as I want to go with this section. I want to build all of the sections to this stage so I can run the roofs in one go.    

Time to crack on and build another three houses.
Until Next Time………..  
 
 
 











1 comment:

Andy said...

Hi Chris, several brilliant ideas here, thanks for sharing them! Especially the one about curtains, it's so true yet I've never really thought about it before - is your wife available for modelling consultation? :) Must also remember your suggestion of having a gauge card to check slot widths - so much easier than hacking with sections during assembly. Looking forward to seeing the completed 8 houses on the layout!