Necessity invents a palette

A couple of weeks ago, as I was setting up to demonstrate at VTE, I realized I didn’t have anywhere for my puddle of glue. I normally use an old CD for this purpose, and for years AOL provided me with an almost monthly supply. I still have a lifetime of CDs ready to receive […]

Perfidious air

The past couple of weeks have been all Christmas gifts all the time, but tonight I finally managed to get few minutes to spend on my projects. With the heavy shop out of action until we rebuild from the flood, I’m reduced to the crowded garage floor for heavy shop work. I’m still working toward […]

More O Gauge Canada Atlantic

Richard Guitar sent some more photos of his O Gauge Canada Atlantic equipment on the weekend of the the Vancouver Train Expo. My apologies to Richard for not getting this up sooner! It’s amazing to me how recognizable these scenes are. Richard seems to have a knack for distilling the elements of a scene

Decking demonstration

The Vancouver Train Expo filled the PNE Forum this past weekend. Unlike last year, I’d actually coordinated with Doug Hicks to have a time when I was supposed to be helping at the Craftsman’s Corner. He usually likes to have two-hour slots, but I find that is barely enough time to get my tools out […]

Flatcars painted

Despite all probability, those flatcars have slipped into the paint booth over the past couple of days and received not only a coat of primer, but also some paint. Truly, when it came to painting, the odds were not in their favour. Not only did I have to mine Mount Deluge for the airbrush and […]

Prepped to prep

The flat cars have taken a little hiatus while I figured out the best way to make paint stick to the plastic parts. My usual method is to give plastic models a good scrubbing with Vim under running warm water. But with parts made of wood and even paper, that method was going to lead […]

Drywall removal

Well, here we are, drying out the basement again. This time we chose to do some of the demolition ourselves. The contents were all out on Friday thanks to Laura and the kids (The Girl had a Pro-D day, and The Boy had been up in the middle of the night shifting boxes and furniture, […]

Not again!

Why are those balloons floating just off the floor like that? Remember the flood we had in January? Well, we thought we had fixed it all and capped off the floor drain. Tonight’s heavy rain has come in through the basement door instead. Because we discovered it at ten o’clock, we have really struggled to […]

Closing in on wheel castings

Thanks to Brian Pate, and to Don Mitchell who suggested I call him, I’ve started vacuuming my castings when I pour them. Brian indicated that he liked to vacuum before and after pouring, but I’ve found the pre-pour treatment makes little difference. The post-pour treatment, on the other hand, dislodges all sorts of bubbles from […]

A good effort at pressure

I’m still grappling with the problem of bubbles in my castings. The accepted wisdom indicates that you want to set polyurethane castings under pressure so the bubbles become very small. I think the Smooth-on site suggests 60 psi (413 Kia). Not having anything that holds pressure, and not wanting to spend a lot of money, […]