N Scale Yard office

List of Materials

N Scale Laser #032 Yard Office Kit

10 thou Plasticard – Ebay

Micro LED bulbs – Ebay

N Scale Office Furniture – Shapeways

N Scale Bathroom Interion – Shapeways

Seated Figures – Ebay

Fire Extinguisher – Model Tech

Tamiya & Model Masters Acrylic paints

Construction

I started by spraying all the parts with a light coat of clear primer. I then assembled the main walls and roof, using the floor template as a guide. I used magnetic clamps to hold the walls while the glue dried. Once the walls and roof were in place and dried I marked out on the floor template the internal walls for the bathroom. These were cut from 10 thou plasticard and the door way was opened and scored so that the door could be ajar. I used some L section plastic component to brace the corners of the bathroom and assembled the internal walls to the floor. To the main structure I added coping around the roof and also modified the kit by adding some brass wire to form a bathroom drain and down spout. I also fitted the doors at this point. For the interior I used 3D printed office furniture and bathroom sets from Shapeways. These were painted with Tamiya acrylic paints and a 0000 paint brush. The desks were painted flat white the computer equipment flat black and the desk legs and cabinets are in dark iron. I picked out the draw handles in black. The interior was secured to the floor after I had painted the floor with Light grey model masters paint and box car red walls (the owner of the office is a railfan). I painted the interior walls boxcar red to match the bathroom walls and painted the ceiling flat white. I then fitted micro LEDs to the main building and also drilled a hole in the exterior wall to fit a light above the main entrance door. The glazing was added and then chanel attached to the inside bathroom wall hidden from view that directs the wires through the hole in the floor. To complete the exterior I painted the building flat white, the roof and coping grimey black and the doors in flat black. I picked out the window frames in brown. I used this prototype image for my colourings.

Having built my CDU it was time to build some controls for the turnouts on the N scale project layout. I used a small project box from ebay and cut 6mm holes for spdt (on)-off-(on), this was a squeeze with 9 to fit.

I then wired all these up being short on wire colours i used one colour and some brasswire to feed the centre pin of the switches and then fitted wires to the on contacts to go to turnouts on the layout. I used some cable tidy to group the wires based on where there destination was on the layout.

Then just because i had a little bit of time left i mounted the box to the layout fascia and fed the wire loom through the layout. I finished my couple of hours work with the first turnout motor getting fitted to the layout. It looks like a bowl of spaghetti under the layout at the moment but these are mostly droppers waiting to be fitted to the DCC bus or auto frogs.

I managed to squeeze in another hour, this time making a Capacitor Discharge Unit that will double as the power supply for the other accesories on my N scale project layout. The CDU was from ebay and came as a kit, but i don’t mind saving a few pounds and having a fun little project like this. An article in model railroad hobbyist about making your own kits like this maybe the way i go in the future but time is not on my side.

It was a nice little project and you’ll learn alot more this way than buying a ready built commercial component.

Its all screw terminals so when this in under the layout it should be easy to work with, i.e no soldering iorns.

Order your own CDU here (no affiliation to me)

So here i have logged another 3 hours, this time tracklaying for my N scale Civil AP project layout.

I continued my previous work of cutting lengths of flex track to complete the whole plan. Its only a 5ft x 1ft layout so this wasn’t a huge job.

Once the track was cut i held it in place with push pins. I then soldered all rail joins and soldered feed wires to each track sections. I also soldered the feed wires to the frogs which i will conect to auto frogs under the baseboard.

Then i painted the ties with a dark brown and light brown wash.

Then i glued the complete trackwork down to the roadbed

Sometimes enjoying the hobby doesn’t mean doing more than just sitting with a good book or magazine and discovering new knowledge you didn’t have before. In fact alot of people in the hobby do no more than watch youtube clips or read articles, for them that is the hobby. For me its an essential part of discovery and knowledge aquisition, the most important thing any of us can do in this hobby is sharing knowledge with others.

So on my flight down to Benson I had this years model railroad subscription, in 2018, it will be Model Railroad Hobbyist and the Narrow Gauge & Shortline Gazette. in 2017 it was NMRA Magazine, Model Railroader, MRVP & Railroad Model Craftsman, with the money I have saved from dropping some of these titles I have decided to fund 3 NMRA memberships for deserving people. I have already given 2 out and still have to find who will be the third recipient.

Anyway my flight down to Benson was made a whole lot better by taking along a Model Railroad Magazine, and what did I learn well.

• I was inspired by a great article about a Jail building and how it developed, possibly a future scratchbuilding project.
• An equally brilliant article by Bill Gould about building a O scale water tower will almost certainly lead to a project down the line.
• I read about three times a great how to article for making evergreen trees by Craig Symington MMR he has a few thousand to make and now I know why i don’t model the pacific northwest
• I made a huge list of manufacturers whose websites i wanted to visit, unfortunatley no wifi on British Airways.