A snapshot in time. A glimpse of the Plettenberger Kleinbahn in 1/22.5 scale.

[Ray Dunakin]

The signs and old crankcase look great!

[finescalerr]

Volker, remove your magnifying glasses and go stand in the corner. -- Russ

[Hydrostat]

Ray, thank you, I still do have a small piece of the Papilio self adhesive vinyl that you shipped to me years ago, which I'm going to use for some more signs. As per normal there are advantages and disadvantages in different approaches. Printing the signs on photo glossy paper makes it easy to cut the outline exactly. The very thin (I think 0.05 mm [0.002']) self adhesive copper foil glued to the backside prevends any light shining through, an effect that destroys illusion immediately. It's easy to bend or camber those signs, but they are a bit delicate, unless they are glued to a wall. I used CA gel for the edge and mounting adhesive for the inner, curved areas. Unfortunately I picked the wrong one (for absorptive surfaces) and it shrinked completely and took away the curving. I 'saved' the sign by filling the curving with baking soda and CA and then glued the now rather stable part to the wall. Glossy paper and copper foil result in a somewhat prototypical wall thickness of 0.15 mm (0,006'). The copper/paper edges are colored with a black edding. Then I dab clear nail lacquer generously to the surface to amplify the 'glassy' impression of enamel and to reduce the somewhat wavy paper surface. The both blue signs show the effect especially well:




The 'Haltestelle der Kleinbahn' and the blue 'Maiplatz' sign show the typical minor bulge.







Again everything depends on materials used. My current photo glossy paper is double sided foil covered. The white signs were made years ago when I had some one sided foil covered paper. I drenched the backside with very thin CA which gave this somewhat used and weathered impression, much better than the current material.




Although the printouts are protected by fixatives and lacquer those paper items are no way suitable for outside use, of course.

Using thin brass sheet (0.2 mm / 0.008') and self adhesive vinyl is the better way for freestanding signs. They are much more stable and keep a curved shape even if treated unwittingly a bit rough. But it is difficult to align the foil exactly, especially if there's a very thin visible outline at the sign. I still do have to test if and how nail lacquer works on the surface. I used vinyl (without additional lacquer) at the street lamp's toilet sign.

Howsoever: it seems to me that printing quality of inkjet printers has passed the zenith. I once had an Epson Stylus CX 5400, which showed great results and one was able to go deep into printer settings, up to manually numbered resolution. Of course this one died like all inkjets sooner or later from dried ink. All the later printers showed results getting worse and worse and nowadays their menus don't give lots of possibilities of professional intervention anymore.

Volker, remove your magnifying glasses and go stand in the corner. -- Russ

I can't. They are basifixed.

Cheers,
Volker

[Bernhard]

Interesting and instructive excursion about sign making, thank you.

Bernhard

[nk]

This is no longer a hobby, is it? Its artistry pure and simple.

[Hydrostat]

Thanks Bernhard and Narayan,

This is no longer a hobby, is it? Its artistry pure and simple.

Oh well: A minefield, but yes - in my eyes it never was a hobby.


A supposed second street sign on the facade puzzled me, as it could not be deciphered in any of the photos available, but the length of the street name I was looking for certainly did not show the required name "Maiplatz". Thanks to a tip from Wolf Groote, it became clear that this was a sign from a time when there weren't many telephones: there was a fire alarm point here. The sign can no longer be seen in later photos of the building from the mid-1950s onwards. It was created in the way already described from photoglossy paper and self-adhesive copper foil.




There were parallel decorative recesses at the two corners of this side of the facade. They are carved into the facade with two sharp-edged brass pieces screwed together.






Then next to the shop door there was a 'Zeiss' sign, which received an additional frame and suspension, as well as a thermometer, both of which were again created in the tried and tested manner. To recreate the tube, I pulled a hot glue thread; it has a diameter of about 0.3 mm.








The implementation of the signposts and the sign for main roads (the square on the top) was a little more exciting.




The latter was an embossed shield that I made using a male and female embossing stamp soldered together. I had to experiment for a while until I found the right material with 0.1 mm thick annealed copper foil. Due to the raw material available, the stamp was a little too deep, which could be corrected with inserted pieces of cardboard.






The fastening brackets of the slanted signpost are twisted. I first made the right angle bends and drilled the mounting holes. A milled drilling jig (seen here in the foreground - thanks, Frithjof!) helped me to place the holes in the middle and at a defined distance from the end of the bracket. I then soldered the bracket prepared in this way onto a sturdy piece of brass.




The desired twist could now be created in the vice by tilting the brass bar.




With the short holder, it was enough to solder the pre-drilled strip onto the carrier plate and twist the protruding ends using a pair of flat-nose pliers by eye.




The sign, which was only subsequently attached to the bracket of one signpost in later years, was attached with a clamping device, which I have also indicated.










The parts are all tinned and then blackened - except for the motif area, to which a printed self-adhesive vinyl film was stuck this time. The traffic sign, in turn, is painted: First I laid out the inner part white, then masked it off and then sprayed the border red. You don't have to worry too much about the colors, because standards for them only existed from 1940 onwards and, due to the war, the industry had to improvise for a variety of reasons until the early 1950s.









Cheers,
Volker

[finescalerr]

Doesn't that look real, kids? Now let's ask Uncle Volker if we can play with his train set! -- ssuR

[1-32]

Hi Volker .
Great.
The brackets and the slight bit of aging on the tip of the signs is very good .
Cheers Kim

[Bernhard]

If you look at the detailed photos, it's hard to believe that this is "just" a model. Unbelievable.
And what an incredible forest of signs on this façade. The motorists probably had to stop for a moment to study all the signs before continuing in the right direction.

Bernhard

[Peter_T1958]

Obviously what really makes the difference between good and very good modelling is the amount of work and time you are willing to invest in every small detail. A feast for the eyes!

[Hydrostat]

Doesn't that look real, kids? Now let's ask Uncle Volker if we can play with his train set! -- ssuR

Nobody except my wife should dare to touch my model railway!

Hi Volker .
Great.
The brackets and the slight bit of aging on the tip of the signs is very good .
Cheers Kim

Kim, I often think that less is more and most time this works quite well.

And what an incredible forest of signs on this façade. The motorists probably had to stop for a moment to study all the signs before continuing in the right direction.

That's exactly what came to my mind, too. I think everything was a bit slower back then and there wasn't this overstimulation with signs and adverts, that we have today. So maybe there was a more intense perception of those road signs. Howsoever, if someone would model a fancy buiding with such an accumulation of signs I would surely be tempted to describe it as overdone ...

Obviously what really makes the difference between good and very good modelling is the amount of work and time you are willing to invest in every small detail. A feast for the eyes!

Peter, thank you, it is exactly what your models show. And those of the other guys and girls here at finescalerr.

'Hostile furniture' is not an exclusive phenomenon of modern times. The Lohmann building also had a pearl of this kind of public space design. This was less to scare away pigeons than to ward off exhausted students on their way home from the nearby school building.



When implementing that, I corrected a few initial interpretation errors, but also implemented findings from photos that had surfaced in the meantime. For example, the window sills and the step at the entrance protruded too far and the supposed layered structure of the window sills was corrected at the same time.



First, the existing step had to be removed...



... and make way for a more prototypical solution. I didn't want to and couldn't remove the scraper grid again, so the step turned out to be rather narrow, but the connoisseur can see at first glance that it was notched out for the grate and the trass cement was installed up to the edge that was created.



In the pictures from over ten years ago, the nail band was not clearly visible and so I had to remove the supposed stone gradation before I could attach the nail plate.





This was made from a sheet of metal that was intentionally drilled in a dancing manner...



... into which I soldered decorative pins (Kim may remember buying them in a shop for party accessories some yeras ago - the shop has long gone since). They are a bit too thick, but pins would be too thin and the whole thing is painful enough if you're not careful (you=me). The board underneath ensures that the tips protrude evenly.



The complete tinning helps to treat the parts later with black dye without having to sandblast them.



Then the window sills had to be shortened. This could be done evenly with a cutter blade screwed onto a piece of brass.



The window sills were then given a few more breaks and the stone coloring that matched the original.



Cheers,
Volker

[finescalerr]

I look at the skill and effort evident in those photos and find myself reeling in stunned disbelief .... -- Russ

[Bernhard]

That's what I call perfectionism. My heart would bleed if I had to maltreat one of my models like that.

Bernhard

[Stuart]

All extremely convincing.  Masterful work Volker.

Stuart

[Hydrostat]

Russ, Bernhard, Stuart, thank you.

My heart would bleed if I had to maltreat one of my models like that.

Believe me, it wasn't an easy step, but it was very clear that not doing it would have bothered me endlessly. And in the end it's ongoing work in progress.

Now we're continuing with the "youthful sins" mentioned in the previous post. I had taken the position of the coal shaft from an approval drawing, but the photos shown here show once again that paper, although not particularly tear-resistant, is very patient. On the left is the original, incorrect opening and on the right is the new breakthrough.



I had to enlarge it again because I had only taken the clear dimensions into account and not the space required for the brickwork.





The shaft was given a frame made of brass profiles, into which a removable checker plate is inserted.



The curbs are cast with plaster, but partly also with ready-mixed cement and attached to the carrier material with assembly adhesive. Plaster is completely sufficient...



The step leaves enough space for the sidewalk slabs, which I cut from 3 mm thick Forex. I don't glue the slabs directly onto the carrier material, but use additional supports to implement the slope of the sidewalk towards the street.



To the right of the shop entrance, another bricked-up cellar shaft is indicated.



Cheers,
Volker