Building the Beer Line in N Scale

[Dave Schneider]

That's one of those brick colors one doesn't often find on a model railroad.

Exactly. But they are common in this area. Here is a closed (Pabst) bar that overlooks the microbrew joint that Matt posted. This WILL be on my Beer Line. This neighborhood has gotten all yuppie/hipster-ized and it wouldn't surprise me if someday soon you will see people drinking Pabst tall boys at this place once again.



The Lakefront Brewery (which is not on the lake by the way) is listed on the Sanborn maps as a pattern shop and misc storage for the T.M.E.R.& L.C. (the old streetcar line in MKE). Here is its relationship to the Beer Line and the Holton Street Bridge.



A little "Film Noir" view of the area under the bridge. This is one of my favorite photos of the Beer Line.



Finally, the cream city brick is very porous, and turned a distinctive dark color with age, such as here on the Trostel Tannery. They REALLY wanted people to know the name of their business!



Thanks for looking.
Best wishes, Dave

[Dave Schneider]

I made some progress on the Journal loading dock the past couple of days. It was a bit of a challenge to figure out how to get all 20 H-beams aligned, plumb and attached to the dock. After some serious internal debate, I settled on the following. I took some .030 thick strip, drilled a series of holes for .040 styrene rod, and glue it in. I then cut the strip to length (about .1 x .1), and glued them to the bottom of the H-beams.



I then drilled the corresponding holes in the dock and inserted the round peg in the round hole. It didn't turn out perfect, but it is pretty darn close. Painting and weathering the concrete dock is next. I need some newsprint rolls. Anybody know how big these should be?  I'm guessing something like 5ft long with a diameter of 4 ft or so.



Best wishes, Dave

[Chris333]

At work last night I hopped on the tow motor and grabbed a roll of paper.

As you can see the clamp on the tow motor is offset a little. We keep our paper in the basement. When it is unloaded the rolls are rolled right out of the truck into a special automatic elevator that takes it to the basement and pops it out on the floor. Here is the basement:


When rolling like that we pick them up like this:


And then we rotate and stack them:


The rolls are 50" dia because each unit of the press can hold 3 rolls at a time. If they were bigger than 50" they wouldn't fit:


And like I said in Weekend Update. Our rolls are 4 pages wide. One page is 11" wide so the rolls are 44" wide. In 1992 the rolls were 54" wide, but we cut down the press every 10 or so years to save money on paper (that we pay for by the ton).

[Dave Schneider]

Thanks Chris. Great photos and explanation.  That was really useful.

Best wishes, Dave

[Dave Schneider]

Just about finished with the loading dock construction. Still needs some downspouts, windows, and the handrail for the steps.  Got the base coat down for the paint and now to add some weathering. I still need to find a forklift and build a paper clamp for it. The GHQ model looks like the correct size.



Best wishes, Dave

[mcjaco]

Nice Dave.  You work fast!

[Dave Schneider]

Thanks Matt. That made me laugh! Looks can be deceiving.
I had to build the dock base twice because I messed up the measurements on the first one, I had to reattach a couple of legs that broke off when I dropped the roof, the first attempt at painting and weathering the dock were horrible, etc....

I am trying to channel my inner MC, who advised recently to just build something. If you don't like it, rip it out and redo it. Since I mess up so often, I think I have nailed the redo it part. Listening to jazz in my workshop really helps.

Best wishes, Dave

[GaryHinshaw]

Looking really good Dave - I love the authenticity.

I too now subscribe to the 'Build it, and if it doesn't work, fix it' school.  It doesn't seem to make me any faster though... Maybe I should try adding jazz. 

[Dave Schneider]

Finished up the Journal newsprint dock, with some weathering, downspouts for the rain gutters, etc... I got some GHQ forklifts in the mail, and need to build a newsprint clamp for one of them.

Here is the final weathered dock.


I then moved on to working on sidewalks, driveways, and pavement. The parking area near the dock and Lincoln warehouse, while the streets are asphalt. I am pleased with the initial results, but got hung up on sewer grates and manhole covers. I know that there are some etched brass ones, but they are expensive. I tried to cut some sewer grates with my Silhouette digital cutter, but had issues with various materials. Tape, vinyl and paper tore too easily, and I couldn't cut all the way through styrene. After a couple of days of failure, I came upon the solution....vellum drafting paper.

For those that are too young to remember drafting paper, modern vellum is a plasticized cotton product, that has a frosted surface on one side (shiny on the other).  The Silhouette machine uses a tacky cutting mat to feed the paper through it, so I just pressed the paper to the mat. After cutting it, I just pealed them off the mat. I stuck the grates (about .20 by .185 inches for the large ones) to some tape, painted them roof brown, and them dusted them with rusty chalk.



After they dried, I attached them with spray adhesive to some .010 styrene that I painted flat black. I used some dull coat to seal them, cut them out, and painted the edges with some weathered black. Here is the final product, not yet inset into the gutter.



I think these turned out pretty well, so manhole covers are next on the list.

Best wishes, Dave

[Nilmadic]

Dave I think you nailed it with those Grates. I just saw some similar ones on shapeways.

[Zox]

Dave, I love the sewer grates--that's the sort of thing I want to do with my cutter, if I can (a) get some time to (b) sort out the issues I'm having with my latest project.

I'll have to try out the vellum paper. I've found acetate (overhead transparency sheets) also works for small parts, while thin styrene (as you noted) will kind of "ooze under" the tip of the knife and not want to cut.

For the dimensions on the grates, are you sure you didn't chuck an extra decimal place in there? I suspect they're somewhat larger than 3.2-by-3 inches in N scale...

[Dave Schneider]

Thanks guys. I edited my post to correct the dimensions. 

Best wishes, Dave

[Philip H]

Dave, how much for a set of those (say a dozen) shipped to the lower 48?  I had been thinking about some of the brass ones that recently came out (http://www.greatlakesmodels.com/Product%20Scale%20Pages/N%20Scale%20Product%20Page.htm)  But hey are the wrong style for south Louisiana (where grates exist and aren't just curb cuts).  Yours are closer, and I like to keep my business in the Family, so to speak.

And did I miss something - it looks like your newsprint dock transloads to trucks ad not directly to the printing plant?

[Scottl]

Nice work Dave.  I'm not very familiar with the prototype, but I'm enjoying watching this layout progress.

[Dave Schneider]

Dave, how much for a set of those (say a dozen) shipped to the lower 48?  I had been thinking about some of the brass ones that recently came out
And did I miss something - it looks like your newsprint dock transloads to trucks ad not directly to the printing plant?

Philip,

Email sent....its going to cost you big time!

You are correct, this is a transload dock. http://i291.photobucket.com/albums/ll290/djs_ank_ak/BBL/JournalTruck.jpg
It was built in 1965, to replace a loading dock that was lost in construction of a new (and current) passenger station.   

Best wishes, Dave