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Ever evolvin dio. ft. 'THE INDESTRUCTIBLE TREE' as ft. on youtube.


Badder

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I decided to fix the shutters in the open position so that the window frame behind can be seen. The window frame was treated the same way, only with less rubbing back. I have to add some hinge brackets to the wall and give the area a coat of mat to finish this area off.

Ttuh66x.jpg

TFL

Badder

 

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2 hours ago, PlaStix said:

The window frames and shutters do look the job! :thumbsup::thumbsup:

Kind regards,

Stix

Thanks Stix,

I wasn't too sure of the shutters at first, but zooming in with the camera actually makes them look better!

 

Rearguards,

Badder.

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29 minutes ago, Ozzy said:

Looking good, are you going to have any glazing?

Hi Ozzy

Thanks.

I had a think about the age of the building... or rather, how long ago it was ruined. It has moss growing along the tops of the collapsed walls, and there will be plants growing on it and inside it as well, so it was ruined a good few years previously. I doubted that any panes of glass would have survived intact, so I've not added any 'undamaged' panes. However, I will be adding some remnants. There' are very thin slots running down the back of each window frame and I should be able to poke a few bits of very thin 'glass' into them.

 

Rearguards

Badder

 

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Not much progress over the past 24hrs. I have been suffering from extremely bad toothache which rendered me completely debilitated and incapable of even watching TV let alone gluing painting and sculpting things. I'm a late onset type 1 diabetic and a symptom of this seems to be rapid tooth decay! I should go to a dentist and have it extracted, but I haven't been to a dentist for nearly 20 years and had such a bad experience I think it's better to let the things fall out)

Today though, the pain has eased and I decided to make moulds of parts of the new building. Again, the kit itself would prove a bit difficult to construct with nice tidy joins as the contact areas between the parts are so miniscule and adding tabs etc to increase the contact areas isn't the best solution in my opinion. I like the fact that plaster casts are solid, not hollow (as the kit's walls would be) and that they can be carved and fitted together easily.

So, 4 large forms have had the first latex applied and these are currently drying. I am particularly interested in the roof as it is a large expanse of tiles and fits nicely on top of another section with rafters. It should come in very handy for extending this kit and possibly the previous one. The top row of tiles, when cast, should provide a supply of loose tiles to scatter around the old building as well.

So, bear with me....there will be photos later, but as for now I doubt anyone is interested in seeing latex dry.

 

TFL

Badder

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Three of the four moulds made so far.

DECjboG.jpg

 

 

The roof underside section still needs a few more layers of latex. With the rafters it will require either a LOT of layers, or some inserts to take up the space between them. I'm going for the second option.

 

TFL

Badder

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36 minutes ago, kpnuts said:

Looking great mate.

Thanks KP.

As before there's a problem with slight shrinkage of the latex mould, but nothing that can't be accounted for.

 

Rearguards,

Badder

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2 hours ago, PlaStix said:

Hi Badder. Sorry to hear about the toothache. Hope the pain is easing off. Looking forward to seeing more progress.

Kind regards,

Stix

Thanks Stix,

It's gone for now, but it will come again!

 

I've just given the rafter section its last coat. I used cardboard strips to fill out the spaces between the rafters to save on latex. The cardboard strips are now entombed within the mould and drying out over a radiator.

 

Rearguards,

Badder

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With most of the major sections of the Ardennes kit moulded in latex, I last night began to remove the wall sections from their forms. Now, the previous building was basically a gable end wall and the remains of a side wall. There were only four constituent parts and their fitting-together was almost a no-brainer, so the basic instruction sheet wasn't a problem.

The Ardennes building, however, has ten parts (not including the external stairway) making the trimming and joining of parts more complicated. It's not handy then that the instruction sheet is an abomination.

While the Ruined Village House instruction sheet DID show where to make important cuts and remove certain sections of 'trim', the Ardennes instruction sheet shows not one. One has to study the diagrams very closely to see which parts of trim are 'missing', and then assume that these sections of trim were supposed to be removed. But the diagrams are very poor and ambiguous and one can't be one hundred percent certain which should be removed (if any) without test fitting.

And it was at this point I realised that the rafters in the 'under-roof' section DO NOT match up with the 'slots' in the front wall sections. This is clearly not acceptable! MiniArt must be very aware of the fault and have done nothing to correct it. Fortunately, I will be constructing my wall with plaster so it will be a simple job to reposition the slots with a bit of filling and carving. To do the same with the kit's plastic parts would be more difficult as the kit's wall assembly is hollow.  So, one up to me for making moulds!

But that's not the only problem. It's anyone's guess as to how the roof's tile and rafter sections are supposed to be trimmed and joined. There are clear 'borders' around the tile and rafter sections, and but their dimensions differ. The diagram doesn't show which way around the parts should be, nor if they should be trimmed so that the sections fit together around the edges or that the rafter section should drop inside the tile section.

 

Annoyed, I thought I'd search the web for 'instructions on how to build MiniArt's Ardennes Building.'

I found a 'Open the box and have a look' video, where someone reviewed the kit. During the video he said he was looking forward to making the kit as he hadn't done any 'construction' videos before.... he said that he was okay at figures and vehicles, but very good at buildings, so the Ardennes Building would be a great subject for his first. 'Ah ha!' I thought, 'Let's see how he copes with the rafters!'

There is no follow up video.

 

MiniArt's home page shows photos of all the parts 'removed from their forms' but even they don't show the 'trimmed' sections clearly.  And no mention of the rafter misalignment. So no help from them then. Anyway, I'm sure I can work it out. I have the moulds, so if I make a mistake and trim off the wrong parts I can always make a cast and try again!

 

Below:

Rafter extreme left aligned correctly with the 'slot' in the top of the front wall.

HbXNXiu.jpg

 

Below:

Ever increasing misalignment between rafters and slots, with the final rafter being almost an entire rafter width out.

DILIjFK.jpg

 

 

Below:

Rafter section overlaying inside of tile section. Now, where do I trim? There's a lip running around some of the trim as well. Do I just remove the lip, the lip and the trim, or the lip, trim and borders?

IGuRuw8.jpg

 

TFL

Badder

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After careful consideration, I removed all of the excess plastic trim/borders and lips from both sections of the roof, except for the 'lips' around the tiled section. These lips run along the sides and the front edge and have details of the tiles on them so these areas are obviously meant to remain.

Now, I WAS going to cast the wall, re-carve some of the slots and fill in the gaps before sliding a cast of the roof into place, however, I've now discovered that if I were to use one of the end slots as a datum the roof will actually sit off centre, hanging over the ends of the building unequally. So, EVERY slot will need to be repositioned. Well done MiniArt.

Having said all this, I was well aware that these older MiniArt kits are a bit questionable. The most obvious faults (to me anyway) are the scale of their doorways and the overall height of their buildings. Now I don't know about you but I've never entered a doorway measuring 9ft high. I can only assume that Ukrainians (the manufacturers . of MiniArt) are rather taller than the average European, (I assume Tamiya buildings have doorways which the average European would have to stoop to enter)

All of that aside, I do find the kits very useful as a starting point and enjoy having to rework them and add to them.

 

Meanwhile, I found some dead plants in the hedgerow down our lane, and was amazed to see just how good they will be for making trees/bushes..... not quite Seafoam, but something very close. I haven't a clue what species they are but they will be dunked in PVA and have herbs scattered over them. I think they will look very good as a bit of woodland edge.

SR88vX8.jpg

 

TFL

Badder

 

 

 

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I've dunked the plants in slightly diluted PVA.... approx. 5 parts PVA to 1 part water. Being quite a thick solution it's formed small blobs in the forks of the twigs and around the dead 'flowers'. The PVA will continue to shrink as it dries and hopefully it will help to strengthen and protect the most delicate of the 'twigs'.  When the PVA had dried to a tacky consistency I re-dunked the plants in a much weaker solution of PVA, 1 part glue to 10 of water, the idea being to ensure complete coverage of the plants, sealing any gaps that the thicker solution may have missed.

The plants are now drying out over a radiator.

 

TFL

Badder

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1 hour ago, Badder said:

I've dunked the plants in slightly diluted PVA.... approx. 5 parts PVA to 1 part water. Being quite a thick solution it's formed small blobs in the forks of the twigs and around the dead 'flowers'. The PVA will continue to shrink as it dries and hopefully it will help to strengthen and protect the most delicate of the 'twigs'.  When the PVA had dried to a tacky consistency I re-dunked the plants in a much weaker solution of PVA, 1 part glue to 10 of water, the idea being to ensure complete coverage of the plants, sealing any gaps that the thicker solution may have missed.

The plants are now drying out over a radiator.

 

TFL

Badder

 

It might be a stupid question, but I am a rookie inside dio's...

What is PVA?

 

8-)

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1 hour ago, Major_Error said:

 

It might be a stupid question, but I am a rookie inside dio's...

What is PVA?

 

8-)

It's Poly Vynyl Acetate, a white, water soluble 'wood glue' that dries clear. You can use it neat to stick wood, plaster of paris, stone, etc, or you can dilute it and use it as a fixative for scatters/flocks/static grass etc. I think the Americans call it Elmer's glue?

 

Hope that helps.

 

Rearguards,

Badder

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I will be using the kit's roof sections for this build as the roof will be undamaged. If the roof were to be half-collapsed then I would use a plaster cast. So, I've glued the kit's tile and rafter sections together.... after a lot of whittling. I don't know if I was meant to whittle away so much, but that's down to the poor instruction sheet. Perhaps the two parts were supposed to fit all around the edges 'lip to lip' so that the roof was hollow, but my rafter section is in contact with the tiled section across the entire inner surface. 

After a 'Doh!' moment I realised that the central rafter in the roof and the central slot in the front wall are.... er..... central, so I can use these as the datum and adjust the rest of the wall's slots accordingly.

 

And whilst I am currently concentrating on this new building, I am constantly thinking ahead and always looking out for freebee materials from mother nature. Today I happened upon an uprooted section of Box hedge where with lovely exposed roots (some major garden work was going on just down the lane) so Mr Muscle removed as many roots as he could before anyone spotted him.

 

The roots are really rather tasty (looking). Some will be used for ivy creepers. Remaining supple for ages, I will wrap some lengths of root around larger tree trunks before fixing in place with CA..  Some of the roots will be used for making shrubs, or branches and twigs of trees.

4AIQjrM.jpg

 

G8HPZUU.jpg

 

 

TFL

Badder

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IMPORTANT INFORMATION!

 

The following edit was made on 25.02.17 for reasons which will become clear. Those new to this thread should note that this edit describes a better method of construction when taking into account the addition of the window frames at a later stage.

 

 

EDIT

Having removed the window frames from their sprues I test fitted them in the window apertures in the front and side walls. THEY DON'T FIT!

This is down to me making a mistake during the primary construction of the building.

Or rather, it is down to me for reasonably assuming that the window apertures in the outer and inner pieces should be glued together when the two halves of the walls are glued together.

It turns out that they shouldn't be glued together at the primary stage, rather be left to bend and flex when the window frames are inserted. When pushed in from the rear, the sides of the inner window apertures will flex and allow the window frames to be pushed up tight against the rear of the outer apertures' side walls. THEN glue (thin CA) can be used to fix everything together.

 

So, I've had to break the bonds at the joins between inner and outer window apertures. Luckily I used CA to fix them so careful prodding and flexing broke them apart in most cases. Unfortunately I had added tabs to the inners which made breaking some of the bonds harder than it might have been.

 

Looking back now, perhaps the better option would be to sand down the side walls of the inner apertures by the thickness of the window frames, then sandwich the window frames between the inner and outer forms when the walls are glued together.

 

Of course, the instruction sheet doesn't allude to any of this.

 

I will cut and paste this post to the beginning of this section on the 'Ardennes Building', for those who follow this thread in the future.

 

TFL

Badder

 

END OF EDIT. What follows now is the original post with the incorrect fixing of inner and outer window apertures.

 

 

 

 

With all of the moulds made I decided to crack on and construct the building using the kit parts before deciding what to do with the rear.

 

I started with the frontage, cutting out all of the window and door apertures using my 'shaving technique'. Test fitting proved the technique once again, with the inner and outer apertures meeting neatly with no need for filling.

As usual though, gluing was going to be awkward. You cannot simply glue the inner and outer sections together butting edge to edge, what with the edges being less than 0.5mm thick. You have to glue tabs along the insides of the forms, along the walls and around the window and door apertures. These have to overlap the joints between the inner and outer sections, increasing the areas of contact for glue application but also helping to locate the parts.

But before I started gluing I stiffened up the open ends of the wall sections by inserting folded-up cardboard inside and fixing them with CA. The cardboard held the inner and outer sections apart with an even spacing but  would remain pliable enough to allow a bit of bending and pushing to get the stonework to meet neatly at the corners once the side walls were added.

After careful consideration I decided to glue the frontage's inner and outer together using CA and working in stages from one edge of the frontage across to the other. 

Gluing the whole thing in one go with Poly is not a good idea in my opinion. There's too much to glue and there is some bending and pressing to be done in order to get everything to fit correctly. Each area of contact needs to be fixed accurately and securely before moving on to the next. Poly would remain pliable for some time and would pull out of shape. Clamping such a large and intricate shape is not really viable either. You would need many and varied clamps.

So, I started at one edge, applying medium CA to the tabs and locating the inner and outer forms together precisely. I continued to hold the parts together by hand until they held together on their own. I then ran thin CA into the join to reinforce it. I then moved across to the window and 'barn door' area. I prised the inner and outer forms apart very slightly, gaining access to the inner tabs, and repeated the process, applying medium CA and then holding the parts in place while it dried. (the tabs aid the correct location of the parts so the job isn't too difficult) And once again thin CA was run into the joints to finalise.  And so I continued working my way across the frontage until all had been fixed. The same method was used for the side walls.

Fixing the sidewalls to the frontage was relatively easy, what with the cardboard inserts. I just had to ensure that all the angles were true. To do this, I placed the frontage tight up against the inside edge of my diorama frame, abutting the corner, and used the side of the frame to locate the side wall at a 90 degree angle. I used a set square to ensure that the side wall and frontage were standing perfectly upright. As it turns out everything sat nice and snug and true and the trueness could be repeated, so I was happy to remove the side wall, apply medium CA to the contact surface and then offer it up to the frontage again. A quick check with the set square and I was happy to hold the parts together while the CA fixed. Then it was a case of dribbling thin CA down the corner and holding the stonework together to form a neat join there as well. Well, I say neat. Some sanding and a tiny bit of filling will be required to make it truly neat.

 

With the side walls added, it was time to add the roof.

I had believed that the problem with the roof would be awkward to sort out, but wouldn't require more than relocating the slots in the wall, so I widened the slots before adding the side walls. The roof then sat nicely, and centrally.  

I hadn't considered how the side walls would interact with the roof though. Position the roof correctly, and one of the rafters actualy sits on top of the side wall. Oh dear. So, out with the scalpel and off with 90 percent of the rafter, leaving just the eaves overhang behind.

 

Here's one of the side walls. As you can see, the cardboard helps to hold the outer and inner sections apart evenly, but allows for some compression/bending when it comes to join it to the frontage and match up the stonework at the corners. Note also the neat joins in the window aperture. The neatness was aided by the tabs which lie inside the hollow wall and behind the visible join.

a5WMdpz.jpg

 

 

The frontage with all the window and door apertures cut out and the inner and outer forms glued. Whilst I was trying to get nice neat joins in the window and door apertures there are a few spots that will need tidying up. However, they won't be visible so I'm just being fussy.

4iy4RS1.jpg

 

The main bulk of the building with the roof dry fitted.

X78IGM0.jpg

Now to decide what to do with the rear of the building...

TFL

Badder

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This building is actually a bit bigger than I had envisaged. The slope of the roof is less than 45 degrees so it actually extends the building back further than the box art suggests. I'm going to have a play around with both buildings on the dio base and see what my options are.

 

TFL

Badder

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The steps up to the first floor are under construction. The assembly is made much easier with the addition of extra large matchsticks glued along the inside edges of the supporting wall to keep the thin and bendy plastic straight.  The end wall of the assembly is slightly larger than required and so will have to be trimmed to fit snug up against the front of the building. For now, the end wall juts out and holds the steps slightly away from the building.

 

Below, the horizontal matchstick kept the supporting wall straight along its length, while the vertical matchstick provided a contact area upon which to seat and fix the end wall.

PL4D3qP.jpg

 

 

The roof has been fixed in place and the ends faced with the kit's er.... 'wooden end boards'. These aren't quite long enough to fit along the entire length as per the box art and instruction sheet, but I will be adding bits to correct this.  I also added a coffee stirrer stick to both of the gables making a nice facia. 

BTW, the join between the side wall and frontage looks well gappy in the photo below, but that's because I've scraped the entire joint back so as to provide a better key for the small amount of filler that I had wanted to apply. The fact is that the kit's plastic, whilst thin and relatively brittle, is actually quite hard to carve and so it will be easier to recarve the stonework in the filler than it will in the plastic itself.

Fexd49D.jpg

TFL

Badder 

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Nice progress on the mini art building, nice idea about the reinforcing the joints. Some of the buildings I've built the corner joins, have been been hit and miss when it comes to any kind of gap. It does look a rather nice fit all round, in regards to the front to back wall joins.

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I have never worked with the MiniArt vacuum buildings.  They actually look like a huge pain in the Dio to work with.  You sure do make the things look good when your done with 'em tho.  keep up the great work!

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23 minutes ago, Ozzy said:

Nice progress on the mini art building, nice idea about the reinforcing the joints. Some of the buildings I've built the corner joins, have been been hit and miss when it comes to any kind of gap. It does look a rather nice fit all round, in regards to the front to back wall joins.

Thanks Ozzy.

The fitting isn't easy and it is a case of dry-fitting and playing around trying to find the best way to do it. The order of fitting makes a difference as well. There is a hell of lot of give in the parts, so keeping everything straight/square/perpendicular etc isn't as simple as it might be. On the other hand, the flexing does allow a bit of pushing and bending to get the stonework patterns to match up nicely at the corners. It's a shame I don't have a photo of that nearest corner before I shaved it back, because it was a lot better than it looks at the moment. I do have a photo of the other corner though, which has only been shaved back slightly and that looks much better. I will post a pic in a bit.

 

Rearguards,

Badder

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