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2 hours ago, Snowman said:

Wishing you well buddy! 👍

 

BTW, fantastic work!🤩

Thanks Snowman.

Today I have had very little pain at all, and I haven't done my usual thing of falling asleep at the drop of a hat. So, that's good!

 

I am glad you like what you've seen so far. Hopefully things will get even better!

 

Rearguards,

Badder

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Bit of a fiasco today in Hobbycraft. I went in to get some more balsa wood, and a couple of bottles of Daler Rowney Acrylic Ink.

The 'balsa wood' racking was more like a haystack, with strips of wood all over the place, split packs, broken contents, some with price labels, most without. and the one pack I wanted didn't have any price label on. So I took a barcode from a similar looking, but cheaper pack and stuck that on. Don't worry, Karma will strike!

 

To the Acrylic Ink stand next. I only wanted two bottles...yes of course one was Antelope Brown, but the other was one to add to my 'rainbow' of colours.... Burnt Umber. Nice.

Then I had a look at the paper punches and saw one which had some poxy abstract design on, BUT within it were some TINY shapes which caught my eye. Hands full of balsa and ink, I took a punch from the hanger and had a closer look. The shapes I was interested in looked very much like oak leaves and were only 2mm long. And one punch would produce about a dozen of them, maybe more. ABSOLUTELY PERFECT! It was whilst turning the punch over that I suddenly felt a cold, wet, sensation on my hands and fingers.

 

Yes, it was Acylic Ink. Lots of it.  Burnt Umber all over my hands, my shirt sleeves, the paper punch, the  other bottle of ink, and all over Hobbycraft's carpet. The lid wasn't screwed on properly.

I brought all of this to the attention of a member of staff and suggested they get their carpet cleaned up quick before the ink dries.  I got a replacement bottle. No offer of a cloth, or tissue, for my hands and clothes mind you. No apology. Nothing.

 

Anyway, I went to the checkout, now with dried ink all over me, and handed over my goods. And the bloomin' label I'd nicked had fallen off somewhere. So, then I waited 5 mins, with an agitated and annoyed queue behind me, as the woman went to find the price. She came back after rummaging through the haystack and asked me to go back with her and find the correct pack, because they were somewhere in the heap and many looked the same.

 

I bit my lip. Paid the proper price. I wonder if I should claim for ruined shirt?

 

Badder

 

 

 

 

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4 hours ago, Badder said:

Bit of a fiasco today in Hobbycraft. I went in to get some more balsa wood, and a couple of bottles of Daler Rowney Acrylic Ink.

The 'balsa wood' racking was more like a haystack, with strips of wood all over the place, split packs, broken contents, some with price labels, most without. and the one pack I wanted didn't have any price label on. So I took a barcode from a similar looking, but cheaper pack and stuck that on. Don't worry, Karma will strike!

 

To the Acrylic Ink stand next. I only wanted two bottles...yes of course one was Antelope Brown, but the other was one to add to my 'rainbow' of colours.... Burnt Umber. Nice.

Then I had a look at the paper punches and saw one which had some poxy abstract design on, BUT within it were some TINY shapes which caught my eye. Hands full of balsa and ink, I took a punch from the hanger and had a closer look. The shapes I was interested in looked very much like oak leaves and were only 2mm long. And one punch would produce about a dozen of them, maybe more. ABSOLUTELY PERFECT! It was whilst turning the punch over that I suddenly felt a cold, wet, sensation on my hands and fingers.

 

Yes, it was Acylic Ink. Lots of it.  Burnt Umber all over my hands, my shirt sleeves, the paper punch, the  other bottle of ink, and all over Hobbycraft's carpet. The lid wasn't screwed on properly.

I brought all of this to the attention of a member of staff and suggested they get their carpet cleaned up quick before the ink dries.  I got a replacement bottle. No offer of a cloth, or tissue, for my hands and clothes mind you. No apology. Nothing.

 

Anyway, I went to the checkout, now with dried ink all over me, and handed over my goods. And the bloomin' label I'd nicked had fallen off somewhere. So, then I waited 5 mins, with an agitated and annoyed queue behind me, as the woman went to find the price. She came back after rummaging through the haystack and asked me to go back with her and find the correct pack, because they were somewhere in the heap and many looked the same.

 

I bit my lip. Paid the proper price. I wonder if I should claim for ruined shirt?

 

Badder

 

 

 

 

The trials and tribulations of being a Modeler. Many have no idea the sacrifices we have to make to peruse our craft.  However the Hobbycraft theft deterrent system seems a bit overdone, loosing bottle tops indeed.

1- it was only a few cents difference in price

2- the cost of the new shirt and agony (😫) of cleaning off hands and other parts of your purchase far exceeds #1

3- the humiliation of having to "find" another package correctly marked, smacks of an repressed old maid school teacher and her wood ruler (ouch! as I still remember) 

4- they darn well deserve to have to clean up their rug. It was their bottle that had the loose top (you had not bought it yet-see?)

5- they should have been effusive in their apologies to you for suffering such a grievous calamity in their store, - darn ingrates, wait til Walmart opens in the next village --Oh, WAIT Strike That!  Not even they deserves THAT.

6- Should you ever again start to receive such shoddy treatment, simply remind them you have a "Medical Condition" ( totally unspecified)  which require sincere positive treatment of yourself while in any commercial establishment. (that'll keep them in their place, the         young scamps!)  

 

SERIOUSLY: Grand progress on the project.  I'm sorry for you recent bad spell but glad it seems to have backed down. Keep up the good work on the blood sugar count. My GP has been brought back from the brink of despair by the slow reversal of mine. 
 

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13 hours ago, Prop Duster said:

SERIOUSLY: Grand progress on the project.  I'm sorry for you recent bad spell but glad it seems to have backed down. Keep up the good work on the blood sugar count. My GP has been brought back from the brink of despair by the slow reversal of mine. 
 

These things must be taken seriously, so keep up the good work.

 

I was in denial I think - just 'going through the motions' with my insulin regime and not really caring about it.

But now I have a jolly decent Diabetes nurse and my urge to please her with better blood sugar readings has kept me at it. I think I'll be averaging 8 on the meter soon. That's about double what it should be, but far better than the average of 15 to 18 that I used to run at!

 

There seems to me to be a lot of it about, especially with children of the 60's. I reckon something sinister was going on around that time ..... possibly some so called 'safe' chemical in the environment or water, food etc.

But then again, I know for a a fact that whilst on exercise on the North Yorks moors, I stupidly drank water from a stream, not knowing at the time that it had just been contaminated by radioactive fallout from Chernobyl.

 

Searches for a day-glo Emoji with two heads.....

 

 

 

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6 hours ago, Bullbasket said:

I googled CIDP when I read your post. It sounds like another auto immune disease, and not at all pleasant. I hope that you get some relief from it soon.

 

John.

Hi John,

It's as rare as a rockin' horse poop (50 cases a year in the UK when I last looked on the web) and not nice at all. It's related to MS, which is by far the worse of the two conditions. In MS, the nerve damage and therefore the pain, numbness, and loss of muscle control etc, happens when the immune system attacks the nerve 'roots' at the brain end. With CIDP it happens at the opposite end or the nervous system ie from fingers up to elbows and toes up to the knees. Both FEEL exactly the same in terms of where the pain strikes (think of the pilot who has his leg amuputated but still feels it's there) , but the condition is more debilitating with MS and it's progressive and can be fatal. With CIDP the worst case scenario is the total loss of muscle control in the legs and arms. I don't really 'study' what I have and none of the consultants were any help. I even had one chap think that I had CODP, which is completely unrelated.

 

Anyway, today was not as good as yesterday, but still not as bad as it has been recently. Fingers crossed (with some difficulty) I am going into remission and will be back to having pain-free days again (well, nearly pain free).

 

Rearguards,

Badder

 

 

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Not much to report, but here's what I did manage over the past few days:

 

I decided that the stairs needed a supporting post. I also decided to change the handrail from painted to unpainted polished wood, now worn and aged. I will be chipping the paint on the balusters and newel a lot more.

AUIrfFO.jpg

 

Just to emphasise that the rubber mat floor will be raised by about 6mm.

 

551KCfP.jpg

 

 

And finally, the door knob, made by repeated gentle heating of the end of a broom bristle and rolling it over various forms.

MIvx9BD.jpg

 

This door isn't rotten enough.

 

TFL

Badder

 

 

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51 minutes ago, Belugawrx said:

Wait,...what...?

a broom bristle,...

what?

 

Hi Belugawrx,

I assumed people would realise that the bristle in question was from the broom pictured earlier. The bristles are lengths of plastic rod about 1mm in diameter.

I heated the end of the bristle and shaped the resulting blob of 'molten' plastic. Once shaped, I cut the knob off, leaving a short length of the bristle attached. This 'stump' of bristle was then inserted into a hole drilled through the door.

 

I hope that clarifies things.

 

BTW, the knob was coloured with 'Bell Bronze' acrylic ink.

 

 

Rearguards,

Badder

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A bit of progress today.

First off, I made this:

I0G6P5a.jpg

This was made from strips of 'foamboard-which-is-not-foamboard-but-something-similar'.

Some may guess what it's going to be, but for now I am saying nothing.

 

 

Then back to the building and a bit of tidying up of some fits here and there. This was in preparation for fixing the supporting wall and the doorway section at the bottom of the stairs.

Having said that, I won't be fixing any of these things in place just yet, but I had to get the fits right so I could more accurately work out the relative postions of the doorway and the 'barn doors'.  With those sorted, I could then begin detailing and painting of the doorway section, and start thinking about the wall section above the barn doors.

v5q2ptg.jpg

 

The doorway far right needs more work, obviously, most especially the addition of a lintel and doorframe, but of course it will also need blending in with the adjoining wall.  And there lies a rub. I have for a long time ignored that wall, because I hate it. If I had a magic wand I know exactly what I would want in its place, but I lent my wand to JK Rowling when we were kids and I never saw it again until it appeared in a film. I dunno.... I didn't even get a royalty.

 

I have thought about;

1, Removing it entirely and replacing it with another, either a plaster cast or a foamboard one. (a lot of risky work would be involved at the removing stage)

2. Removing just the outer layer of stonework and replacing it with a 'foarmboard' wall including a window aperture.

3. Cutting out a window aperture, re-skimming the wall with plaster and re-carving the stonework. (safer, but still a lot of work)

3. Cutting out a window aperture and covering most of the wall with ivy. (Easier option)

Having weighed up the pros and cons, I'm going to be a chicken and opt for 3.

 

Back to the barn doors. As I said earlier, I never intended that these should be closed, but I postioned them thusly so as to work out their 'closed' width and whether I needed to add wooden frames. Turns out I need to add frames to close the gaps. Thus far, I've just faced the insides of the aperture with some-wood-that-is-not-balsa-but-is-something-similar'.

 

Oh, and I took the floorboards back to an earlier state by removing the 'tarred' finish' with various sandpapers.

qARGDSB.jpg

 

TFL

Badder

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Lintel added above doorway. A fair bit of work still to do in this area of the building.

yqfqwAs.jpg

Stonework to the right of the doorway will be dealt with, one way or another.

 

 

I still have to work out what I'm going to do in this area, with regards to the floorboards and the stonework above the barn doors.

Oh, and yes, I've cut the window aperture out in that 'hated' wall.

INxe81l.jpgLooking from this angle has reminded me to 'rot' the tops of the barn doors.

 

F7kBFBp.jpg

 

A view through the internal door. Stairs looking wonky the wall with the door is just leaning in place.

ueDucoj.jpg

 

 

 

I'm starting to like how this building looks at certain angles.

V5WP5ft.jpg

 

 

WjjgBZL.jpg

 

W59zhYt.jpg

 

TFL

 

Badder

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I saw this paperpunch in Hobbycraft on Saturday, but didn't have enough money to buy it at the time. (I'd purchased more 'urgent' stuff)

But I popped in there again today. £5.60. A bargain.

talYUZc.jpg

 

One press of the punch creates 18 'petals' which are bloomin' tiny and compare favourably with those produced by far more expensive 'purpose-made' leaf punches.

Not quite oak-leaf shaped, and not quite ivy-leaf shaped, they will work as either.

 

Here they are beside a 1/35th figure, from Tamiya's 'Camp German Infantry Set'.

lAI0Ejt.jpg

 

These will be used as ivy to cover the building. I will eventually use them in my other diorama 'Ever Evolving Diorama' as well.

 

TFL

Badder

 

PS, Sorry if you've visited both WIPs to find the lastest posts are about the same thing.

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2 hours ago, Vince1159 said:

Love the last photo of the building,it's turning into a work of art....

Hi Vince,

And thanks.

The funny thing is I can't pick out a single square inch of this building and say 'This bit is finished'.

There's still bits which need to be made and added on, then virtually everything will get more paint. There's lots to apply damage to, add ivy to, and ultimately add snow to!

 

Rearguards,

Badder

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"I'm starting to like how this building looks at certain angles."

 

"Starting to Like"

 

  It always seems to be that we are our own worst critics.   We have been liking how your building looks at certain angles for a while now!  Keep up the great job!

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Hi Rich,

Yes, I think it's human instinct to try something, maybe for the first time, out of inquisitiveness. And whether fail or succeed, the human mind is still inquisitive and thinks, 'is there a better way of doing it?' or 'Hmmm. I nearly did it. I'll try again, slightly differently. And of course, this makes us critical of everything we learn to do. Very few people think 'Ah, I have achieved perfection! I certainly don't. All we can ever do is learn and seek to improve with every attempt.

 

Philosophy over. That's 12 dollars please.

 

Rearguards,

Badder

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Progress has been slow due to yet more 'falling-asleep-at-the-drop-of-a-hat-after-a-hard-day-at-work-syndrome' but I have made strides today.

Originally, I was going to make this a bare-brickwork chimney (or 'chimley' as some seem to think it's called) but the singular mass of red-orange struck me as being a bit too garish for the overall colour palette of this diorama. Having said that, I did, and am still considering, using 'bare-brickwork' over the barn doors. This would 'spread the red' and help to balance the scene.

However, I decided to explore another possibility first: to plaster the chimney and expose only some of the brickwork. I could always revert back to the bare-brickwork if this didn't succeed.

Ecedhtq.jpg

So this was the 'mysterious' elongated block of 'foamboard-that-is-not-foamboard-but-is-something-similar' (hereafter called FTINFBISS) that I picutred earlier. Made from 4 CA'd strips, the block is hollow, but in truth the internal shaft is a bit too narrow. I will have to widen the shaft at the top end.

 

Once again, the advantages of this FTINFBISS won over the alternative of constructing this chimney from plaster casts.

The first job was to 'press' the stonework pattern into the slightly spongy surfaces. This was done with the back edge of a scalpel blade, kept square and true with the aid of a metal set-square. In places I widened and sharpened the mortar gaps by slicing and cutting into the board more deeply. I only applied the pattern to those areas which would be exposed: the section of the chimney from the top down to the floorboards of the upper main room.

IQVM0WG.jpg

 

With that done, the next stage was to coat the chimney with plaster. I slapped this on fairly thick when you consider how thin the final 'veneer' was going to be. This was done to ensure that I had at least 1mm of plaster to work with. You could call that a waste of plaster, or an unwillingness to be more precise in my plastering, but I would call it a desire to crack on and get it done quickly. And in that same mode, I began to scrape the plaster back while it was still damp and soft. I managed to get the required amount off before it had all set, and was left with only that thin veneer.

 

 Then came a 'little trick' I'd had in mind. I had in mind the 'accidents' I'd had when skimming the supporting wall with plaster - how it had cracked and flaked off in a few places and how I'd 'saved' some of it with CA.

Well, with the chimney I was going to crack and flake it off deliberately. Once again, the FBWINFBBSS showed its usefulness by having some flex in it. A bit of gentle bending here and there caused the plaster to crack and in some cases fall away. I preserverd the more interesting cracks by dribbling thin CA into them. Most of the pieces that flaked and fell away were left as is, but some of those flakes were re-sited and again fixed with CA. A bit more scraping and sanding followed, until I was happy with the overall look.

 

IA6Jmqq.jpg

 

I plan to stain the plaster the same colour as the mortar used in the walls. I also plan to knock the top of the chimney off, and add fireplaces at the very bottom and half-way up the stack.

 

TFL

Badder


 

 

 

Edited by Badder
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I coloured some plaster dust with antelope brown acrylic ink, wetted it, and brushed it over the entire chimney, making sure to get it packed into the mortar gaps. Unlike my 'plaster-dust washes' this gunk is resilient enough to survive a spray with matt varnish. I won't be applying that varnish until later though.
Once the gunk had begun to set (quickened with a blow-dry) I wetted a fingertip and ran it over the chimney, removing the gunk from the faces of the bricks. I also took the gunk away from the plaster (rendering) using an emery board. This removed the 'stain' from the high spots, re-exposing clean white plaster in some places but not others. The exposed areas will accept washes more readily, soaking them up.

 

rMWS7gM.jpg

Yes, there is a small patch of unpatterned brickwork above. This will get done, although of course one side of this stack needs no detailing below roof height as it will be flush to the supporting wall. I had envisaged that it would be this side of the chimney that would fit against the wall, but I will probably change my mind.

 

c7UUZh7.jpg

 

rMWS7gM.jpg

 

TFL

Badder

 

 

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OMG Badder I so enjoy mis-reading your posts! Your material acronym for the chimney breast was mis-read as Fit In Fibbies (as in FBI agents) which was then CIA'd to something. A lot of US Govt. agencies making an appearance in your posts these days. You'll get blacklisted from the 'Net if you're not careful. hee hee hee... 😉

 

On a more serious note ( a seriously difficult thing to do after two hot toddies to counter my current cold infection) your work remains informative and inspirational - though it has occurred to me that perhaps you have a cherry picker, a high-res professional Digital SLR and a penchant for superior photo-compositing and therefore these pics are from a real building and simply scaled down to make us think you're building a model! 🙂

 

Keep on wowing us, mate! We're a little jealous, but a lot interested.

 

Kev

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5 hours ago, modelman182 said:

OMG Badder I so enjoy mis-reading your posts! Your material acronym for the chimney breast was mis-read as Fit In Fibbies (as in FBI agents) which was then CIA'd to something. A lot of US Govt. agencies making an appearance in your posts these days. You'll get blacklisted from the 'Net if you're not careful. hee hee hee... 😉

 

On a more serious note ( a seriously difficult thing to do after two hot toddies to counter my current cold infection) your work remains informative and inspirational - though it has occurred to me that perhaps you have a cherry picker, a high-res professional Digital SLR and a penchant for superior photo-compositing and therefore these pics are from a real building and simply scaled down to make us think you're building a model! 🙂

 

Keep on wowing us, mate! We're a little jealous, but a lot interested.

 

Kev

Hi Kev,

I'm sure the site is positively glowing on the CIA and MI6 screens, with so many mentions of bombs, guns, and operation code names - even if many are 70 yrs out of date!

 

And you've sussed out my trick with my work. Yep, it's all real objects. I just happen to have very large scale graph paper and lined paper which I nail up behind them before taking photos!

 

Thanks for your continued interest, support, appreciation and humorous comments. Comments like yours keep me going, even when sometimes I feel like I'm banging my head against a 1/35th scale brick chimney stack. For, if it makes you feel any better, I've spent the best part of 5hrs trying to get this chimney painted up and looking right. I know there have been stages where it looked 'adequate' or even 'good', but I wanted it to look excellent. I think I may be close to 'very good' at the moment, but I'm still not happy with it.

And the photos aren't doing it justice either. For some reason the camera is picking out tiny fleks of red and exaggerating them to the point of florescence.

 

Pics in a bit.

 

Hope you are feeling better, or at least 'too far gone' to give a damn!

 

Rearguards,

Badder

 

 

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Ah, the photos turned out better here than they did on the camera view-screen.

 

2uGYAer.jpg

 

EULWFJL.jpg

 

KUcR78L.jpg

 

BGfxEU7.jpg

 

ztMtyoS.jpg

 

If you read the preceding post, you'll know I spent over 5hrs trying to get this chimney to look 'excellent'. I don't think I've achieved that, but it's close-ish. I will have to accept it as it is or I will make it look worse.

 

The 'look' was achieved by alternating ink washes with gloss and matt varnishes, where those washes were reds and very dark browns for the bricks and antelope browns for the render. And between those bouts, applications of more plaster dust washes and sanding back took place. There ARE some nice litte bits of effect here and there, which could be classed as 'excellent', but I'm not entirely convinced by the overall look of the thing.

You'll notice that I really toned down the redness of the brickwork. I decided it was far too garish.

 

Oh, and I did knock a few bricks off the top and hollow out the shaft, but forgot to take a photo. My camera is currently charging up, so I may take one later.

 

 

TFL

Badder

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Hey Badder, don't worry about my comments - they're meant in the "best possible taste" like Cupid Stunt, the famous Kenny Everett character.

 

I love your work, it serves to inspires me to greater detail in mine.

 

Having already consumed a whole bottle of brandy today, my judgement is not the best - BUT I know what like 🙂

 

I do give more than a damn about great work like yours though it's not easy to express it (when typing is an archaic magistry, like it is now)

 

Time to sleep or watch TV, I think...

 

Kev

 

 

 

Edited by modelman182
finger trouble
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10 minutes ago, modelman182 said:

oh, that is SO cool! Good one Badder.

Er... I didn't share that particular link. I may have done it accidentally.

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Hmmm... that's weird - I saw your chimney breast (not any other kind of breasts, I hasten to add)  pics originally. But when i tried again it was a bunch of random pics. The 'Net has Parkinsons, if you ask me!

 

Kev

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