1/35 scale auto repair shop

[Malachi Constant]

Well, I hope I'm not confusing things if you know someone else by the same name ...

Sadly ... (Frederick) Rick Baier of Baltimore, MD, passed away recently after a quick and devastating bout with pancreatic cancer.  Believe he was 59 or 60.  He left a lovely wife, two grown children and a young son with special needs ...who shared his enthusiasm for trains.

One helluva nice guy!
Dallas

[marc_reusser]

That looks great. I like the 'scale coloring' of the board.. the whole thing looks very real.

Marc

[RoughboyModelworks]

Agreed... the belts & display board look great, very convincing.

Paul

[Ray Dunakin]

I'm sorry for the loss of your friend. Working his name into the model is a nice way to pay tribute to his memory.

[Malachi Constant]

Haven't forgotten about the garage project either ... in the process of accumulating a massive amount of junque, spare parts, clutter, details, etc.  Here are a few of the many in the "metal parts" category! 



Made a whole mess of radiator hoses (about 20, me thinks) from styrene rod ... will do some additional coloring on these, but have to know which way each one will be placed so I don't end up highlighting the bottom or something. 



Rebuilt a plastic wire wheel with metal spokes and doing some other little nutty bits ... some parts will get additional work, some will get edited out ... just part of the process, cuz it sure takes a lot of little bits to fill up one of these places!  Won't bore you with all of the details, so to speak ... just thought I'd drop in and show that things are still moving ... will post some more pix as these things find their way to the walls, parts bins, etc.

Cheers,
Dallas

[Ray Dunakin]

The details are looking good. I know what you mean about the quantities needed to fill such structures! It's the same with stores and other types of buildings, it seems to take forever to produce all the stuff needed to realistically fill even a small space.

[Malachi Constant]

More experimentation on painting the "metal" parts ... (which are all plastic or resin) ...



This is about 2x actual size on ye olde typical home monitor.



Extreme close-up (obviously, eh?) ... trying to make it look like they're all "metal" without making them all look the same ... so they can be placed individually or piled up in bins, etc and still have some differentiation of the individual pieces.

Open to all thoughts, feedback, criticism, etc. Thanks in advance!

Cheers,
Dallas

[BKLN]

Dallas,
I really like your new parts. The add a lot of dimension and depth to the benches. It is very easy to get lost in "flat" clutter like wrenches and other tools, but you created a believable pile of junk. I am having a hard time putting these more voluminous (is that the right word?) spare parts together in 1/87 so I am following your project with great interest. 

Christian

[Chuck Doan]

A few inches of diorama consumes hours worth of clutter in a few minutes. That may be one reason I have been doing abandoned scenes that have been "picked".

[BKLN]

Chuck,
that's a nice understatement.
Your scenes don't look "picked" at all. Too me they seem more like the detail truck just dumped off a big load.

[Junior]

Dallas, very nice coloring of those metal parts. The larger piece to the far left (muffler?) was that done with the Testors liquid cement, hairspray and Bragdon pigments? By the way I´m done with all my radiator hoses and tons of other stuff for D. Krakow Auto Repair. Will post pics. within the next couple of days. Great to follow your excellent work as it´s quite similar to what I´m struggling with.

Anders

[Malachi Constant]

Thanks all!  I set up to do a batch of 20 parts and started getting pretty punch about half way thru ... thought it was time to stop and get some feedback ...

Suspect that 1:24 or 1:25 would be the "ideal scale" for doing an auto shop, because you can get every little automotive detail right down to spark plugs, hose clamps and key rings!  With a little creativity, I'm finding some pretty useful bits in 1:35 scale ... some of the plastic vehicle kits have detailed engines, and there are some engine parts available as separate items.  A lot of those are geared toward tanks and other large vehicles, but there's enough to scavenge some useful bits.  Imagine it would get pretty dang tricky in HO scale ...

Anders -- I have used the cement + Bragdon's method on some other parts, but these were all done with acrylics.  All painted over a base of flat black spray paint.  Some of the resin parts already have surface texture.  Some of the larger pieces received additional texture just by applying a coarse layer of spray paint to start.



I've tried a variety of acrylic metallics and like the Reaper Miniatures the best.  This palette only has two shades of metallic on it ... all the other colors were used to mix / blend the shades from warm to cool tones, cast iron, etc.  The Reaper metallics have extremely fine pigments, take well to thinning/blending and have much more muted (subtle) appearance than the Vallejo metallics (to me).  Also, you can buff them to a degree using brown paper from a grocery bag.

Also, while I'm thinking of it ... a lot of the Vallejo non-military "colors" seem rather bold, weird or garish to me.  Finding a lot of very nice colors in the Reaper Miniatures Master Series ... reds, greens, blues, yellows, oranges, etc that all look really good out of the bottle ... many of the individual colors are offered in various shades with different complementary colors, so they provide a real nice way of painting parts in a variety of subtle and varying colors.  Can't stand it when all the detail parts are "basic blue, basic red, basic green" etc ... been guilty of that myself in the past, and hope to be moving on with a better approach now! 



"Battle scene" ... mixing colors on the palette ... making little washes, etc., etc.  Used a variety of cheap brushes for most of the work and a very good sable for some outlining and fine blending.  Some colors blended on the palette ... some blended on the individual parts ... some parts received lots of "blotching" of different colors to build up uneven bases (and/or add texture) followed by top colors brushed over to blend things together a bit.




Really like the way blending Vallejo "Flesh Base" and "Shadows Flesh" work together to make a weathered oxide red and a variety of rust colors.  (Think they're hideous as actual skin tones though!) 

Alrighty ... got a bunch more metal parts that are prepped or halfway done ... and ordered a 1/35 engine kit and another bundle of parts to scavenge ... we'll win this battle one square inch of detailing at a time. 

Cheers,
Dallas

[finescalerr]

Very helpful photos. Excellent results. -- Russ

[Junior]

Dallas,   excellent tutorial on those paints. I´m not familiar with the Reaper brand but will check it out. Thanks very much!

Anders

[Malachi Constant]

Reaper has two different sets of paints -- the "Master Series" comes in little dropper bottles like the Vallejo ... the other ones come in little open-mouth jars.

Reaper web site:
http://www.reapermini.com/Paints/master

I've been getting them from MiniatureMarket.com -- they carry both Reaper & Vallejo ... nice discount, quick service, reasonable shipping.  (They don't give me a kick-back, but I'll take one if it's offered!) 



Thanks again for the positive feedback, finished that batch of parts last night ... scavenged parts from various sources including a Verlinden "Tiger Tank Engine Disassembled" ... a couple of the larger parts are a bit "odd" for the auto shop, but should work nicely at the bottom of a bin or pile, etc.   Very pleased now with the way that palette has worked out to provide a variety of tones while sorta "batch painting" a lot of pieces.  These will all become "background" details, so the level of finish should work out okay there.

Have a couple more (different) sets of engine parts on order, meanwhile will work on some other bits, figures and various details.  Oh yeah ... one of the reasons for all this "now" is that I want to hang a variety of replacement parts and stuff on the back wall, put up some shelves and make some "built-in" parts bins ... so I want to get the details worked out and placed before the walls get glued in place.

Cheers,
Dallas