I make my own buildings, as they are to 1/20th scale, I started with Korroflute, but first I found some new building material here in the UK; it is called Vekaplan SF, and may well be what is called 'Sintra' in the USA.

This is 5mm thick closed cell, and solid PVC foam. The surface is a satin finish, and it can be cut with care, but can be sawn, and drilled easily. I use a fretsaw (scroll saw for the USA?) to cut out the window and door apertures, and a DIY jigsaw for the initial cuts from the large sheets – these are 8ft by 4 foot (outside there will be bits everywhere!). Using a strong knife is possible, but there is a tendency for the blade to cut through at an angle – that is why a circular saw, or a jigsaw, or fretsaw are better for cutting.

As usual I have started a trial building to see how it performs. I chose a 1/20th copy of the Grandt Line, Reese Street row houses - otherwise known as 'shotgun' houses.

I sent a request to Grandt Line asking if they could send me an HO plan which the very kindly sent me by e-mail. My considerable thanks were passed back to them, and there will be a photo or two sent to them when I have finished this one, there are likely to be more as I like the design, which can have many different versions.

The plan was enlarged and I started work. The walls were marked out and cut, then scored for the planks. I used my olfa cutter, which is better pushed to make the groove and it does not tear the material; later experience has shown that the best implement to score grooves in this material is a plain woodworkers ‘blade’ type scriber. The windows were made and I decided to add to the design by adding a bay window; the basic design of this hat came from the ‘Mineral Belt’ books. A couple of different style doors were made. All these are to 1/20th which are not available (Grandt Line go up to 1/24th) as far as I know.

The building is virtually the same size as my ‘Columbia cabin’ building and will sit on a paving slab foundation that is 2ft x 1ft, (cut with an angle grinder & bolster chisel a 2ft square one in half), more details on this later.

I use Evostick (latex based contact cement) glue and it has worked well, but it does need some setting time to be allowed for, primarily due to the weight of the sheets I think. All the corner joints have been reinforced with the ‘Hard as Nails’ adhesive.

This building with the exception of the shingles on the roof (shed felt or tarpaper) will be all plastic, the cross pieces are made from the PVC plastic planks that are available here in the UK and will also be used below the roof. They rest on small pieces of cut down PVC electric wiring conduit which is basically a trough; cut it in half and there are a couple of right angle pieces.

I am very pleased with this material, and have a lot of it now for the new buildings; here are some photo's of the first stages of making this building.





These are a couple of views of the main carcass of the building; all the window and doors apertures have been cut with the fretsaw. The material is very though and can be filed, it takes quite a lot of effort to do it though! It can also be reduced/adjusted with a drum sander in a motor tool, there will be bits everywhere but the job is done in a short time. Have the vacuum cleaner handy to clear up after.

The windows are all hand made, using my normal method (see the article about them please). I gave the front something 'extra' - I added a bay window unit - here is a photo of the windows, all windows are the same size except for the bay window, and the tiny window attached to the rear door -



Put the windows, doors and bay window on one side, and we return to the main building. Here area couple of photos of the roof stiffeners and all the extra internal stiffening.







Before the roof was added I worked on the foundation slab - the building will be held to the (half size) slab with a couple screws through the sides into two of the 4 pieces of plastic angle; the other two are for easy positioning purposes. Here is a pair of photos: the upper one with the building in place, and the lower one without so you can see the 4 pieces, note I have left the screws in position -



I am very impressed with the new material, which is both tough and easy to work with, and will be using it again.

I decided to use the state colors of Colorado for the color scheme - OK I combined the red & yellow to make orange which looks better in this context, but that is my choice!

Here is what it looks like --





The weather when the photos were taken was both cold and wet here so I did not stay out long when taking the pictures!

The light blue did not take kindly to my varnish which has a brown cast (UV protection), and messed up the color: it was re-painted with Humbrol enamel, and looks much better. The trim is a very light grey (better than white which is too bright



The roof is done to the system that a friend on MyLargescale.com - Richard Smith uses; he has all the credit for it; I saw it on there, and started to use it and continue to do so - thanks Richard.

Here is a description of the stuff to use and the method -

The shingles are made from what we in the UK call 'roofing or shed felt': in the USA I think this is called 'tarpaper' - it is used for putting a waterproof roof onto sheds etc. It should in its normal use be put down onto wet hot tar when it is laid correctly; that way it will last for a long time.

It is just over 1mm thick, and has a tarry internal consistency to it, the outer surfaces are clean and the tar is inside. One side is smooth and slightly glossy, the other is slightly wrinkled; the wrinkled side is used for the shingles with the wrinkles running down the strips. Both sides have an added coating of sand that can be and is easily rubbed off both sides. Do this outside - the sand then goes onto the garden; wherever possible, I also cut the strips off the roll outside, as the knife (a heavy duty Stanley type knife) gets messed up with the tar as well. Implements can be cleaned with paint solvent.

I cut the felt/tarpaper into 3/4" (or 20mm) wide strips, approx 6" long, and then using a guide piece from scrap score half of the depth with a woodworkers scriber, to indicate the joins between shingles. You do not want to cut through the felt (etc), just deeply score it. Richard Smith does this scoring of the strips when they have been fixed onto the roof. I can see the reason for that; I just find it easier to do it on the bench for the scribing. IF your sub roof is sufficiently stiff it can be done as Richard does it: I occasionally have to adjust some of the scribed lines to keep the rows having an overlap between the rows as the real shingles have.

I fix mine to a plastic sheet sub roof that has been pre-scribed with location lines that has been fitted to the building, check that it is secure and will not 'belly' or sink over time – that is the reason for the (added underneath, before putting on the sub roof) stiffening struts etc. The strips are laid onto the roof and fixed with brown coloured window frame sealant - that is used her for fixing plastic (PVC) window frame units into houses. Richard Smith uses silicone sealer - my window frame sealant can be if necessary painted, our (UK) silicone sealer cannot, thus I use the w/f sealant. The US product could well be different.

When laying the first and lowest line of shingles only have a very small overlap of the shingles on the bottom edge of the sub roof, the normal amount of overlap of the shingles will make them very weak here - they can bend downwards, which is not what you want!

The first and lowest row only needs a projection of about 1/8"; (normal overlap is 1/4" to 3/8") this can best be achieved by trimming down the depth of the first row of shingles: this trimming is to allow the next rows to lie better, the bottom shingle rows upper edge will be too high for the overlap otherwise. They always seem to take till row 3 or 4 to settle down when I am 'roofing' with the strips. In addition I glue using Evostick the first row down; this means you can start adding the next rows of shingle strips faster as the w/f sealant requires some time to dry off properly.

Go up the roof strip by strip, one or two strips to the full length of the roof on each side; keep them running evenly up the roof. I have a small distance gauge to ensure they are reasonably even. Finish off the roof ridge - it can be done many ways, the house has strips (half the normal width laid lengthwise to look like wood planks, they can also have lengthwise (half strip width) shingles as well.

Where roof end against a wall - like the kitchen extension, and the bay window, and around chimney stacks add some 'flashing' from thick tinfoil - from 'ready meal trays', over the top of the tiles on the upper (flat or straight) edge portion, and half under (cut it in half)on the slopes. Finally if you do not have end boards fill in the gaps between the shingles with sealant. If you have fitted end boards if can also be done with care, or (much more messy) with glue - I use an epoxy glue - this melts the tar that goes everywhere on you fingers! Be warned!

Leave the roof alone after checking that it is even to dry.

Now for the fun part and I admit that you do need a reasonably artistic eye - you will have one as you build/run/assemble models - don't you? It’s painting time - you need the craft shop acrylic (matt) paints - at 99c each pot (as usual ours in the UK are twice that price - Grrr!).You want various medium to dark browns, and a selection of greys as well, plus some cheap bristle brushes. What you are going to do is 'dry brush' the roof.

I give the row of colors a good shake - that gets a small amount of paint onto the inside of the cap. Remove the cap and use that paint; when empty repeat the shake etc. The colors are randomly applied over all the area - but only a portion of it - the natural color of the tarpaper is the base color, and is intended to be still seen in areas without any paint at all: from Richard Smiths photos from Oregon the natural blackish, brownish greenish color is very lifelike. What you are doing is giving it both some variety and also contrast, and using the color of the stuff as a basis. You are not intending to produce solid color, just a thin semi transparent glaze, BUT do not have any water on the brush - just solid paint and gently and in a downward movement add a see-through coat on some of the shingles; this is the 'dry brushing', not ever solid color, but a thin random color picked off the brush by the wrinkles in the felt (etc). Do this with the different colors and DO NOT try to get it to even colors - it must be totally random, and you can also have secondary colors by doubling up on colors as well. Yes, you may well get it wrong to start with, but mistakes can be covered up with a darker color; please do not use black - it is NOT a color but a tint, and pure black kills everything it touches - try mixing a dark grey + brown, that is a much better version for black. Where you have added some 'flashing' add below it a dry brushed area of light grey - this is to indicate the oxidized lead that has been flushed off the surface by rain.

I live in the UK, where we have a 'maritime climate' - wet and warm (occasionally) courtesy of the Atlantic Ocean, which never knows its own mind! In the US you can have much more (at one time) rain, Richard Smith adds a covering of (Thompson's?) water seal onto the finished roof as an extra layer and precaution against the rain getting through. All of my roof (and most of the buildings) are plastic so I do not add this.


Finally a minor addition - I added some curtains. These are shaped and painted strips of plastic; onto the base color add some slightly darker color to indicate folds in the curtains - just a quick curved shape with a brush, there is no need for accuracy; behind those are another sheet of dark plastic as a 'light and see through' blocker for the windows, glue these two pieces together with a thin piece of scrap between them, and glue them inside the windows. Some of the windows are simpler – they have a simple blind – a straight forward piece of painted plastic card, with the view blocker behind as above.

When I was making the front gable ornament I was aware of the Arizona flag sunburst, and had a wry smile about it - the design is to us in the UK a very 1930's design - we used in especially on house gates, but Arizona had it first! It is one of a whole range of different designs that were used here, this one had first use, others will be different.

I will build more from this (Grandt Line ) plan, a variation I may use is to add some dormer windows to the roof, the design is capable of lots of variations.