Well gentlemen (and probably the occassional lady!)
Despite suffering from a serious buildersblock lately, the modelling microbe got hold of me again with a project I am totally hooked on!!

It is going to be the build of a barn, which contains some old WW2 vehicles, abandonned and rusting away there for years, just waiting to be discovered by an enthusiastic collector.

The idea came to me, while I was clearing out my buildersstuff and sparesbox. So it is also a tribute to our treasure troves; the sparesboxes!
For this I will only use what I have in there; some building materials, some old/damaged kits and spareparts.

Enough of the talking, let's show some pictures:
The basic materials:


Originally the whole scene was to be in a French barn, but I chose to go for a traditional, local type of farm. A bit of chauvinisme and pride of me.


The progress so far:
The skeleton, which is made of the wooden tail of fireworkrockets from last new year's eve:


The stairs, which lead to the hay attick, made of balse wood, which I had for years:


In this picture you can also vaguely see the positioning of the vehicles. The walls were made from left over plywood, which had a brickwallpattern carved in to them.

So, there it is!
Comments are welcome!

thats looking good. Ive always wanted to do something like your doing. good luck.

Hi Ron,
Nice to hear that you are building again.
The idea and the reference pic are a good start for a nice dio.

Not so a good start, sorry to start so early with some critics, is your scribbed in brick pattern.
These lines are simply not straight enough and that is only a mild comment.
I think you have plenty of time to redo that before it is to late.

Cheers
Claude

Hi there

It looks good and the story is nice too.
I envy those of you that have the skills to build these kind of buildings and projects. It looks all too easy...but not for me.
I'll keep an eye on this one to learn and get a story told.

Good luck with it

Simon

You are certainly of to a good start ,on this very interesting project.

@ Claude:
It looks a lot harder than it actually is! What works for me is putting my ideas in writing and make drawings and work from there.
@ Simon
you are right about the brickwall. I was trying to make it look like an old wall with poor bricklaying. In the end some sections of the wall would be covered with plaster, in various states of decay. So I have the perfect way of "correcting" my mistakes.

@ the others:
thans for the comments. This one really got me going and I have to slow myself down!! That hasn't happened to me for a long time when modelling.

Here are some more pictures
The barndoor and stairs just built;


The barndoors after painting. I painted them in a dark green and when that dried I "brushed" them with a steelwoolbrusch in a powertool. They will receive weathering at a later stage.


The corrected walls:


The atticfloor: this was made by using lollypopsticks and giving them first a brown and then a dark grey wash.


And finally an impression of how it all could turn out:
The hay was made by cutting sisalrope in very short pieces. Looks great, but is very stiff and lacks the natural way of hanging like hay does.

Very cool stuff! Cant wait to see it all finished.

Ok, you covered most of the "bad" brickstone, looks a bit better now.
The hay looks good also, but i would leave away all the hay on the stairs.

One question regarding the barn's door. Why are the two long planks covering the two sides of the door in one single piece?

Cheers
Claude

HI Ron, I like the wood part of the building , very interesting and original, but as Claude says, the brickwork may be need a bit of improvement. This is a case where cork can be usseful.

congratulations and hope that soon we can see more photos

Looks great, Ron. A very good idea and a nice setting for a diorama and at the same time a good excuse for cleaning out the spares box

Looking forward to see more

I have been busy trying to get an idea on how to make the roof and especially the tiles. There is an item on rooftilemaking in Roy Porter's " Masterclass modelbuilding, but these are Southern European tiles, which are quite different from Western European tiles.

Somehow I got the idea of making the tiles from cardboard (Don't ask. My brain works in mysterious ways ).
If you look at a crosssection of a cardboardbox, you'll see that it is made up of 3 layers; 2 straight ones and a curved one in the middle. I figured I could use that middle layer.
So I started by cutting up the box in thin strips; the size of a rooftile. (Later I found out that you should cut them a bit larger for ease of glueing them)


The I peeled of the top- and bottomlayer, leaving just the wavelike part.


Next I cut op that string into single tiles, making sure a got a flat S-like shape.


The follow step was to glue these single tiles onto a piece of balsawood, making sure that the tiles overlapped each others edges.


After (quite) a while, you'll end up with something that looks like this.


This is for a roof that has seen many seazons! If you are looking for a neat roof, you'd have to work more precise.

Thank you for this tip ! Superb ! G.

Uitstekend Ron,

Those tiles are great, thanks for the tip on the cardboard. The rest looks good as well.

Looking forward to more progress, and tips..

Cheers
Henk

This is a really amazing build to watch... thanks, there's much to learn here.

So, this is what it looks like when the tiles have been added. I must admit that the job was more tedious and timeconsuming than the worst tracks imaginable, but in the end I think it was worth the trouble.
The spaces between the rooftiles and the toptiles will be filled and I left the tiles on one of the slopes a bit rough on purpose. This way it will be easier to create by drybrushing the green fungi and such one can find on old roofs.

Great work looks very good

Hi there

Interesting build.

That roof is awesome. Thats a great idea to use the middlelayer of cardboard.

This is turning out very nicely indeed.

Simon

Roof looks real even without paint! Good job!

So, here we are again!
The cardboard rooftiles have 1 major disadvantage; they warp after they come in contact with fluids! And it doesn't matter if you use a brush or spray it! It happens with every layer you put on, so my advise is to glue the tiles on all sides, not just the top, as I did!
When they dry they do come back into place, but not as neat as they were before..
So here is what the roof looks like after the basic coats of paint:



This is what the barn looks like now:


And these are the vehicles I am going to use:


And after the first treatment:

Hi Ron. I had my doubts about the walls when I saw the first images, but adding the stucco and only revealing patches of this, has totally made a new impression. The stairs and attic add a lot of interest to the interior.
Good idea to use up some old kits .... get the weathering/ageing right on these, you´ll have a winner.

well, some more work has been done. I started with some rusting and dusting on the vehicles and the figures had some work done too. I also did some work on the workbencharea in the corner. The colours on the figures are to see if the coulorsetting is good and to check for imperfections.
The farmer:
This one is from Preiser and not completely up to the levels we are used to, when it comes to plastic figures. I hope that with some sanding and painting it will turn out ok, though.



The farmer's daughter:
This one is from the Medic-kit from Dragon. I cut off her cap and added loose hanging, long hair.


The barn as a whole with the stableboy on the attic:


And the workbencharea:



so....

Progress is slowing down a bit, because it is something of a sickbay here lately This time I turned my attention to the vehicles, which I have finished now.
First a quick reminder of what they looked like, when I started out:


First the GMC:
Since it had been in the barn for ages, out of wind and rain, I kept rust to a minimum. I added only some rust on the surface and the edges. On the other hand I applied a thick coat of dust instead.
I added some of its loose parts to the cargobay to show a vehicle, which has seen some worked on in the distant past. To add more interest to that area I also added a piece of old camouflagenetting I plucked off an old model once and I added a Panther wheel and one of the chairs from the Kübel. To "fill out" other empty spaces I used an ammobox, al old dufflebag (?) and some tools.
The old firehose on the right frontfender has been added to add some interest to an otherwise dull area.
After everything had dried, I added the hay. I first sprayed the vehicle from the top with glue, then sprinkled on the hay and pressed that a bit flat to show the flat surfaces.
The only thing that is missing is the cherry on the cake or in this case a hen on the hood.




Next is the Kübelwagen:
First I gave the vehicle a basecoat with dilluted Tamiya dark yellow to tone down the quite orangelooking colour and the harsh contrast that the dark green made. Then some washes is black were added increase the depth of the colour and show details.
Because of the large number of parts missing (doors and wheels mainly) from this one, I decided to cover it up with an old tarpaulin, which was a great excuse to add a splash of colour to the scene. The tarpaulin was made out of household aluminiumfoil, which was hell to work with, but which perfectly showed the stiff and sharp creases you get from those thick aggricultural tarpaulins.
The rearend of this model was the most appealing, showing the engine and detached wheels, so I left these exposed. I added an old German radio to increase the value of this "treasure" and threw in an old MRE-box, just for fun. The right rearwheel had been take of in the past (and has gone missing, both in the story and in real life...) so I made a "temporary" pile of wood to support the axle.
At last I covered it all with the same coat of dust as the GMC and gave it a layer of hay, too.



The last vehicle is the DKW motorcycle..... or what was left of it.
I really only had the basis for that; the wheels, the frame and engine. So this one would get a "dustcover" too. I added a rudimentary handlebar, saddle and footsteps, because these shapes would show, when the cover was put over the bike.
After that it too received the coat of dust and hay, but I kept the latter a bit less heavy, because it would sit under the stairs and not directly under the attic.


So, all that remains now are the figures, the accessoires in the barn, the barndoor and the barn itself, in- and outside.....

Impressive work! I like the roof tiles...

It's been quite a while, so an update would be in order, I thought.

When looking at the black/grey roof I thought it was quite (very) boring, so I started to play around with colours. I know that old "black"-tiled roof show a great veriety in shades I replicated that by mixing the black with burnt sienna, oker, blue, brickred and several combinaties of the colours mentioned.
After applying those, I drybrushed the roof with bright grey and ditto sand. Then I gave the "northside" a coat of moss and algea, making it different then the other sides.


I wanted to add a bit more interest to the gatewall, so I decided to add a rainpipe and roofgutter. The idea of the rainpipe came, when someone here in our street had the curtiousy of breaking off our car's antenna. So I used that one as a rainpipe.
The roofgutter was cut from the tins of tealights, because these had a nice folded edge to them. It all looks very new and shiny, but that will soon change.


And last but not least, I finished the barndoor by hanging it in its place. The hinges were made from etching leftovers.

Ron
I love it.
One comment is concerning the wheels standing on the end wall you needs to drill all the holes from the rivets and the axle, like you are depicting actually in no real.
One question what is the timeline of the story ???
Because rubber tires exposed on sun and dust will certainly crack.


Cheers
Seb

Looks fantastic, Ron. The roof tiles look great. I will definitely steal that technique

Excellent diorama - looking forward to see more

Brilliant so far - and something out of the ordinary.

Along similar lines for anyone who may be interested, the March and May 2008 issues of "Military In Scale" feature a two-parter about a diorama called "One Man's Junk", the centrepiece of which is a Hetzer rusting away quietly in a post-war scrapyard.

- Steve

I'm following with interest, this is shaping up very nicely. I love the roof which looks very similar to your reference pictures.

Chas

Absolutely briliant work mate. Excellent job!

And I have been at it again..
When I look at my checklist it says:
Interior: DONE
Props: DONE
Leading actors: DONE

So I am going to show you some more pictures... Boring, I know...

Here's the toolcorner with the farmer.
I must say that Preiser's farmer is nice, but lacks considerable detail! He is standing with his lower legs crossed and his arms are holding a fork. There are no creases, folds or even separation of limbs visible! I had to paint 90% of those myself!
The fusebox on the wall and the TL-armature are old Bradley M2 parts, by the way.
The poster on the wall is a hint as to what was going on at the attic, before the farmer came in.


Here's the man's pooch; a German sheppard. Painting that one proved more challenging than I expected. In the end I think the brown turned out much to dark, for my liking.


Next is the stableboy. He is a converted Tamiyafigure from the Stuka zu Fuss box - the sitting man handling a rocket. I cut of his boots and give the man some socks. Since I cut of the boots, I had to redo his pants too.
To make his posture more logical I added the daughter's pantiehoses in one of them. I made those out of a piece of tissue, which, when taken apart, gives a nice transparent look. Add some black water to that, et voila!!


And last but not least, the farmer's daughter.
As I said before I gave her some loose hanging hair. Painting those blond and adding make-up makes a nice challenge in 1/35...