The White River and Northern IV Enginehouse

The origin of this unremarkable-looking, run-down structure stems from the WR&N III, which was to feature a three-stall roundhouse based loosely on the one belonging to the Conway Scenic Railroad in New Hampshire. For some time I'd had an old Arnold Rapido roundhouse kit that I'd intended to Amercianize. When that layout went poof and plans for Version IV started coming together, there was no longer enough room for a turntable and roundhouse, and so the engine facility was reduced to a modest, conventional two-stall enginehouse.

The Rapido kit still retained some appeal, however, particularly the siding, which was plain board and batten. Actually, the walls, some of the interior framing, and the roof vents were the only parts I used for the new model; the rest was all scratchbuilt. All of the kit's useable walls were chopped into rectangular pieces that were rearranged and grafted back together to form the basic structure shape. I found some Grandt Line factory windows that were almost a perfect fit for the kit's window openings; because the windows were just a bit undersized, I modified them to appear to be open by removing the bottom one, two or three rows of window panes, then finished off the frame with strip styrene.

 
Because I had planned to animate all of the doors, a large box-like foundation was made from 1/8-inch thick sheet styrene, with an open bottom, to accommodate the four door mechanisms. After slicing two inspection pit openings into the top surface, I created pit interiors with layers of sheet styrene to form steps and floors. I bonded tie-height styrene strip stock along the sides of the pits, removed equivalent lengths of ties from Railcraft Code 40 flex track, and bonded the track over the pits.

More strip styrene was applied to the foundation box surface to support scribed styrene sheet such that it sat flush with the railheads. The flooring parts were bonded in place, with an allowance along the perimeter for the enginehouse walls. Finally, a 1/4-inch tall stone foundation, scrounged from an old stone viaduct bridge kit, was laminated along the top edge of one box side.

The roof began as scribed sheet styrene oriented so that the scribing faced inward. I scribed the smooth sides at regular intervals with a knife blade, then bonded thin copper wire into the scribed lines with CA. I laminated strips of aluminum foil to the surface lengthwise, firmly pressing the foil onto the copper wires to simulate seams. I also applied short bits of strip styrene to the underside along the edges to simulate the ends of roof studs. Finally, I secured four of the roundhouse kit vents near the ends of the roof.

Interior roof framing was bashed from the kit's original framing plus some strip styrene, all bonded to the underside of the roof. Brass wires were positioned within the framing to power lights, which were microbulbs mounted inside HO diesel loco bells. The brass wires run down one wall to the floor, and heavier brass wires mounted in the foundation were bent to contact them so that the structure could be removed. After painting and detailing the walls and roof, they were permanently bonded together.

It was time to get serious about the animated doors. I decided the best approach was to make them a permanent part of the floor, with no attachments to the walls at all. I started by making bearings for steel rods out of thin sheet styrene and drilling them for the rods. I drilled oversized holes in the floor assembly at each side of each door, and bonded one of the brass bearings to the top of the floor over each hole. After inserting a length of steel wire into one bearing and aligning it to be perfectly vertical, I slipped the lower bearing on from below and bonded it in place. Then I repeated this seven more times.

Eight lengths of steel wire were cut and bent into Z-shapes. The lower ends of the rods slipped between short wire pairs soldered to the edges of 4-40 nuts. The nuts traveled along 4-40 bolts coupled to gearhead motors with thick wire insulation. The four mechanisms were each run to determine the travel required by the nut to rotate the steel Z wires 90 degrees; then microswitches were installed to limit the travel.

The doors were scratchbuilt from strip styrene and designed to press-fit onto the steel wires so that they could be adjusted for proper start and stop positions. The gentle press fit also allowed the doors to easily move away if they were accidentally struck by a finger or a locomotive, so that doors, fingers or locos would not be damaged by a collision. The motors were operated at a very low voltage (1.5 volts) for realistically-timed movement as well as silent operation.
 

With the structure and door mechanisms completed, the remainder of the work involved detailing, which was a lot of fun. I wanted the enginehouse to be richly detailed inside and out, so I rooted through every box and drawer of junk parts and scraps, and loaded it up. It eventually acquired hundreds of commercial, handmade and found objects. Many of the interior details are not necessarily realistic—the interior was never meant to be viewed with the structure removed. Coupler springs, watch gears, bits of wire and other scavenged items joined some nice machine shop equipment from Alloy Forms to provide visual clutter that's glimpsed through the doors and windows.

Painting was equally fun, since I love weather-beaten old buildings. The roof received several applications of Rustall. After being painted a pale cream color, the interior was heavily grunged up with black chalk dust. The exterior olive green paint was faded using pale gray chalk. The foundation was finished by first painting it dark gray, then rubbing on thick tan paint to fill the mortar lines.

The photos were all taken after the enginehouse was removed from the layout and donated to Rick Spano for eventual use on his Sceniced and Undecided. Along the way, a pair of doors disappeared and remain among the missing, so they'll have to be re-created someday. At least this remnant of the White River and Northern is still around to enjoy.

A note about these photos: Rick was originally going to incorporate the enginehouse into the Fording area of his layout, near the Freytag Steel Mill, which was under construction about the time I showed up with my camera, so I quick fired off these shabby handheld shots before the model was installed. Then, Rick changed his plans, installing my Rearden Metal Works building in the spot where the enginehouse was to go instead. So, now I have a chance to get some better images of the enginehouse, which I'll take soon (but now I can't shoot the Metal Works building the way it was, since Rick has modified it to fit the location—ah well, such is life).

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