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Okay, so it's not 1985. But it was when I brought home my first large scale train and started looking for accessories for it. In addition to railroad buildings like stations and water towers, I wanted a town of two-or-three-story brick storefronts, like you'd find throughout the part of western Ohio I planned to model. To my dismay, most of the buildings I could find in catalogs or stores cost more than my train, and they all looked like they came from "International Street" in a theme park. Having shallow pockets and even shallower woodworking skills, I began looking elsewhere. Thus began a dangerous habit of "shopping" in the most unlikely places for things to adapt for use on my garden railroad.
When a model railroader adapts a model of one prototype into a model of something else (maybe even splicing together parts from different kits), we call it "kitbashing." By extension, when I adapt an otherwise useless old toy or flea market item into something I can use on my railroad, I call it "trashbashing." The whole point of this article, like most of our New Boston and Donnels Creek pages, is to get folks thinking about affordable ways to have a unique railroad.
The first victims of my spray paint cans were a set of Fisher-Price Sesame Street Houses. No, I didn't use my kids' set (it's sealed in the attic waiting for grandchildren that I hope are still a long way off). Rather, I found a set at a garage sale for $2. Later I found a Playskool set that was supposed to represent the same scene, also for about $2. Neither set was playworthy at the time, or my kids would have confiscated them, I'm sure. But both had possibilities. (One has a very nicely detailed storefront and the other has a nicely detailed brownstone). Unfortunately those pieces are nearly impossible to find now, but I have seen them on other people's garden railroads, so I know I'm not the only one who kept his eye out for that sort of thing.
The Fisher Price set had a "floating hinge" arrangement connecting the two building that I hacksawed off. The Playskool buildings were connected by a molded-in "piano hinge" that I left alone. Both sets had handles on the top which I also hacksawed off. Then I removed the bases of the Fisher Price buildings, which were screwed on. To get the buildings ready to paint, I also had to soak off stickers and labels. One way to do that, once I could lay the building down flat, was to lay a washcloth over the building front and soak it with water. Eventually, I scrubbed off the residue, wiped the plastic clean, and got out the spray paint.
Here is where I made a less-than-superior judgment. The Fisher Price building used pressed-wood sidewalls. Had I really been serious about creating a weather-worthy structure, I would have replaced those walls at the start. As it is, I was never certain the pressed wood, no matter how I prepared and sealed it, would hold up to long-term exposure. A damp spring this year proved me right, as the building sidewalls have swelled and distorted. Since then I have accumulated some good-sized chunks of Plexiglass, from old signs and the like, that I hope to cut to the right size and use to replace the walls as a winter project. (Maybe winter 2005?) The other thing I should have done was to replace the pull tabs on the doors with little doorknob. On the Fisher Price storefront, I carved a window into the left side, where a sticker had shown a side door.
At any rate, I painted everything flat primer gray, then masked off everything that wasn't supposed to be gray and painted it again with various shades of red and brown. With some signage created on an ALPS printer, I was able to create store fronts that were every bit as believable as most of the "G Scale" store fronts being produced at the time (and a lot more American-looking). The versions shown in the photo at the top of the page have goosneck lamps that were marketed for O scale mounted on each corner.
Of course, early success lead to excess, as I followed up by tracking down several more pieces and building a town's worth of the things. I also found a schoolhouse that made a nice church, a firehouse, which makes a nice tire store/garage, and a Cape Cod house, which makes a nice Cape Cod house. You may never see any of these items at a garage sale or flea market, or if you do they may be in "collectible" condition that makes a hacksaw seem unwarranted. But I include them as ideas of what sort of things to look out for. Each, building, in turn, had the labels soaked off, the surfaces prepared for painting, and Lucite windows added.
| For the church, I lengthened the "porch roof" with a bit of vinyl siding trim. I also used an ALPS to print "stained glass" on transparency film, and glued that inside the Lucite windows. To get a rough look for the roof, I sprayed it with "car trunk paint," a textured spray paint that isn't weather-worthy, by itself, then covered that with flat black. I need to replace the masonite base with plexiglass, but otherwise, the structure survived a very wet summer pretty well. |  |
| For the Cape Cod, I cut window mullions from a strawberry basket and added Precision Products shutters that were left over from another project. Then I glued Lucite pieces behind the mullions to provide "windows" and to keep the (rather frail) mullions from being pushed out by careless handling. To finish the job, I need to fix the area around the door and replace the masonite base with Plexiglass. I discovered that the "end walls" of this structure are plywood, so it should hold up better to long-term exposure than the pressed-wood sidewalls of the storefronts have. |  |
Other "trashbash" projects I've done over the years include:
| Northline Products Barn Feeder - I wanted a barn that didn't take up half my remaining real estate, as the mailbox barn I was planning to use would do. This has a small footprint and a believable, if remarkable roofline. I told them that for all of these structures, they should use three smaller windows across the side to make them seem more realistic, but they've already made the molds, so they're not going to listen to me. Still the house/cabin version of this would make a nice, cheap addition for a 1:13 or so RR. I plan to disassemble, paint, and detail this, but I tried it out this summer to decide if I really liked it or not (and to give me a reason to have all those cows and goats in the yard). It made a nice companion piece for the Cape Code above. |   |
| Fisher Price Victorian Dollhouse - I haven't yet started on this, but I realized early that if I simply fill in the "open" sides and keep the same "footprint," this will become the largest building on my railroad. And frankly, I don't need something like this to draw attention away from the "serious" models. So I'm thinking I will cut this thing in half, and use the materials from the half I cut off to fill in the remaining "open" sides. This would also make a cool "haunted house" if I ever wanted one. In fact, I will probably never get around to this one. But it cost me $2 at a garage sale, so I'll keep it on hand in case I ever get all caught up with my other to do lists. |  |
Now that I have more buildings than I can fit on my existing layout properly, and access to a far wider variety of building kits than I once did, I don't feel as compelled to track down such potential projects. But it was fun, and when you get to open houses in your area you will see that my efforts along this line were far from unique.
I had my 9 year old build
some "forts" out of some knock-off lincoln logs. The sets, especially the
non-Lincoln log types, are CHEAP and can be used to build several log cabins
near a mining or logging location. Robby did just that this week.
Also, some of the lego-knock-offs have castles and buildings that you can pick up at garage sales. Find families have garage sales and start buying.
I use the parts of old pull trains for display around the engine house (like a mini-junk parts bin behind the engine house. It's realistic.
David DeMoss says: . . . one of my "conversions" . . . started out as a "Hello Kitty" playhouse. As made, it came in bright cheerful colors, but the scale is close, and I thought it would look good in the layout. The back is flat and used to unfold for the "yard", but I glued that in place and the house sits against some fence with a cow farm as it's front yard.
It was painted with house paint, and has held up well. It's in the shop for repainting, after its 4 year stint on the layout.
The chimney in the center was made from "brick" styrene sheet,and covers the spot where the carry handle was. The bricks sheets were painted, and over time it has weathered nicely to a realistic brick color.
All told, I probably bought the house for a buck or two, and used some leftover paints and a little time, and ended up with a cute additon to my layout.
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