I ache! It’s amazing how much time little tasks take. This weekend (with over 12 hours on the clock), all I have done is put in 2 extractor fans to vent the loft into the void over the eaves and then the void outside. It didn’t help that one had to be replaced and that I left part of the ducting at the shop. Three visits to B&Q is enough for anyone in a weekend!
It’s hard to believe that one little fan can take so long.
I did manage to cut up some bits of wood to edge the pier. Here they are are drying in my bath after a india ink and isopropyl alcohol bath overnight:
I used the SRMW recipe for a light wash – 1 tsp india ink for one pint of alcohol. I mixed a squirt of brown ink in to the mix. When they first came out they looked way to dark but they have evened up a lot to a pleasant light grey colour.
The aim is to add fenders to the Walthers pier as any ship tying up at the moment would bash straight into the concrete. I am basing my model loosely on the Connecticut State Pier at New London.
All photos taken from Library of Congress, American Memory, Built in America: Historic American Buildings Survey/Historic American Engineering Record/Historic American Landscapes Survey, 1933-Present
The Walthers’ spacing is much closer so I can only fit one small upright piece in between the horizontal fender pieces. I’ve used 5mm balsa dowels and cut a sheet up into 5mm square strips to make the horizontal sections. The main problem is that the Walthers’ kit is too short in the piles so I will have to model nearly high tide, not too much of a dark wet band. I need to use the Walthers one as it is the same height as the car float which I am also building for the same area.