The Detroit Union terminal was organized by local produce dealers in 1928 and opened for business on July 1, 1929. The Pennsylvania, Pere Marquette and Wabash railroads supported the acquisition of land and construction of the facility through the Green Real Estate Company. They also served the facility with their jointly owned belt line, the Union Belt.
This is an overhead view of the complex. It is comprised of two 1000 foot long buildings. The "A" building is two stories tall and parallels Fort Street, fronting on Green Street. The "B" building is a combination of single and two stories. The first floors of the buildings are used for display sales with vendor offices located on the second floors. The ends fronting on Green Street were terminal operation offices. Bulk sales were handled on the team tracks and transfer sheds seen along the lower portion of the photograph.
The total capacity of the yard was in excess of 200 cars. In 1937 a total of 31,555 carloads were handled. 11,107 cars were delivered in line-haul service by the Wabash, 8,212 by Pere Marquette, 1,196 by Pennsylvania, 1,619 by Detroit, Toledo and Ironton with 9,411 by other railroad companies.
Planning The Model
This facility could make an entire layout but for my purposes I am only going to model a portion of the southwest end of the "A" building.
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| Fort Street side view |
Above is a detail photo of a wall section showing that the windows are in sets of three double hung single pane units. Micro Engineering 80-068 28" x 64" windows appeared to be similar to the prototype. To evaluate the use of these windows I assemble a triplet adding a scale 2 x 8 sill. Using this window assembly, assuming 18" pilasters and 18" of brick along the side of the windows I proportioned a scale drawing of a wall section to see how closely it could represent the prototype. In this case it resulted in a window center to center spacing of 15 feet. I felt this was within reason when using the Micro Engineering windows as the basis for the walls, the visual effect being consistent with the prototype building.
This photo is ascribed to the Union Produce Terminal showing the track unloading side of the "B" building. It also shows the step down along the track side. Of note are the dockside loading doors which seem typical for the era when the terminal was constructed. It is difficult to tell if they are roll up doors or four panel folding doors. Because of the above uncertainty I chose to take a different tact, I would model roll up garage style doors framed out with concrete block as thought a post war modernization had been done. I also needed to make a decision about the step down. This model is a flat the total depth available is a scale 28 feet over the dock face, with a ten foot dock width I did not think that I could create and effective visual step down. I chose to replicate the street facing side with a flush two story wall.
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| Scale drawing of proposed model |
Construction
Window Fabrication
Window Fabrication
Having determined the window configuration, I created fifteen total sets. To do this I cleaned up casting flash, trimmed off the bottom sill casing and sill protrusions, bonded the frame edges together and then reinforced the space between the the inner frames with .30 x .040 styrene strip. A new lower sill was acreated using scale 2 x 8 styrene strips. The windows were then painted, weathered, glazed, dirtied with powdered pigments and set aside for installation.
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| Rear view of window assembly showing reinforcement |
Wall Fabrication
About four years ago I purchased a Microlux table saw, it has made quite a difference in my ability to do precision cutting when working with wood. To me the time savings and precision when doing repetitive cuts justified the expense. If you plan on doing any extensive work with wood I highly recommend the purchase.
Monster Model Works etched basswood brick and concrete block sheets were used in constructing this model.
I fabricated the pilasters, wall bases and loading dock components from 1/8 inch thick basswood sheet stock, this matches the thickness of the MMW material. First I ripped my pilasters, they are cut to a scale 18 inches wide. Next from the MMW material I ripped the scale 18" brick and block strips which will frame the windows and loading doors. Always rip a few extra pieces as it always seems you will need them and it is easier to do now. Trying to accurately replicate dimensions can be a challenge, a few thousandths of an inch can make a fit and visual difference.
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| Block and brick strips |
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| Pilaster strips |
Next I set up the saw and ripped 3' 6" strips for the loading dock and lower edge of the walls.
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| Wall base loading dock strips |
This photo shows the process used to determine the total width of each wall panel. I lightly clamped a pair of pilasters and window side fillers between the window blank. I then measured the distance between the pilasters. This will be the width of the main wall sections. This width was setup on the saw and the necessary brick sections were cut. At this time I also cut the wall base pieces from my dock strip material.
Next I set up the saw to cut the individual brick sections that go above the door and below the window. After resetting the saw I cut the sections that go above the window to the top of the wall.
The wall is ready to build. From left clockwise. Pilasters, above window panels, between window door panels, base filler, brick and block strips, and window/door spacers.
To facilitate square construction I built a jig from basswood sheet and stripwood. Make sure that the base and side stripwood strips are square, any variations will accumulate over the length of the wall resulting in a bowed wall. Cover the jig in wax paper to eliminate bonding the wall to the jig. Place a pilaster and wall base against the stripwood stops bonding the base to the pilaster. Now place the door blank, lower brick filler, window blank and top brick filler in position and when satisfied with squareness bond the brick fillers to the pilaster. When the glue has set remove the wall section. In the above example I was working with a corner so it was necessary to add an additional pilaster.
Now cut, fit and bond the brick and block window/door edge strips into the openings.
Here is an example of a "next" wall section being fabricated. Note that only one pilaster is used and that only the pilaster side has the window/door edge strips applied. The additional edge strips will be added once the wall sections are joined together.
I use a piece of glass as a surface plate. With a straight edge and square I check each wall section for square fit sanding as needed to insure a precise fit. When the fit is satisfactory each section is bonded together. The missing window/door edge strips are added. To minimize cumulative assembly error I built three section sub-assemblies, those were then assembled into larger sub-assemblies until the wall was completed.
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| Camera lens created bow |
Loading Dock
Nine loading dock spacers were cut from my loading dock strip material. This photo shows how I applied the spacers using a machinist square (maintaining perpendicularity) and a wood block (flush to bottom).
After adding the dock face, rear deck supports were added between the spacers.
Basswood sheeting (1/16") is applied as decking.
To simulate a steel angle applied to the dock edge a .060 square styrene strip is applied to the dock edge. The strip is cut into short segments to facilitate handling/gluing, a wood block assists in placement flush with the deck surface.
Interior Bracing
I used water based stains and paint when finishing models therefore it is necessary to heavily brace the interior of the structure to prevent warping. I use 1/4" square stripwood for this. After adding additional thickness to the pilasters I applied three bracing strips to the wall. Note that I have allowed a space (3/32") between pilaster bottom and the top strip. This will accommodate the sub-roof.
The wall was placed face down on my work bench, covered with a piece of plywood, and weights were applied. The glue was allowed to set.
While the glue was setting I fabricated the side walls and added bracing.
When all of the bracing glue was set the side walls were attached to the main wall section. Note that the rear brace is offset from the rear of the side wall. This will accommodate the black matting backer board.
To bring the bottom of the door opening flush with the dock surface 1/16 x 1/8 wood strips were glued in place.
Support strips (.040" sq styrene strip) are added around the window openings. These strips serve two purposes, they keep the windows from fall through the opening simplifying installation, they also provide the attachment point when gluing the windows in place. To insure that the strips are flush with the back of the wall I hold a block of wood against the wall to act as a backstop when attaching the strips.
Roof Installation and Surfacing
The sub-roof is 3/32" thick basswood sheet stock, cut to width and glued in place.
A 1/8 sq stripwood strip was bonded to the back edge of the roof offset for the backer board. I unfortunately did not bond 1/4" sq strips across the underside of the roof. When I applied the roof surface texture the sub-roof curled badly, luckily after it completely dried it became flat again. Bracing is important to remember.
Roof surface texture will be created by using facial tissue. It is cut into manageable widths before attempting to apply it to the sub-roof, scissors work much better for cutting the tissue than a razor or knife blade.
Matte Medium (Scenic Express) is applied and then distributed over the roof surface. The pencil line on the right de-marks the length of a single tissue. Only work with a single tissue piece at a time.
A fan brush is used to press the tissue into the matte medium. Do not brush the tissue as it will tear.
Scissors are used to cut the tissue to allow it to fit around the pilasters.
Painting and Finishing
The interior surfaces are all painted black. This will help minimize the potential adverse effects of humidity on the model.
The roof and the back of the protruding walls were painted using Polyscale Grimy Black.
Usually I paint brick walls using Rust-oleum spray paint in various shades of red or brown. For this project I chose to try a different method of staining the walls, making my own stain from powdered pigments. I use pigments sold by DRBENS.COM. Dissolve a small amount of pigment into a portion of matte medium to create a stain concentrate. Dilute the concentrate with water to create different intensities of stain. The base coloring was done using various intensities of Worn Orange Brick pigment. Darker brick effects were created using Chicago Red Brick pigment applied as dilutions. Final accents were created by dry brushing the concentrates over the surfaces.
Mortar was added using water diluted washes of marble impregnated modeling paste. The Liquitex brand contains marble dust.
Pilaster Finishing
The face of the pilasters and front of the loading dock were finished with MMW Concrete with Forms etched laser card. I bonded it to the wood using Weldwood contact cement.
The tops of the pilasters were finished by building up a cap using .030 styrene strip.
The pilasters, caps, block, and loading dock were primed with Floquil Antique White.
I tried Majestic Mountains pigment as a stain for the concrete elements of the model. The above series of photos show the steps in mixing up the stain concentrate. I used this as described above, washes then dry brushing.
Upper Wall Flashing
To create the metal flashing used to cap the top of the wall sections I use adhesive backed copper foil. This is used in stained glass assembly. The foil is cut into pieces which will fit between the pilasters.
On the right is a foil piece being test fit. After pealing off the backing the foil is burnished down on the wall edge. It is positioned such that the first layer of brick on the wall face will be covered.
Next a heavy layer of solder is flowed onto the foil, covering the front, top and rear of the flashing.
The final step is applying a coating of solder patina solution to darken and weather the flashing.
TO BE CONTINUED
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