World War II Project - Return to Normandy - Putting it together

I have a much of sub-assemblies and its time to bring them all together into a single massive edifice now. As you can tell I have pretty much thrown out the instruction book from Sally 4th at this point. After you have built one of these terrace house kits they are pretty much the same and you should build them in a way that best suits you. I think that overall this second one went together faster and easier. Not sure if its because I opted to build up all the sub assemblies first or not but it certainly made some things a lot easier. I'm definitely all for not assembling the basic building shell till the very last step at this point.

First thing to remember is to remove your exterior paper anyplace where another section butts up against a wall. On the back wall there are four spots where this happens. If you don't get back down to the original MDF none of the pieces in the backyards will fit very well or the fit will be so tight that you may actually break something. Its much easier to do this now than after you have started gluing things together (lesson learned when building the Left End Terrace House).

Nice fit and you can't even tell the paper was cut away from the main building.

Moving down the line, test fitting first and then adjusting things with a knife and file for a good fit.

Here are the center three sections cut. At this point I hadn't done the end walls, both of which just butt up against the back wall.

Everything looking pretty good at this stage.

Front and back walls all glued up with windows, doors and shutters.

Second floor built up and ready to go

Backyard "sheds" built up and ready. Note that I still need to add a little bit of stone wall to and edge here. I didn't bother gluing that bit on till after everything was assembled.

Here are the pieces for the main building. 

I glued up the back wall first as there is a lot going on here and it will really affect how the rest goes together.

Then adding an side wall.

 

Then the main floor fireplaces and the other end wall.

And then the front. Note that I have removed all the rubber bands that I used to hold this together while the glue dried.

Looking down at the main floor after the staircases were added.

And the second floor in place

The front and the roof. But wait the roof isn't finished! I didn't realize that I had completely run out of roofing material. So the roof will have to wait while I wait for more roofing material to arrive.

And from the back

Now sitting up against the left end terrace house.

I think its going to look really good once I get the sidewalks in place and some of those extra details like gutters and downspouts.

World War II Project - Return to Normandy - Mid-Terrace House - Sub-Assemblies

My approach to this second building from Sally 4th is going to be a quite a bit different. My intent is to build and paint all the sub-assemblies before I assemble the whole building. I want to build as many things "flat" as I can, especially the walls. I think that will make things a bit easier to put together than with the first building.

Here is everything that had the "bumpy" paper applied. Note that I apply this as a single sheet and cut out the window and door openings after the glue has set.

The stairs are just a pain. They come in pairs, be sure to build one for the right side and one for the left.

Applying weights to the stairs while the glue sets

And here we go, one left, one right.

And then I spackled them to hide all the joints

All the sub-assemblies ready for paint (well most of them anyway).

First coat of ebony applied to the interior side

And finished with white, in between is a layer of "neutral"

Ready to assembly into bigger sub-assemblies!

World War II Project - Return to Normandy - Terrace House Finished...Mostly

I have been working on this piece off and on for a week or so now. Its easier to find 15 minutes to work on this then finding enough time to return to the painting table and get some vehicles wrapped up.

I like this Sally 4th kit but I had some issues with it as well. Keep in mind that I have had these sitting around for a couple of years before I pulled it out to work on so its quite possible that some things have been up graded. The instructions are adequate at best and a couple of elements are just flat out missing. Things like how to finish off the shutters, which requires the hinges which are on their own little sprue, a sprue that is not even listed in the components. Another thing that comes to mind is the black squares for the chimneys are no where to be found, at least in my "edition". They are clearly mentioned as being on the cover page but I have checked the instruction book and the package cover sheet and I sure can't find them. Because of this the chimney remains unfinished. Another point to make, when I first bought these the pdf files for the exterior walls, the interior wall paper and the roofs were available as a free download. That is no longer the case, not that they cost much, but I was a little irritated since all my original downloads have been lost over the course of time. I do believe that they are included in the current edition of the kit.

The building is basically finished at this point, the courtyards have been left unfinished just because I haven't decided on how I want to mount the building and I want the scenery to more or less match. The interior will remain somewhat bare as well, just because I don't want to spend to much time on something that will not be seen to often. I would rather spend the time detailing interiors of buildings for Calamity (something else I need to get back to). There are some exterior touch ups that need to be done, but its certainly usable as it stands right now.

I would recommend the Sally 4th kits, just read through the instructions first and then decide how to tackle the putting it together. The order in the instruction book isn't, necessarily the best way to go about doing it. I'm quite happy with the "bumpy" paper as well. While I need to get better at hiding the bare edges at the corners I think it looks quite good. Better than the dormer house that is just done from smooth paper. 

The roof glued together. The tabs stick out way to far and need to be sanded down to get a nice flat surface on the angled end.

Sanding and filing accomplished. Certainly made gluing the roof paper on much easier.

Weights in place to try and keep everything flat while I glued the roof material in place. In the interest of time and sanity I opted to do it in one piece rather than placing individual rows. May go the other way for the next one.

All the roof paper is on and the first dormer has been added.

All three dormers, the chimney and the edging have been added. Just need to add the dormer roofs and the chimney cap at this point

From the front. I'm thinking that I'll mount it with a sidewalk permanently attached, still mulling that over.

The alley way side.

From the back with the unfinished courtyards. No idea how you would actually get into the court yard there are no doors from the inside of the main building to the little sheds (which have quite fancy window and door framing, which really contrasts with the old wood planking I used).

This blank wall would butt up against the adjacent building. I guess I should build that one next.

Upper floor and you can see the fully completed roof sans the chimney stacks.

The bottom floor showing the optional staircase kit. Which by the way does not fit well in the end unit. The staircase on the alley way side partially blocks the door and needs to be cut down a little in order to fit. 

World War II Project - Return to Normandy - Terrace House Progress

I haven't been able to find a lot of painting time right now. Between work and "life intervenes" moments about all I can fit in is during the day. Working on the Terrace house lets me work for 15 minutes and get called away for something else and not need to shut down and clean brushes and the like.

Progress at this point is kind of all over the place but mostly I have been working on the "backyards". Oddly enough there is no backdoor and the more I think about the more I think I might have made a mistake by making the small out building from "wood" rather than the stone. Oh well, I doubt that to many people will complain about it.

All the pieces wrapped and ready to go, if only it had been as easy as that sounds.

First thing to remember. The width of paper can really make things difficult, especially this bumpy paper. Every place were the garden walls came into contact with the building required me to cut away the paper from the building and around the tabs to make things fit. As it is I did quite a bit of "forcing' in the end. There is not a lot of glue holding things together in the back.