Paul's Repair, RS Laser Kits (N scale)

You folks might be wondering how I can get away with sneaking a depression era structure into a modern layout.  Come step inside this review and find out what I did...

These are the tools and supplies I used to assemble the kit:

• X-Acto Knife (Make sure it has a new blade)
• Elmer's White Glue
• CA Adhesive (Crazy Glue)
• Doc O'Brien's Weathering Powders
• Toothpicks (for applying the CA adhesive)
• Paint Brushes & Q-Tips (for applying the weathering powders)
• A pair of fine point tweezers

Here are all the parts that came in the kit.

The instructions that came with the kit had plenty of pictures and diagrams (I like lots of pictures).

Ok, I'm going into broken record mode but make sure you use a fresh X-Acto blade when working with one of these kits.  The parts are pretty fragile (you'll see what I mean later).

This particluar kit come with a base, which makes putting up the walls a breeze (and also reminds me I need to pay a visit to Micro-Mark and invest in some kit makers jigs...)

I began by applying some Doc O'Brien's powders while the parts were still in their frames.

Next I began to cut the walls out of their frames...

...and this is where I found out how fragile the parts in this kit were.  There are grooves cut into the wall to simulate the siding. That makes the walls half as thick as normal, where the grooves are.  I ended up breaking a small strip at the base of of the office doors.

I decided not to repair it since there was a frame that would get stuck on the outside around the doors that would over up my gaffe.

When I finished cutting out the walls I began to cut out the window frames and glue them into the window openings in the walls. I applyed a thin layer of glue to the outside of the window frame and put the frames into the holes.

Next I stared working on the front doors.  I colored the door panels, removed the adhesive bakcing from the door trim, and stuck the door panels to the trim.  I kept the doors in the frame until I was ready to glue the doors to the shop.

I handled the office doors the same way.

This is where I fixed my mistake.

The office door frame covered up the fact that there was a small strip of wood missing underneath.

Problem solved!

I then moved on to attaching the external window frames and...

...inserting the glass.

Now it was time to put up the walls. Having a grooved base made assembling the structure a lot easier!

I ended up having to touch up one of the walls with powder.  I got a phone call in the middle of building this thing and one of the walls fell back into a small reservoir of crazy glue (I haden't glued the wall in place).  Oops! The Doc Obrien's powders covered things up nicely!

The kit comes with comer braces that cover up the seams where the wall panels meet.  I put some powder on them and glued them to the builidng with crazy glue.

After the glue had dried I trimmed off the excess and filed the braces flush with the roof line.

Next up: the center partition...

Now I could finally put on the roof.

I realized the roof had a substantial overhang so I put some powder along the outside edge.

Once that was done I started gluing the roof pieces in place.

The kit comes with an ample amount of tar paper.  You can substitue the tar paper with any kind of roofing material you want.

I first applied the glue to each strip using my finger then decided to use a cheap paint brush instead. It was definitely a lot less messy!

To make the roof cap I took a strip of paper and cut the straight edge with my x-acto knife gently rock back and forth as I cut to simulate a serrated edge.

I glued it in place and flipped the building upside down to trim off the excess roofing material

I glued on the front door by dipping one side of it in crazy glue and stuck it to the door frame.

Finally I installed the deck.  The deck allso comes with self-stick adhesive.  I had to trim the corner braces off a bit since I ran them all the way down to the base when I put them on (oops again...).

And here is the (mostly) finished structure.

The kit comes with a sign but I decided to attach it later since I wanted to make my own decal.  I'm not going to use this as a "repair" shop.  It's going to be a little trail head shop where hikers and campers can get their supplies.  Repurposing is a great way of sneaking older quaint structures on a modern era layout.  RS Laser specailizes in these kinds of buildings and if you're looking for something unique they have many different kits to offer.  This was a well designed kit that was relatively easy to build.

Evert Claesson
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