Kevin Sweeney

After a break I'm back working on my MGW station design. I reduced the number of parts in this stage of the model to 15, not including the windows and doors. My earlier builds had almost 50 parts and was a more complex structure to assemble. If all goes well I intend to sell a finished version of this model for about 200 euros. I had a meeting in Cavan County Museum recently. There will be a week long exhibition of my models in the museum in April, details to be finalised in March. This is my collection of exhibition ready models at the moment. But I planning to have a few more ready for the exhibition, including a model of the County Museum itself.

I was at the exhibition yesterday morning, my first ever model railway show. Big crowd when I was there. On my way in I passed two teenage girls who were leaving the exhibition. One said to the other "that was really cool wasn't it", her friend agreed. It was great to hear, I can't think of any other hobby that is mainly the preserve of middle aged and elderly men, that teenage girls would describe as cool.

I'm very conscious of the level of precision needed for a kit. I've built 3 GW station houses in a row, refining the accuracy of the parts with each build and they are still not good enough. It would take several more builds I think to get them all accurate enough for a kit. I'm leaning towards the idea of selling finished models. I have the build time on the GW station down to 10 hours. This is cutting all parts by hand (my cutting machine died recently), a new cutting machine would take 3 hours off the build time. By simplifying my build process and making small batches of 3 or 4 at a time, i could probably knock another hour off the build time. This would allow me to get a reasonable return on my time and still sell a finished model at a very affordable price.

I think your probably right. I'm currently building my 4th GW station house in a month, but this time I'm trying to simplify the build process. My methods of building are too complex for a kit. Even if I never sold a kit, the process of thinking this out will make for faster model making.

I made my offer yesterday. it was declined but it was an interesting exercise for me. Without the advise I got here I would pitched the price a lot lower. The whole process of thinking out the work involved and costing it was a useful learning experience. And I now have a set of drawings of Dungannon Station. Attached is the plan I sent to the client.

I will keep playing music and will do a few small choice gigs near home, but I don't want to go back to it full time. Playing informal sessions with friends, playing what you like to play and just pleasing yourself is all fun. Once you get paid to play, you have to play what the venue want, deal with the drunks, and the venue owners trying to renegotiate the deal at the end of the night. Also at 61, the late nights catch up with you really fast. As Darius points out making models for money brings its own stresses, I guess it's a case of choose your poison. I have promised my potential client an answer today. I estimate 80 hours work to complete the build, with about 10 done already, the drawings are nearly done. I will price those hours at a reasonable rate, one that will give me a good return on my time, but which allows for the fact that my overheads are almost zero. If he says yes good, if he declines good too. I've being doing a lot of time and motion studies in the last month investigating the practicalities of selling finished models and/or kits. As you can see in the photo I'm building up quite the collection of OO GW buildings. I also have three complete crossing keepers cottages not in the photo. The second and subsequent build in each case take a fraction of the time that the first one required. With this way of working I could sell a whole station, station house, signal cabin, goods shed, water tower and platform shelter for the same price as a single once off building. Either way my main advantage is that my kids are reared, I own my own home and I'm debt free. What ever I decide to do i won't have to work very hard at it to keep my little ship afloat.

Thanks Darius for that comprehensive answer, lots of food for though there. especially your advise about sticking to your guns. I can really appreciate your point about how doing what had been a hobby as a job can knock all the fun out of it. As a musician I'm very well aware of that problem. For the last eight years I had been a fulltime carer, but that has now run its course and I'm embarking on the next chapter. I have two major skills, model making and guitar playing. I have too choose which one to do for money and which one for fun. The attraction of model making is that I can work in my kitchen and be in bed by midnight, no long journeys or late nights.

If I might impose on the community by asking for some help. Someone based in the UK has asked if I would make them a OO card model of Dungannon station. I am very interested in this commission and getting into that line of work, but I have no idea how much to charge for that kind of job. They have supplied me with some oblique photos. I have already spent nearly half a day studying them and am still at least a half a day away from having a complete set of drawings. The model is further complicated by the fact that the ground is sloping, being about 2 foot higher roadside, than trackside. There are canopies on both trackside and roadside, I would be worried about them being damaged when the model is being shipped so I'm thinking I need to make a custom made wooden box with some kind of internal card structure to hold the model in place. This in itself will be an other major job to design and build. Any advise on how to price this job and any other issues I need to consider would be very much appreciated.

I'm building up a nice collection of OO buildings.

OO certainly feels huge. nice to work with thought, much bigger margins of error than in n scale. i have a hankering to make a big building in OO, time will tell\

Making good progress with the Ballyheelan diorama. I've been trying out different possibilities with ground cover. Almost finished making my Great Grandmothers shop. In a new departure for me I made my first OO model, of the crossing keepers cottage just south of Ballywillan

Making good progress with the village. Just three small buildings left to make. I've had my first go at static grass, happy enough with the result. I created a field of ripe grain and a field of tall grass, ready to cut for hay. I'm also experimenting with making lazy beds. Potato gardens were a common thing in that era. There is also an overgrown area next to the bridge. So I have the chance to create many different kinds of ground cover. I've also been applying powered pastels to the house walls, and using a diluted acrylic wash to darken the thatch. But more of both are required.

Amazing work. i love the way it all looks so battered and worn out. It sets a very high bar for the rest of us. Inspirational stuff.

Pendon looks amazing. I'm planning a trip to the England in the next few months. Pendon is definitely worth a visit for some inspiration.

I used a pound shop clear glue for the water. The base of the river is mountboard. On top of that I put a layer of toilet paper soaked in PVA glue. While the glue was still wet I worked it with a brush to create ripples. Then I poured the glue on top. It took about 48 hours for the glue to dry. I'm happy enough with the result for a first effort. Another layer of glue or two would add more depth to the water.