Monogram/Revell "Yankee Lady" Enhanced Build

Thanks! For Alclad (and other solvent-based paints) I need to install an outside-vented spray booth. I'm lobbying the CinC to do it. She seems to have a problem with installing a dryer vent through the outside brick wall of the basement. I really want to do this so I can do all kinds of airbrushing without having the fumes in the house and in my lungs. Even the Tamiya and Vallejo paints end up being breathed in. I don't like using a mask since my glasses always fog up.

This sir, was one of the most exciting ventures I've ever had the opportunity to follow along.  Your top quality building skills made some of the issues you encountered moot!  

As you so correctly stated; "We all make mistakes, it's how you recover that that's the key".  I learned much from your tutorial and look forward to another WIP from you.  If I may, what is your next project?

Toshi

Thank you Toshi for your over-the-top compliment.

Next projects in plastic are probably two Trumpeter Kits: 1/32 ABM Avenger with some Eduard AM parts and a 1:350 Essex WW2 carrier for which I haven't yet purchased any AM but plan to do it up like the Missouri.

But, most of my efforts are going to completing the large O'scale model railroad I've been building for over 4 years. I've been posting a thread about this creation from the very beginning and it can be found here:

http://ogrforum.ogaugerr.com/topic/continuing-saga-of-the-pandampprr

As in the B-17 thread, I cover all aspects of the build in ridiculously granular detail. So while you're waiting for me to do more plastic you can spend some idle time watching me crash through building some unique and interesting things such as:

A scratch-built 1870 Bourbon distillery including modern material handling system.

A free-lanced substation with a free-lance main transformer and ABB 135kv switchgear. This was an article in Railroad Model Craftsman in November 2015.

And there's a model of a Victorian train station, the style of which was on the NYO&W reailraod in New York. This was an HO plan in a Kalmbach book which I enlarged to O'scale and then scratch-built in styrene. It has a full main floor interior, but it's not easy to see.

The railroad is 39' X 15' and has been a dream of mine since I was a kid and had a 13' X 4' layout. It started in Germany at 21' X 13'. I enlarged it to 27' X 13' until the move to Kentucky where it grew to its present size. So if you need something to read, check it out.

OMG, OMG, OMG!!!!! I love the train layout. When I was about 5 years old my father built a 15'x10' American Flyer layout. About 5 years later he built a 20'x15' HO layout. I had a great dad. I can't remember how many hundreds of hours I spent playing with it over a number of years. Such great memories of my childhood. I wish I had a train layout now, but there are just so many hours in a day and just so many dollars in the bank. 

I will say it takes a lot of determination. I was just ready to build the layout in our Pennsylvania home when my company asked me to come to German headquarters and run some global programs. I only had a couple of engines and some track. All of it had to come from the USA. I asked Henkel if I built a model railroad in the basement of our German house (we had a rare thing... a house in Duesseldorf) would they pay to move it back to Pennsy when my assignment was over. They agreed. 

We lucked out customs-wise. Germany, unlike the US, checks your bags to your destination city. In the US you have to take you bags through customs at the airport which you land first, then re-check your bags to your final destination. In Germany, we used to fly from Philly to Munich and then take a local flight to Duessldorf, but the bags didn't come off in Munich. And there was no customs at Duesseldorf since it was a inner-country flight. So... I brought duffle bags full of Ross track, MTH cars and engines to Germany without paying any duty. I did have one engine that I bought shipped from Sunset 3rd Rail and it cost me 30% duty! I wasn't staying that country nor was I re-selling it there. That enabled me to build a working layout there (no scenery or structures), and then ship it back home. I built it to come apart and to fit into our Pennsy home. 

So, my point is if you really want to do it, you can find a way. It would have been much easier to have not started the railroad there, but as things have it, while in Germany, Henkel divested their Chemicals division. This reduced the US Henkel workforce by 50% and all people over 55 were offered early retirement. I took it and then started a consulting company. Therefore, my salary was greatly curtailed and I wouldn't have had the resources to start building. But since I already had a railroad, it wasn't very expensive to enlarge it.

Carpe Diem. You need to get into action since you never know what's around the corner.