Last fall, I built an O-scale version of Hal Carsten's suburban station "cut-out" that appeared in the April 1953 issue of Toy Trains magazine. After completing that, I decided I wanted to build a slightly smaller version in Cardboard-Christmas style. This is what we came up with:



Pretty simple construction using a cereal box and some USPS corrugated, a sheet of computer paper, a few basswood bits, acrylic craft paint, a scour pad, and some coarse glitter, all on a 6.5"x 4.0" base.



The windows were printed on vellum paper using MS Excel.

A fun little project for the paper village.

Paul Too

Everything about this is nice!!

Paul Too…

A perfect combination of tinplate and glitter…hope to see it on your holiday village/train display…and I feel certain you probably have another project or two already lined up…

Howard…

Howard wrote:Paul Too…

A perfect combination of tinplate and glitter…hope to see it on your holiday village/train display…and I feel certain you probably have another project or two already lined up…

Howard…

Well, I still have over 150 Sears houses to build, lol, but I'll likely go off script and build some stuff that might be a bit more putz-traditional. No shortage of ideas, just gotta find the time.

Paul Too

I really liked this one!

Howdy Mr. Paul!

Nice train station sir. What's your method of making your windows? They look really nice! I used to use a free online program called "Squeeky" but when they discontinued Adobe Flash, it wouldn't work anymore. Thanks in advance sir!

~Clinton

Happy Easter, Clinton...hope the wabbit was good to ya!

Thanks for the comments re: the suburban station. It was a fun simple build. I'm trying to get my head wrapped around the idea that everything doesn't have to be O-scale (1/4-inch to the foot)...it's been a bit of a struggle

Being an ex-accounting/finance guy, I use MS Excel to make windows. With the natural grid format of a spreadsheet, together with the options available for making border details, I find that with some trial-and-error sizing, I can make window glazing for these cardboard house projects. I print them first on plain computer paper to modify/verify the sizing, then once I'm satisfied they are correct, I print them on translucent vellum paper.

I use an HP inkjet printer to print them, so I have to let them sit for 30 minutes or so to make sure the ink is dry. If you try to use them too soon, the ink will smear if you touch them. Once dry, I cut them out leaving about a 1/4-inch around the edges for cementing them in.

I use Elmer's white glue to paste them in. When you first glue them in place, they tend to ripple up a bit (they are paper, after all). You just need to make sure the edges are completely glued. As the glue dries, it shrinks the rippled paper down tight and all of the the little wrinkles disappear. It seems to work pretty well.

When I first made a few of these, I had the thought that the paper might grow brittle or some overly exuberant display visitor might poke a hole in them, but that hasn't happened, at least not yet. I've not seen any problems.

I tried to attach a couple of examples, but the site doesn't allow copies of files with Excel ".xlsx" extensions. PM me an email address and I can try to send you a couple sample files to play with.

Hope this helps.