There are a few relatively new models coming from Japan of fairly large (modern looking) parking garages. I decided to get one because I have lots of large office buildings from CMR and Lunde Studios. I had asked the Lunde' to make garage kit because their buildings would need some parking accomodations... same with the CMR buildings which can be up to 20 stories (plus additional sections). Open lots just wouldn't cut it... so parking garages are the only real solution. I thought about making some imitiation garage using the Brach's building walls... but wouldn't look convincing. The garage I got has 4-1/2 stories and says would hold up to 180 vehicles. Its about 1 foot x 9 inche footprint and about 6" tall... which seems a bit high... but that because its Japanese N scale 1:150. I was very impressed by the molding of the plastic parts and each sprue comes cellophane wrapped... instructions are as vague as any Heljan/Walthers kit though... all pictorial... but at least its 8 pages of sub-assemblies. Looks like it will be a beauty when finished. Have any of you guys built one of these and have any tips on the assembly you'd like to pass along? Also... I'd like to backdate the structure to a 1950's version... which might be a stretch considering the design of this garage. Any assistance would be great.
There is a person on Nscale.net screen name " Jimmi " who has built one, try contact him. I think he may be on this site as well.
That is a nice find! For a parking building, the proportion difference is minimized IMO. Backdating: This has the staggered openings on the ramp side, I believe, so I might replace that wall unless it is hidden or largely out of view, of course. You lose the view of the ramps, but you can have a big wall dog (ad) there. If you have parts to scavenge from other kits, I'd then try for a slightly more streamlined look. Round the vertical building corners including the elevator tower just a little, if you are ambitious. Or even try for an earlier art deco look but now painted very conservatively. That would include the vertical sign in front. They made parking structures more building-like in those days and that means not leaving it a naked concrete gray. The stock colors are okay. I'd make the girders and fencing gloss/semi gloss finished, the wall dullcoated. An interior to paint for a parking garage (or just the most visible parts - that's detail! Uh-oh, there's that ambition again with someone else's project. . . If that's a "pay" machine by the exit (Japan is RH drive), I'd just replace it with a standing attendant. Similarly, rearrange the ticket machine(s) for the entrance. I'd cut off the top level of the fencing; less liability worries in those days. EDIT: looks like you may be able to leave off that top guard fencing.
Thanks for your responses! Steamghost... I was thinking along the lines of using the Plastruct PLS91608 red brick sheets and some Walthers modulars pilasters along the sides to cover-up the open angled views. Don't know if I should use that on the front and back at all... but I do have to do something to take the 'modernistic' look away. The old garages were often repurposed warehouse or office buildings... they had little resemblance to the garages built in the past 40 yrs. The angled parking ramp design actually goes back to the early 1920's (D'humy); but, the majority of structures from the 1900's thru the 1950's were using elevators to move vehicles up/down and were in relatively small buildings in large cities. This model would be a behemoth in the 1950's.
