NP Lester WA T-Trak Z Module Set Project

It's been a busy couple weeks, but I finally finished my replacement Lester Depot with better lighting than the first attempt:





Here is the original for comparison:


Here are some side by sides with the lights off, showing that I added the no bicycles sign, the right side Western Union sign that went missing between the 50's and 60's, and the under eaves lamps:

On the back I added the ladder to the roof, the roofwalks for water barrels, pipes extended up the walls to the roof, and the rear porch lamp

And here I have the platform extended all the way around the depot.


You can see the under eaves lamps, the roofwalk, and the no bicycles sign in this prototype photo:


And the backside prototype:

 

Yes, I use Corel Draw for everything. I use it to draw the parts for laser cutting, to make the signs and decals for printing, to write exploded diagram instructions, and to design kit boxshots.

Here is what the laser cut parts diagram for the Lester Depot look like:


Here is what the sign artwork looks like, it's all vector art, so can be scaled up or down without loss of fidelity:

 

Argh! Absolutely Unbelievable! Some King County tax photos from 1940 yielded new info. First the water tower WAS a 100,000 gallon tank. It had straight legs, so I have to build YET ANOTHER water tower:

And so as to ADD INJURY TO THE INSULT, I discovered that the roundhouse needs to be rebuilt. Somewhere along the line it was rebuilt to accommodate longer steam locomotives:


And I found this photo from the south looking at the depot area showing there was a small extension added to the second stall, as well as a large Machine Shop added to the 3rd stall next to the small 2nd stall extension:



This photo from the hill North of the depot area shows the Large Machine Shop extension, extending real close to the Lester Railroad Hotel. Also visible is both front and rear of the roundhouse smokejacks:


And as if that was not enough to bake my cake, after building the turntable 3 times, it seems that there was an operators shack installed on the turntable at some point:


And I found an older photo of the front of the roundhouse, before the front smokejacks were installed and the turntable was motorized, showing better construction detail of the upper tilting window panes:


Also this picture shows that the old style rectangular smokejacks were on the backside of the stalls. I guess so the locos could be steamed up nose in the stalls as well as the traditional nose out:


So all these findings really blow my Cha Cha, and I have to rebuild everything again. Oh well, it's all in good fun, and I always do a better job the second, third, and fourth times around anyways.

 

Yes, it's true, it don't really cost me too much to build Z Scale models, Just the time it takes, and I'm retired and under lockdown anyways.

 

Made some progress on the Roundhouse redesign:

 

It's gonna be sweet when it's done!