Thornycroft Building #7 - Shed

In the photo below this building sits between two railway sidings and next to the large building with three ridge roofs on the left. (Click image for a large view).

  The Thornycrofts Motor Works, Basingstoke, 1928 - Britain from Above

Function

Unknown. Probably related to the movement of materials between railway wagons and the yard. Adjoining the shed is what looks like a dump or spoil heap enclosed by two walls. In later years, after the shed was demolished, industrial waste is known to have been stored in this area.

Time Line

Built between 1919 and 1928. Demolished in the 1940s when it was replaced by a larger, brick building.

Construction

Corrugated iron throughout. Unlike other corrugated buildings on site this one was not white but black, or similar dark colour. The fencing for the dump was upright timber beams or planks, could be sleepers but may have been from the stock of timber used in vehicle manufacture.

The Model

Here is the model on our full size plan. (Click image for a larger view).

One of the delights of modelling the factory buildings is the variety of styles and sizes. You may have detected that I am alternating construction between large and small buildings. The large ones take some considerable time to design and make from scratch whereas this shed was completed within a couple of hours, which helps with motivation.

Designed in a graphic application and printed on paper that is stuck to card. I have given the building doors at each end and a window at the other end. Somewhat fictitious as no images are available of the prototype in this respect. No relief is given as they are flush with the iron.

The walls of the dump are designed using a photograph of a vertical wall of sleepers.

I wanted to model the dump to look like an industrial spoil heap and happened to have to hand a moulded rubberised dump bought for early railway layouts. Not sure what the scale is but the footprint is larger than needed for this model. I did not want to cut it to size so I used FIMO* clay to create a mould from part of it. This was used to mould the dump from more FIMO.

*FIMO is heated in a domestic oven to harden it.

Next I studied colour photographs of industrial dumps and painted the various bits and bobs in the model with similar colours.

Quite pleased with the result.

The next building to make will be the largest on site.

David