Hello Folks
Does anybody offer a brickworks kit in HO? I think I remember coming across an ad in MR sometime back but I can't seem to find it in my library.
Thanks in advance.
Warmest regardsBill
I seem to remember seeing an ad for one that Campbell made, but I think that was some years ago now.
Try searching Walthers' site, they should have one available if anyone does.
Yeah, I remember a kit, but it wasn't from Campbell, but rather a plastic model from somebody like Model Power or AHM.
But nothing shouted out to me "brickworks." The model looked very generic (a smokestack coming out of a building equals brickworks?). I'd recommend you doing some research on brickworks for the period and geograpical area you're interested in to understand the manufacturing process and what features such a plant included. Look particularly for those features making up a brickworks. Let's see: a local source of clay and a method to transport and store same, structure(s) and machinery (if visible) where raw materials are mixed, ovens and smoke stacks for "cooking" bricks, a place to store finished bricks, etc. Then, with some kitbashing and perhaps some simple scratchbuilding, you'll come up with a much more convincing model. (Anyway, a lot more convincing than the plastic kit I recall.) Heck, if the industry is on the edge of your layout, maybe all you need is a brickyard where finished bricks are stored and loaded for shipment. Figure out a method for representing thousands of finished bricks ready for shipment.
Mark
Here is a start.
http://calbricks.netfirms.com/brick.richmondpbcobm.html
Explore the entire site for more information. I haven't explored the site thoroughly. Photos of brickworks shown on the site are generally poor and long-way off, but the one shown above is one of the better ones.
modern brickmaking...
Here's more. If I can do this and the above in 15 minutes, think what you could do in hours.
http://www.glengerybrick.com/about/manufacturing/packaging.html
I think sometime in the early 60s, MR had an article on building a small brickworks. I also seem to recall that AHM had a kit called an Old Fashioned Factory, that had a few tracks cast into the base, roughly HOn2 1/2, that could represent a link with a clay pit to feed a brickworks. This, if one could be found, could be a good start on this project. I thought it was carried under the IHC or maybe the Faller or Heljan brand most recently by Walthers, but I don't see it in the current catalogue.
Possibly a little research could either turn up a copy of the original MR article, or a few minutes in the Walther' catalogue could turn up something suitable for a building that could occasionally recieve a hopper or two of clay and coal, maybe a boxcar with sacks of special bonding and coloring agents, and maybe bags of charcoal instead of coal hoppers, maybe supplies for a small water purification plant, one or two stacks for an inside drying room to dry the newly formed bricks, and doors to allow a fork lift to carry pallets of dry bricks to the external ovens for firing. For firing ovens, Walthers has a line of older kilns and ovens made by Model Rail Stuff, in HO, and I think in N. There are the larger ovens similar to the ones built in the MR article, older Beehive and an older style that would be built into a hill or embankment. The Walthers numbers are 506-650, 506-660, 506-630, 506-640, 506-580, and 506-590. The larger ovens match those constucted in the original article.
A suitable building, or combination of buildings, would take in the supplies, have an area for mixing the clay, molding the brick, drying the brick, and firing them. I even think one of the Dirty Jobs episodes covered the procedure. Maybe for a slightly more modern era, he coal/charcoal could be replaced by lines of ground mounted tubing to represent a natural gas feed to the kilns.
Clay and other supplies come in, finished bricks and maybe drain tiles would be shipped out. Good two-way commerce