Garden Railway Forum

A few years back I built myself a station building based on the old Stanley Station in West Yorkshire.

Details of the build here: http://www.jasonplant.com/Pages/Railway ... ation.aspx

The method I'd used for the walls were to coat wood with glass resin and car filler to waterproof it. Well after a few winters the moisture still gets in no matter how well sealed you think it is, first the walls started to "bulge" as you can just see in this first photo and eventually disintegrate completely as in the next photo!




So this summer I've stripped the base off and started afresh but this time using Perspex as the base, I still used some car filler on the outside to add some texture and allow me to dremel out the bricks a bit easier.



The end result is pretty much back where we started and with a bit of weathering on the paint work it looks as good as .... well as well used station :-)

That's such a shame your work didn't survive but we are all facing the inevitable.... British weather!
I have only recently decided to put my structures outside based on the experience I have had with my plasticard bridge sides having withstood frosts and wet Welsh conditions for a couple of years now. I have also introduced cast concrete structures in the hope they will last the test of time!
I agree though that individual buildings should be tried by any means to set the atmosphere of your particular railway.

Plastic and good strong glue seems the way to go, you can see that the top half of the building that was plasticard has survived really well with very little maintenance.