Scratch Building the Robertsdale Engine House - Part 2

 As I explained in part 1 of this series, I wanted to build the EBT two stall backwoods engine house in Robertsdale, Pennsylvania, at the southern end of the railroad.  The main shop facilities were in Rockhill, where the railroad had an eight stall round house and turntable, a car shop, locomotive shop, machine shop, foundry, blacksmith shop, and just about anything you might need to build, repair or service the railroad.  

But Rockhill was more than 20 miles north of Robertsdale and the coal mines on Broadtop Mountain.  If one of the EBT's fleet of 2-8-2 steamers needed repairs, it made sense to have a small service facility available at the southern end of the line.  The board and batten engine house was built around 1875, at the same time that the EBT was building the Robertsdale depot and company store.  

There are very few photos of the engine house when it was still standing, so I turned to the FEBT Company Store for a set of drawings based on field notes from William J. Karl made in 1973 when the building was still standing.  The set of 7 drawings was a godsend.  They were extremely well detailed, and included the floor plan, wall plans, the site plan and roof plan, front and rear elevations,side elevations, main door and vent stack detail. And best of all, they were drawn in HO scale!  This vastly simplified construction of the model.  After cutting out and assembling the walls, I was able to set my model directly on the plan, as seen here:

Since the engine house was built before the EBT bought its fleet of modern 2-8-2 locomotives, the tolerances between the engine and doors were extremely tight.  Being able to set the building on the floor plan helped keep the tracks within the proper clearances.

I decided for the sake of structural integrity I would set the sills on a concrete foundation -- in this case a 1/8 inch sheet of styrene painted a weathered gray.  Using the plans for a guide, I carefully marked out the stalls, then cut out the spaces for the tracks.  I tested the fit on a flat surface to make sure the tolerances were correct, then glued the walls to the foundation with ACC cement.

The plans indicated that the roof of the main building was supported by a series of 6 trusses.  I followed the plans and constructed four trusses that were then placed where the plans indicated they were located.  The front and rear trusses were continued up to the peak of both ends to strengthen the assembly.

At this point I was able to place the structure on the layout where it would go when finished.  The laser cut shake shingle roof panels from B.E.S.T. would rest on the trusses leaving enough space above for wiring the lights and for a roof beam to run from one end of the building to the other.  I will continue the construction in part 3.