Walls 2: A Hole in One. Inset Bricks.

Similar to Walls 1 but this end will have inset bricks. A large area was marked out…

…then cut out. Note I didn’t cut across any timbering lines this time. Instead, the saw blade was temporarily loosened/disconnected from the saw, fed through a pilot hole I had drilled, and reconnected/tightened. The hole was then cut, the blade was loosened/disconnected from the saw again, removed from the hole, and reconnected/tightened to the saw. A bit of a time-consuming process but I only had a single hole to cut out.

The pre-painted Linka plaster brick piece was cut to fit the hole and put aside. The timbering was glued onto the wall and everything was primed flat black. The brick piece was then glued into place, insuring it was flush with the timbering.

Filler/paint applied. After drying, cracks were scribed in with an Xacto knife. As with Walls 1, I’ll give it its final colors sometime in the future.

The back side: Filler/paint used to fill in where the brick piece is, then painted neutral gray for now.

NEXT: Wattle and Daub.

Walls 1: Full of Holes. Flush Bricks.

Here’s how I cut out window openings in a wall as well as fill in openings with bricks.

- After I cut this end piece, I marked where (W) open windows and (B) bricks were going to be.
- I drilled holes a bit larger than my scroll saw blade, then cut across the timbering lines to the holes. The holes make it easier to rotate the piece around the scroll saw blade when cutting out the wall holes.

Holes all cut out. The lower left corner is very fragile but becomes MUCH stronger once the timbering has been glued on. I then used a 1/4” square rasp/file to clean up the holes to exact size.

The usual black undercoat, then filler/paint applied but this time I used a small artist‘s trowel instead of using a large putty knife (as in METHODS: Spackling). I like the rougher, less uniform result much more. I then cut some leftover painted Linka castings to size and glued them flush with the front surface.

The back: Small pieces of mat board were glued in to raise the surface somewhat…

…and a filler/paint mix was applied to level it. After sanding it all flat, the back was painted neutral gray. Yeah, I should have done a more precise job filling/sanding and filled in that thin little crack between the windows as well. But I didn‘t.

The finished wall for now with a few cracks added using an Xacto knife. I’ll paint it when it gets used on a building whenever.

Next: Inset bricks.