As Chris mentioned in Scratch Build a Pigeon Coop: Part 1, the design of pigeon coops (also called pigeon lofts or pigeon houses) are quite varied from design to design. For my design, I chose to build a small coop and for the prototype and follow an existing HO scale coop made by Model Power. This is what I picture when I think of a pigeon coop and it’s what I’ve wanted on my roof tops, but they just don’t make it in N scale…so make your own like I did!     

Construction

1. Cut clapboard to height (10 board). The first thing I did was cut the .030″ spaced clapboard to match the height of the front of the pigeon coop. The prototype (HO pigeon coop) was 10 board heigh, so I matched that.     

Using a marker, I drew a line along the bottom of this piece. I made sure the marker was pressed against one of the boards to keep it straight. I did this because even if the piece is cut slightly crooked, I can use the marker line as a guide as I cut this apart and repiece it together.     

2. Repeat (4 board). Next, I repeated this but this time, using a height of four boards instead of 10.     

3. Cut clapboard into strips. I then cut the clapboard into strips. These are approximately 1/2′ wide in scale. I set my Northwest Shortline Chopper to the appropriate width and then cut down the 10-board and 4-board pieces until I had a small pile of each.     

 4. Assemble the strips and divider. Now, you just need to connect the strips (using the marker line as a guide). The assembly is 10-board, 4-board, 10-board followed by a .020″ x .040″ strip (.020″ width is facing the camera in the photo below). We are creating an opening for the individual pigeon holes in the coop and this will eventually be the front facade of the coop. The strip on the right is a divider between each pigeon area (imagine there’s a thin wall dividing the pigeon areas).  The .020″ x .040″ strip should be flush with the back of the clapboard and protrude slightly from the front.Notice that the center piece (4-board) is cut slightly crooked along its bottom edge but the marker line helps keep everything straight. The irregular bottom edges will be sanded flat later.     

5. Repeat this assembly. The same 10-4-10-strip assembly is repeated for the entire length of the coop. For the one I built, since I was matching the HO version, I created 5 openings. Be sure to leave off the .020″ x .040″ strip for the last one you add to the chain. Neither end of the front facade should have a .020″ x .040″ strip and the overall piece should start and end with a 10-board clapboard piece.    

 6. Clean up and bracing. Then I cut the strips, flipped the piece over and added a scrap piece of styrene strip along the back to brace the piece.      

7. Add doors to the pigeon holes. After removing the remaining bits of strip dividers, I started to add the doors that are slid open for each pigeon hole. Since my NWSL Chopper was still set to the width of the 10-board and 4-board clapboard cuts, I cut strips from .020″ styrene sheet to ensure the doors would fit the openings properly. I slid these into place and glued them. The doors are flush with the back of the clapboard and resessed from the front.    

8. Add side and bottom pieces. To each end of the front facade (far left and right), I added a .030 x .030 square strip to cap the ends. I also added a .030″ x .030″ strip along the bottom edge. You can see the bottom piece in the photo in step #12 below. Although not shown, I also flipped the piece over and braced the door area with another strip of scrap styrene.   

9. Cut angled coop sides. The coop I’m building has a flat angled roof. To create this, I simply cut two pieces of clapboard to match the overall height of the coop front and then angled in down approximately 1 scale foot. Note that if you’re using clapboard sheet (and not something like V-groove), the clapboard is directional so be sure that you’re facing these properly — either with the raised part of the clapboard forward of the resessed part of the clapboard forward.   

10. Attach the sides to the front. Simply add the sides to the front piece that you’ve created. These sit behind the front wall.   

11. Add rear wall. I apologize for not having a photo of this step — that’s what happens when you get on a modeling roll. To add the rear wall, I cut a piece of horizontal clapboard to match the height of the low-end of the side wall. I then cut the width of this piece so that it would fit inside of the side walls. The side walls overlap the back wall.   

12. Add a roof and distress it. For the roof, I simply cut a rectangle of .010″ sheet slightly larger than the size of the coop. I left a little less than 1/2 scale foot overhang all the way around and about a 1 scale foot overhang on the front.  

There is a small gap between the top of the front wall and the roof created by the angle. For this, I used a .010″ x .020″ strip slid into place (not shown). This strip is glued above the front wall, following the angle of the roof.  

The coop photos I’ve seen are pretty distressed and roofs especially show quite a bit of wear and tear. For this, I used a piece of corse sand paper. First, I scratched the top of the roof and then folded the paper and lighted sanded along the roof edge to look like pieces of the roof had decayed away.  

13. Front detail. Beneath each pigeon hole opening, I used a small piece of .010″ x .020″ strip cut to the width of of the openings. This is the same width pieces were cut in step #3. In the HO scale version, there is a small detail there that I believe is supposed to represent the locking mechanism for the sliding doors or perhaps a small perch. You can see these pieces in the next photo.  

14. Adding legs and support pieces. For the legs and supporting lumber, I used .020″ x .030″ strip styrene, following the HO model as a guide. First, I added 8 legs — one at each corner and two on either side of the middle “bay”, both front and back.  

With the legs in place, I then used .020″ x .030″ strip to run stringer boards between the legs. There are placed:  

• 1 horizontally between the two front center legs
• 1 horizontally between the two rear center legs
• 2 used to create an “X” behind the two size legs on both sides
• 2 used to create an angled brace from the top of the outer legs to the bottom of the center legs (Note: to prevent the boards from looking too visually heavy, I did not place angled braces on the rear legs.

15. Painting and weathering the coop. To paint my pigeon coop, I first airbrushed a coat of black paint. This took care of the roof color and created a uniform base coat to cover the marker lines and other marks.  

 Next, I added a coat of brown paint. I used a relatively light brown craft paint (almost a tan color) to cover all of the coop surfaces except for the roof.  

After the second coat was applied, I drybrushed various shades of brown and gray craft paint onto all of the surfaces until the coop took on the aged appearance I was after. After drybrushing, I also used shades of brown and gray weathering powder by Bragdon Enterprises to create more variation in color.  

I sprayed the coop with Dullcote and then I drybrushed a light grayish/cream color over the all of the surfaces to create some fading and streaking, especially under the openings. I drybrushed the edges of the roof as well to highlight the edges.  

16. Weathering the roof. I took an atypical approach to weathering the roof and spotting it with bird droppings. Rather than simply speckle the already-painted black roof with white or cream spots, I smeared cream colored craft paint over the entire roof surface. I actually did this with my thumb — it doesn’t need to be pretty. Then, once dry, I used black weathering powder to completely cover the cream paint and turn the roof back to a black color.  

Then I dipped a brush into rubbing alcohol and and ran my finger across the brush lightly so that tiny droplets of alcohol would spot the roof surface. The alcohol removes the weathering power in spots. This approach removes the powders irregularly making some spots look like fresh spots and others look like older stains. The alcohol also creates some minor streaking which looks very prototypical.  

Creating N Scale Pigeons

For the pigeons, I basically followed Chris Brimley’s method as outlined in part one of this article series. However, rather than work with the birds on the end of toothpicks, I glued the finished but unpainted birds to the roof of the coop and in one of the openings. I then painted them in place – first with a base coat of light gray, then darker gray around the “head” and “tail” areas and then some light touches of green.  

It’s really hard to photographically show exactly how detailed these birds look. The photographs show so much detail that the human eye just can’t see and even if your bird are not perfect (like mine), they look incredible in N scale.  

As an interesting side note, my coop took a fall to the floor after taking these photos and I’ve since lost my best bird!