Dimensions

 Many of the dimensions I knew of the carriages were in imperial units, so it was more than straightforward to use the generic UDK units. I knew space was going to be tight however, so I went and started building the basics of my shell with 1ft x 1ft tiles with collision, to see if the character could actually navigate around the carriages. The checkerbox appearance of the tiles next to eachother also made it easier to count how many feet long a certain area was, and i could easily halve a tile to make 6 inches, or 3 inches etc.

UDK Units  =  Imperial

16   =  1ft

8  =  6"

4  =  3"

2  =  1.5"

1  =  0.75"

The first big problem i encountered were the width of the doors. Based on blueprints and from reference, the doors are about 2 feet wide. As soon as I tested this in UDK, I realised that the character would not fit though the doors, and only three feet wide was sufficient birth, with about 2 inches leeway (enough to fit in the width of an open door). The first thing i didn't like about making the doors a foot wider was the visual appearance. The cabin doors in reality do look tall and narrow, which i think is part of their elegance and charm, but if they won't work in game then i have to make them wider. Unfortunately this meant having to make each cabin a foot longer, as the 3 feet required for the bed and the 2 feet required for the wash cabinet couldn't be touched. It does at least give the player/camera a bit more room to look around with.

 Obviously, with the discovery of gaps having to be 3ft wide, other areas were also going to need to be ammended. For example, part of the wall that was the same length as a door when it is open, had to be made a foot longer. The gaps between diagonal pieces had to be adjusted, and even places where locked/static doors were placed had to be made wider just to flow with the overall scale of pieces. Working in UDK first this way was such a big help, much better than working in max first, exporting assets, finding out they're wrong, going back and forth..