Coal mine project

[Coaltrain]

This is my official new project kick off post. I am going to build the last significant structure on my layout and scenic the area around it. This project will include the building of a coke oven battery of 40 ovens, a coke crusher / loader, the coal tipple, and the truck receiving pit.

The mine tipple that I am building will be an older variety with a wood frame covered with corrugated metal siding. The tipple will receiver coal from an older Drift mine opening (located out of sight) and a newly build truck receiving pit. As coal was becoming mine out in the area many tipples started to receive coal that was trucked in from other mines that did not serve a tipple.

Also, on this tipple I will try to simulate the many additions that were added throught the years. Besides the addition of the truck receiving pit there will the addition of a new coal loading boom installed on the last track. To add the boom I had to relocate the outer mine track which required me to pull up the rails (I hand lay track) and remove the ballast and the ties that I had glued down four years ago.

The coke ovens will also be a new addition. The ovens that I am building are being modeled after the ovens located at Pine Branch on the Interstate railroad. I am building the ovens as close to the prototype as I can. I had to scratch build the oven openings and oven doors from styrene. After building one opening and door, which took about two hours, I started to look for other options to the other 39 openings and doors I would have to build. I decided that I would use the pieces I built as masters and make some RTV molds and cast the rest in resin. I used Walthers brick sheet to make the top of the oven and I cut ten door openings leaving space on both sides of the first and last opening. The plan is to complete this section and make another mold of the whole section, and cast five sections. The three middle sections will have both ends trimmed off and the ends will have either the right side or the left side trimmed off leaven the space of brick for the ends. Below the level of the bottom of the ovens there are two layers of cut stone then cast concrete. For the cut stone I am in the process of hand carving small little stones in strips of styrene. Once I finish the stones and add the concrete I will make the new mold.

The oven doors were a bit of a challenge because I did not have a very good picture what the doors looked like. I studied the pictures and made a decision to get as close a possible. After I finished the door and made the mold and all of the castings I found pictures of the actual doors as they look today. I compared the current door photos to the photo taken in the late 50’s and they have been changed a little. The current photo shows two larger holes in the top center of each door and the older photo shows more smaller holes, I modeled the older doors with many holes. The other nice thing about the current photos I found is that I now know that the ovens were a red brick color.

So far I have been working on the master of the coke oven and I started to build some of the frame of the coal tipple. I have got the scenery in the area around the coke oven and I started to add ground cover around the coke tracks. I want to have some of the ground cover around the mine be freshly worked earth with very little weeds, other areas that have not been changed in a while will have more weed growth. For the soil I have been having fun finding soil of different colors of brown, black, and grays. I have mixed and blended them around along with some larger gray stones to represent mine tailings.

Here are some photos of what things look like so far.

Here is the resin casting kit that I purchased from my local hobby store to make the molds and the castings for the coke oven openings and doors.
http://www.railimages.com/albums/jeffkraker/ahy.sized.jpg

Here is a picture of the ovens that I am trying to model when they were new. (photo from Hagley Museum and Library , Westmoreland collection)
http://www.railimages.com/albums/jeffkraker/aht.jpg

Here is a link to what they look like today
http://www.hagyfawbush.com/frontporch/Pine_Branch_Coke_Ovens.htm

and here is what I have built so far. I still have one row of cut stone and then the concrete.
http://www.railimages.com/albums/jeffkraker/ahv.sized.jpg

here is the masters I made the mold from
http://www.railimages.com/albums/jeffkraker/ahq.sized.jpg

[Coaltrain]

I have been staining the wood for the tipple structure so it is ready for when I start building the tipple. To stain the wood I use acrylic artist paint, Burnt Umber and black mixed together and water to thin it like a stain.
http://www.railimages.com/albums/jeffkraker/ahw.sized.jpg

here is a shot of the soil that I have been playing with. the gray soil is Arizona Gravel Co. River Bed. The black and brown soil I found around my house.
http://www.railimages.com/albums/jeffkraker/ahu.sized.jpg

Hopefully next week I will be be able to show the finished casting of the entire coke ovens and I will start to add the details for the door tracks and supports.

[racedirector]

Very nice Sir! I love the trick with making your coke oven masters - they are coming along very nicely. I will definately be keeping my beady eyes on this thread to glene as much info as I can for my own mines - especially the truck dump part and the construction of older style mines.

Cheers

[JASON]

You've already done so much from last week,man you dont muck around.
So you are using actual dirt from around your house?I gather you glue it down the same way as comercial stuff?
Can I ask also,what is that shed on tracks for?I realise it's to roll between ovens ,but whats it's purpose?For the brickies or just to keep the rain out/off?

[Coaltrain]

The "shed-on-wheels" is used to push the coke out the opening on the other side of the coke battery. As you can see in the picture every other oven has a door mounted on it and the ones in between are open, it is just the opposite on the other side of the battery. So on one side you see a door, the opposite end of that oven won't have a door. The ovens are like a hallway with an opening on one end and a door on the other.

What happens is the door on one side is shut and the oven is tended from the other side that has no door. The oven is charged with slack coal (very fine coal) and the coal ignited. The bricks that you see on the open end is the way the oven master controls the amount of oxygen the fire gets. The oven opening is almost completely bricked up for a period of 5-7 days, during that time the oven master can add of remove brick to control the burn of the coke. When the oven is ready to be "pulled" the bricks are knocked out and the shed like machine is aligned on the door side of the oven and a large ram will push the coal out onto a cart the takes it to a dump pit where it is dumped onto a conveyor that takes it to the coke crusher

If the coke was not to be crushed it gets pushed out of the oven onto a traveling conveyor that takes it right up into a hopper car that has been spotted in front of the oven.

The reason why they say that when the oven is ready to be "pulled", is because in most older ovens they used long rods with hooks on the end to pull the coke out of the oven. Pine Branch was more modern and they used a machine to push the coke out.

[Coaltrain]

here is a shot of an older set of coke ovens that are still pulled by hand. The fourth figure from the front is in the process of pulling coke out with one of the hooked rods. Two of the ovens in the picture have water hoses proped up on legs and are cooling the coke so it can be pulled. One figure is getting ready to knock out some bricks to cool another oven.
http://www.railimages.com/albums/jeffkraker/agg.sized.jpg

[Coaltrain]

Here is the project update for the week.

I have been working hard on the coke ovens building the new master for the side mold I want to make. This casting business is kind of fun. I finished the side master by adding two rows of cut stone that I hand carved from two strips of 0.060 styrene and below that I glued on a scale 36" tall piece of 0.060 styrene to simulate the concrete base. I added brick sheets to the oven openings that don't have doors so I can cut open some and leave some bricked up. I needed to find some thing really flat to fasten the master to so the mold would be level; all I could find was a scrap of tile from our kitchen floor.

I was not very happy with the resin that came in the starter kit I purchased, so I ordered some new stuff from Micro-Mark. The trouble I had with the old stuff was that it would set up so fast that I could not get the air bubbles out. I purchased some slower setting resin that claims it is water thin, it's not water thin but it is better. It might not be water thin but it is water clear and it was easy to see air bubbles that were trapped in the mold. To get rid of the bubbles I used a toothpick to pop the bubble. Although the new resin sets slower, it still kicked plenty fast, I was able to demold the part every 10-15 minutes. After demolding I let the parts sit on a flat surface for a couple hours to harden.

So far I have all of the oven sides done and I spliced them all together. There are vertical steel beams that support the door hoist rail that will cover the seams in the bricks where my splices are. The splice joint in the concrete will be filled with model putty and sanded smooth.

After I get the basic oven model build I will have to make more masters for molds of the door hardware, oven filling openings on top, and the concrete blocks that support the tram that rides on top of the oven. Then I will paint and finish mounting the whole model on the layout and do the scenery. The coke-pushing machine will be last.

The tipple also made some progress. I build most of the wood structure while I was waiting for resin to set. The concrete footings are made from pink foam that I cut to look like footings.


new master, mold, and resin
http://www.railimages.com/albums/jeffkraker/aic.sized.jpg

Forty ovens waiting to go to work.
http://www.railimages.com/albums/jeffkraker/aib.sized.jpg

close up of oven casting
http://www.railimages.com/albums/jeffkraker/aia.sized.jpg

progress on the tipple. The bent that has the top section of vertical post cut out will have siding covering it. I will also need to repair the back drop, the hill was taller when I painted it.
http://www.railimages.com/albums/jeffkraker/ahz.sized.jpg


sorry for the blurry pictures, my batteries must have been going. I'll make sure the next ones are in better focus.

[ May 12, 2005, 03:14 PM: Message edited by: Coaltrain ]

[racedirector]

Excellent progress! This whole scene is going to be impressive. Can hardly wait for the next installment! :D

[Alan]

This is certainly a very ambitious and impressive project! Excellent and interesting progress so far. I would never get something like that finished, so it is great to be able to watch someone else do it :rolleyes:

[disisme]

Coaltrain, do you have any photos of a working tipple from the side you photgraphed and from the 'coalface' side? It'd be nice to see those alongside your completed work smile.gif

[ak-milw]

Coal Train, You really jump in with both feet and go!!!! Excellent work so far, I really enjoy watching your scenes come together! graemlins/220.gif

[Comet]

Absolutely beautiful! Your craftsmanship is awe-inspiring.
Bill

[Coaltrain]

Disisme;

I have many pictures of tipples that I model from, all of which are published photos in books. The tipple I am making here is not a specific prototype, I am just using parts of tipples I see in photos and building it to fit the location. As of yet, I'm not exactly sure what the tipple will look like on top of the frame I have build so far. Later this week I will start to play with the walls until I get something that looks like what I see in my head.

I will look for some pictures that look somewhat like the tipple I am building.

Thanks everyone for the kind words. The coke ovens are taking a lot out of me. The amount of detail that is left to build is daunting and if it wasn't for the fact that I want to have new progress photos to post every week I would not even be this far along, which is why I like doing these post, they keep me focused.

[Coaltrain]

Not much to show this week. I did assemble the coke ovens and I have started to paint them. The painting is going very slow. I am off to the hobby store to try and get a better brush to do the detail painting. I will post some pictures later, after I get it painted. I also started to gather the supplies to build the door hardware. I will be glad when the coke oven is done, only because the repitition is getting boring (painting 40 door casings by hand is boring me to death).

[friscobob]

All I can say is: WOW!

Have you ever thought of having this project published in one of the major model RR publications?(the coke ovens, that is) I think you could get this in print with no problems.

[Coaltrain]

I've thought about it, but I did an artical on building a steam locomotive a few years back for MR and it was more work than I ever thought it would be. Also, there are some parts of this coke oven that I am going to have to freelance because I can't find any photos the show some of the things I need to know.

[ May 12, 2005, 03:17 PM: Message edited by: Coaltrain ]

[Coaltrain]

Not much to show this week either, it is getting to be winter here in Minnesota and I had to close up the house. We already had temps below freezing this weekend.

I started to build on the tipple so I can take a break from the coke ovens. There was so much repetitive work on the ovens that I was going crazy and I needed a change. I do have the ovens painted and ready for the final detailing. The ovens can be seen in the background of the pictures below.

I started to add the walls to the bottom of the tipple using 0.30 styrene. I did have to add some floor joist that I had not pre-stained, so I will have to get them painted this week. The styrene walls will be covered with metal siding using the same weathering that I used on my other coal loader project. I will be using Grant line window castings for the windows. I have a temporary piece of styrene in place where the coal-loading boom will be to give me an idea of how big I will have to make it. I should have more time this week and I would like to have all of the upper tipple walls build and the coke ovens weathered and the door hoist rail in place.

http://www.railimages.com/albums/jeffkraker/aid.sized.jpg

[Coaltrain]

Ok, I know it has only been a few days since the last post, but I am going fishing this weekend with my son and then we are going to put the boat away for the winter and pull in the dock, so I won't be doing anymore work on trains this weekend. I also got a little inspired to go back to work on the coke ovens after the nice break I took building the tipple.

Unfortunately I discovered an error in my ovens that I decided it was too late to change, so I will have to live with it. I discovered that my ovens are about 16 scale inches too tall. My ovens were never meant to be an exact copy because when I get to building the end where the coke is dumped into a conveyor for transfer to the coke crusher I will have to freelance it because there are no pictures of that area.

Anyways, what I did this first part of the week was to build the 21 brackets that hold the door rail up. I was putting this off because I did not know how I was going to build 21 identical brackets per side. My first thought was to build one and make a RTV mold and cast them, but I figured that they would be too delicate and I was also having trouble casting very thin parts without getting air bubbles trapped in the mold. I knew that making them from brass would be best but the thought of soldering together 21 brackets had me looking for short cuts. One trouble that I was having is that the front of the ovens slopes back yet the rail support is level.

After much thought I decided to suck it up and make them from brass. I made a soldering jig and a cutting / bending jig and had at it. I did all of the work over a four-day period, taking breaks so I would not go crazy and start rushing. I used DA brass strips 0.015 x 0.060 to make the brackets.

After I had the brackets made I started to think what would be the best way to mount them on the ovens. I decided that I would drill two 0.20 holes in each bracket, one in the center of the "L" that hooks over the top of the oven wall and one in the bottom of the vertical part of the bracket. I soldered two short pins (one in each hole) to each bracket and I drilled two holes in the coke oven to mount the brackets to the side of the ovens. I wanted to pin the brackets to the ovens so I could solder the door rail to the brackets and then remove the entire assemble for painting.

The photos below show where I am at so far. The ovens are basically painted except for the black that has to be painted around each oven door. I would have finished painting the doors except my paintbrush was not in very good shape and I have to go buy a new one. There is still some detail painting to do on the ovens and some touch up painting. I also will weather them before I add the railing back on. I also started to add the concrete supports for the tram rail on top of the ovens.

http://www.railimages.com/albums/jeffkraker/aie.sized.jpg

http://www.railimages.com/albums/jeffkraker/aif.sized.jpg

[ 21. October 2004, 13:13: Message edited by: Coaltrain ]

[racedirector]

Wow Jeff!! Your patience is WAY better than mine will ever be.

Even with the extra 16" in height, your ovens look awesome - a damn fine job Sir! They are going to be a real showpiece of the Derby area.

BTW, enjoy your fishing while you can. Have a great weekend.

Cheers

[Coaltrain]

I have decided to stick with the coke oven part of this project until it is finished. The repetition is driving me crazy. I knew that everything on the coke ovens would have to be scratch built, but I had no idea what that really meant. I ran out of RTV from my molding kit and to keep cost down I tried using bath tub caulking to make the mold for the oven filling openings on top of the battery. The caulk is working ok but after only 20 parts I have already gone through 3 molds before they would get a tear. I have about 18 more to go.

I have been taking breaks from working on one part of the ovens to work on a different part. When I get tired of casting oven top openings I cut and glue some ties for the coke pushing machine. When I get tired of cutting and gluing ties I build tram over head wire supports, and so on.

I did weather the ovens and the door hoist rail. I also added the tram rail footings made from styrene. The top of the ovens are covered in what looks like sand or gravel, which I am guessing is for insulation reasons. I will add about an 1/8" of sand to the top of the oven battery when all of the top detail is in place.

I had a hard time trying to get the foam level where the ovens was going to be, so I cut out the foam and I am using a thin piece of plywood for the base. This has worked out well because I can do all of the detail work at the work bench. I also noticed in the picture of the prototype that the oven pushing machine rails were at a lower elevation than the train rails, so I cut down the scenery and made the plywood oven base mount a little below the top of my roadbed. I will have to do a little scenery repair.

http://www.railimages.com/albums/jeffkraker/aih.sized.jpg

http://www.railimages.com/albums/jeffkraker/aii.sized.jpg

[racedirector]

Lookin' good Jeff

Hang in there - bit by bit is the way. There is some really nice work in this piece, you are to be congratulated with your project and perserverence!!

Looking forward to more smile.gif

Cheers

[ 31. October 2004, 13:07: Message edited by: racedirector ]

[disisme]

Absolutely.... I can understand you switching jobs back and forth, but man, your patience level makes me look positively twitchy (and my wife thinks I'm patient enough to watch paint dry!)..... Incredible Jeff!

[Flash Blackman]

Just found this thread. Jeff, beautiful work. graemlins/notworthy.gif I think it is being done exactly right as the slow and easy, step by step. That is the hardest thing I have to do: be patient! I am always rushing and will do it over again, for sure.

[Coaltrain]

Well, I know I said I was going to wait until I had the coke ovens and the tipple built before I built the coke tram and the coke pusher, but I needed to build them so I knew how high to set the overhead wires and their post. So this week I built the coke tram and I have a good start on the two coke pushers (one per side o the oven battery). I built the coke tram from plans in an old MR, it is not exactly like the one at the prototype Pine Branch ovens but I had the plans for this one so I went with it. I did add the details that would help make it look close to the prototype.

http://www.railimages.com/albums/jeffkraker/aik.sized.jpg

http://www.railimages.com/albums/jeffkraker/ail.sized.jpg

[racedirector]

Coaltrain

Once again you have done real good. The coke tram and pushers look great!

Cheers

[BELG]

Jeff some more excellent work,your attention to details is superb, I guess the coke pusher will also ride on a set of rails to move it back and forth?? How will the coke tram deliver its load,is it operated manually?If so what are the overhead wires for? Thanks for educating me as I don't know anything about this type of operation,Pat

[Coaltrain]

The coke tram is powered by an overhead wire. There is an electric motor on one of the axles. On the front of the tram there is a place for an operator to stand where there is a forward and reverse control stand and a brake wheel. Once the tram is stopped nest to an oven opening in the roof of the coke battery the tram operator lowers a shute on the tram and the load of slack coal is poured into the oven. At the Pine Branch coke ovens they recharged each oven right after the coke is pulled (pushed out) so they can take atvantage of the heat in the oven. I read that the ovens are so hot that the slack coal would ignite right when it was poured into the oven.

the coke pusher is also powered by an overhead wire, it has an electric motor that drives a hydralic pump to push out th coke. there is also and electric motor on one of the wheel to position it in front of an oven, and yes the pushers will ride on rails.

I had to start building these items so I could set the overhead wires at the correct level. As I built them, the overhead wire supports are a little on the high side and I will have to lower them.

[BELG]

Jef thanks alot for the explination. I guess humans could not get next to something that was so hot that it would ignite coal as it entered. Pat

[Chris333]

Jeff,
I guess this is where you hang out at. I pretty much keep to the N scale forums graemlins/nono.gif

Nice to see the coke ovens coming together and thanks again for the tip on the Interstate RR book, lots of great photos in there.

[Coaltrain]

Are you guys getting tired of seeing coke ovens yet? I am. I am almost ready to move on to the next phase of this project, the coal tipple. I almost have the ovens finished, all that is left is to add the gravel / sand to the top of the coke battery and some coal spillage around the filling openings and add the rail to the top for the tram, in the photos the rails are just sitting on their foundations until I glue down the sand.

This week I painted the tram and added coke to the hopper. I also painted the coke pushers. I still have to add the device to pick up the electricity from the overhead wires to both the coke pushers and the tram and I have to add the door trollys above every door and then I am done.

Next I will add the scenery around the coke batter and then move on to the tipple. On the right end of the coke battery will be a tall hopper where the coke tram will get it's charge of coal from. I will build that next and the conveyor that will attach to the tipple.

I am going to have an operating session this weekend and I will have to clean up the layout for that this week so I don't know how much more I will be able to build on this project.

Thanks for hanging in there, I know I have been on the coke ovens part for a while but there was way more scratch building needed than I first thought there would be.

http://www.railimages.com/albums/jeffkraker/aip.sized.jpg

http://www.railimages.com/albums/jeffkraker/aio.sized.jpg

[Coaltrain]

BELG: there are still people that operate both the tram and the coal pushers. the ovens were very hot on the inside but the walls were very thick and on the top of the battery they added a thick base of sand / gravel to help insulate the ovens. From what I have read, working around the ovens was not a very fun job.

Chris333: I have been so involved with this project I have not had much time to spend looking at all of the post. I glance down the list to see if anything catches my eye, if not I don't go any farther into them.

NP on the book info, the amount of coal mine photos in those books are fantastic.

[31ford]

Looks great!!!! Awesome detailing!!!

graemlins/notworthy.gif graemlins/notworthy.gif graemlins/notworthy.gif graemlins/notworthy.gif

[Coaltrain]

Well, it has been a while that have posted anything about this project. I did not forget about it, nor did I stop building, I just had to work on another part of the layout for a while. I had an operating session and from that I found a change to my yard that I had to make and it set me back about four weeks.

But I'm back in the coalmine making business and here is where I am at. I am almost done with the coke ovens. All I have left to do is add a short section of chain from the door trolleys to the doors themselves and the ovens will be done. I added the sand and spilled slack coal to the top of the oven and I glued the tram rails in place.

I started to build the slack coal bin that will feed the tram with slack coal to deliver to the ovens. I had a hard time trying to figure out how to make the cone bottom bin for the slack bin. I tried to roll one out of brass but I did not have a piece big enough at the time to do it. Then while I was out in the garage looking for something I saw a funnel that I had to pour oil in the lawn mower. My first thought was to use the funnel but the plastic that it was made from was too slippery to glue to it. Then I had an idea, I plugged the spout with a piece of clay and I poured sand into a cup. Then I set the funnel in the cup of sand so the funnel would stand upright. I leveled the funnel and I poured casting resin in the funnel and I let is set overnight. The next day the hardened resin popped right out of the funnel and I had the perfect start to my slack bin. The rest of the bin, the structure on top, and the supports are all made from styrene.

The slack bin is not shown in its exact location in the photo. I am building an elevated platform for the bin to sit on and the rails from the tram will continue under the bin at the same elevation as the top of the coke ovens. I will also be starting to build the conveyor that will go from the tipple to the top of the slack bin.

I added the second floor to the tipple and I started to cover the tipple with metal siding. My first thought was to use the same weathering method that I used on my smaller coal loader but I changed my mind. I don't want this tipple to look that old and run down. Instead I will paint and weather the siding after I glue it all in place on the tipple. It will still look well used but it won't look like it is going to fall over, this tipple is still a major producer on the railroad and the tipple should show that.

Another thing that has taken some time is that I decided to hand paint my backdrops. I have not tried this before so I have had a slow time at it. I like what it is looking like so far. I still want to add some more clouds, one to cover up the green spot where I slipped with the brush.
http://www.railimages.com/albums/jeffkraker/ajf.sized.jpg

http://www.railimages.com/albums/jeffkraker/ajg.sized.jpg

http://www.railimages.com/albums/jeffkraker/ajh.sized.jpg

[Flash Blackman]

So, if you pour the resin down into the funnel with the sand in he bottom, does the resin percolate down into the sand or does if just "float" on top so you get a solid resin piece for the slack bin? Why doesn't the resin go on down into the sand while it is fluid?

[Coaltrain]

I used a piece of clay to plug the bottom of the funnel so the resin won't run out. The sand is not in the funnel, it is in a cup that the funnel plugged with clay in pushed down into so the funnel will stand up while the resin in the funnel is setting up.

[Flash Blackman]

Got it.

Actually, I was interested because that funnel shape is probably good for coal chutes, water towers, some kind of steel mill thingy, and a lot of other shapes. It is a great technique to file away. Thanks! smile.gif

[racedirector]

Once again Jeff you have excelled yourself - brilliant work. I really like your hand painted backdrop - works very well and looks awesome.

The mine and ovens are looking great too, you certainly have been busy!

Cheers
Bruce

[Alan]

I have been following this project and am becoming more and more impressed with your perseverance and your modelling skills. graemlins/notworthy.gif

[Coaltrain]

Thanks everyone. I have 11 days of from work and I plan on get the coke side of this project done, the ovens, bin, the conveyor that will come from the tipple, and the coke crusher (yet to be built) I would like to have done so I can get the ground cover on the back half of the mine done.

Merry Christmas and happy new year to everyone.

[ak-milw]

Real nice depth in your backdrop! Also I have used funnels to make a few grain loadout bins. The plastic is a little softer but with super glue they held just fine. I never thought of useing one for a mold! graemlins/220.gif

[Coaltrain]

The coke ovens are done and I have "planted" them into the scenery. I added the last details over the holiday week, the door trolleys and chains.

I also installed the supports for the slack bin to the scenery, I built them from balsa wood and painted them to look like concrete. I still have to add the handrails to the slack trestle and I have to attack the slack bin. In the photos the slack bin looks like it is leaning a little because I have to trim the bottom of the legs so that it will sit level.

Over the last week I scratch built the coke crusher from photos of the prototype located at the Pine Branch tipple located on the Interstate RR. I still have to finish the loading conveyor and mount the building to the scenery.

I am getting closer to the tipple everyday. I ordered a Walthers conveyor to go from the slack bin to the coal tipple, after I get that in I will work full time on the tipple. I have to stop working on this project again for a couple weeks because I have another operating session to get ready for. My goal is to have this area finished by the end of March. After I get done with the coke side of the tipple things are going to get much easier and it should go faster.


http://www.railimages.com/albums/jeffkraker/ajk.sized.jpg

http://www.railimages.com/albums/jeffkraker/ajj.sized.jpg
picture of coke crusher / loader and the slack bin in the background.

[Kitbash]

Bravo!! http://www.accboards.com/newboard/emoticons/gifs/eusa_clap.gif

[Alan]

The finished project is going to be amazing! Wait a minute - it already is amazing graemlins/notworthy.gif

[Benny]

I wish I had the house to build my layout so I could enjoy projects like that! Salivating!!!

[Coaltrain]

I am now moving on to the right, no more pictures of the coke ovens because they are done. I am now working on the area the handles the slack coal that is used for making the coke and the coke crusher that is used to load coke that is gathered from the ovens on the back side. I have been building both the slack bin and the coke crusher and last weekend I started to add them to the scene.

I added some lights to the slack bin and glued it to the platform. I made railings around the platform from .028 brass wire. The stairs going to the ground are from Plastruct. The platform sits on concrete pillars made from balsa.

The prototype coke oven had a massive ground storage pile of slack coke. The slack coke was pushed into a receiving pit by a bulldozer. I didn't have space to show this so I just simulated it with a slack coal receiving building that would be open on the back side to allow a bulldozer to push in the slack coke. I made a slack receiving shed from styrene and use a Walthers conveyor to go from the receiving shed to the top of the slack bin.

I had to raise the coke crusher up a little and now the stairs don't fit. So this week I will have to modify the stairs and finish building the loading conveyor. Then I will add lights and glue the building into the scene.

The end of this week will be my last post on this for a little while because I have to get the layout ready for an operating session on the 21st.

http://www.railimages.com/albums/jeffkraker/ajl.sized.jpg

http://www.railimages.com/albums/jeffkraker/ajm.sized.jpg

[racedirector]

Wow Jeff!

This project is getting better and better every time I see new pics. You have once again outdone yourself. Great work, keep them pics coming!

Cheers

[Comet]

Your hand painted backdrop is looking better and better with each picture as well.

[Coaltrain]

Wow, it has been a while since I have posted to this topic. Sorry to those who were following it, I had to take some time off to work on some more adjustments to the track and control system. I am back to work on this project but I have changed my mind. Instead of having a truck dump and receiving pit I have decided to use that space to add more company houses. I felt that the small space I allowed for company houses on the other side of the wye did not give enough feeling of a company town. So I removed the old lift out that was located just east of the mine (where the truck dump was to be) and I built a new one with a different shape to the scenery. The new lift out is not as tall as the old one was so I will have to patch the back drop and repaint it in above the new lift out.

I build two different types of company houses, both based off of houses found along the Clinchfield RR. I have decided to use the houses that have their front on one of the long sides (of which I build two so far) along the tipple lead tracks, and the houses that have the front on one of the short sides (of which I have build three so far) on the opposite side of the wye and east of the depot. I will also add a company store next to the tunnel entrance.

In mocking up the new company houses I found that I can fit three along the tipple lead and I will have room to add an Atlas water tower as well. Just an FYI, the Atlas water tower mold is getting old and the tower supports are not molding well at all and it will force me to have to build new ones just as I did in Roda.

I have also pulled out the plaster in the town of Derby, behing the depot, because I want to rearrange the town and include a small Freight house (a very small freight house), a post office, church, a row of stores, the lumber mill, and as many company houses of the second type as I can fit in (at least 5-6 I hope).

I will try to get back to building the tipple very soon, I just want to get the new town designed so I know which direction I will be going. I made this change so that I could model the entire coal mining scene of the 50s', and the town was as big a part to the mine as the train part was and I want to include them both.

http://www.railimages.com/albums/jeffkraker/akg.sized.jpg

http://www.railimages.com/albums/jeffkraker/akh.sized.jpg

[Alan]

Thanks for the update. It is good to see some non-railroad structures appearing, it will give the whole scene a very realistic look.

Wonderful work smile.gif

[Flash Blackman]

Great work continuing, I see! graemlins/notworthy.gif

I build two different types of company houses, both based off of houses found along the Clinchfield RR. I have decided to use the houses that have their front on one of the long sides (of which I build two so far) along the tipple lead tracks, and the houses that have the front on one of the short sides (of which I have build three so far)

For me, that is the kind of subtle differences I like to do. Sort of like detailing engines and each one is slightly different.

[Coaltrain]

Here is what is happening with this project. I am still working on it, just about every day, but most of the time has been spent reworking the scenery around the front of the coal mine area. I didn't like what I had and after I decided to model more of the company town I had to remove the plaster scenery I had build and I replaced it with a scenery base built from foam. I have been reshaping it and adjusting it to fit all of the new buildings that have been making. So this project changed from building a huge coal mine to building a large coal mine and a coal mining town. Here is what I have as of yesterday.

I finished the company store Which I scratchbuilt from an onld RMC article. I have some detail parts that are not shown in the photo that I will add when I add the ground cover around the structure. The church next to the company store is almost finished, I still have to finish the steeple roof and add the cross. I was going to scratchbuild the church also but I found a Walthers one room school house that looked like a church. To make it look more link a church I built the steeple from styrene. The roof of the steeple is covered with shingle strips.

http://www.railimages.com/albums/jeffkraker/akq.sized.jpg

Here is how the company town is starting to look. The scenery base is foam which I spent a lot of time carving all kinds of gradual elevation changes. I did want any part of the town to have a flat level serface. It took a ton of carving to get all of the gradual elevation changes in but in the end it was well worth it, they are hard to see right now but I think as the ground cover is applied and the roads painted you will be able to see it better. The roads are made form WS Smooth it, which at first I had my doubts that it was going to work but it ended up working very well. The gas station is a metal WS kit and the small freight house is from a kit which I can't remember the name of the manufacture. The back drop is in the basic stage of painting and I will finish it now that I have the scenery finialized. To the right of the church will start a row of company houses, to the right and across the street of the gas station will be some other stores.

http://www.railimages.com/albums/jeffkraker/aks.sized.jpg

This last picture is taken from the loads track of the tipple looking at the company town. The water tower on the left is part Atlas (the tank and roof) and part scratch built (the legs down). It was a real challenge to get the footings to work out on the sloping ground. To get it all to sit level I cut out a level patch from the foam and glued in 12 identical height footings made from balsa wood. Then I filled in between all of the footings with foam scrap. I used Sculptamold to blend in the area around the footins and build up the narrow road that leads to what will be three company houses and the mine's bath house. The road will just be a narrow dirt path, most mines walked every where back then. The depot was scratchbuilt. I had to recast much of the rock work in this area because I lowered the hill and replaced most of it with new foam. I used foam this time because most of the hill is a lift out to get at the turnouts in the staging yard that is located under this area. The rocks are cast using molds that I make from a large chunk of coal. I colored the rocks with washes of thinned WS stain using Stone Gray, Burnt Umber, and Raw Sienna.

I also had another set back in this area. I was never happy with the track infront of the depot and the west turnout that leads to the wye, the track didn't have a smooth flow and there was a very big dip right infront of the depot. The did was hard to notice when a diesel went over it but it was easy to spot when a steam locomotive went over it. I pulled up all of the rail in this area and two turnouts. To fix the dip I glued new ties on top of the existing ties and I sanded them all level, checking often to make sure I was to making a new dip or building a hump. I also removed some ties to realign the track so it had a nice smooth flow. I had to build two new turnouts to fit the adjusted track but I am much happier now when I watch a train travel through this spot.

http://www.railimages.com/albums/jeffkraker/akr.sized.jpg

As for the actual coal tipple, I have started to work on it once again. I have finished covering it with the metal siding and I am going to add the roof sections next. I have to scratch built a coal boom which I want to spend lots of time making it right because it will be closly viewed. I should start posting pictures of it over the next few weeks.

This project has been huge and I never would have guessed it would take some much time. I know I have worked in reverse for a while but I had to make some changes that were bothering me and because they was not happy with some areas I could not get motivated to do the work I needed to do. this is also the last area on my layout to build and I want to savor it a little.

[Coaltrain]

Ok, I'm back to work on the tipple. I finished adding all of the metal siding and I painted it the same light gray / blue color as the company store. I weathered the tipple with acrylic washes thinned with windshield wiper fluid.

For the roof I preweathered the same metal siding material that I used for the side using Radio Shack PC board etchant just as I had done on the small coal loader if you had read that post. The photo below shows a scale 4 x 8 piece of siding mater in a cap full of etchant. I found that if I poured a little etchant into a washer fluid cap I could get the etchant to react much faster. The warmer the etchant is the faster it will etch. Once I got a piece to etch I would grab it with a tweezers and wait until the entire sheet was etching (it will turn a dark gray) and then I would drop it in a cup of water to stop the etching process, then I would quickly drop another new piece into the etchant and it would start to etch right away. I got into a rhythm and it went really fast, but there is a fine line between each piece not etching enough and a piece etching too much (unless you wanted a really rust and rotted piece). After I got a water cup full of pieces I would run clean tap water into the cup until the water in the cup turned clear. Then I dumped the water out and spread all the pieces out on a paper towel to dry. At this point the pieces all looked a dark gray, but as they dry they turn different colors of rust.
http://www.railimages.com/albums/jeffkraker/aku.sized.jpg


One interesting thing happened, one day I had etched about 12 pieces and I had them sitting in the cup of water, which had become discolored from the diluted etchant, and my wife asked me a question upstairs. After we had talked for a while I forgot I had these 12 pieces sitting in the cup of water and I turned off the train room lights and went to work for the day. When I returned home from work I remembered that there were pieces sitting in the cup and I ran clean water into the cup until I could see them. I was disappointed to see that they had turned light gray. I laid them out on a paper towel anyways and returned to the train room to weather some more sheets. When I returned to the where I had laid out the light gray sheets I saw that they had rusted a little and resembled weathered galvanized steel that had just started to rust. I used these panels to represent sheets that had been replaces a few years ago and they are just starting to rust.

You can see some of the light gray sheets in the photo below. Sheets that are only half weathered were not left in the etchant long enough and I used those sheets where I needed half of a sheet.
http://www.railimages.com/albums/jeffkraker/akt.sized.jpg

I also started to build the Link Belt conveyor that will be exposed. I am using styrene to build the conveyor. The tall angle iron pieces will support a roof of lightly weathered siding, I will try to duplicate the light gray weathering method that I discovered on accident.
http://www.railimages.com/albums/jeffkraker/akx.sized.jpg

Sorry for the dark photo, I am still trying to get the hang of this new camera.

I also started to add ground cover around the "empties" tracks. I have seen lots of photos of empties tracks at tipples this size where the tracks are covered in weeds and grasses. I have uses Silflor and ground foam to try and simulate the weed overgrown effect. In the photo below the ground cover is still very wet from gluing it down with diluted matte medium, the colors should lighten when it gets fully dry.
http://www.railimages.com/albums/jeffkraker/akv.sized.jpg

http://www.railimages.com/albums/jeffkraker/aky.sized.jpg

http://www.railimages.com/albums/jeffkraker/akw.sized.jpg

I'm sorry this has taken so long to get back to working on the mine structures but I had to go change some scenery so in the area and I wanted to do it before I got any closer to it so I would not chance messing up all of the work I would be doing on the tipple. I back in business full steam and I should have more regular postings again if you’re still following this. I'm hosting an operating session next week so I will have to clean up the scenery mess and make sure trains run through this area again.

[CP&E 3207]

Excellent work on the Mines and Coke ovens, Coaltrain!

I wish I had the tools, time and skill to do all that! graemlins/226.gif

[LR&BRR]

dont suppose we should ask if you will be making a kit of this ???
sorry that was evil of me

[Coaltrain]

Sorry, too late to make this a kit. I did about making the company store into a resin kit, but I wanted to get it done so I just built it.

For anyone that started following this post I am still working on this mine, a little slower than when I started but I still make progress. I will post what should be the final pictures next week as I am just about done (I think). I can't believe that I started this project 9 months ago and I am just now starting to see the end of it.

[SD70BNSF]

Wow coaltrain. I hadn't seen this thread in a while either, but I must say, great work. Looks really nice.

[Alan]

Ok Jeff, will look forward to next week's pictures smile.gif You definitely took on a long term project!!! :D

[Tompm]

I don't believe I missed this topic before now.

Wow, what a project! It looks amazing what you have done so far!

I will be keeping an eye out for updates on this one.

[Flash Blackman]

Really beautiful work! graemlins/notworthy.gif

[Coaltrain]

This is not the official last post for this project, just another update.

When I saw that there were some replies to this topic I noticed that I had made some progress since the last time I posted photos.

So here are some new photos.

I completed the exposed loading boom. Everything is scratch built from styrene. This model is really close to the edge of the layout so I wanted to spend a lot of time making it look as close to prototype as I could get with the limited photos that I could find. The conveyor is a Link-Belt type, which is a conveyor that has a metal-segmented material belt. The belt is made up of metal plates that are pinned together like a chain. Each plate has a raised rib to move the material that it is conveying. In the early years of coal loading most tipple simply had chutes that dumped the coal into cars (as did this tipple), but what happened was that the coal would have to fall so far that the first coal that would fill the car would break up. Customers that bought a specific size coal would find that the bottom coal in the load would be pulverized and only the top three quarter of the load would be usable. To eliminate this problem coal tipples installed boom conveyors that could be lowered into the car and the coal could be carefully loaded into the car, raising the boom and the coal filled to the top of the car. To stop the coal from "rolling" or sliding down the conveyor they used these Link-Belt conveyors.

My Tipple represents a tipple that has had many upgrades and changes over the past 40+ years of operation. The original tipple only loaded on the two tracks to the right using coal chutes.

The first upgrade was to install an early version of a coal boom that is housed in the long extension that is now over the middle track (it used to be the last track until the "new" track was added on the end of the tipple). When the first coke ovens were installed behind the tipple the original inner track was used as a switch lead into the coke yard (originally one track to a set of bee hive ovens).

The coke yard has recently been rebuilt with the new ovens, crusher, and a second track. The inner track still loads with a chute but it now loads only what is called "slack" coal, a very fine grade of coal, which does not require a loading boom.

When the coke yard was added a new coal-loading track was installed between the mainline and the outer loading track (which is now the middle track under the boom extension shed). The new coal-loading track has a more modern (modern for the late 40's / early 50's) coal-loading boom that is not housed in a shed. The boom is lowered into the car from the overhead hoist and is counter balanced with the concrete weights located in the hoist support structure on each side of the car. The old coal-loading boom also had counter weights but they are concealed in the boarded up section of the wood support structure.


http://www.railimages.com/albums/jeffkraker/alk.sized.jpg

Here is a close up of the new coal boom, notice the concrete counter weights.
http://www.railimages.com/albums/jeffkraker/alj.sized.jpg

http://www.railimages.com/albums/jeffkraker/ali.sized.jpg

There is not much more to do now, I just have to finish a few more details and I will be done. With the holiday weekend I don't know it I will get a chance to work more on this project but my guess is within the next two to three weeks this project will be complete if all goes well.

[racedirector]

Wow Jeff!

That is looking so good - damn fine job. I must say it is a VAST improvement on what was there previously smile.gif

[Flash Blackman]

Truly amazing work. Looking at the time of your post, it took about three weeks to finish the coal mine structure from its' last state to the present. So realistic!!

[Tompm]

WOW I am floored!

Awesome job!

[Jon Grant]

That's really coming along, Coaltrain. Looks great.


Jon

[Colonel]

Jeff,

Truelly inspiring, some of the best modelling I've seen

[watash]

I must say this has got to be the best metal sided building I have seen yet, and that includes the few I have seen in museums!

This is more like art than model reproduction!

You should be awarded a Master Craftsman Award for this Mine!

That is my personal opinion.

[BELG]

Jeff, I hadn't seen your project for a while you have made some great leaps forward in finish the whole scene, and it looks fantastic. Your attention to detail continues to inspire me. Thanks for sharing the project with us, Pat.

[Coaltrain]

Thanks again everyone.

[N_S_L]

One project complete...


...next!

[Coaltrain]

Time sure flies, last I said was that I would be done in a few weeks and here it is October.

I have built the last item for the mine scene, the coke loader. I have not painted it yet because I have not decided what color it should be, the only prototype photo I have is a B&W. I have a friend that thinks it might have been silver but I'm not sure I agree with him. I was thinking it should be yellow, but some have told me it might have been light gray. Anyways when I decide then the mine scene will be done, I can't believe it took a year to make this but then again this is almost 1/3rd of my layout and all the structures had to be scratchbuilt.

After I paint the coke loader and add a few trees around the scene it will be done for sure, I am ready to move on.

here is the prototype loader.
http://www.railimages.com/albums/jeffkraker/alt.sized.jpg

and here is the model so far.
http://www.railimages.com/albums/jeffkraker/alv.sized.jpg

I did add some figures around the ovens.
http://www.railimages.com/albums/jeffkraker/alu.sized.jpg

here is a look back to the prototype again.
http://www.railimages.com/albums/jeffkraker/aht.jpg

[OC Engineer JD]

That is an amazing project, and some of the best modeling I have seen! graemlins/notworthy.gif

[C40-9W]

WOW! Thats amazing!

[Gats]

Jeff, your coal mine is incredible. The loaders, coal and coke, are fabulous. Beautiful modelling - kudos! smile.gif

[Coaltrain]

IT IS FINISHED!!!!!

I have declared this project finished. I'm sure that over time I will find little details to add here and there, but I am moving on from this project for good. I started building this mine on Sept. 27, 2004 at which time I was asked how long it would take to finish and I was thinking in my head about 4-6 months. Well, one years and seventeen days later I have it finished :( . I knew that just about everything was going to have to be scratchbuilt and I was right, everything but the one conveyor that transfers slack coal to the top of the slack bin (the tall cone bottom structure) was the only thing that I didn't scratchbuild, it is a Walthers kit.

For all of those that have posted the nice comments I want to thank you for them, they encouraged me to stick with it to the end. On long projects like this I tend to loose interest and start work on other things, and although that started to happen when I had to reshape some of the scenery around the load side of the tipple, I was able to pull myself back and get this finished.

I hope you all enjoyed this project and maybe you'll find some information within this post that you can use. There were a lot of first time things I had to try on this project and it was fun to learn the new skills. I think casting my own parts was one of the most exciting things I learned how to do, and it was easier than I thought it would be. Even though painting the back drop really had little to do with building the tipple, I still had to learn it for the first time so I could make the scene complete, and it is another thing that I am excited to have learned. It took a few repaints until I became happy with the results, and I actually had to repaint it once more after the structures were in place (man was that hard to do graemlins/220.gif ) , I like the way it has turned out.

[Coaltrain]

Here are some of the final pictures of the project and a few recaps of the progress photos. Thanks again to everyone and Trainboard for making a place to share our hobby with others.

http://www.railimages.com/albums/jeffkraker/aly.sized.jpg
An empty coal shifter pulls past the backside of the Wise Coal Company tipple at Derby VA, summer 1954.

http://www.railimages.com/albums/jeffkraker/alw.sized.jpg
Lots of empty hoppers await loads of coal and coke. The Derby tipple can load coke in covered hoppers and open hoppers. The covered hoppers are rolled down under the coke crusher for loading. Once loaded they are rolled down below the tipple to the "load" tracks. The Derby tipple is on a grade, as most coal tipples in this region are, so that tipple employees can use gravity to roll hoppers into position for loading. In this photo there are several empty hoppers spotted on the mainline, which would indicate that this photo was taken on a Sunday afternoon. During peak coal loading the R&S will set out empty hoppers on the mainline after the last train has worked the branchline so that the coal tipple can load extra cars in through the night and have them ready for pick up Monday morning. The trouble with this procedure is that the first train that arrives in Derby Monday morning will find the mainline blocked with loaded hoppers that it has to spot on the wye track behind the depot before it can continue on its way to Roda.

[Coaltrain]

http://www.railimages.com/albums/jeffkraker/alk.sized.jpg
Here is the front side of the Derby tipple. Over the years the tipple has seen many additions and upgrades with the most recent being the new loading boom located over track three. When the Derby tipple was first built it loaded coal over the right two tracks only using chutes. Loading coal with chutes tended to pulverize the coal as it first fell into the empty hoppers, which would cause customers to complain because they had purchased the coal as a specific size only to unload coal dust when they first opened the bottom hatches of the coal hoppers. To respond to customer’s demands the first loading boom was installed in the covered extension that is located over track two. The coal boom (slat conveyor) could be lowered into the empty hoppers as the car started to load and then would be raised as the car filled with coal. Smaller size coal was still being loaded over track one (far right), and track three (to the left of the covered boom) did not exist. As demands for larger size coal increased a third track was laid to the left of the covered coal boom extension and a new coal boom was installed, newer technology didn't require the boom to be covered. It was also at this time that the new coke ovens were opened behind the tipple. The new coke ovens had a huge appetite for fine coal (called slack) and the tipple quit shipping the slack coal that it used to load on track one, now it is rare that any hoppers are loaded on track one as there is very little slack coal to spare. Track one also provides a place for tipple workers to roll loaded coke cars into while they wait for pick up.

http://www.railimages.com/albums/jeffkraker/alx.sized.jpg
The "modern" (for the 1950s) coke ovens behind the Derby tipple provided some of the best coke coal produced in the United States. The prototype ovens were actually located at a location called Pine Branch, which is a few miles to the east of Derby, and they operated into the 1970s. The Derby coke ovens used all mechanical means for charging and empting the ovens as well as loading the coke into rail cars. Slack coal is loaded into a "Larry" from a tall cone bottom hopper that is located on a trestle at the end of the oven battery. The larry holds one charge of slack coal to fill an oven. They say that the ovens were so hot that once they were emptied of fresh coke they would dump in a new charge of slack coal and the coal would ignite on its own from the heat stored inside the ovens. When the coke is ready to be removed from the oven (called "pulled" because in the early years a man would use a long hooked bar to pull the coke out of the oven) a machine will line itself up with the oven to be "pulled" and a long hydraulic ram would push out the hot coke onto the conveyor on the opposite side of the oven battery. An empty hopper is spotted under the conveyor and fresh hot coke is loaded from the traveling conveyor into the hopper car. An employee would use a hose and water the hot coke to cool it for transportation. I can only imagine what that hot coke did to the paint on the side of the hoppers graemlins/088.gif

On the back side of the oven, away from the hopper tracks fresh coke is pushed into a side-dump car that will travel down to the end of the oven battery and dump the coke into a pit where the coke will travel on a conveyor to the coke crusher. The coke crusher will size the coke and load it into either open hoppers of covered hoppers and on a rare occasion it will load into a boxcar. The coke crusher is the tall skinny structure located next to the empty hopper tracks that go under the coal tipple.

http://www.railimages.com/albums/jeffkraker/alu.sized.jpg
OOPS graemlins/222.gif I forgot to retake this picture with the now painted coke loader, oh well. This picture shows the machine that pushed the coke from the ovens, there is one on each side of the oven battery. On every other oven opening there is a metal and concrete door that is hinged on the bottom. The hinged door is lifted so the coke ram can push the coke out the opening on the opposite side of the oven. The openings that the coke comes out of do not have a door, they are bricked up by hand for a specific period of time, typically 5-7 days depending on the customers needs. Sealing the opening of the oven with bricks controls the oxygen supply to the burning coke. Most of the oven opening is bricked closed except for a small space at the top of the oven opening. Bricks get added or removed to control the burn of the coke. All kinds of nasty chemical were burned off the coke coal until a specific amount of carbon is all that is left as specified by the customers. The gasses that were expelled from the ovens during coke production would kill much of the vegetation on the land around the ovens and thick greenish smoke would fill the air twenty-four seven. Working the ovens was not a very nice job.

[Coaltrain]

Here are some of the flash back photos.

http://www.railimages.com/albums/jeffkraker/ahv.sized.jpg

http://www.railimages.com/albums/jeffkraker/aib.sized.jpg

http://www.railimages.com/albums/jeffkraker/aik.sized.jpg

http://www.railimages.com/albums/jeffkraker/ajg.sized.jpg

http://www.railimages.com/albums/jeffkraker/alu.sized.jpg
Darn! I have to take a new picture of this.

http://www.railimages.com/albums/jeffkraker/aht.jpg

[Coaltrain]

http://www.railimages.com/albums/jeffkraker/ahz.sized.jpg

http://www.railimages.com/albums/jeffkraker/aid.sized.jpg

http://www.railimages.com/albums/jeffkraker/ajh.sized.jpg

http://www.railimages.com/albums/jeffkraker/akw.sized.jpg

http://www.railimages.com/albums/jeffkraker/alk.sized.jpg

[Coaltrain]

Thanks again everyone.


Hummmm.....what's next. ;)

[Coaltrain]

One last photo. Jim Six took my photo and added real smoke and turned it into a B&W. I really love this picture.

http://www.railimages.com/albums/jeffkraker/alz.jpg

[Ironhorseman]

Great work Coaltrain .. and I really think that B&W photo looks real. Ya really have to look close to tell it's only a diorama. smile.gif How long did it take you to build the entire scene?

[watash]

Excellent job and weathered to perfection! :D

[Coaltrain]

Originally posted by Ironhorseman:
Great work Coaltrain .. and I really think that B&W photo looks real. Ya really have to look close to tell it's only a diorama. smile.gif How long did it take you to build the entire scene? It took just a little over 1 year.

[racedirector]

I would have to say that, in my unbiased opinion, that this is some of the best modeling I have seen in a long time. There are those that rave about the "names" in our hobby but I think Jeff's work is right up there with the best. Following this project along to it's finalilty has been a lesson in perserverence and skill. You are to be commended Jeff on your fantastic rendition of coal mining in Appalchia during the 50's. That black and white shot just says it all!

Cheers
Bruce

[JASON]

Hi Jeff,
Took me awhile to find this thread,as it's been on my mind lately & just have to ask if you can provide us all with abit of an update on this fantastic layout of yours.
It was really cool to watch how things progressed,I guess I miss seeing the layout come alive over time.
Anyway,anything changed or improved?New buildings etc?

[Wolfgang Dudler]

Jeff, phantastic work. And so fast. When do you sleep? :angel:

Scenery, weathering are great!

Wolfgang

[chooch41]

I had a really bad day at work.... started to re--read this thread. Wow!! Not only did I forget about how well this area turned out, I feel alot better. Thanks for your great modelling and turning my mood around. What's next???????????????????????????????????

[Officer "B"]

That is a great photo! Blow that one up into a framable size and hang it in your layout room!!

Scott

[loco1999]

Very nice work and great photos! :)

[watash]

Very realistic workmanship Coaltrain! Give you a Hero Medal for it!

I just thought of something I heard about while on vacation. A guy used 1/2" tape to make a 'conveyor' belt, then glued real coal on to one side. It was not thick, just enough to be shiny black. He mounted a small motor from a washing machine timer to run a belt pulley drum in the tipple house, and another free wheeling drum down at the end. He said you could see the coal moving up to the tower. He had frequent visitors and would be interesting to see how long it would take them to notice.

Its an idea I had not thought of before. Gee, here I thought I knew it all! Ratz! :D

[verse2damax]

Superb!!!!

verse

[Black Cloud]

Bravo!

You have single-handedly motivated all of us here to start our very own personal project. I commend you for not only your expertise, but also for the kind-heartedness to show pics and details of your progress. You are truly a modeler's modeler.