HO Scale

I cannot take credit for this scenery tip,as others have done this before me. Just wanted to share with my readers.

I was inspired by scenery techniques but various contributors at Trainboard.com to use tea leaves and natural dirt material for ground cover. Tea leaves, you ask? Yessir, tea leaves! I found Lipton loose tea leaves for $4.18 for a 1/2 pound box at my local grocer., so I bought two boxes. We will come back to the tea leaves later..

For the natural earth ...

I haven't updated my blog for a good while, so it is time for another update!

The entire yard has been ballasted with old ballast I had on hand that had been in storage for years. The yard tracks are ballasted with Woodland Scenics Dark Fine Ballast, the Main track and the runaround ballasted with Medium Gray Fine Ballast. I used a 1/3 Water, 1/3 Rubbing Alcohol, 1/3 Matte Medium mixture for gluing ballast down. This worked very well for me. I intentionally let some of the painted ...

Since my last update I completed the roadbed installation and painted this section of the layout according to the plan I mention in my last post.

In this posting I am documenting the placement of the Central Valley 9' Main line and 8' Branch line ties. I began by placing the switch tie strips for the switch kits. In this section of the layout all of the switches are #5 Code 83 or Code 70 switches. The Code 83 switches will be used on the cross over from the Main and the Arrival/Departure ...

In May, I purchased two sets of bi-fold doors to use as bench work for the Gulf & Ohio Midland Little Kanawha Secondary. Each door section was 18" by 80", perfect for the shelf layout I planned. I also located some 8 by 6 metal shelf brackets at a local tool and hardware sale.

I used a stud finder and located the studs in the walls the bench work would be attached to, and measured the spacings. I then marked on the under side of the doors the spacing of the studs I ...

A couple of years ago I started this blog following the construction of the Gulf & Ohio Midland. I let the blog go by the wayside over the last couple years and much has changed since then.

My wife and I closed on a 1,300 SF home with 2-car garage today and we will be working over the next 3 to 4 weeks fixing a few things and painting a lot of walls. We are very happy with our new home purchase but it lacks one essential elemnt for any model railroader.... there is no basement! ...