I can honestly say this is the strongest party thrown for quality of work and the quality of pics accompanying some of the work: BEGINNING OF WEEK FOUR
Not much progress tonight - very tired Overall shot showing add'l areas of turf added. The dark brown areas are wet ground goo to fill in the contours where needed. The white stripes are just areas where I needed some add'l fill as well, but I used plaster. --- closeup of the storage tank --- closeup of the sceniced area on the upper bridge bank --- and the backside. I'll be adding a 1/8" (or there abouts) layer of WS foam putty on both sides of the blast thru areas so I can add in some rock formations. Hopefully that turns out well
nscale_lover....your bridge abutments look really good!! The paint and weathering on the stone looks.......real
Now, I've finished one of my two projects. I've installed at Harbor District switch stands, movable of course! Look at the points and at the target! And with the turnout thrown: Wolfgang
Well, I like a working railroad. And so, I like sound, moving parts, lights. Light is another thing I will have to install in the future. Mostly, my operation is in daylight. Then I can read better the papers. Some time ago at my European railroad I had light at the station platforms, 72 lamps under the roof. Wolfgang
Some nice work getting done here. NScale Lover, those abutments look great. And Wolfgang, the switch stands are just awesome. I don't think I have the patience (or the eyesight) to try building them in N scale. I think I'll stick with the Caboose manual throws. I didn't get as much done this past week as I hoped to, but I was able to post some new pictures in the Rail Images Album, including webshots of the layout CAD drawings. This week work will continue on the river crossing, there's four bridges and abutments to be built. The abutments will be fashioned from hardwood and Random Stone styrene sheet. The bridges will be Micro Engineering 80' open deck girder bridges. I am also continuing to work on scratch building the DLW passenger station. I'll add pics to the album as I progress. Back to the layout room. My Rail Images album I changed this http://www.railimages.com/gallery/ronaldwestbrook/aag.sized.jpg[/IMG] to http://www.railimages.com/albums/ronaldwestbrook/aag.sized.jpg[/IMG] [ February 20, 2005, 01:28 AM: Message edited by: Colonel ]
Here's the latest picture. I've laid the track and can run trains again. The picture shows the first test train climbing from Harbor District to the Jct. Then it takes the curve to Third Street District. I have still to wire the turnouts. and work at the industrial spurs. Wolfgang
For the town's streets, I first laid masking tape down where the roads will go (1 main street and 1 small "spur") then I added the earth color fine turf, let fry for about 5 minutes and then remove the tape
Then for my abandoned mine project, I wanted to add a once-used section of track that was connected to the main line in previous years. So I carved out the area, added some scrap track pieces and filled it in with plaster (while it was still liquid'y) with some coloring and ground cover, to include some fine black ballast to act as coal reminents it should turn out well and an initial straight-on shot showing how the years have covered the track again, will look way better once it's sceniced
Mike You have made great progress with the layout! Tad Keep the cars coming! They look great! Ronald Looking good! Some progress is better than none. Wolfgang The layout looks like it is coming along nicely! Great looking train!
Excellent work everyone, lots of progress happening I see. I guess we're almost into week 5 now, the home stretch. Here's my progress report for last week. I finished the bridge spine. Next week, hopefully I can put on the bridge track and frame in the trestle bents.
Ok.... I see that some of you are really Busy great keep UP the work guys... and for the rest of you Guys we still got some time left. My self I finished my water area and did all my wiring for my DCC system. I spent the weekend messing around with DCC settings. For the next week I plan on doing ballast work.
Jeff, this bridge looks good. I'm waiting for the bents. Mike, very abandoned ! Was it a kit? Mike, looking under the layout is very interesting. Wolfgang
The party's not over is it? I'm still working. I'm at about 75% coverage. But it's the old 80-20 rule, the last bit is going to take the most time! Tasks for this week: - Finish ballasting upper line - Ground foam town area - Paint the rock cliff
Missed the normal update, but better late than never. Had to do some serious rethinking of the plan this week. I guess I could have pushed ahead and completed everything as originally planned. But when I was sanding the foam to put in some of the more subtle curves and swales, I realized that it was going to take longer than I thought to get it the way I wanted. So rather than push ahead and put ground cover on something that wasn’t really at the state I wanted, I’ve decided that discretion is the better part of valor. I’m going to accept the fact that I won’t get the entire layout covered with ground cover as originally planned. I’m still happy with the progress I’ve made these weeks, and will continue to work on the layout not only in this final week, but beyond the end of the party. Anyway, this week I finally got all the loose ties installed in the joints of the flex track where I had removed ties from the tie strip to make the joints and cuts. I was surprised at the difference it made in the looks of the track. It was worth the time it took to sand them down to fit under the rail joiners. I also did the first installation of a Caboose Industries ground throw switch stand. I’m almost ashamed to discuss it after looking at the pictures of the exquisite work Wolfgang did on his switch stands. But for me it was an achievement. This was trickier than I originally expected it to be. The Atlas Standard switches I’m using aren’t really designed for ground throws. The first thing I noticed after removing the manual activator is that all the ties on that side are cut short to allow room for the machine. So I’ll have to go back and add little extensions on all the ties. I was also concerned about how to attach the ground throw to my foam base in a way that would withstand repeated cycling. I also had to adjust the height to suit the throw bar on the switch. I finally decided to combine these two tasks. I cut a rectangle of cork roadbed about ½” x ¾” and glued that down to the painted foam using Elmers Carpenters glue. To help reduce the size of the ground throw (which is a bit oversized for N scale) I cut off the end of the ground throw’s throw rod that has the hole in it. I also trimmed the opposite end of the bar, leaving one of the molded on pins that will drop through the hole on the switch throw bar. Then I cut a sheet of .040 styrene to shim the machine up to the height to allow the throw rod to clear the throw bar on the switch. I actually glued this piece to the bottom on the ground throw using Walthers Goo. Then I glued the ground throw with its plastic shim to the cork using Goo. Seems okay for now. We’ll see how it holds up. On the scenery front, I filled cracks and voids in the foam on the east half of the layout with lightweight spackle, sanded it down, and touched up with paint. I continued to sand the foam on the west half to get the contours the way I want them. That’s about it for this week. Hopefully in this final week I’ll get the western half closer to the contours I’m looking for. But no promises on finishing it. I’m also planning on getting the first ground foam on at least part of the east half. I don’t want to get too close to the areas where I’m still sanding the foam, because I don’t want to get my new ground foam filled with little traces of sanded blue foam. Congrats to everyone else on the progress you’ve made. I’m really impressed with Wolfgang’s switch stands. Real work of art. Jeff, the bridge will be great when you get it finished. Regards
