Further Progress in Tacoma In addition to the Wheeler Osgood Plant I have completed a few buildings for my version of Tacoma. Here is a picture of the Schaub Ellison Garage on Pacific Avenue: It poses two significant challenges to model correctly on my layout: It sits on a corner lot and it is set back from Pacific Avenue. Both features are impossible toreplicate as there is a 3-track hidden staging yard directly behind the buildings. So I have tried to make the building smaller to make the deficiencies less obvious: Construction is with styrene, Grandt Line windows and metal "mesh" for the garage doors. The sign is printed on paper that I had spray-painted with the same color as the building (Tamyia "Dessert Sand" iIrc). Fun little project and it nicely closes the gap to the staging yard. Cheers Dirk
I have completed two "relief" structures: They sit directly on the backdrop, but offer more 3D effect than a picture on the backdrop would. The first is the Hotel Lewis: My version: Still to come is the backdrop painting to complete the building along Pacific Avenue (though it will be difficult to get the perspective right) and the advertsing signs. I still need to find evidence which billboard was used in late 1949. Another building is the Pacific Storage building. The big advertising sign is quite visible in a lot of pictures, like here: Here is my version (not mounted yet on the final position, which is probably a little more to the left...). I have no idea about the actual colors used on the sign, orange and red is an "educated guess", but I still have the sign in my PC, so if new information surfaces I can reprint and mount a new sign. I have used black copy-machine toner for the weathering: It sticks like crazy and it is for free... Thanks for watching... Cheers Dirk
Dirk, your work and explanation on how you are attempting(successfully) to be as accurate as possible is very helpfull. Thanks for sharing the sourse and proccess. Great results with challenging prototypes.:tb-cool:
Jamie, the helix looks terrific! Neat job, it will blend perfectly. Dirk, your structures are great, I love the inspiration prototype photos... however, I wonder what kind of dessert has sand in it confused:
Progress is slow but steady on my Boyd's Logging Camp Static project. Constructed the Ridge the track will be on and the dummy tunnel. First coat of color. View of track ridge and dummy tunnel View of merged tunnel to older 3-D mountain. I'm enjoying myself. It does keep me moviated to get work done. See ya Ron
Well guys, we need a smiley icon for "falling off the bandwagon". Due to having to do unrelated train stuff in the daytime, I could only get work done at night, which is when the whole house is asleep. So drilling was out. And that's 50% of what I need to do. This week will see me getting alot done, since the other half is going to visit a friend in Spokane till mid next week. Whole house to myself, woohoo! I did manage to do a writeup on installing a decoder into a LL/Walthers GP38-2. Decoder Install: LifeLike/Walthers GP38-2 - TrainBoard.com And I added some details to an American Models CNW boxcar for my dad's S scale layout. -Mike
Noise Pollution I have that problem as well! I live in an apartment and my upstairs neighbors keep pretty wierd hours (so do I, but I digress) so I usually will wait to saw, sand, etc. until I hear them stomping around--and then only if it's between 9am and 9pm or so. (for the next door neighbors) Drilling is a little quieter usually so I don't worry quite so much about it. BTW, thanks again for that GP38-2 decoder tutorial, very well done.
Me too.. I keep MEANING to work on things.. but the kids need something, work needs something.. It's great watching everyone's progress though! oh, and yeah.. thanks a LOT for the decoder tute.. just got done buying two of 'em :tb-err::tb-biggrin:
This evening, I set up two small power blocks on my engine house lead. Gapped one rail and switched the blocks on the fascia. One thing I really like about building atop a stryrofoam roadbed is the ability to run wires in shallow slits in the foam like you can see in this photo above. That enabled me to run all three wires through just one hole back to the fascia. I've settled on mounting fascia switches in blank wall plates. That way I don't have to remove the fascia to access the wiring. The button to the upper right of the wall plate is a ball point pen actuator for a turnout 30 inches away, at the back edge of the layout. This is one of those little projects I have put off thinking it would be a pain. However, it turned out remarkably simple. Better yet, it kept me from falling asleep early in the new recliner then being awake half the night. :thumbs_up:
Been off the wagon but hopefully I am not disqualified. My foot is still hurting, I broke it a few months ago and it still smarts! STUPID CAMERA:tb-mad: Picked up some poster board and am making a template for teh masonite to fill in the area I am going to have the potato dealer on. Got sidetracked painting and assembling a Walthers backshop. :tb-mad:Camera:tb-mad:
So the plans that were made for this afternoon fell through, so I got some time to work on the layout . I finished sinking all the screws and covered them up with filler, just waiting till tomorrow to sand them down and paint. While I was doing this, I figured now would be a good time to cover up the exposed 2x4 and 110v wiring that is on the ceiling. This became exposed when I knocked down part of the wall between what was a bedroom and a storage room (keep the storage room or have a bigger layout room. hmm:tb-wink I ended up covering it up with some 1/8" masonite. It still stands out right now, but it will be painted the same color as the ceiling, so it should blend in then. Anyhow, before and after. -Mike
Todd, Those fascia controls look super clean and professional. Top notch! Mike, Coming along nicely...I agree that once painted, the boxed over ceiling area will be completely seamless and integrated into the rest of the room. As for me, I was real happy with the way the helix base turned out, but something was just bugging me about it. After some thought, I realized it was just too darn big and taking up too much space in the layout room. I noticed this a bit as soon as it was completed, but it became more and more obvious as I reviewed photos of the room with the new helix base in place. Plus, every time I had to turn sideways to squeeze past, I felt like I needed to install one of these signs: Originally, I planned a 36" diameter helix but switched to 48" at the last moment when I thought the extra size would not make a difference (wrong!) and the added circumference would reduce the grades from about 2.5% to about 1.5%. I am now going to rebuild the helix base according to the original plan using the 36" diameter base, which will yield an additional 6" of aisle space on each side. I made this decision based on two tests: (1) I moved the current EXTREME HELIX BASE (48") over six inches and can now walk comfortably past it without turning sideways or brushing against it or the benchwork across the aisle. (2) I have determined I can go with a 2" separation between levels of the helix instead of the planned 2.5" separation. This change will result in about a 2.0% grade in the helix, much better than the originally planned 2.5%. With 2" spacing between levels, there will be a minimum clearance of 0.25" between the tops of my tallest cars and the roadbed above. Not a ton of space, but should not be a problem because I have full access to both tracks from inside and outside the helix. Now the only question I have moving forward is... "Why didn't I think of this sooner?" Expect to see photos of the new LEAN, MEAN HELIX BASE (36") in the next few days. Jamie
Jamie: Ouch!!! Can't you just cut the base of the helix to allow clearance at least for feet? That would make "human meetings" easier and should get you a little more room to maneuver. I'm a bit concerned about reducing the helix radius...
After all the disscusion I have been having with the interface and decoderpro threads I need to add, Build a basic oval for spead matching and have a seperate program track so decoderpro can read the decoder type. I can do this through the Powercab by itself where the interface allows for a program track. When used with the SB3 there is no program track provision. This way I may be able to fine tune in the comfort of the house where the computer is.:tb-biggrin:
Well, it's no big deal to rebuild the entire base--especially since I now have completed a practice run As for the radii in the helix (15.0" inner, 16.5" outer), I really don't have any worries about that (I used to!) since I have seen several examples of helixes using the exact same radii without any problems. In fact, I found this video on YouTube which makes me feel at ease with the slimmed down helix: [ame="http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=LWciHbKRYRE"]YouTube - N-Scale Layout Tour - 12/19/2008[/ame] Jamie
Jamie, could you drop the size to 42"? I'd hate to see you have to change things when you get it built and run your first train up it, especially since you plan on doing just the bottom level and waiting to build the rest of it. At least right now you can move the base around to see just how far into the isle it can go and still feel comfortable. -Mike
Finished filling terrain... I got the rest of the terrain filled in with the foam in a can. Instead of doing it all with expanding foam I decided to use some bead foam I had laying around. I just cut a bunch of sloppy layers and then used foam in a can to fill in the gaps. Again, Im very satisfied with the result. Tomorrow morning I'll carve the hardened foam and paint. -Mark
Hey I can always rip it apart a third time! I have done lots of testing with my trains and 15" radius curves on my test layout, and I feel good about the 2.0% grade, so the only question is how will performance be affected with a train on a 15" radius curve and a 2.0% grade. I'll be testing trains as I get each level of the helix completed, so (theoretically) I should get a pretty good feel for the performance of the helix early on in the process. Jamie
