Well .. I'm really new to garden railroading, but I'm in the process of placing a number of cribbing and retaining walls in my landscaping. What I have been doing is rip 3/4 pressure treated and/or clear cedar in 5/8's or 3/4 widths cutting to 10", 12", 16", 18"and 24" lengths and joining them with 6x32 or 8x32 all thread at the joints. The strips are stacked in uniform lengths with alternating gaps for cribbing, or glued and brad nailed in a random pattern for retaining walls. I occasioally insert a piece end on to effect the look of a deadman in the retaining wall.
To place them I use 5/4 by 1" stakes of pressure treated nailed to the rear of the cribbing on each side of a joint, or periodically and at the ends of a retaining wall and set at least the length of the wall below ground. We have both desert termites and carpenter ants in the pasture, so pressure treated is the only wood to let hit the ground around here. An alternative I considered is 1/2" or 3/4 EMT with wall mount straps screwed to the wall instead, but cost pushed me away.
When I can I like to utilize old fence (cedar or cypress) wood that has been salvaged from a rebuild but cypress is hard to come by.
The varing lengths let me shape the walls to the curves of the land scape and look fairly realistic when compared to pictures of the 1890's to 1920's. The all thread at the joints lets me make it up in the shop and carry it out to the site and then customise the shape. The longest piece I've made up so far is 21' with the height varing from 7" to 22".
It is time consuming in comparision to a keystone/castlewall/pavestone retaining wall, but I like the look versus the look of concrete block. By the way I laid 5 and 3/4 pallets of pavestone to raise my entire garden railway to start with.
Email me and I'll send you a picture of an early sample wall and cribbing section.
Mark
Hi Mark:
Thanks for your response. I'd be interested in seeing any photos you may have, thanks. I'm sure it was a pretty intensive process, but I don't think our client would mind making his train garden look as good as possible; of course, it all depends on what he wants to do. I just want to give him as many options as I can.
Thank you for your help. I really appreciate it.
Matt
Mate have you come to the right place for this kind of thing!
This is a favourite subject of mine and there are many ways to go about this. I have used concrete blocks which manufacture myself with a jigstone kit, this looks terrific but it is very time consuming.
Others in USA like to look toward old time mining or timber logging style operations for inspiration. Mine is more pre WW2 central Europe though. Wit a bit of far east religeous stuff thrown in.
However i must support Dave on this and use sculptured concrete, there is an entire magazine article on this subject and if you email me; i will send you a copy of said article. It was written by Jack Verducci who is an extremely sensible and practical professional installer of model railways.
The idea is; you may or may not use bird mesh (chicken wire) possibly attached to outdoor plywood say about 9 mm and you daub it with what they call Glupatta or similar. I have adapted the formula for Queensland conditions and metrified it.
30 parts mortar mix, 2 parts hydrated lime, 2 parts fireclay, 1 part portland cement and half to 1 part colouring and 17 parts water, depending on conditions, it needs to be a bit wetter here in Queensland though. You mix all the dry ingredients together except the colouring. You mix the colouring with the water then add the dry ingredient to the water. Do a few trial runs where it doesn't matter, as you may wish to change things. I am also now using second hand bricks to build things up as the 110 mm side is ideal size for "G" scale tracks
If you want photos get the article from me or possibly from Rene thats where i got it from.
Rgds IanJ Brown
Kawana Island Tropical Railway.
I am building my layout. It will contain and "S" curve going up a small hillside, about 3.5' and will have to remove approximately 5 x 5 of dirt. I'm interest am in seeing any pictures of the in process and finished cribbing and retaining walls.
Thanks,
You could go with the concrete block wall like this.
This was not to bad to build!
Sean
I use Natural stone to build a dry laid stone wall interspersed with small plants it looks pretty nice in my wild setting.
Winnegance and Quebec Railway
Eric Schade Gen'l Manager
Generally I agree with Mark (2nd post), with the exception that I would use 1/16" diameter stainless steel welding wire in stead of the 6-32/8-32 screws. I would also be real careful about cutting pressure treated lumber on any kind of saw, the dust contains toxic materials.
Another source of information, albeit a pay for site, is largescaleonline.com. If my memory is correct, there was a great article on that site regarding this very subject, complete with good pictures, descriptions and techniques.
Good luck.
Bob C.
I just used concrete cinder blocks with cut cedar strips glued to them using Liquid Nails Exterior & Landscaping grade glue in cauking gun. Used limestone rock on other portions. Both are holding up quite well after 4 years outdoors in Texas heat! Lots of current photos at: http://www.largescaleonline.com/cgi-bin/eimages/eimages.cgi?direct=Team_Member_Pics/jackplon
Regards,
Jack
Tantarra Western Railroad - Burleson, Texas.
One thing you must consider is whether your client is doing this for the first time. There is a school of thought that suggests that a layout be built with a sense of permanence. This does not take into consideration that the client may want to make it larger or smaller in the future. A permanent concrete build does not change easily. Stacking bricks can be undone and reconfigured. I change my layout every few years. It is a question worth asking. Regards, Dennis.
This may not be what you're looking for, but perhaps someone else might find it helpful...
I've made miniature retaining walls from real stone to support track in places where it runs along a cliff. Here's how I made my scale stone walls:
http://www.raydunakin.com/Site/IRR_Stone_Walls.html
G'day,
I use brick or cinder block walls to support the track, and build up rocks and earth to hide the walls and provide pockets for the scale trees to grow. The average height of my track is 18 inches above the paving. If you have the space, this is more natural looking than concrete retaining wall blocks.
Good luck, and post pictures of your results.
Mick
Chief Operating Officer
Northern Timber Company - Mt Beenak
Nice work, Mick!
Thanks, Ray. Coming from you that is high praise indeed.
This the way I would redo my RR it has a realalistic feel to it .
Dave
The head is gray, hands don't work , back is weak, legs give out, eyes are gone, money go's and my wife still love's Me.
I built a "dry stack" retaining wall with most of the interior motarred.
My cribbing was ripped cedar fence boards brad nailed together with 1 1/4" air driven staples and then dipped in wood deck perservative.
Rex
Rex,
I love the 'high lead' log drag in your first photo. Does it operate or is it just a static model?
Mick,
There are two donkeys. The one not shown works the log drag which is currently hand operated. Yes I can pull logs up the hill with the hand cranks on the donkey. My logs are pine limbs cut to size so they're fairly heavy. The tongs come from Ozark Minitures.
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