On my project I'm undecided whether to use the foam for a scenery base, or use plaster cloth over cardboard strips. With asthma, I'm concerned with having to cut and file/sand the foam board, and it's associated particles in the air. I do have plaster cloth already, I also have a supply of foam as well to use, plus of course I plan to use Sculptamold and Smooth-it, which I also have on hand.
Did you notice a problem with filing or sanding the foam insulation? I know that foam would be a lot lighter to work with than plaster, but my layout really won't be going anywhere other than where it's at in my garage, so weight I'm not worried about too much...
HI,
I haven't used plaster cloth over cardboard strips. With the foam board, I really did minimal sanding . I mostly cut it with a box cutter to get the desired shape. Where I did sand it was with a rasp, and that was minimal. I never encountered a situation where I needed to wear a mask as the chunks were rather large. If you stick to a steak knife and a box cutter (which works really well) there really is no residue that would effect asthma. Once I had the basic shape I used the sculptamold to fill everything in. Where the Scultamold was to be covered with trees I left it as it was. Where I am going to put ground cover, I waited 1/2 hour and wet my fingers and smoothed it out.
Thanks,
Steve
Looking good Roger! Did you place the mine conveyor into the mountain and mold the plaster cloth around it? Is that brown color regular household latex paint I take it?
Thanks Steve for the info once again....:)
I was concerned after I think one of the MR project videos concerning wearing a dust mask for those foam particles....
Airborne,
The mine conveyor is just resting against the mountain right now. When I permanently place the mine, I will cut out a hole for it and seal around it with plaster. The brown paint I am using for a base color is normal flat latex paint.
My Layout Pics
Roger,
Where did you get the cardboard strips, did you buy these pre-cut, or cut out strips yourself? If you cut strips yourself, what thickness of cardboard did you use? If you bought these, were they from Faller, or? Not sure if MicroMark carries these, or Woodland Scenics, or someone else....
I believe those cardboard strips came from Amazon.com. I cut the strips from one of Amazon's shipping boxes.
SJ,
Did you place the foam rocks into wet Sculptamold on the hills, or carve out the foam to glue them on?
Also, did you run feeder wires from every switch, or just every three feet on the layout, or?
Although still behind the others, here are a few updated photos of my progress
All track is down and soldered except for "Green Hill" section handy panel which has not been attached
One photo shows three track mine area
One photo shows 6 track yard
One photo shows PECO code 100 switch by yard which was put in per MR's instructions in the track laying issue, that is, the rail joiner was soldered to the code 100 switch, then the code 83 track soldered to top of joiner. The other code 100 PECO was used on top of branch where siding starts coming off where bridge would be (no bridge on my layout). This code 100 switch was simply attached to the code 83 track with transition rail joiners, which is a snap.
One photo shows scale house and track in place. If you're using Walther's scale house as MR and I did, you have to cut off the track spikes on one side of rail where middle piece of "wood planks" go, so this piece will sit down evenly on ties, otherwise it sticks up....
Hopefully I'll have more photos of further progress soon, as I am waiting on help and a few more supplies to start wiring....
Finally, one photo shows "Reid Gap" area with extra siding off main, where feed and seed store will go
In doing the track work, I used Atlas super flex track and MicroEngineering weathered flex track, along with a few pieces of Atlas snap track. For switches, I used a combination of Atlas snap switches, PECO, and Walther's
I carved out the foam and glued the foam rocks into the hills, then I did the Scultpmold over the foam and around the rocks. I followed the feeder wire instructions on the layout graphic from the magazine. So I put feeder wire such that there was at least one roughy equidistant between each switch. On the longest part of the main run, I put 2. To do this I put the main power run around the outside of the layout and installed bus bars that I jigged up from the electrical section of home depot to feed the track instead of using the suitcase connectors that were shown. This gives me flexibility to add more DCC controlled components in the future with minimal effort. I used a HEX Frog Juicer for polarity reversal on each Peco switch.
I have started the landscaping around the bridge, so will post some pictures of that soon.
Thanks to all who have contributed! I too plan to build the Virginian with some minor adjustments and the extra info is more than appreciated. I will keep close tabs on this thread! My build is most likely a year away still but I plan to locate it in the Sierra Nevada mountain range.
I have "mostly" finished the bridge. Just a bit of weathering on the supports to do. Here are a few pictures.
Cheers,
Steve, That looks fantastic. You sure this is your first layout since you were 15? Keep up the good work and keep posting the pics.
Are there any bears hiding back under your bridge?
You sure this is your first layout since you were 15?
I built a couple of Star Wars models and a B17 in the late 70's . Thats all.... My first and only other layout was built by my Dad and I took over between about 11 and 15.
For the scenery I just copied what David did in episode 17. I screwed up by putting Cinders near the tracks instead of black ground foam, but it ended up looking OK. Getting the angles right on the bridge was not the easiest. The main key I have discovered building this is that if you screw up, go with the flow and work your screw up into the design.
I am still trying to figure out what to do with the bare hill near the tunnel in the photo. I built it too steep to put rocks ( or a rock slide) and its too close to the track to put puff ball trees.
Work looks great SJ.....:)
Great job on the layout
More photos of progress on my layout. Last piece of wood (handy panel) for Morris Fork section with final risers attached, so all track is down and soldered. Used stained wood ties to fill in gaps from cutting/splicing track. These were glued down with yellow glue. A few photos follow. Since these were taken, all feeder wires were dropped and soldered. Bus wire will be run and tied in next week. I'm using soldered connections underneath sealed with "liquid tape" instead of suitcase connectors. Pics of this will follow later....
More progress photos showing bus wire and feeders soldered and coated with Liquid Tape, also showing track painted with a mixture of Grimy Black and Roof Brown which almost matched the weathered ME track exactly. Final is a short video of the first train running on the layout.....
airborne 101,
Great job!
doesn't look like the last pic came thru as a video.
.
Thanks much!
Oops...I'll have to figure out how to post a video then from Photobucket.....
Two things that may be of notice in the photos that may help others. In the photo taken in the 6 track yard, you may notice red "car stops" in front of the hoppers. This is a neat trick to take a small, short piece of wire, strip the insulation off the end, then bend the other end so as to catch a cars open coupler knuckle. The bare wire end gets pushed into the cork roadbed/ballasted roadbed to act as a stop or bumper to keep cars from rolling out the tracks, in my case, when I roll the layout around and out to run....
The other tip is if building this layout, or others with switches from different manufacturers, is to not do as MR listed in the bill of materials in the track laying issue, which called for Caboose Industries 202S switch throws. I learned the hard way what you actually need are the 218S switch throws, which come with different attachments for different manufacturers switches....
Two more photos, one of an Accurail NYC 40 ft boxcar re-decaled and weathered, the other a photo of the Woodland Scenics "Sicken Tire Co", which will be used as the "Armitage Furniture Co" on the layout. MR used a background building as the "Cherrywood Cabinet Co" I believe....
Hi All,
I have done some more work on the yard, ballasting the area and attempting some landscape. I couldn't find the right backdrop building so used another. Once I got it painted I realized it jarred somewhat with the other buildings, so I might attempt to tone it down at some point in the future. The roads and the yard are various combinations of highball ballast. The yard is HO light gray and the road is a mixture of HO dark gray and N black. I tried to get the road fairly smooth by rolling it with a roll of duct tape once it was about half dry. There is still some work to do with signage and trees, but its getting there. I had a lot of problems with the ground throws as I bought the ones recommended in the magazine (202S). I am going to replace these with 218S which have better fitting for the Peco switches. I didn't put the scale in the yard. The hole in the extension will hold a Digitrax Zephyr Xtra.
Looks great Steve, I am way, way behind you on the scenery. I am currently in the process of scratch building the two truck dumps. Once I get these completed I will start to create the mountain on the backside of Green Hill. Hopefully I will post some new pictures in the next few days.
Keep up the good work!
Roger
Building the layout with the intention of modeling late 80's, early 90's CSX (GP38's), would keeping the same color scheme on the structures be appropriate?
David
Looks great guys! This is really exciting to watch these layouts come together
Great job so far Steve. I am also planning a Virginian build of my own. I was wondering if you used the flexible rubber rocks or something else for the elevated branchline tracks that are tight to the mainline like MR did? What rock material was used for the hillside close to the Rogers yard tracks as well? Thank you for your input, and I look forward to seeing more progress.
Chris
Thanks for the kind comments guys.
Chris,
I used the I.S.L.E laboratories flexrock 501, 502 and 503 flexible rubber rocks listed in the magazine. These were not easy to come by. I eventually got them from Walthers. I see they are in stock now. When I started they were out of stock everywhere and originally ordered some "Mountains in Minutes" from the same manufacturer, not realizing they were rigid polyfoam.. Unless you use something like Sculptamold and shape it like rocks you really need to use the flexible rocks for the elevated branchline tracks to get the curvature. From memory I used 501 for the elevated branchline , 503 for the Rogers yard tracks and 502 for the rocks set into the hills. You could use rigid rocks for the hills and above the tunnels just as easily. The 5xx series are flexible, the 8xx series are rigid.