You can't believe how itchy I am to put this all together! If not for the work, my train books, magazines, this website, videos, Ebay etc. I'd be going out of my gourd with toy train layout desire! The fact that I can't even RUN any trains at the moment is torture enough to get me throwing circles of track on the floor once in awhile!
Becky
Trains, trains, wonderful trains. The more you get, the more you toot!
Awesome Becky! Looking forward to you getting it all in one place on your proposed layout!
Regards, Roy
DESERT ISLAND
I've got about half of the roof done today. It's the half on the right in this pic where the tree branches inside the house are lighted a bit different than on the left. There are 2 small "huts" to go in the higher branches that I haven't started yet plus the water distribution system. But today was rainy so it was a good day to do a bit of gardening.
TREEHOUSE WALLS AND ROOF
Onward and upward! The "walls" were made using aircraft plywood and the darker brown craft stick (match stick) pieces are the same as what I used for the deck of the bridge and earlier as ties on BTM RR.
Here's how I'm making a thatched roof:
I'm gluing unraveled sisal rope pieces to tan paper. Simple, but very messy! And here's how it looks when finished:
I've also made a waterwheel:
The wheel is from an HO scale watermill paper model kit. I printed it in black and white and painted it using the same acrylic colors I've used for the rest of the house. To simulate the bamboo paddles of the wheel, I cut drinking straws in half lengthwise and painted them with a mix of acrylics.
I'm having trouble with Photobucket so I started a Flickr account to post these. Please bear with me as I'm not 100% sure how this all works yet.
Anyways, since I don't have the time or floor space to build both New Orleans Square and Liberty Square, I compromised by building this:
[View:http://cs.trains.com/TRCCS/themes/trc/utility/:550:0]
On the left is the original Disneyland NOS Haunted Mansion built in 1965 and haunted in 1969. The middle building is the Phantom Manor from EuroDisneyland (now called Disneyland Paris). And on the right is the trusty Plasticville Independence Hall acting as the Hall of Presidents of Liberty Square.
Most of the the railings and iron trim on the Phantom Manor were printed on InkJet transparancies.
Whereas the same types of trim on the New Orleans Square HM are on white cardstock. As you can see, the transparencies are worth the effort for fancy ironwork!
Work also continues on the Swiss Family Robinson Treehouse:
The tree, like Big Thunder Mountain, is carved spray foam with various acrylic washes to provide color and texture. I'm building the treehouse itself one board at a time to fit the existing tree. So as you can imagine, it takes awhile!
TRACK DIAGRAM
Now this is the way it should be done! What do I mean? Build the structures first and worry about how much room you need later!!!! OK, not exactly. But close enough!
Anyhoo. This is a R-R Track (MTH edition) diagram I worked up today to get a handle on how it will (or won't) all fit together come November. The measurements are metric and the grid is 24cm. The long wall accross the top is 15 feet and the room's side wall on the right is 13 feet. Basically it takes up the same amount of floor space as the Standard Gauge and G Scale pike I've been setting up here for years. And fear not! The Standard Gauge layout is just being moved to another room! The box labeled "HOP" near the top center is the Plasticville Independence Hall doing duty as the Hall Of Presidents. If you're familiar with the structure, this will give you an indication of scale.
Becky - I have to agree - it all looks great!
That looks great!
ANOTHER ONE DONE
Now arriving on track one from a grand circle tour of the Magic Kingdom...
All 3 cars were unlighted, however one did have the white window insert. For the other two I glued tracing paper in the windows. Each car has 2 MP peel and stick lights.
The car in the middle is the one with the insert.
The back side of the station.
Oh without a doubt that would work! In fact, I've long wished I had a printer that could handle styrene so I could make the models durable.
The only issue you might have is some of the mouldings where the parts are split onto separate sheets. But since they're pretty straight foreward duplicating them to fit from stock pieces should be easy.
Thank you! I prefer working with wood, so maybe I can make templates from cardstock first.
http://www.disneyexperience.com/models/station_model.php
I like to use 65 pound cardstock for my paper models.
110 pound cardstock and 67 pound coverstock are also common at office supply stores like Staples. However the 110 pound card can be tough on the average printer and 67 pound COVER stock is flimsy and doesn't take glue very well.
If you want to know any of my tricks, just drop me a line! I'm always happy to promote the hobby!
I love the Disneyland station! Where did it come from? What's it made of? I'd like to build one for my pike.
MY ROCK GARDEN
In front of Main Street Station is a large floral display. In fact it's a neccessary fill created because the station and mainline are elevated 7 feet to allow park guests to get past the station without waiting at crossings. In the center there's a big Mickey Mouse face to welcome guests to the Magic Kingdom.
A little carbon paper (do kids even know what carbon paper is?) helped transfer the Mickey face and some curleyques to posterboard, which I then glued to my posterboard hillside. The question was, how do I create the look of thousands of flowers easily and economically? After kicking around many ideas, I settled on medium grade ballast.
With acrylic paint applied thickly, it gave me a nicely textured surface.
I've drawn and painted Mickey many times, but never on simulated gravel!
I know what you mean! It's a looooonnnggg way to go for just one train set!
FINALLY! Some actual TRAINS! hahahahaha. It's all looking good!
ALL FOR ONE...
It's hard to believe that all of this is being done to show off just ONE locomotive! Well, a lot of structures and 2 more baggage cars later, things are moving right along!
Today I took a break from working from scratch to go back and light up the station.
There are 12 bulbs in total: 3 peel and stick lamps on each platform ceiling, 4 Life-Like streetlamps trackside and 2 Model Power HO brass streetlights used as wall sconces. You can see the wall lamps better in this slightly blurry one:
The structure in front of the tracks will become the flower garden with Mickey's face.
Nice bright platforms just waiting for passengers!
Moving on,
A better look at the carrousel. This was one of those unpainted wood 3d puzzle/model kits you often see at craft and hobby shops. However the horses supplied with the kit looked more like dogs in my opinion, so I bought better carrousel horse cutouts from an Ebay retailer. On the left you can see the top finial I made. From the bottom up, it started life as a button, part of an earring, 4 ball tip pins, the top of a broken tree ornament and a longer ball top stick pin. It's held together with hot glue and painted with Testors gold.
This is the Tom Sawyer Island corner module. I had some hydrocal castings I made years ago and decided this was as good a place as any to make use of them. I filled in the gaps with spray foam and started carving it today. The fort was originally put out by Disney in the 1970's(?) in the German Mickey Maus Magazine. The Mark Twain kit is available for free download from www.disneyexperience.com.
Then there's this thing...
It's trying to be a very large tree with a treehouse in it. I'm not holding my breath on the success of this one! So....
....I'll get down on the floor and play with some prewar goodies while I figure it out!
I'VE BEEN BAD!
A NAUGHTY LASS. A BAD GIRL. A CHEEKY CHICK.
You might even say....A WICKED WENCH!
Standing in for the Jolly Roger is the Wicked Wench of Pirates of the Carribean fame. The Wench was based largely on the design of the Roger which was anchored in Skull Rock Cove in Fantasyland from 1955 to 1982. The WW is the ship you see "shelling" the old Spanish fort with cannonade on POTC.
The Jolly Roger was a seafood restaurant and I originally planned to put a door in the side of the hull to reflect this. However I just couldn't bring myself to do it! So instead I made a canopy out of 2 spare sails and some dowels to cover the table and crates down on the beach. Those are "killowat palms" by the way!
A better look at the beach level. The 3 wood crates are from the Greenberg repro of the Lionel paper train.
I had to have a croc if this was going to be Captain Hook's ship! I used the chain from a broken necklace as anchor chains and the ship is rigged with ship building thread.
8 cannon would make for a heck of a broadside!
wallyworld The lighting just adds another dimension with the shadow effects and the carefully placed up-lighting..all I can say is to see the entire project lit up at night will be awesome and I think a visitor could spend quite a lot of time looking over all the careful details and enjoying it..as I know that looks even better in "3D." How many hours do you estimate this project has taken all together? It is just simply remarkable..
The lighting just adds another dimension with the shadow effects and the carefully placed up-lighting..all I can say is to see the entire project lit up at night will be awesome and I think a visitor could spend quite a lot of time looking over all the careful details and enjoying it..as I know that looks even better in "3D." How many hours do you estimate this project has taken all together? It is just simply remarkable..
I had to think about that one for awhile. Best guess: if the average complex model (castle, temple, riverboat) takes 7 days to build and another 3 days to install on it's landscaped module. If we assume those numbers are reasonably accurate, then each required 10 days to construct start to finish. There is a lot of overlap since I work on many things simultaneously to keep from getting bored. For example, it's been hotter than heck around here the last 3 days so that's when I tend to sit still and work on small details like the deck ladders, railings, wheel and 16 cannon I needed for the pirate ship. Or, I'll make palm trees which are boring as heck when I'm just too tired or too lazy to do anything else. Big Thunder Mountain also required more like 2 weeks for the landscaping alone added to the 7 days or so to build the 2 train sets.
But perhaps the best measure is that at the end of June when I decided to do this, only 3 models were anywhere close to being ready to use. The castle was at about 90%, Space Mountain was at about 85%, the Mark Twain was about 98% and the Main Street Station was the only one 100% finished. Everything else has been built from start to finish in the last 10 weeks.
What's left? The Wicked Wench pirate ship now has masts and needs about 2 more days to complete. The Astro Orbitor is done and lighted but I'm still fiddling with trying to install a Peoplemover on the second deck of the tower using Skyway buckets since they look a lot like the DL Peoplemover cars. I haven't started the Carrousel of progress yet but King Arthur's Carrousel is moving right along. I'm still tinkering with motors, pulleys and gears for some Fantasyland rides and I need about 50 more garbage cans for around the park too. There are 2 big modules left to be built. One is the Matterhorn and it will have a sub lagoon at it's base. I need 5 more Skyway buckets and 2 more subs for that module. The other biggie is Tom Sawyer Island and a river for the Mark Twain.
For all of those I know what I'm doing but 2 remaining projects still need a lot of engineering. One is the Swiss Family Robinson Treehouse and the Disneyodendronsemperflorensgrandis (large ever-blooming Disney tree) in which it resides, and the other is the monorail. I still haven't decided on a motive power system 100% but I'm leaning toward an HO or S drive chassis. The MPC unit I was hoping to use is a bit too wide and I'm not 100% on board with the idea of widening the Marx M10000 cars to accomodate the MPC motor.
Sooo, while I'd like to have all of this done by the end of the month so I can focus on other things, like the 1:48 scale Junkers tri-motor I need to build for my Plasticville layout, the reality is usually a bit different. I'll probably be madly building things between decorating the tree and setting up the layout come November! Still this is the first time I've ever tried to do anything of this magnitude in such a short length of time! If I make it, and considering what I had done previously, 5 1/2 months would be a reasonable estimate. If I don't, well that's another story!
fifedog Oh, now it's obvious to me how you switched to the DARK SIDE... I bet you wore your hair like this in your HO days...
Oh, now it's obvious to me how you switched to the DARK SIDE...
I bet you wore your hair like this in your HO days...
Uh...something like that...
I'm kinda known as Darth's daughter here and there...
Beckyvader
Nothing is more fairly distributed than common sense: no one thinks he needs more of it than he already has.
Well now we know Fife did not get washed away last week...
Penny - this just gets better and better - too much fun!
You are inspirational. I love using paper, cardstock and styrene to make things like this. You've given me some nifty ideas. I would love to see this featured in a magazine.
Doug Murphy 'We few, we happy few, we band of brothers...' Henry V.
Believe it or not, 10 to 14 hours a day! Seriously!
Becky, do you sleep? When this is complete I think you need some R&R. Leave that hippo butt here and head over to Bangkok for some khaophadkai and ice cold coconut milk out of the coconut sitting under a nice palm tree.
TEMPLE OF THE FORBIDDEN EYE
Next step, a polyeurethane pour for the Jungle Cruise. Also, I'm not entirely happy with the boat so there may be a new one before all's said and done.
Looking up river towards the hippos. I cut one in half at an angle. Anybody in need of a hippo's butt for their layout?
There's a regular snake in the grass here! The trees also!
2 Lionel 432C screw base bulbs in pre-war passenger car style fixtures provide the mood lighting. Both are mounted to styrene tubes painted the same shades of brown as the trunks of the palms and both are obscured in the tree canopy.
Anybody dare to enter???
Sunset was always my favorite time to ride the Jungle Cruise. The dimming light added a sense of mystery to the ride that made it more fun. It's also when the lines are often shortest! Just off the boat's aft starboard side you can see "Skull Rock". I found this piece of sandstone back in the 80's and carved the eye and nose slots. It was part of my first theme park layout.
Becky, amazing as always! You are a great inspiration.
Patrick
I THINK I CAN I THINK I CAN
This one was a quickie. I have a Polly Pocket playset from around the turn of the century and I needed a way to incorporate it into this layout. The Casey Jr. Circus Train in Fantasyland was the perfect spot. That train circles a small castle called "Cinderella's Castle" on the ride.
I didn't have time right now to experiment with new graphics software, so a better 3D rendering of the actual ride train will have to wait. Two Lionel O rails gave me a good mounting point for the 2D train and since I used hot glue to install them they'll be easy to remove at a later date. The little hillside is also wide enough to accomodate whatever I build down the road. This is a backdrop module meant to go between the tracks and the wall. The lettering is wood.
I designed the station in 2006 and it will be inside the track oval.
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