Layout Extension In Work


Scenery Work 2/4/2005

I finished painting the plaster and laid down a ton of Woodland Scenics fine turf, course turf and clump foliage with Elmer's glue painted on the plaster first. Then I oversprayed diluted Elmer's over the top of the turf to soak it down. Nothing moves on there now.

I painted the tunnel portals to match the prototype as close as I could, using washes of different shades of grey. Over the weekend I'll be ballasting the track.

Bill
 
It's coming right along Bill, sad to say but you're way ahead of me in the scenic department. You seem to be getting a nice effect with the ground foam, are you dusting it on over a brown latex paint? I'm curious, it's looking good.
Willis
 
Willis,
I had to repaint the plaster with a darker paint. I didn't like the brown paint I chose. I used a dark grey color. I painted glue on the plaster and then sprinkled the ground foam on top. Then I sprayed over the whole mess with diluted white glue to hold it all in place better.

Bill
 
Trees

I made a batch of 100 trees over the last week or so. They're your basic furnace filter pine trees. I make them with dowel rods sharpened in a pencil sharpener. Then I spray painted them dark green and covered them with 3M Super 77 spray glue to attach the Woodland Scenics ground foam. They turn out OK, not the greatest, but OK. I did a little figuring and it looks like these trees cost about 40 cents a piece, when you figure the dowel rods, Super 77, spray paint, Woodland Scenics ground foam and furnace filter cost.

Bill
 
Hey Bill! Looking good! Glad to see that you've made so much progress. The trees are nice. I'm looking forward to seeing the finished forest. :D
 
B_Kosanda said:
Willis,
I had to repaint the plaster with a darker paint. I didn't like the brown paint I chose. I used a dark grey color. I painted glue on the plaster and then sprinkled the ground foam on top. Then I sprayed over the whole mess with diluted white glue to hold it all in place better.

Bill

Looks good Bill,
I know there are plenty of regions where brown is a good choice of soil color, but I went with the dark grey as well. Most of my rock formations will be Granite.
I needed some paint early on to color and seal the white styrofoam in a tunnel as well as under the right of way. I went down to the local McCoys Hardware expecting to hem & haw over umpteen available shades to choose from. I got there to find that they were having a sale of all the unbought cans of blend. Right on top of the pile was a quart of dark charcoal grey for $2! It took me longer to find the cheapest 1" brushes to apply it with! :D I won't be painting exposed rock with it, but it's great for current use and will likely go under a lot of the ground cover too.

Ken
 
Wow Bill, I need to get off my keister, and move to the next phase of my layout, which is...and has been 75% complete with the benchwork for the last year!

Nice looking addition. Cant wait to see whats next!
 
Nothing wrong with the trees at all. I made a few of them a while ago and now I should make some better ones. Layout extension looks great Bill!
 
I just want to know where those 100 trees went! They disappear very fast when placing them on the layout. I'm on my second batch of 100 trees now. So much for running my railroad (too busy making trees).

Bill
 
Scenery Mostly Finished

I have the scenery mostly finished now, except for some detailing and cleanup. That will need to wait. I'm tires of working on scenery and will move on to some other tasks. I still want to build capacitive discharge switch machines for the switches and then I want to add signals. All in good time.

I completed 300 trees for the extension. They took me about 3 weeks to complete. I could have used a couple hundred more, but....

I took my first photos of the extension tonight, with a quick run by of a UP mixed freight. These are the results.

The first two are entering and exiting the tunnel, modeled after tunnel 20 on the Cascade Sub.

Bill
 
Snow Shed

I think I'm the only person with a model of a snow shed on their layout. This is a model of the snow shed at tunnel 5 near Cruzatte, Oregon.
 
Cruzatte, Oregon

Here are some quick shots as the freight passes through Cruzatte. Eventually I want to build a model of the old water tower here. This passing siding is almost 20 feet long and will hold almost any train capable of running on my layout. Like I said, I will be adding working signals to this passing siding sometime in the near future.

Bill
 
It just gets better and better!!! The snowshed is an amazing piece of work. Thanks for keeping us "posted."
 
Gate Up

BB, You are a real trouble maker! ;). Here's a picture with the gate up. It opens really easily and does not damage the scenery. Obviously it's not the kind of thing I'd want to do all the time, but it will easily give me occasional access to my water softener.

Bill
 
Thanks for sharing Bill. Really a nice looking gate. I hope my swing down gate comes of just as good. Won't have any trees on it though.
 



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