Starting on my layout

[flyboy2610]

Since it doesn't appear that I will be able to have access to a reasonable portion of the main room in the basement anytime soon, I have decided to go ahead and build a small switching layout along one wall of my 'man cave.'
I plan to build this one, with some mods:
http://www.gatewaynmra.org/layouts/gc15/project15-trackplan.htm
Instead of 14" x 60", it will 24" X 96". This will allow me to put an interchange track along the bottom edge, where the switch engine will pick up cars and drop them off to be picked up.
The theme will be a small southwestern town with some industries. The town will be along the Santa Fe mainline, who will drop off and pick up cars. The town will be served by a Union Pacific switcher that was purchased cheap, since the original switcher blew it's boiler. (Anybody want to hire an out of work fireman?) The setting will be the early 1950's, since I have mostly steam power.
I am building this on top of a hollow core door. The doors dimension are 24" X 72". I added 12" extension on either side to bring the length out to 8 feet.

I had already glued on the 2 2' x 4' chip board panels, then turned the door over and built the extensions in place.
Here is the basic tabletop, sitting on sawhorses.

Here the Homasote is being glued down, using my standard construction adhesive technique: put down the adhesive, then place the panel off center 3 to 4 inches each way, then slide it into place. that helps to spread the adhesive all over the bottom of the panel, ensuring a good glue bond.

After the adhesive is dry, I'm going to put some tan latex paint on a back corner to see how well the Homasote holds up to the moisture from the paint. Hopefully, it won't harm it.
Wish me luck!

 

[Cjcrescent]

I don't believe that there is enough "water" in the paint to do any damage. I helped a friend in Gautier, Ms (pronounced Go shay), which is right on the Gulf Coast with his layout and we painted his homasote with latex, and there wasn't any change in the material at all. He had brought his homasote down from NY when he retired. Its not a commonly used building material in this part of the country.

When you can get it here, its very expensive. The only dealer here in Birmingham that regularly carries it, had a price of $55 for a 4x8 sheet, 18 months ago. No telling what it is now.

 

[flyboy2610]

$55 a sheet? Holy sheet, Batman! Up here it's about $22, and that was yesterday!
Thanks for the tip on the latex. I just put some on, so we'll see how it holds up.
I can see why Homasote wouldn't be real common down on the Gulf Coast. The humidity would be rather harsh on it, I suppose.

 

[Charles Smiley]

Homosote scenery

I use Dutch Boy Dirt Fighter flat Latex on Homosote scenery and it works great. I have it mixed to a 'dirt-brown' color they call "Hen House". I get it at OSH Hardware -- but it should be widely available elsewhere too. Don't worry about

You can carve Homosote and stack it in layers glued together with Liquid Nails to create many scenic features. You can snap the edges off and the pressed layers look like layered shale deposits. Sometimes a hand applied layer of Liquid Nails can also be carved with features onece it's cured - 24 hours.

Scrape the white paper layer off for dirt areas. Leave sections of white and paint it grayish-black for old pavement too. You can "scutter" it with a razor blade to distress and age the pavement areas.

If you carve ditches on both sides you can create Homosote roadbed in industrial/branchline areas too. I'm surprized it isn't used more for scenery - I don't like plaster BTW. I have some more mountainous areas that will have a combo of foam board, Urathene molded rocks and Homosote coming up soon. So far all the Flatland areas are all Homosote construction on the base plywood.

 

[flyboy2610]

I like the idea of carving ditches to simulate raised roadbed. The only track that would have raised roadbed is the 'mainline' that will run across the front of the layout. All the rest will be a flat industrial area. I thought about using foam roadbed on the mainline, but tapering the tracks down to a flat area in such a short run, with turnouts in the mix, wasn't something I looked forward too. I think I have my solution. Thanks a bunch!

 

[Charles Smiley]

Roadbeds

My first experience using Homosote was long ago making a 2X8 foot traction layout for industrial switching. I put the white paperside facing up on top 1/2" plywood laid on a frame.

Since then I've adopted the method and I like it for fairly flat areas such as towns, farms and industrial areas. Make sure it's the white paper face type with brown fibers. I tried some grayish looking stuff and it made me itch and it was poor to work with. Our local Lowes HArdware stopped carrying the good stuff lately.

You can draw on the white side and carve features away. The Homosote gives you a half inch of possible depth to play with. If you stack another prefabed Homosote layer on top of the first you can build elevation and grind it down for easements to the lower layer. I use a big Stanley SURFORM rasp (PN 21-296) for this. It makes lots of dust. Work slow and keep a shop vac nearby and it won't be a big deal. Maybe a face mask would be wise too.

Here are a few more photos. It's all scuplted Homosote with fine sifted dirt bonded on with Scenic Cement drizzled over it. Hen house painted first after carving it all to suit your needs.