Building the Pinnacle Creek Mining & Timber Co. RR

[Lyagukh]

Yes, I did - and will reread it again after some time Igor

 

[Lyagukh]

Thank you guys! Jim's approach worked like a charm! Igor

 

[HOexplorer]

Glad to hear it Igor. I'm sure with your electrical background you did a much better job, and neater, than I do with my fumbly old fingers. Jim

 

[HOexplorer]

Some of our best places for scenery details...and free too.


I guess we are all model railroaders here and we've all been faced with something like this:

I don't mean the cow head, but the smooth as a baby's bottom deck on the flat car. Many of us wonder about weathering and detailing a perfectly new model out of the box. I invite you to head for the tracks and find that clean a car in real life. If we are modelers, or think we are, I tend to feel a little something must be done to 'improve' on our new cars. Remember this photo?

Check out the deck of that flat car. I decorated it and other cars from two sources and didn't go to my LHS either. One source for weathering supplies is somewhere in this mess. Actually you can't see it yet.

The real place is in the drawer if you have one:

Look at all that good stuff just waiting for you to take a pinch and put it on or in a flatcar or gondola. Another really great place is here:

Treasure trove of great stuff! Plus you didn't have to get in your car and drive some place for this material it is, if you are like me, already close at hand. Even the chain on the flat car has been in my desk drawer for at least a year! So today with little or no effort and 5 minutes of my time I get this:

 

[HOexplorer]

More:

Or you may like this:

Or this:

So what have we learned. Look close, not necessarily far, for some hobbies supplies. In my case I've paid for these items years and years ago. Can't beat that. Jim

 

[BLewis49]

Great weathering idea. Right under our noses all the time. Jim, you're telling on yourself. My workbench looks just like yours. (telling on myself too)
great models come from cluttered workbenches. Bill

 

[HOexplorer]

Bill, Yep, just the way I roll. Most of by modeling at the desk is never a square foot in size. That is why crap always falls into the drawer. I leave it open a bit to catch stuff. Floor is getting too far away these days. Jim

 

[BLewis49]

I'm Rollin' right there with ya. Getting harder to bend down these days. Bill

 

[HOexplorer]

Just an update: I think I'm close to tearing this layout down and getting the room back to some semblance of normality. The last layout will be built on a 4'x6.5' table top. I'm thinking about casters on the legs. Anyone ever used them? The layout will be VERY scenery intensive, (a no bare ground kind of a thing), Trees will be taller.

I'm thinking about piling up pink or blue foam and carving the land forms and the one canyon. They don't sell this foam in SoCal so I may have to drive a long way to find some. In the end I will probably do traditional building techniques, but I wanted to do the foam one more time.

Again, this site is for all of us. If you need a question answered please ask. Jim

 

[Lyagukh]

Jim, when you say "pink or blue foam" - do you mean insulation boards used in building houses? If yes, I am VERY interested in your work, because I am going to use it all around my layout - even for baseboard . Igor

 

[BLewis49]

I've used them before. Had a 2' x 12' layout in a garage at a former residence. The layout was split into (2) 6' sections with casters so I could roll it out from the wall for access. Used dowels and bolts to locate and attach the (2) sections, 2 x 4's for the legs and added adequate bracing for strength. Worked out real well. The casters were only 2" as I was on concrete. On carpet, if that's what you have, larger ones would be better. Bill

 

[HOexplorer]

Igor, Yes, Dow company's foam is blue and Owen's is pink. It's too warm where I live so it is hard to come by. I think it is called extruded polystyrene. Great stuff. I built one layout using it to model desert sandstone walls.

Bill, Thanks for the input. I took some off my retired office chair, hopefully they will work. Can't see why not. This will enable me to turn the layout for better lighting for photos. Jim

 

[Bruette]

Jim your work is amazing! Thanks for sharing your pictures and experience.

 

[Railrunner130]

Jim,
You won't have to drive to purchase rigid insulation if you order from Home Depot or Lowes. I just looked at HD and most are available for shipping. I've found that if you ask a question online, they'll usually give you a 10% off discount code. That should at least take a chunk out of shipping charges. You might even be able to get them to ship it for free because your local store doesn't stock it. Going out on a limb there, but it's worth a try. Maybe that could be your question!

 

[HOexplorer]

Thanks, Louis. I'm here to help anyway I can.

RR, Good points. I will check my loco HD. Lowe's won't be bothered with 3 or 4 sheets. Jim

 

[Lyagukh]

Jim, I have been couple of times to SF so I know a little about Californian climate. And San Diego should be a much warmer place . We have different brands here of course but the product is the same. Currently I am finishing styrofoam baseboard and - hopefully - soon will start doing some styrofoam hills. Therefore your experience is literally invaluable to me. One immediate question: on the photo above have you covered insulation with some plaster cloth or you have used wire cutter/hot air to produce the surface? Igor

 

[HOexplorer]

Igor, I have not covered the foam in the above photo. If I did I would not have been able to replicate the erosion you see on the cliff faces. 100% of the rock carving you see in that photo and on the rest of the layout was done with the first 1.5 cm of the tip of this handsaw. I simply scribed down the foam ripping through with the tip and forming the cliffs. I then sprayed with liquid glue and covered it all with real desert sand. In fact there was around 15 kilos of sand on the layout. No wire cutter or hot air was used or even contemplated.

Today I use this saw to scribe my tree trunks. I also used it to make my turntable. I find this saw to be invaluable to my modeling efforts. Jim

 

[tootnkumin]

An interesting way to use nature's (foam's) natural land forms

 

[Lyagukh]

Thank you, Jim - quite interesting idea! I do not think it will work in my case though, because the styrofoam I have is a very rigid (which is good) but it is crumbling when I try to scratch or scrub it. But I will give it a try on a test piece of insulation Thanks again! Igor

 

[HOexplorer]

Igor, I didn't mention vacuuming up the mess. Extruded polystyrene is very rigid but make a mess, crumbles, when scored with the saw tip. Also the trick to making desert cliffs like mine is only vacuum. Whatever sticks or clings to the foam I just left there and covered it with sand. Jim