Pine Flat

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Len Turner

Len Turner

Well-Known Member
Pine Flat is probably more diorama than a model rr, but its something I've been wanting to do for some time. Its completely fictional (fantasy ?? ), ho scale and set sometime in the 1930s or so, somewhere deep in the Pineywoods of East Texas. Its on a wall-mounted 24"x 80" hollow-core door panel topped with styrofoam sheet. Backdrop is also styrofoam sheet. Track plan is probably going to be something simple like runaround with 3 or 4 spurs coming off of it. Other than that everything else is wmiuawg (we're making it up as we go).
pine flat temp.jpg

Yep, its flat...
 


I'll be watching along as well, my KG&B Railway is also a hollow core door and it's surprising how much space that really is. Have fun with it and look forward to the progress in the future!!

Best about building a small layout, try different things, if it don't work out just take it out and try something else. Not much material (scenery, etc) wasted. Most of all have fun with it!!
 
Seckler's Cold Storage by Bar Mills...
Had this unbuilt kit in storage along with some other stuff I kept after scrapping my previous layout three years ago. Needless to say, I love Art's kits. Started this about 3 weeks ago. Went together quite well. Got more stuff to do on it, but its complete enough to set it temporarily on the layout. Probably going about this all bassackwards, but I wanted to sort of plan and build the track and scenery around the structures, so I still need a couple more structures for the back of the layout. Maybe another background kit.. or maybe something else.
Seckler's 2024-0617.jpg
 


Pine Flat update...
Layout:
Not much new here..Got some new bulbs for the studio floods – LED 3500k120w equivalent– not quite as blue as 4000k daylight. And, of course, the new lighting exposed some issues with the backdrop – I painted it outside with RustOleum 2x rattle cans. Looked fair until I put the lights on it.. aaagh.. looks even worse in the photos. Maybe a redo, but still got a while to mull it over before anything really gets stuck down in front of it...

Workbench:
Work continues on the Tory Hill Lumber kit plus and some touch-up and a few more details to Seckler's. Did I mention that I love Art's kits...

Acquisitions:
The RPO dropped off a box from the Yankee Dabbler containing several Walthers turnouts, and W/S turf, bushes and ballast.

About those turnouts:
For years I used Micro Engineering turnouts and flex-track (HO code70) but lately seems like they've fallen on hard times... I was a little leery of Walthers as I had difficulties some years ago with their Shinohara stuff but, got to hand it to 'em; their new HO code 70 #4turnouts look really nice and are competitively priced. A couple things I really like: they use single pieces of rail with no hinges from the frog to the points and the frog is insulated from the rest of the turnout with a convenient solder lug. No power, so haven't tested locos yet, but cars seem to roll through the mock-up quite smoothly.

pine flat temp2.jpg


The Plan:
Trying not to get too far ahead of myself.. Thinking about one more medium-sized structure scene against or close the backdrop in between Seckler's and Tory Hill Lumber. Planning on integrating the FSM sawmill into the T/H scene, so that's going to take up quite a bit of space on the upper right corner of the layout.

And, last but not least... a shout out to the good folks at Yankee Dabbler Hobbies. Good stuff at good prices from good folks! Thanks Y'all!
 
Len Turner said:
Probably going about this all bassackwards, but I wanted to sort of plan and build the track and scenery around the structures, so I still need a couple more structures for the back of the layout. Maybe another background kit.. or maybe something else.
Click to expand...

While I got the footprint size online for a couple of industries I planned to have I largely did it the same way.

If you're waiting on buildings to continue you could see if you can get the footprint size online and build a mockup. It worked well for me
 
Monday update
eegads... Monday already.. with Beryl and other stuff, progress at Pine Flat this week was slow at best.
Workbench: continued work on Tory Hill Lumber Yard kit but spent a lot of time, especially this weekend, watching weathering how-to videos on YouTube. You'd think as long as I've been doing this I'd have developed some sort of weathering skills... NOT.. So, I cut a bunch of squares of clapboard, batten board, and pieces of timber and lumber, to practice on. A/I wash, weathering powders, earthtone paints.. Looks like I'll have plenty of sawmill and lumber yard scrap for scenery.
Layout: I did not like the first go-round on the backdrop panel, so off it came for a redo; sanding, primer (Saturday) and color (Sunday). RustOleum 2X (gray primer, french blue and ultra gray). Got other stuff to do today, it'll have to wait until Tues for clear flat coat.
The backdrop panel is a 20"x 80" piece of styrofoam sheet from the 4'x 8' sheet I used for topping the door panel. The backdrop fits between the back of the horizontal panel and the wall. Double-sided tape holds it up vertically.
Looks a tad better, not quite so splotchy looking. I'll add some background hills, trees, etc when we get some stuff on the layout.
Desktop.jpg
 


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