Good morning all, starting the showcase with some old stuff as with the summer and helping out at the Hobby Shop haven't gotten much done scenery wise on the layout in weeks. I have done a little rock face painting but really need to get the ground cover, bushes, and trees in soon. I know some of you are still doing some great projects so let's see what you have accomplished this week.

A little busy at the Hot Dog Stand as a Dad photographs the kids on the carousel.


I did add a new fire truck in front of the station, actually I wanted to replace the engine that the MTH Firehouse uses with this one, but still working on getting the drive mechanism altered so this one will work.



Some rock work in progress.





Some welding going on in the repair facility.

Paul, they layout is looking great. Great job on the hot dog stand. Thanks for kicking things off this Sunday, though it does seem to be a slow one.

Jim, as usual, great looking layout. I like going back in time to look at layouts. Fun to watch the progressions.

Not a lot new for me this week, been working on the freight platform and scenicing the module, Nitty Gritty Dirt Bland .

Did manage to build a small oil rack.







And for nostalgia's sake (leftover from last Sunday).

quote:

Thanks for kicking things off this Sunday, though it does seem to be a slow one.

Slow isn't the word for today! Gee I think molasses would run faster in January then the Forum today LMAO! Love the look Jim, and I too like to look at older pictures of layouts to see how we have progressed and grab some new ideas for my layout. Love the detail you put into something as simple as a barrel and cradle Vulcan, that look like it is sitting out back of some barn instead of on the layout.

Not much has changed on my Christmas layout except that I now have a different Christmas tree and no wife





I know that a Christmas-only layout can't stand up to the permanent layouts that you guys are putting together, but nonetheless, I enjoy participating in your scenery forum! Your work, all of you, is remarkable. Really!!!

- walt

Great work guys. Yesterday I had a great time touring some incredible layouts and dropped off my trees to the new owner. I snapped this photo of the tree lot on the back of his Ford 250 pickup in sunlight. The trees look better here than under the layout lights I posted Friday.

Finishing up the framing on the Freight Platform.





Kurt

A tunnel portal I started working on this weekend. Also a lookout tower that is in process. And a chain link fence I am working on. I seem to want to build and fill up my layout without ever finishing the detailing on anything!!!:

sorry for the late start everybody ... no internet all day at the apartment, just got the positive pings about an hour ago. great work so far!

paul: glad to see the snack shack in business again ... sure looks great in that scene. nice rock work as well!

jim: love those shots ... reminds me of the 'motive power review' shots the companies used to take. love the turntable shot but the one of the steamers is my favorite.

vulk: another great addition ... i'm digging the old drum: nice weathering work as well. what did you use for the spigot? btw, that broad shot of the coaling / sand / water facility is the best of the bunch ... the angle is very convincing!

walt: cant get enough of the x-mas setups ... especially like the aerial views. must be something all lit up with the tree.

gixxi: its really starting to come together! the retaining walls and the planking between the ties is really cool ... really gives it a great feel. have you checked for clearance yet for the lips on the insides of the wheels and the pick-up rollers? i learned the hard way with my rural crossing: measure twice!

al: the trees are beauties and look great in the sunlight! i really like the ones on the right and the dead-wood in the middle. great work, i hope they've found a deserving home.

kpolak: i'm kind of partial to your ramp as i am including one as well in my build. clever problem solving skills setting it up with the switch machinery! looking forward to more shots on tuesdays token post.

ike: you know i'm a sucker for the military themes ... great work, excited to see how good the tank shed and the lookout tower turned out. looks like you used the same skills on that tunnel portal ... given any thought to the weathering of the wood yet? how about a captured tiger tank getting the blowtorch in one of those sheds ... now that would be pretty cool! keep up the great work.

aside from the shots i posted in the token roll-call, not much besides adding the planking to the tops. trying to figure out the weathering approach as i type. i did find this little treat at the grocery store today!

I know this is probably double-dipping, since I have posted this on the narrow-gauge thread but here is the structure (an adobe blacksmith shop) I finished up this past weekend.



And ... here's one interior shot ... the other shot is at the narrow gauge thread.



On to other things ...

Jim

Very nice work, Jim! I don't think that I have ever seen that style of building modeled in O gauge before. You really captured the look and feel of it, nice job!

Art

Jim193 - welcome aboard, and no that is not double-dipping! This Forum is about scenery, and your photos are about scenery, so they fit like a glove. Most of us (myself included) post the same pics over on the Weekend Photo Fun thread on the main Forum too.

That is a really unique building - I am curious how you obtained the stucco look, with the rounded edges.

Cheers,

John

Walt, nice shots.

Gizzi, I think the concrete look is the way to go. I agree with fish, check those clearances carefully.

Al, those trees would look great anywhere, you have it down to a science.

Kurt, the platform is taking shape well.

Ike, I'm particularly fond of the wood tunnel trestle.

fish, "Strange Brew"! Never seen it before. Most be a western thang.
The spigot is mostly scratch. The bulk of it came from some piping from an HO Walthers refinery kit. The turned down spout is a piece of styrene tubing and the handle the head of a straight pin.

Jim, it's great that you posted here. I likely would have never seen that great work over on the 2-rail side. But I did go over and check the thread since you brought it to our attention.

quote:

Originally posted by JohnBoy:

That is a really unique building - I am curious how you obtained the stucco look, with the rounded edges.

Actually, after several different experiments, the my adobe turns out to be pretty easy. It's balsa! I start with 3/16" sheet balsa and cut out the basic wall shapes, etc., along with door and window openings (there's doors and windows on the back side). I rough out the rounded edges with my trusty Dremel and then sand the edges smooth with 400 and 600 grit sandpaper. I then paint the building with an adobe colored latex (I have the formula for those interestesd). While it's still wet, I literally blow a fine soil powder (from Arizona Rock and Gravel) on to the wet latex. When it dries, it's pretty convincing, I think. I am attempting to put together an article on the entire technique.

By the way, other adobe buildings on my layout might be appearing in Run 231 of the magazine, which I am told will be devoted to narrow gauge.

Jim

quote:

Originally posted by Loco Ike:
A tunnel portal I started working on this weekend. Also a lookout tower that is in process. And a chain link fence I am working on. I seem to want to build and fill up my layout without ever finishing the detailing on anything!!!:

Ike,

Who took a bite out of your Fastrack?

Nice work! I like the military theme. I may need to build a special "play" layout with a military theme. My son is into it.

George

My pliers bit the track. As I was experimenting with track configurations at one point that particular inch of plastic ballast made the mistake of being where the corner of a trestle needed to go. Of course the train then hit the trestle. Eventually ballasting will fix it.

My son and I put plastic army men on the tracks and mow 'em down. Good fun, although they sometimes derail the train, scoring a victory even in death!!!!

Excuse me, guys. This is a question purely out of curiosity, and not meant as a critique. But why buy track with ballasted roadbed, if you plan on ballasting the roadbed? To save cost on ballast?

Vulcan,

I just plan to ballast a couple of places between closely spaced track, like the entrance to the tunnel. And probably something as simple as a wedge shaped piece of foam painted gray. Otherwise, I will leave it as is except for maybe following some advice found on this forum for bringing out the detail on fastrack ballast.

I went with ballasted track because I really like the cool floating ballast effect on my trestles.

Seriously, when I got started last winter I liked (and still really like) the classic toy train look of Lionel operating accessories like the Army ammo depot, exploding ammo dump , etc and had planned to go in that direction, with some scratch building of items not available.

About the time I finished putting down the fastrack for what I decided was a good layout for my available space, I started hanging out on the scenery forum-- originally to get advice on the perforated steel planking I wanted to build to park a couple of airplanes on. (not done yet as I think I can expand my layout at the end where it will go-- so no sense doing it to tear it up later, but Vulcan you were right on with how to do it--thanks)

The awesome scenery stuff I saw here drew me in a new direction. I want to build everything. But the track is already down and I don't want to spend the coin to replace it, so i am making the best of the track I have.

And I will probably cut about a million pieces of balsa to make my floating ballast look "good".

Good enough for me, Ike. I was just curious. No harm meant.

quote:

Originally posted by Vulcan:
Excuse me, guys. This is a question purely out of curiosity, and not meant as a critique. But why buy track with ballasted roadbed, if you plan on ballasting the roadbed? To save cost on ballast?

a very legitimate question vulcan! i buy the mth realtrax with the plastic roadbed for three reasons ... 1) ease of maintenance and connectibility, 2) the plastic roadbed gives the track a more realistic height in my opinion, and most importantly for my situation 3) by gluing the ballast directly to the plastic roadbed, i can change track configuration and store unused sections with ballast in place thus reducing the need to re-ballast the track after every change or layout move.

i'm sure there are a number of legit reasons, but those listed above are the top reasons in my book. it suits my situation with the shelf sections, but i have an important decision to make if i'm ever get the chance to build a permanent layout.

No offense taken, Vulcan. Basically I act first , think later.

A good example--when I got started in January, I bought 3 sheets of plywood and 3 folding tables. My wife said build a real table out of 2x4's but I wanted to start putting down track. By April the folding tables had developed a lot of play making the whole setup unstable--crawling under to do wiring got pretty scary-- and I had serious sagging issues where the plywood hung over the edges of the tables (48 square feet of tables under about 90 square feet of plywood) So I had to build a real table after all.

Of course I did it in sections rather than take everything down and build it all at once. I just built it AROUND what I already had set up. Easily three times as much work as if I had done it right in the first place. Someday maybe I'll drop the folding tables, slide them out and put a 2x4 structure in their place. But the whole thing is actually quite sturdy now.

Surprisingly, no big 'I told you so' from my wife.

Thanks for explanations, guys. They all make perfect sense.

quote:

When it dries, it's pretty convincing, I think.

I think so too. Nice!

Applying a thin layer of ballast to one of the pre-ballasted track systems (Lionel's FastTrack or MTHs RealTrax) can look pretty good, and it saves you a lot of ballast. My only gripe is I wish they would both make the pre-formed roadbed lower by about a quarter-inch, so that the tops of the ties could poke out of my layer of extra ballast on top. If they did that, they would have a real winner on their hands, methinks.

John

cool trees csx,very cool jim193.CYPRESS KILLS train station. .