Calling Arthur “two sheds” Jackson

 That’s a Monty Python reference for you young ‘uns.

Progress ground to a halt on this layout for a while as I couldn’t decide how to treat the left hand side of this micro. I knew that I wanted a shed cum workshop on there, but I couldn’t find a shed to inspire me. Yes, I really do have to be inspired by a shed to build it. I don’t quite know how I found it but a video appeared on YouTube of a German gentleman’s Feldbahn collection. I spent hours on the internet watching his videos and perusing his website in the name of research. Feldbahn in Obersulm is the site, and I heartily recommend it. I don’t understand a word of German, but I found the videos very interesting. His backyard railway would make a great micro layout. He has, on his railway, a workshop, and it spoke to me. It’s a home built thing. Using pressed siding for walls and roof, and though I didn’t have the siding type to match it. I had plenty of different corrugated siding.

A couple of stills showing the workshop/loco shed

That was all I needed. I set to and using the video stills as a guideline. I started. I also had plenty of strip wood in stock, so I could model the framing inside, it would be clearly visible. The most difficult part of the project was deciding how large the shed should be to fit some workshop equipment inside. Construction was quick, just cutting wood and sheet styrene to size, and before long I had a shell that I liked. In my mind, it has the correct homebuilt feel to it.

Workshop shell. Not a match. But the original gave me the push I needed.

The speed of the project quite fired me up and before some of the glue was fully dry, I had a quick test fitting of some workshop equipment, just to see how it all looked. I think it looks pretty good.

The workshop seems to sit well in the scene

The door opening might look tall. It’s a scale 8 feet, and as there is little room for swing doors to open. I may model an up and over door instead.

That quick project has certainly got the momentum going on the layout again. You can now look for more reports as things progress in the near future.

Moving on in the new direction

Wholesale changes are on the way for the challenge layout. Though I thought the layout was generally OK. That was it. It was just OK. It didn't grab me. So I was looking around on the good old internet Searching for structures and their arrangements to recreate. Steve Thomason's ingr.co.uk site is an excellent resource and I found plenty of ideas. Also I found the shapes of some of the buildings at Twyford Waterworks quite interesting. 

One thing I did like about the original layout was all the different materials I had reproduced in model form. Stone, brick, rusted corrugated iron etc; it suggests that building were built at different times and for different purposes. Something I felt should be carried on in the structures for the new version of the layout. 

I had in stock a lot of wooden clapboard siding. So it was inevitable that it would end up being used. So I’ve modelled a long storage shed using that. Right now, that wall looks a bit long, I may put a door in there to break it up. The length and location is nice, as it funnels the viewers gaze towards the corrugated loading point at the back.  

The long wooden wall directs your view to the back and the loading point.

The corrugated covered loading point has an interesting staggered shape and roofline

The corrugated structure will have a working wagon loader in there. My layouts invariably have working wagon loaders featured. Another interesting feature of the loading point is that in this picture at ingr.co.uk two different sizes and styles of corrugated material are clearly visible. I suspect it could be corrugated asbestos/fiber cement and corrugated iron. I have some 7/8th’s (perhaps 1” scale) corrugated material I have used for the main structure and I’m corrugating my own sheet using foil baking trays for the regular material. The contrast between the different corrugations is noticeable.

The baking tray foil based corrugated sheet doesn’t show too well in this picture.
As soon as the weather gets above freezing here I’ll get down to the garage to spray it

The Landy moves back into the scene. I do like it there.

As I write this, we are currently in the middle of the December bombogenesis (or bomb cyclone) you may be reading about in the news. Right now, it feels like -30 Fahrenheit out there. It may be above zero tomorrow. It might make it to freezing (32F) by Thursday. Then I can think about going down to the garage to spray paint the loading point. Stay warm!

Did you know that Hudson skips used to be clean?

It’s difficult to believe I know. Generally, the only pictures we see of them are when they are battered and caked in mud, dirt, and rust. With that rust eating though to become fully fledged holes. It’s difficult to believe that at one time they were brand new and clean.

I often wondered what they must have looked like brand new, or at least just a few weeks or so old, they must have got dirty very quickly.

Then while leafing through Steve Thomason’s excellent website industrial narrow gauge railways in search of  atmosphere for the revamped challenge layout. I discovered some pictures of skips that were only months old. The rust was starting to build up. But they were quite clearly yellow in colour. Upon delivery this must have been quite the bright yellow indeed, probably matching the hi-vis yellow of the loco’s. On top of that, there was a logo on the side. “HUDSON RALETRUX”. The spelling didn’t do much for me either. But it was there, and working on the theory that you don’t see many Hudson Skips in a relatively clean condition on layouts. I thought that when I assembled the next two Binnie skip kits I have, I’d do them in a relatively clean condition. So I would need decals for this logo.

Hudson “RALETRUX” logo

I call myself a graphic designer. I spent 15 years designing and making signs after four years at art college. But I left the art and design industry behind almost 20 years ago. Things have some along a lot since then. Tasks that were done in design programs like CorelDraw that cost hundreds of dollars back then can now be done in Apps that are free or cost only a few dollars.

I design trackplans in an App called Graphic ($8.99). So I though that producing the artwork for my own decals wouldn’t be too much of a problem. Especially as the typeface was very square. Then I as I started started to work on it, I recalled terms like “node edit” vector/raster graphics, which I knew little about back then and had forgotten most of that by now. But I was confident I could solve those problems. 

Let’s get started…

I opened up Graphic and full of the confidence that working in a new scale brings, started work. It’s true that I got a tad frustrated when I couldn’t add nodes to manipulate things the way I wanted, but the simplicity of the typeface made it quite easy to find a workaround, and after a couple of hours had flown by. I had a logo that I was very happy with. It might not be exactly to scale, but it looks pretty good. Now all I have to do is print it off. Printing my own decals. There’s something else I know nothing about. 

Done! Feeling pretty pleased with myself

The lesson learned from this is to try things. You never know what you can do until you try. I need to take that attitude into other aspects of working in 16mm scale. Already this 16mm scale journey is very rewarding.

Next steps.

 The deadline for the Micro Model Railroad Cartel Christmas Challenge is past and I’m running a resounding last in the voting. But that doesn’t bother me, not in the slightest. I’m having so much fun with 16mm scale. When taking the photographs for the challenge entry post, I was shuttling the Huddy up and down the tracks, just enjoying watching it pass through the scene, and feeling very good about what I had acheived.

Overall view of the small layout 

Right now, there is just one loco. The LocoRemote “Huddy”

The simple trackplan. (Rock face removed to see the other siding)

The view into the yard that no-one will be able to see

Being busy with the Micro Model Railway Dispatch and taking other layouts to three shows in four weeks recently, severely curtailed my abilities to work on this model. But I felt that as the person who came up with the concept of the challenge, I had to see it through. So the layout wasn’t finished to the level that I wanted. But I really like what I see in the layout. The scenes have come out as I envisioned them. The large size, and the physical presence of the stock gives this scale an indefinable quality. There’s a feel that I can’t quite put my finger on. I honestly haven’t felt this way about a model railway scale since I first picked up Gn15, and we all know where that led. This shot below, that I converted to black and white almost gives me the chills.

Atmospheric “feel”

It’s fair to say that I’ll be in 16mm scale for a while longer, that’s for certain. To that end I joined the 16mm Gauge Society the other day. At only $25 for a digital membership, it was foolish not to. There are other 16mm indoor micro layout modellers out there, I know some of them. Perhaps there are more. Perhaps there are others just waiting to be converted to the idea of a small layout in this large scale.

As for the layout, the buildings have already been removed and more atmospheric, prototype structures to model are being researched. Some structures will remain, others will go. The plan is to keep the forced perspective element, because I feel that worked really well. I was very surprised with it.

There will be no change in the viewing angle either. The layout was also an experiment in running the trains to and from the viewer, rather than passing in front of you side to side. Again, I think this really works very well. I’m glad I tried it out.

Lots of excitement for the future then, keep following the blog.

Back on the ground

It's been a while. 

Those who follow my Facebook page will know that since the last blog entry for this layout, I had directed my energies towards readying my APA box layout for Trainfest in Milwaukee in early November. You will be able to read all about that in the winter issue of The Micro Model Railway Dispatch. So with Trainfest over, it's time to devote my energies for getting this layout presentable for The Micro Model Railroad Cartel Facebook challenge. It won't be finished (whatever layout truly is finished). But it should be presentable, and functional.

The first, and probably most important thing, is to get some ground cover down. As this is a light industrial running through muddy fields on panel track, the need for ballasting is pretty minimal. The track could be buried to the tops of the rails if I so desired. Though I am so proud of my modelled panel track that I don't necessarily want to bury it.

So, I covered the whole baseboard, except for where the buildings would be, with Woodland Scenics fine brown ballast. Good for ballast in 4mm scale, and N scale. For 16mm scale, I felt it would be a quite reasonable ground texture.. 

Ground cover work starts

At one point, from one angle with the lighting just right, it looked a little snowy.

I treated it just like regular ballasting, giving a good soaking with Woodland Scenics scenery cement. Now we wait for it to dry...

As of today, Sunday November 10th I have 10 days to the competition deadline. How much will I get done?

Don't believe what it says on the label...

For more years than I care to remember now, I have had this Noch Brickpaper in my bag of styrene sheets.  I like the look of the relief in the mortar courses and it's also quite photo-realistic. I thought I could make a use for it. Though so much time has passed since I bought it, that I can't remember what I use I had in mind for it. But I kept the product anyway, like you do...

A very nice looking product from Noch

The label says that it is for HO and TT scale. Though there's no way that it is for those scales. The bricks are even too big for O scale and G scale. Take a look at the close up below. You can also see how nice the product actually is.

Approximately 12mm x 3.5mm in size. Too big for G scale even

I naturally wondered how the size of the brick fared up in 16mm scale. Many modellers know that pre-1965 and also pre-metric system bricks could vary in size by manufacturer. So I felt that if this brick sheet was even close to any one size they would do. I was about to set to on some brick size research and I suddenly remembered that there was a drawing of some scale sized brick course in Roy C. Link's Crowsnest Tramway book. The easiest thing to do was measure that. What do you know? It was an exact match for size.

A building shell covered with the brick paper. The effect is good.

Spurred on by this, I immediately made up a building shell to fit the planned area. It's semi relief, so does not have the full depth of a building, then again, neither does the building next to it. But I think it'll be enough, and the overall effect is great. I'm out of stock of this brick paper now. So, I'll have see if I can find some more. It's been such a long time since I bought it I don't know if my local hobby shop still stocks it.

Clearly it does pay to keep hold of things even if you can't remember why you bought it.

Land Rover as a view block? Why not!

I love a Land Rover

A week or so ago now, my 1:18 scale Landrover arrived. A grand little model. OK, little is something of a misnomer in 1:18 scale. It's close to six inches (150mm) in length. But the series 1 Landy was a small vehicle. By todays standards anyway. 

However, it does eat up a fair bit of real estate on my micro as I found out when I put it where I wanted to, while testing things out on another blocking in session. If I were to put it where planned, it would eat up the space I had in mind for the workshop scene. It would block the view of the layout too much.

Testing out a rock face and the Land Rover

I was a little disappointed. I really wanted the Landy in the layout, and the workshop too, for that matter...

Wait a minute...

Did I just say the Landy was blocking the view?

Then why don't I use it as an intentional view block?

I've been struggling with how to hide the exit to the sector plate for a long time, ever since I started the project. Walls, fences, and now rock faces, have been considered. So why not a Land Rover? I put it in place. Not quite knowing what to expect. 

This is about as natural a looking scene as you can get.

Huddy is small and is easily hidden by the Land Rover

Seriously? Now doesn't that look the part? It only protrudes into the scene by about three inches (75mm) so doesn't eat up a lot of room. Huddy really squeezes by. The fact that the Landy is parked uphill adds another dimension to my mind. 

I'm not entirely sure about the rock face, I think it obstructs the rear building and the forced perspective it creates too much. and may try a fence again. Perhaps it's the unpainted colour of the foam. a duller, dirty rock face might just do it. 

But what the heck, that's for another day.

Today it's Land Rover for the win!