Day 2.

It does seem strange typing that after all these years.

With the liquid nails setting, there was nothing I could do to the layout itself. So I decided to cut the sleepers for the deck of the tipping dock to size. I had gone out and bought some basswood strip 5/16” x 7/16” after I’d dropped my wife off at the airport inn the morning. I picked that size because that was what Roy Link used for his sleepers on his 16mm Crowsnest layout. I made myself a simple little jig for scale 6’ long sleepers and started sawing with my razor saw.

A very simple jig using a mitre box and some foamcore

Timber decking for a 17” long deck. My deck will be 24” long. Back to the hobby shop then.

24” of timber decking

Not buying enough basswood strip on Thursday, I had to go back today and get some more. I still didn’t buy enough strip but manage to piece together enough from off cuts. 

This is one of those aspects of the layout build that I think doesn’t translate time-wise from a smaller scale. Having cut all the decking to size. I had to distress and paint/stain them all.

I’m still trying to find a good mix of India ink wash and acrylic staining. Sometimes it goes on really well (bottom picture) and then it starts to fade as it soaks in (upper image). 

We will just have to see what these look like in the morning.

On your marks…

Do you remember way, waaay back in the olden times… (2009 actually), I set out on a seven day model railroad project. It garnered quite a following and the layout was quite popular at shows in Minnesota. I loved the spontaneity of the project, working to that self imposed seven day deadline. I’ve tried several times since then to recapture that spirit, but failed. Perhaps I was trying too hard. I forgot all about the idea.

However, now I find myself in the situation where I could have another go at it.

My wife, her sisters, cousins and an aunt have disappeared on a break to the San Juan Islands, leaving me to my own devices for a week.

Hmmm…

You know that I’ve mocked up the layout…

And built some track…

So it seemed quite natural to build a baseboard for the project.

As the layout is built on EPS sheet. The weight is neglible. So the support framework for it can be pretty simple. 

It just so happened that some good friends were moving house, and when we went over to help them pack, Roger said to me. “I’m getting rid of this shelf unit. Do you want it?” 

I had no room for a shelf unit, but the 4’ x 2’ shelves made of 6mm MDF were very tempting. So I said that yes I could probably use a couple of them. Amazingly I had ended up with some free baseboard material. A quick trip to Menards to get some 2 x 1 pine to brace it, and I was well on my way. 

This is the way things look right now, 5pm on Friday evening. The EPS sheet is being glued to the wood using liquid nails adhesive. Everything is under weights while it sets.

Is this another seven day project? I don’t want to commit myself to that just yet. 16mm scale is a lot different to HO scale. I’m not sure if everything will translate time versus increase in scale. I have some other things going on as well. I’m training for my 25th marathon in October, so there’s training to do every day. 

I’ll endeavor to work on the layout every day for the next 7 days and see where it ends up next Saturday. 

Who’s up for the ride?

 

Back on track.

Momentum is building up on the layout project, and today I decided to lay the track on the layout. Lay the track being rather over describing the work as there is barely six feet of track to deal with. As there is one third of that on the yet to be built tipping dock. I thought that a bit of track laying was in order to create the impression that a layout is on the way.

Regular blog followers will know about my track construction method. If not check it out here. You’ll also know it’s one of my least favourite aspects of layout building. But as there’s not much to do, and it’s all in a straight line. I figured I could put up with it. In addition to that, as the tipping dock will have a timber surface, I thought it would be a good idea to try spiking to basswood. 

In a change from my previous method, I decided to try Micro Engineering medium spikes instead of the large ones previous. I had always thought they looked a bit large, and I think they may have interfered with the wheels on the rolling stock.

I definitely feel that the newer size of spike looks better and the flanges of the wheels most definitely do NOT touch the spike heads.

Where the floor of the workshop will be on the model I spiked the rail to some basswood strip. Working on the theory that If I made a real pigs ear of this process it would at least be hidden under the floor of the  building. Not enjoying the original process. I enjoyed spiking basswood even less. It’s a tough wood to spike, and it helps to pre-drill a small hole in the sleeper to start the spike as you push it home.

Anyway, after a couple of hours, I had all the “ground level” track installed. 

I’m sure most of you have thought at some time of other. “Why on earth does he persist with this track laying method when he dislikes it so much?”

Quite simply. It looks good. I like the way it looks. A lot of people like the way it looks. So I think it’s worth sticking with. I might get to enjoy it after a while. 

I'd better get on and build the layout then...

Tipping Talk

There’s only two structures on the layout. The garage/workshop and the tipping dock. The garage/workshop was outlined in the previous post. Now let’s discuss the tipping dock.

I was inspired to build the layout by the picture in issue 134 of The Review. So the structure has to really look a lot like that. So far I have only found one other picture of it. Tucked away in the background of a photo by Gordon Edgar on Flickr

Handily, it’s an end on shot so it gives another angle on the structure. 

End on in the distance of Gordon Edgar’s photo

I scrutinized this picture and the one in The Review and I think I’ve manage to come up with an arrangement that I’m happy with. It’ll be adjusted to fit the location of course, but it captures what I’m after.

Possible arrangement of Garside’s tipping dock

I think it looks like a quite passable representation of the actual thing. I’d appreciate any thoughts and feedback on my interpretation. 

In praise of the prefab concrete garage

With the general idea of what the layout should look like. I did some more measuring out. To see how things would fit more precisely. 

I’m looking for a pleasing vignette in this area.

The yellow grey board is the footprint of an archetypal 8’ x 16
’ prefabricated garage. The sort of thing that was very popular in the UK from the post war years to the late 1970’s (see below)

The prefabricated concrete garage is one of the forgotten mainstays of English society in the late 20th century. To go with the post war motoring boom everyone wanted a garage to house their beautiful new car. These pre-cast concrete panel kits were cheap and plentiful. Marley, Kencast, and Dencroft were almost household names. They could be “put up in a weekend with the help of a friend”, as one manufacturer said in their advertising. One of my Grandfathers had one. I’d really like to fit something like this on the layout. It would be the perfect thing for a small industrial narrow gauge railway to use to service and store their rolling stock. 

The standard size of a garage back then was 8’ x 16’. So, I cut a 16mm scale floor pan to see how it would fit on the layout. It fits as you can see on the photo above. Depending on its position, it may need a little cut out to fit within the track clearances. But it would fit in. But would everything fit in the garage? Another mock-up was called for.

Things seem to fit. It might be a bit cramped. But what garage isn’t? 

It would fit two small locos. The garage looks like it’s a going to be a project then.

Where do we go from here?

Where indeed? I have a mighty fine looking concept here. Big trains being busy in a small space. Some action in the form of some tipping and a chance for some great detailing in the workshop scene. All my boxes ticked.

I’ve mocked the layout up on a 1220mm x 355mm sheet of white expanded polystyrene foam. There’s no reason why I shouldn’t use that for the layout. All being well, the layout will end up in a cabinet protected from the rigours of being transported to shows. It’s exactly the same way as Purespring Watercress was built. On a piece of foam (in this instance the pink insulation foam), so I could work all around it and only at the end was it placed into its cabinet. The layout has stayed like that for perhaps 15 or more years. So I know the method works.

Purespring Watercress in its protective cabinet

I expect to be going to the local hardware store to pick up some Liquid Nails to glue the foam together on Monday.

The next step (part 3; mock up)

 

A good idea.

It is a good idea, isn’t it? Something like this really ticks a lot of boxes for me. We have the front siding, where we have a workshop where, if I’m clever. The inside should be able to be viewed without any problem. I like detailed workshops. There’s one on Give Way to Trains, and many years ago there was one on Purespring Watercress. I like tools. I’m not mechanically minded enough to use them. But tools are a great detail to fit into a workshop scene. Hopefully I can make something work in there. We need to start mocking up.

The first thing I work with when mocking up, is what I call the “Train Length Unit” or TLU. How long will a typical train length be on a micro layout?  It dictates what you can do in an area. It’s no good having a 4’ (1220mm) TLU on a 4’ long layout. It can’t move.

My TLU will be based around a short loco like the LocoRemote MotorRail and a couple of Binnie tippers. 

TLU = 11” 280mm

As you can see, the TLU is very short for such a large scale. On a 4’ long layout, the train will travel its own length four times. Which I feel is a pretty good minimum for a micro layout. With that detail ironed out, I felt I could start the mocking up.

The tipper

Let’s start with the tipper vignette. What should the height of the rails above the ground be? In the Sydney Leleux article in The Review, he states that if the material was being tipped into a standard RCH wagon that height should be  about 10 feet. Ten scale feet would be 160mm (about 7”). As I’m not planning on tipping into any vehicles (road or rail), I decided to go with what looks right. I added a couple of chaps from Give Way to Trains to the scene for scale. The rails are above them. But not too far above. In this image the rails are 120mm (just under 5") that’s about 2.3 meters or seven and a half feet in the real world. Not bad. I'm inclined to think that any taller would look too tall, especially given the narrow baseboard. This is being mocked up on a piece of white expanded polystyrene sheet 4' x 14" in size, and the layout will likely be the same size.

A workshop

Now the workshop. Its primary purpose is to to hide the exit to the sector plate/fiddle stick. It could be a fully modelled building, or it could be part relief, or even built to fit the site. Depending on the structure. Clearly there's plenty of room to fit a structure in there. The siding poking out of the building is a nice place to pose items for layout viewers and photographers. The scope for detailing around the workshop with scrap, spare parts and other detritus is enormous.

Overall view

Overall things look pretty good. I like what I see a lot. There's a lot of space. For a large scale in a small space. It's almost empty. I put my Land Rover in there to see if a truck could be fitted in to be loaded. A small one probably. But in these days of Radio controlled vehicles on model railway layouts I'm not sure there would be the room for one to operate. The trees that I sketched into the original concept will probably have to go. Or at least be smaller low relief ones, from the way I see things going together. So with a quick sketching over the mock up photo. You get this…

I think it will work.