I have to admit that it makes me feel like I’m not alone when I see pictures of other folks layouts where there is still a lot of plywood showing. I had hoped to start covering mine with scenery months ago, but I’m still months away.
How long did it take you to not have any plywood showing?
Let’s see…I’m almost 4 years into my current layout and I still have plywood (well foam) showing.
Nick
I’m doing my layout in three stages or phases but I think there’s still a fair comparison. The completed (and operationally independent) first stage measures 5x10 feet and took around a year to finish. I’m currently working on stage two, a 3x12 “wing” (the completed layout will be E-shaped) depicting a highly urbanized scene still in the structures-atop-foam phase, which I hope to finish up by this autumn.
CNJ831
I worked hard to get one spot sceniced, which means I have some that will be years away. I have basic plaster on some, but I tend to want to put the fine detail in as I go, so it will take forever.
Since I’m always adding or revising my layout, I still have plywood showing after 4 years. I usually try to paint some appropriate color on it, to at least hide the bare wood. Sometimes I just scatter some ground cover and loose trees around as a temporary effort.
In my case it was 1" beaded white foam, and it took 12 months to totally cover.
2 days…I laid foam over all the plywood. But the foam? It’s still showing…
We’re (my dad and I) are just beginning to put scenery up: 10 years and counting.
Plywood’s still showing on my layout after 6 years.
Gordon
Let’s see, I’m 31, and haven’t yet started on my newest layout (been doing experimental tracklaying, planning, etc.)
I’ve been into this hobby off and on since what, 5 years old or something?
And I’ve never not had plywood showing.
So I’d say 26 years and counting…
About two years using foam…it’s so much faster…
Well, our club layout never had any plywood to show, but there is still raw benchwork and roadbed showing after, ummm 18 years.
[:D] I must be a little ahead of the game, a year and a half. 2ft deep around the wall layout, 12x16 with a 6x6 ft center island coming off one wall. I did try to get basic ground cover over the whole thing as quickly as possible for my own sanity.[(-D]
We started on October 1st of 2005 with a four by eight module. Right now one third of it is under plaster and basic 3 color (rock/grass/dirt) paint, with the other two thirds showing near finished foam. We have two warm days coming starting today, and the plan is to knock out the foam details outside using the warm weather to cut down on cleanup time (cutting foam makes a bit of a mess).
If that works out, I doubt it will be more than a month to plaster the rest, and another month to cover it with basic paint. I doubt paint will take that long, the basic palatte is already mixed, which took up most of the time for the first third.
That will be eight months for basic paint, and the structures, ballasting and details are expected to take five to ten years.
I had ‘bare’ plywood/foam for about 10 months before I got mine covered - but not with WS or anything like. I slapped down a temporary layer of earth-colored latex paint to hide the raw look until I can put down the permanent scenery. I want to be sure my trackwork functions flawlessly before going any farther.
Before:
After:
Over a span of better than half a century, and at least twenty personal and club layouts, I never reached the point where the skeleton was completely buried. On my present layout I have one un-sceniced module that is approaching its 26th birthday, still as bare as the day it was built. On other parts of the layout, I don’t even have the plywood in yet.
Of course, I’ve only been working on it for about 5 months now. Next year, things might be different.
Chuck
On my previous layout, after several years of work I finally got sick of the “Plywood Central” and put in temporary scenery. It looked pretty good, and I did that on my current layout about a year into it. Once the main tracks were in place, I just took the areas where I figured where the city would go and painted that area primer gray, plus any areas where I figured there would be roads. Once I established where the buildings would go, I used 1/2" masking tape to mask the edges of the streets (including driveways etc.), then painted the other areas dark brown and while the paint was still wet sprinkled on WS green grass. Then after the paint dried I pulled up the tape and touched up the area. I also did some water areas, different shades of blue paint with gloss medium stippled over it.
Not great but not bad, especially after lighting the buildings and adding street lights, cars, people etc. I ran the layout like that for a couple of years while I concentrated on adding DCC and some other things, went back recently and did permanent scenery.