Here is the background on the project. For almost 5 years, I had been working a large, garage based HO layout. It was 14 x 19. It was my little bit of heaven. You can visit a picture and history thread I posted here back in 6/08. It was my own creation of a freelanced railroad.
But then one day in late Nov of 2009., I came home from work and faced a very sudden and unexpected seperation and divorce. Skipping all the gory details and sticking with the “trains”,she moved out,I lost the house garage and layout. All the good stuff, track, trees, structures, rolling stock, etc was saved. The layout, in the land fill. You can read more of the story and see some more pictures.
So, out of the old house into a new place. I was very, very fortunate to be able to move into my parent’s house which has been vacant as they are are out of town due to my step dad’s job. Great place to call home and allow me to get back on my feet. I have a 12 x 11.5 sqaure foot room that is mine and as soon as first moved in, my wheels in the head began turning. Room was limited due to bed, dresser, etc, but I still wanted “a lot”. Its a trick downsizing like this but I have what I have. After grinding out a bunch of ideas, I finally came up with plan and began building late in Dec.
I was lucky to have the space of the old layout but now what I have is much more “normal” and I know a lot of what I am
Knowing that is a temporary place for me and being limited to what I can build/mount to the walls, etc, my options are pretty limited. As it stands now, I might keep this layout in the future if it really continues to progress, but I know, I will want to build again to the biggest size I can get away with. Hence, why I think this one is going to be a “fling”.
Plan? Well, I have one but I use that word loosely.
First trick was to figure out where to put it and after wandering around my parents house, my room seemed the most logical. While they don’t stay here much any more, they still have all their stuff so the house is full. So with some quick measurements, I chose to go 24" deep and 11.5 long. Basically, the length of the room. And, the only place I could put it, was over some furniture.
So, now to build it. One part was easy. I used 2" thick white foam. Its what I used for my last layout and I had great luck with it. (Im lucky and buy it from a construction company.) Its fairly stiff so you don’t need a lot of support under it.
So now, that leaves the bench work. I will say this, its probably the lamest, goofiest, bench work to ever grace the web pages of Model Railroader. But, it works for now. I lined the 2 sections up, (a 8 foot piece and a 3.5 foot piece,) and glued them to a 11.5 piece of wood angle trim. Keep the front glued solid, adds some rigidity to it and keep the foam from breaking off. Then, I scientifically, methodically, and with great precision… chopped and lopped a bunch of PVC to form stilts. With the foam now wedged between the walls, it really couldn’t go anywhere and propped it up over my book shelf and dresser. I do have some plans to build some better supports. I am leaning
this is going to be a mighty fine layout, which will give you a lot of fun to build and operate. It will surely help you to overcome the awkward situation you are in.
For different reasons, though, my situation is not really funny either. I have lost my business, my income, my house, but fortunately, I have not lost my wife & family. I am right now slowly moving back into becoming an active MRR again. I wish I had those 11 1/2´ to build a layout! Mine will be a little over 7´by a little less than 1 1/2´, following British prototype, as it is not only a lot cheaper than US outline equipment here in Germany, but it also looks nice - a little exotic.
You know, the fun in model railroading is not correlated to the size of your layout or the cost of your equipment!
I am looking forward to seeing more pictures - hang in there!
Your shelf Kiva Valley is already looking very nice and interesting to switch! I really like the way you have the industry tracks peeling away from the running track along the rear of the layout - you are getting a lot of industry spurs in there, without industries getting in the way of each other.
Are you using just #4 turnouts or a mix of #4s and #6 turnouts? How long is that switchback lead for the industry tracks (at the left, second from wall) - enough for the engine and three 40-foot cars or so?
Thanks Stein. I have been working on the track plan for awhile. I wanted enough to keep me busy but not get “over crammed”. As it is now, I think its close.
The way the yard is set up with the run around, i can get about 3-5 cars at a time. Which, means I can roughly make up 4-5 different trains to work. With that, it helps keep me from getting bored an doffer lots of operating schemes.
I think the track you are reffering too is around 30 or so inches longer. There is a enough room for 3 50’ cars and the SW7 switcher. I think there is more room but I will have to double check. One of the next rainy day projects will be draw up a track plan for it.
The switches are all the “snap” switches from Atlas, I think they are #4’s. Makes it tight but saves room for track. From time to time I will put on some of my big road power, as in pulling in the train to the yard, but most of the work will be with my SW7 and GP units.
The next step once I had the track plan figured out was to start some scenery. But before I could do that, I had to get the “roadbed and ballast” down. I learned a few tricks on my last layout as ballasting the track, while I really wanted to try it, I realised, it just wasnt practical. I knew some day I would have to take it down and tearing up ballasted track would just be a nightmare. So, I came up with a good stand in.
On the last layout, I painted the cork with gray primer then hit it with a light sprinkle of texture spray. Lay the track on top and secure it with the pins and it was good to go. While it didnt have the finished look, it gave enough to get by. Once I added the scenery around it, didnt look to bad.
Here is a shot from the previous layout.
With the new Whitton Branch, I decided to leave out the cork for the main line look and lay at ground level. So, it was time to do my trick again.
First I taped off all the track to map out where the “ballast” would be.
Then, I brush painted it all using gray paint from the hardware store. I admit, I thougth about using the gray primer, would have been a lot faster and with the latex paint on the foam, it would have been safe (most spray paint can dislove foam). Being indoors, the over spray and fumes, I skipped it.
Once that was done, I papered off the walls and masked the rest of the trac
I suppose that different people react differently to separations; been there; done that; bought a t-shirt. My circumstance was somewhat different than yours but after 13 years of bachelorhood I came up with a real winner for wife #2. As Lapchance informed Crocker in The Man Who Loved Cat Dancing “My wife left me one time. Know what I did? I sent her her suitcase!” View this as opportunity, my friend!
I can’t offer you any advice on construction of a shelf layout but your photography of your new layout tells me that you don’t need very much. Lookin’ good! Lookin’ very good! Keep up the good work and keep us posted on your progress.
Don’t recall you ever having your layout open for visitation during any of the Arizona Division/PSR/NMRA meets in Phoenix. Too bad! I’d have loved to have toured it!
As an experiment I tried one of those textured spray paints under a turnout (just to see if there was a decent looking alternative to the challenge of actually ballasting around the points of a turnout). Fortunately one of the stone shades was a very close match for my Chicago & North Western “pink lady” ballast, and it looked pretty darn good. There are other shades that come very close to Woodland Scenics gray ballast.
What I did find however is that even with turning the can upside down to clean out the nozzle, it seemed I had at most two or three uses of the can before it permanently gunked up. So if you are going to follow John’s lead here, I suggest taping stuff up like he did and prepping for using quite a bit of it at a time. And John hits the nail on the head - these textured spray paints seem to explode out of the can in unexpected and uncontrollable ways.
Well, time for another small update. I have started some scenery work and mostly, to show how well it tied in with the ballasting project. There are some places where I will continue with the scenery, mostly around the yard in and in front. I am still up in the air about some of the buildings, the where, the who’s and the why’s.
I am also strongly thinking about making quite of the few buildings inter-changeable so I can change the look of the layout and also have an excuse to keep working on new building kits. So, I am trying to igure out the plan how to do the scenery where I can manage that. But, that will be another update.
So, hereis what I have so far. I am modeling “central Arizona” and we have what you would call the “high desert”. Leaning toward more toward lighter shades of green and more dirt exsposed. Feel so good to be cranking along again.
Now that the layout is getting shape, one of the next projects is to improve the lighting and get a better camera!
On the east side where the mainline comes in, I had a small space between the main line and the two sidings. I wanted to put something in to help increase the “visual distance”.
Trees where out as they would be too easy to knock during operations so I decided to come up with a small “mountain”. I took 2" white foam, cut it down with wire cutter to fit it in. Once the cutting was done, it has all the rough, sharp edges from the wire. I rounded off the foam, carefully, with the heat of a lighter flame. (A little trick I learned from my other layout and yes outside is preffered). Doing that give it a smooth, rounder shape. Once the flame job was done I painted it.
One of the biggest complaints of white foam is the “small beads”. I have learned that texture can really help when it comes time to do scenery. The little pockets it forms helps to hold the glue mixture and scenery materail. I use sand I took from dunes out here in the southwest and use that for the “dirt”. Woodland Scenic materail for the grass and bushes. As a happy note, the bushes you see here were taken off my layout and used again. They live on!
I have some more scenery work to do along with some sculpt-a-mold work to do on the side that faces the track. I would like to add come “cut rock” to add details and intrest. I like the look now as it is enough to help “break up” the 3 tracks, with out blocking the view behind it.
You need to get one of those Floquil track paint pens and color the track brown. It would really finish off your very creative, and very nice compromise for ballast.
great suggestion. I admit, I have thought about it.
At the moment, I am treating this layout as a short term project as my living arangements are short term, I think. If I move, I will most likley end up with a different set up and start over. So weathering track is something I am hesitant to do because if I go and change, I could be altering it in a style that may not work. If I weather the rails, it will show when I relay it… hence re-weathering and it turns into a mess.
That’s the main reason I did the short term “pretend ballast”. Give it the look with out fulling commiting. I have told myself that if this layout is still around when I am complete with scenry and buildings, I might make the jump and really do up the track. Maybe. [:)]
I had a thought. I know that you don’t use ballast, and yet you seem to be an experienced enough modeler to know what ballast is and how to use it. So, thought I, you must have a story to tell on the subject. Did you once use it? Were you overwhelmed at the extensive costs of using so much for your Railroad? Or is it something more? Did you vow never to use ballast ever again when loose grains knocked your favorite childhood locomotive off the table? Please, enlighten me.
