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AVRR-PA
Fireman
USA
4603 Posts |
 Posted - 12/11/2009 : 10:08:29 AM
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quote:
Originally posted by ebtnut
Vagel: You guys given any thought to getting one of those hot wire tools to sculpt the foam?
Vagel likes making messes. He also enjoys finger painting and making mud pies. He runs with scissors and colors outside the lines. That why he's fun to work with. 
Don
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Vagel Keller
Crew Chief
USA
722 Posts |
Posted - 12/11/2009 : 1:26:18 PM
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I have a hot wire foam cutting tool for small jobs, and I might use it to shape some parts of the mountainside. But I'll stick with cold steel for the big cut-outs, and I'm used to working with surform and rasp to work the surface.
Vagel |
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Vagel Keller
Crew Chief
USA
722 Posts |
Posted - 12/16/2009 : 8:56:02 PM
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I'm taking a break from cutting foam land forms to finish the Mountaineer Precision Products PRR Lines West station that I would like to use at Buchanan on the narrow gauge branch. This is a highly detailed laser kit with double hung windows and multiple trim layers on the exterior walls that must be glued (that's right ... NO peel and stick. Pain in the butt!
But that was OK until I discovered a major glitch in the engineering of this kit. What, pray tell, would you say is the most prominent feature of a small-town combination depot? Could it be, say, the agent's bay!? Take a look at the advertisement photo of the finished kit on the MPP website:
http://www.mpp-models.com/900/961%20-%20PRR%20Class%20A%20Station/961b.jpg
Now, take a look at this:
The overlay for the bay front wall is the same height as the main wall. Moreover, the bay front windows are about a foot shorter than the windows on the sides of the bay, at variance with the picture shown on the website and on the kit box art.
The difference is more clearly shown in this image:
Note that the bottom of the window sashes are BEHIND the overlay and the milled lines on the bay front wall end too soon at the top.
I'm too far along with this project to discard the building (it's too much money to throw away, too). I think I can hide the problem with a judiciously positioned station sign at the top and a baggage scale and some other clutter in front of the agent's windows.
I applaud the efforts of small companies such as this to bring historically significant yet not so mass-marketable railroad structures such as this. But ... [:-grumpy][:-irked]
Vagel |
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Vagel Keller
Crew Chief
USA
722 Posts |
Posted - 12/30/2009 : 9:00:29 PM
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Hello, all, and Happy New Year!
It's been a while since I posted anything, but I see several hundred folks have visited the thread without commenting since my last update (about the unfortunate problem with the MPP kit). I hope all are enjoying the holidays.
Over the Christmas week I picked away here and there at the styrofoam land forms, so when Don came by for today's work session I had more or less roughed in the mountainside between the narrow gauge Buchanan Branch and the yard at Ft. Loudon below.
The landscape down-grade from the trestle reminds me of the Conehead planet, but that will change with the judicious application of sureform tools and a rasp.
The deep cut on the approach to the village of Buchanan might look a bit too "Roadrunner-and-Coyote-ish," but there really is a cut this steep and nearly this deep to get to a tipple at the end of the Joller Branch on the East Broad Top RR. We've noticed that the sounds of the locomotive change as it goes behind and re-emerges from the cuts on its way up the grade for a neat extra credit effect.
With Don's help we dealt with the complex task of installing the base for the removable scenery hatch below the ore prep plant and tipple, which will access to the hidden standard gauge tracks:
Also, note the different station structure, much smaller than the PRR Lines West prototype from MPP. While running trains for the neighbor children on Christmas Day I suddenly realized that the tall windows on that station towered above the height of the M1 gas-electric (and, thus, all of the n.g. rolling stock) in a way that literally made the station look like it was S-Scale! So I've decided to retire that project unfinished and move on.
The prototype for this little red building was the EBT's Coles station and was a kit by the unfortunately short-lived Furnace Hills Depot company of fellow FEBT-member Craig Williams. BTS now offers a laser kit for the same structure, but with less pronounced roof overhang as the building appeared in the 1940s and 50s.
Back at his workbench Don is working on the road overpass that will pass from under the ravine trestle across the tracks at Ft. Loudon. He brought the trestle bents to test fit them today. Between now and next Wednesday I have to finish the scenery base for the trestle so we have a precise length for the kingpost truss that will span two of the tracks.
Until next time, write if the mood strikes,
Vagel |
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Vagel Keller
Crew Chief
USA
722 Posts |
Posted - 01/05/2010 : 10:11:37 PM
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I've concentrated since New Year's on getting ready for tomorrow's work session, when we'll determine the final position for the abutment of the road overpass leading from beneath the ravine trestle across the tracks at Ft. Loudon. The mountainside is shaped for a couple feet each side of the trestle and ready for a coat of base color and started to work up the 3-D backdrop for this scene, although we're going to have to do a lot of rock casting before it's all said and done. Here are a couple of pictures:
On lesson learned is that the use of multiple 2"-thick pieces in vertical format leaves too many seams that can't be hidden by paint and ground cover the way it can be done in the layer cake method.
The base for the 3-D backdrop is a 1/2" piece of insulation foam tapered down to a fine edge at each end where it merges with the hardboard backdrop. This idea is from an article in a recent Model Railroader. Because the backdrop is curved in this area, I'll have to glue and screw the foam to the frame once it's done; tonight I was just playing around with ideas.
The concept is to use clump foliage near the bottom, moving through coarse turf to finer foliage at the crest, which is rounded to give the illusion of distance from the painted backdrop. I thought about starting with puff balls from WS foliage sheets impaled on tooth picks at the lowest levels, and I believe it will work:
For the more distant ridges, I've been studying Mark's (Dry Fork) amazing fall foliage back drop painting on the Backdrops thread, and today I helped pay the utility bill for one of our local Michaels' stores by laying in a stock of acrylics from his recommended pallet. I'll post pics of that effort if and when I move the next step of actually putting sponge to wall. As my aviator friends in the Army used to say, "No guts, no Air Medals."
Finally, up at Buchanan I finally bit the bullet and decided that this is where the narrow gauge railroad facilities will reflect the prototype EBT that actually existed at a remote place called Coles, one of my favorite places on the railroad and a great place to go and sit and just listen to the squirrels working in the oaks.
The tank is on the wrong side of the track, but that's life in freelance model railroading!
More after Don and I finish up tomorrow. |
Edited by - Vagel Keller on 01/06/2010 6:34:52 PM |
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George D
Moderator
USA
9916 Posts |
Posted - 01/05/2010 : 10:38:00 PM
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I see you’re keeping busy, Vagel. That’s good therapy when having to deal with the Steelers not being in the playoffs.
Your backdrop is a fascinating project and I’ll be following it with interest. One tip you might use for attaching ground foam to a vertical surface that I picked up on a Dave Frary DVD (I think) is to mix the ground foam with diluted matt medium or diluted white glue so it’s about the consistency of oat meal. You can spread it on with your fingers and it should stay.
This old Army aviator doesn’t remember the “No guts no air medals” quote, but I do remember “there are old aviators and there are bold aviators, but no old bold aviators” – tread with caution.
George
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AVRR-PA
Fireman
USA
4603 Posts |
Posted - 01/06/2010 : 07:52:10 AM
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Hmmmm.... Sounds like I'd better bring the rock molds and stuff like that when I head for your place in a couple of hours. You've been busy.
Don
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Harsco
Fireman
USA
1101 Posts |
Posted - 01/06/2010 : 08:18:17 AM
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Vagel...I'm eager to see what you do with that foam backdrop; I've been contemplating something along those lines too but wasn't sure how to actually go about it. I'm especially intrigued with the clump/coarse/fine method...it sounds like it should work well.
Standing by..... |
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ebtnut
New Hire
USA
36 Posts |
Posted - 01/06/2010 : 3:35:03 PM
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Vagel: Just a thought - instead of trying to do a even transition from coarse to fine all the way up, consider doing maybe the lower half mostly coarse foliage, with the fine above it, to maybe give the impression of a close hillside, with a more distant one behind.
DM |
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Vagel Keller
Crew Chief
USA
722 Posts |
Posted - 01/06/2010 : 4:29:19 PM
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We delved further into the Howard Zane rosin paper scenery method today, but before posting those pictures ...
Deane, the idea is to create the illusion of horizontal distance on a single ridge as it climbs toward the crest. The modeler whose article I mentioned (wish I could find the MR issue where I mislaid it) actually uses multiple layers of 1/2" styrofoam with declining sizes of ground foam, over-sprayed with light blue acrylic paint as they recede. I don't have that much depth to play with -- there's only an inch or so behind the trestle -- so I have to rely on the painted ridge lines a la Mark "Dry Fork's" method for the more distant hills.
Actually, George, I'm going to finish the piece flat on the workbench and install it after it's all dry. I held off soldering the rail joints above and below the trestle in case we had to remove it to finish the scene, so it won't be a problem while we're fiddling with the backdrop. I like that idea of mixing the ground foam as a paste, although I'm not sure how it would work with fall foliage ... might work for distant foliage but you'd want more distinction between reds, golds, and greens on a close ridge, I'd think. I could mix up different batches and work them in ... Hey, I'm likin' that idea even better!
Rick, I was pleasantly surprised to find two really instructive and innovative scenery articles in MR in 2009. The still unattributed piece on 3D backdrops and a more recent piece by the Great Sam Swanson on roads that seem to go on forever but actually only occupy an inch of space between the track and the backdrop. Both articles are timed perfectly to this ravine trestle project and the scenery conundrum I created for myself.
We added another six linear feet of so of scenery base today below the ravine trestle adapting Howard Zane's variation on the cardboard lattice and hardshell method. First, though, we positioned trestle bents and measured the length for the skewed king post truss road overpass at Ft. Loudon (it's 43'). The short bent will be replaced by a concrete or cribbing-and-rubble abutment in the final version.
Then we got to work cutting strips of cardboard and hot-gluing them between the sub-roadbed on the Buchanan Branch and the lower level. With those in place, I started weaving the horizontal strips and hot-gluing them to the vertical strips.
You have to be careful when pressing the two pieces of cardboard together, so as not to get hot glue on your fingy-wingies, because
it [:-censored] BURNS![:-dunce]
But even with the occasional call to the Burn Center this process went quickly and we were soon ready for the rosin paper and glue stage ...
... which went even faster; it took us less than 30 minutes to cover the whole area. Don mixed 1 part water to 2 parts white glue, which was still thick but spread much more easily than our first experiment with full-strength glue. We cut the rosin paper in to approx. 12" squares and crumpled then flattened them back out. We then brushed glue on the side that went against the cardboard frame, laid the square in place, and painted more glue onto its surface.
By the way, at Don's suggestion we're going to leave the pink foam section down grade from the trestle loose for access in case of a derailment.
When I got back from Ritters, the whole thing was nearly dry. There are some spots with gaps at the lap joints, but these can be easily fixed. Also, as the rosin paper dries one can discern the pattern of the cardboard grid, but I assume that layers of paint, ground cover, and rock castings will disguise that.
I put together what will be a normal-length train on the branch to get some perspective, and was quite pleased to note that as it passed from one view block behind another, the locomotive was disappearing before the caboose came into full view. And the train stays hidden for 2-3 seconds before emerging at the trestle.
All in all I'm quite pleased with the result. I intended this to be a quasi-temporary solution to make this section presentable for up-coming open houses while we got serious at Buchanan, but now I'm not so sure it won't become permanent. It's certainly far more time-efficient, cheaper, and less messy than styrofoam. We'll see how things work out ... for now it's time to put the ravine trestle scene to bed, the subject (I hope) of our next update.
See you on the railroad,
Vagel
PS, George take my word for it, there were a bunch of impromptu work sessions that began before the final gun on Steelers Sunday this season!
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Edited by - Vagel Keller on 01/06/2010 6:33:01 PM |
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Frederic Testard
Engineer
France
16456 Posts |
Posted - 01/06/2010 : 7:11:06 PM
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Nice progress on your scenery, Vagel. Just a note about the cardboard web and its glueing. Hot glue is a fairly quick way to do it, that fits particularly well when you glue the card to a backdrop for instance. But to glue two pieces of cardboard together, you can also use white glue and hold the joint with plastic clamps. If you have enough clamps, you won't waste time because when you've finished using them, the first joint has set enough to let you use the clamp again.
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Frederic Testard |
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Vagel Keller
Crew Chief
USA
722 Posts |
Posted - 01/06/2010 : 7:26:56 PM
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Thanks, Frederic. Good advice on the white glue alternative, which got me to thinking about a heavy duty squeeze grip stapler.
Vagel |
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mainetrains
Fireman
USA
1373 Posts |
Posted - 01/06/2010 : 7:31:23 PM
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quote:
Originally posted by Vagel Keller
Thanks, Frederic. Good advice on the white glue alternative, which got me to thinking about a heavy duty squeeze grip stapler.
Vagel
You have to be careful with those staplers...
stapling a finger hurts an awful lot too.
Dave [:-banghead] |
"there's something happening here, what it is ain't exactly clear"
Check out the Hard Knox Valley Railroad at -
http://www.mainetrains.webs.com/ |
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Frederic Testard
Engineer
France
16456 Posts |
Posted - 01/06/2010 : 8:02:10 PM
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Taking Dave's remark into account, I think that the stappler idea may not be bad. I had never thought of using it for this job. Might be worth trying it (even if some fitting in awkward places won't be possible with a stappler).
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Frederic Testard |
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George D
Moderator
USA
9916 Posts |
Posted - 01/06/2010 : 8:33:43 PM
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When it comes to cardboard strips, I use a hot glue gun. Yea, you get burned once in a while, but it’s a quick reliable way of fastening everything together.
I don’t know what rosin paper is. I crinkle up paper from shopping bags for my covering and it seems to hide the strips.
Good idea to keep the piece of foam loose for derailments, but now that you’ve done it, you won’t get any derailments there.
George
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Topic |
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New Home for the Blacklog & Shade Gap Eastern
