Garden and railway complete re-hash

Hi Guys, well had a break for dinner then had another go when the sun went round the front of the house and  things cooled down a bit at the back in the shade. Heres the state of play at the end of the day. G scale track fixing timbers laid right round the corner and a hand rail cemented in place. While still fairly steady on my feet at 63 I might no be so steady in years to come so I'm thinkin ahead,plus theres always the night I might have had too much to drink and need a wee bit support ...lol  

Way to go Davy, A man after my own heart! Think ahead, I never did then one day it bit me in the A**! Now I take every day new and exciting and plan for the long haul!

Hi Guys, well not much physical progress on the layout today, spent the day collecting stones from a local river for the scenic work on the layout . Another lovely day again, ....worse places to pass a day....mind you humphing the stones up the river side wasn't much fun, just about dead on my feet tonight,but hey ho, no pain no gain eh ?  .So heres me today...(PS hope the movie works ????)

Hi Davy, hard work always pays off in the end! All I got for a video was a black screen and the sound of the river.

mike g. posted:

Hi Davy, hard work always pays off in the end! All I got for a video was a black screen and the sound of the river.

Hi Mike, sorry about the lack of visual on the video, afraid I remain hopeless at curing this problem,works OK this end ???? .As for the hard work, ....does make the effort worthwhile when you achieve the desired results........onwards and upwards !!

Hi Davy, the Video worked great in the Email you sent me. Makes me feel right at home, I grew up and a river just like that with all the green trees here in the Pacific Northwest!!! Always green around here! Thanks for bringing back memories!

mike g. posted:

Hi Davy, the Video worked great in the Email you sent me. Makes me feel right at home, I grew up and a river just like that with all the green trees here in the Pacific Northwest!!! Always green around here! Thanks for bringing back memories!

Hi Mike, ...one thing we're not short of in Scotland is rivers and water ...... ,this river ,the Avon, spills into the bigger River Clyde and as part of ,eventually runs through Glasgow to the sea beyond.....  

Hi Guys, just received this pic from my next door neighbour, was taken a couple of years ago..   glad to say the whale-gut is greatly reduced these days .... My garden used to go downhill to the same level as my neighbour at this side.... however as we all know trains like it more level  ,so had to build up my plot to level of course.... built that wall I'm standin on too, as you can see it involved collecting a few stones ......  

Davy, you ROCK !

Davy, Now that your showing your past, I am starting to thing your just a rock hound and using trains to hide the fact that you like picking rocks!

Hi Mike,love workin with natural stone. Always on the hunt for stones with "character" .Particularly so for tryin to get a kinda scale look adjacent to the train tracks. I picked up some really nice stones today, probably wont get anythin done with them till next week though now as the  good weather has to succumb to rain tomorrow for a couple of days, .....

Rock and rolls  on the baggies!

Hi Guys, well finally gettin around to some scenic work on the O gauge layout. Staged this wee photo shoot just to give you an idea where its goin. I;ve planted the first miniature spruce.Its in very little soil but has slow release fertiliser in the compost. These are very slow growing and it will be years before it gets to any size and with the very small amount of soil it has should be very stunted hopefully having somewhat of a bonsai effect. So the "mountain"scenery makes a start.

Hi Guys, just pushin on with the scenic work today , very time consuming ,but hey ho... gettin there. 

Davy, pushin-on and rockin-on ! Looks great !

Looks great Davy! If I made our yard look like that I bet my wife would let me put trains in it. But we have a huge yard, and I'm still trying to just get grass in! Love your work!

Arthur posted:

Davy, pushin-on and rockin-on ! Looks great !

Cheers Arthur, ....need to get more stones out the river, river level was up the last couple of days due to heavy rainfall,however sunny and dry again so hopefully the water level will be back down off the  patch where I get the rocks. Still need a whole lot of stuff yet to complete things. Once I get that side I'm working on finished I need to make up my mind exactly where the loco stabling area and turntable will be allocated. haven't made my mind up exactly yet. I also have to fit in an access path and the G scale line. Anyway,all good fun ! 

mike g. posted:

Looks great Davy! If I made our yard look like that I bet my wife would let me put trains in it. But we have a huge yard, and I'm still trying to just get grass in! Love your work!

Thanks Mike.  Tryin so hard to get the scenic work and hardscaping done before winter sets in,but everything seems to take so long , still ,its comin together !!    

Looking very good Davy.

I can't wait to get started on my 1st attempt at a small outdoor garden layout this fall. Been accumulating materials all summer for it just watching you and reading.

You sure can intimidate a new outside layout beginner. hee hee just kidding.

Keep up the excellent work. Enjoy watching your progress and especially the techniques you are teaching us new guys that are venturing into the world of G gauge.    Me ........ totally lost.

Larry

Hi Larry, thanks,

Larry Sr. posted:

Looking very good Davy.

I can't wait to get started on my 1st attempt at a small outdoor garden layout this fall. Been accumulating materials all summer for it just watching you and reading.

You sure can intimidate a new outside layout beginner. hee hee just kidding.

Keep up the excellent work. Enjoy watching your progress and especially the techniques you are teaching us new guys that are venturing into the world of G gauge.    Me ........ totally lost.

Larry

Hi Larry,  just bear in mind that some of my techniques might not suit some US climate zones. Severe frost heave being the main one potentially methinks. However having spoken to some Canadian garden railway modellers in the past who have to cope with some severe frosts of a winter,their main frost antedote seems to be good layout drainage. "No water retention = no frost heave" seems to be the order of the day in Canada. I don't know how different your climate is in Tennessee ?.  Anyway ,good luck with your project.  

Thanks for that info Davy.

I will send ya some photos when my G gauge ADVENTURE starts

Just like my O gauge I will be winging it on the fly

Larry

Larry Sr. posted:

Thanks for that info Davy.

I will send ya some photos when my G gauge ADVENTURE starts

Just like my O gauge I will be winging it on the fly

Larry

I'll look forward to that Larry. One real mistake folk often make when tryin to do rockeries etc is to make great big piles of topsoil and stick boulders in it. Just not the way to go. The rocks just sink into the soil and never look right. Becomes a mess in heavy rain etc.,  Better to make your scenery on  a rubble base.Any old rubble's fine ,or crushed rock whatever, then place your finishing rockery stones in place.They'll never move. I then apply a shallow compost/rough sand mix ,stick in your miniature plants/trees etc., and top off with a pea gravel.  Bullet proof tried and tested method. Alpine plants in nature grow in poor thin soils in mountain country,so basically ....copy nature.... 

 .

hi Guys, started to ballast the G scale layout. Granite 6mm chips. Don't know exactly what colour they'll be when the dust washes off them but they look OK.

Looks just wonderful Davy, a lot of work there. Please tell me you didn't get that out of the river also! LOL

mike g. posted:

Looks just wonderful Davy, a lot of work there. Please tell me you didn't get that out of the river also! LOL

Hi Mike, no, I noticed it yesterday while in the builder's merchants yard and bought a few bags. Its fine for the G scale 45mm track but I think it will look too big against the O gauge track. Anyway I'll try some against the O gauge and see what it looks like.There is a finer grade of crushing we call whin-dust, only problem is  its a red rock. And in Scotland we actually do have areas where the mainline 1 to 1 scale tracks are ballasted with red ballast. So would look OK if I was only running Scottish trains but have never seen red ballast in the states or in mainland Europe ???? Anyway, we'll see. I used to get a fine grey quarry grit years ago but the quarry I used to get it from has new personnel and they are health and safety nuts, the old guys that used to work there would let you in to fill bags of the stuff for a few bucks but not these days...   God knows how we survived without health and safety regulations in days gone by.. . 

HI Guys, not a lot done yesterday but I got the G scale track bed edged with stones to retain the ballast along the house face. I can now get the wall strapped and timbered and painted..... just another finishing job of many still needing done !  

I like the Ballasting of the track Davy nice work!

Seacoast posted:

I like the Ballasting of the track Davy nice work!

Cheers George !!

Hi Guys, well got the wall strapped and mostly boarded yesterday,Just about to finish it off and get it painted. Treated timber strips were nailed to the concrete blocks using masonry nails then the strips were bitumined. Then boarding nailed to the timber strips. 

Great work Davy, what's next?

mike g. posted:

Great work Davy, what's next?

Hi Mike, have worked away all afternoon finishing this and gettin it painted. Just waitin for paint to dry as I write this. Umpteen things still to be done,... plenty to do yet on the O gauge section up the back,however have family comin to visit from Canada in a few weeks so I want to have the main bit of the garden finished and tidied up for them appearing.  Next on the menu is finishing the still to be done stonework and planting on the back left hand side of the pond. Plus the remaining stonework and track laying on the G scale line down the right hand side .

Hi Guys, well working on finishing off the stonework etc., at the back left hand corner of the pond. Quite a bit to be done here . Couple of progress pics attached....still a ways to go ! 

Looking Great Davy, everything is blending very nicely! so do you have a plan your fallowing or just placing everything on what looks best to you? Either way your doing a smash up job!

mike g. posted:

Looking Great Davy, everything is blending very nicely! so do you have a plan your fallowing or just placing everything on what looks best to you? Either way your doing a smash up job!

Hi Mike,just work to a picture in ma head.... was quite tired today so didn't do any more heavy work,however I cleared weeds and stuff from up the left hand side of the garden and the G scale loco yard area and laid some track and ballast. Another couple of hours or so work will see the loco yard area completely finished. 

Busy workin this weekend but got a bit more ballasting done on the G scale....

Progressing nicely Davy. 

Don

Looking good Davy, you will have the G rail done in no time!

mike g. posted:

Looking good Davy, you will have the G rail done in no time!

Hi Guys,well had a good long shift at the garden today, Now have all the G scale track-base timbers in place. Only track to be laid now is one piece next to the turntable, about 9ft or so in the back area to join up with the track I laid today round the wee hut and shed.then, along the R/H fence towards the house. That will be all the G scale track in situ. Was gettin dark as I took these pics.... 

Hi Guys, in the cold light of (a very wet) day..... lower garden and G scale line almost done, ...glad I got all the G scale base-timbers set in cement yesterday. Intended to lay the remaining G track today however heavy rain so ...no go. Not much to do now to get the G scale up and running  and ditto for the final stonework/planting and ground dressing touches for the last of the garden ... where the barrow is sitting is the last of the garden work to be done to tie in that corner..., how much further I get with the O scale layout up the back before the winter frosts turn up will depend entirely on weather 

Davy, once again very nice, are you sure you don't have a little army helping you? You get so much done for just one guy!