What did you do on your layout today?

The work on the drop ceiling continued today. Patrick and I finished boxing in the final section of ductwork in the corner. Then we hung sheetrock on the vertical surfaces, which allowed us to finish L rail in the north half of the room. We also got the last of the eye bolts up, so we are ready to start hanging the main rails.













Thursday, we'll have to flip a coin to see if we do L rail in the south half of the room, or start hanging T rail in the north half. I have to say it would be nice to be done with all of the L.

It may not be layout work, but it all needs to be done.

 

P.S. One consecutive day without a work related injury.

Today was the first opportunity I have had in the past few days to work on the railroad. I have been busy with client activities up until late this afternoon.

 

I installed eight trees in the grass strip between the benchwork edge and the road in the new train station complex. This covered an expanse of over 21 ft. I then started to install the gooseneck street lights that go in between the trees. This sure looks good and dresses up this area. The metal gooseneck Lionel street lights are spectacular and one of the best options for street lights. I have used them extensively in other parts of the layout and not only do they look good, they give off a very nice amount of light. I will post pictures of them when I finish installing them.

Hey Elliot.... Glad to hear you and Patrick are back at it and am sure once ceiling is finished the work will resume on the rails again.

we 3 vagabonds are currently in Newport,Oregon enjoying the views and the rain!

 

$oo

Today I made some progress on the creosote plant.  Another Ameri-towne building I picked up at York, "Acme Machine Co.", had two walls replaced with closely appearing

sheets of Holgate & Reynolds plastic brick material (unfortunately, no longer available)

to eliminate many windows. All four wall were washed with thin white acrylic to fill

in the mortar joints, remaining doors and window frames were painted, and all are assembled waiting roof and "glass".  This building, now slightly larger,  is the office building for the plant, as other parts for the treatment plant are not here yet.  Will

probably scratchbuild some kind of boiler room on which to mount a tank of heated

creosote next.

Yeah Ray, between the surgery, the layout tours and Patrick's real job, we didn't get much done the last couple weeks. Things are starting to pick up again, and by the time you visit in August, I hope to have power on the new helix, and trains running through the new lower level.

 

Have fun on your travels!

My parts for my creosote retorts came in today, but I will get nothing done, for with them floated in the MTH catalog, and Narrow Gauge and Short Line Gazette...probably

blow the rest of the day in the Lazy Boy, feet up, turning pages..

Did the last of the wiring today. I now have seven working gooseneck street lights in the new train station complex and all of Jack Pearce's lighted vehicles are doing their thing. It is nice when a plan comes together with the grass strip between the edge of the layout and the street in the station area came out better than expected with the new trees and lights. I also love the color of the Lionel gooseneck street lights that in this batch are a medium green.

 

Not a lot left to do after today. The new park benches came in with the fountains that all go in the new station area. Also have to add figures and that is about it. It has been three months in the process.

 

I came up with an idea to add a shed roof over the station platform on the elevated tracks above the station.

The L rails are all done except for 2 small pieces, which are easy to reach. I'll get those taken care of Saturday. The south half of the room would have been a perfect rectangle, but we had to box around the tops of two air return grills. That's where the 2 pieces go.

 

The nimble Patrick flies around the layout like it was a jungle gym, while I nearly fell off the second step of the ladder. That would have hurt.

 

In order to complete the project we moved things that hadn't been touched in close to 8 years. It seems that a mouse had decided to use a Rail King signal package as its personal bathroom. I've set some traps down there, but I think the mouse has either moved on or passed on.

 

Next Wednesday, eye bolts on the south half, and start the T rails. Let's see if I can get back to some track laying this weekend, it's been a while.

 

Hi Guys,  I really enjoy reading this thread on my daily commute from Tacoma to Seattle!  I have needed to put aside layout work for a while, so this post provides some pictures of my progress to enlarge my 8x8 Lionel type display layout by adding a 12 inch extension on each side.  I also raised the layout by about 6 inches so I could place 4 cabinets at each corner to enhance the stability. I will add a loop of track that will have 54 inch curves so I can run bigger engines. A tunnel will also need to be modified. Lastly, I added shelves and found out that the wall was not straight!

I completed setting the road/track and wiring a 4 x 3 foot oval "hilltop" with two "streets ovals that will crown my layout's town area and connect to my country road.

This was a big completion day. After three months, we put the finishing touches on the layout today. Populated the new station complex with more accessories, added cars to the roads in this area, and got the City part of the layout up and running after being dormant for three months. Feels good to have the layout fully back in service.

 

Many thanks go to Alex Malliae for his work on the new train station, stairways going to the elevated tracks, and the new additions in the refinery area. He is a very talented individual and made out changes even more special.

Today I finished two buildings for the creosote plant complex....the HQ/office building,

a kitbashed Ameri-towne "Acme Machine Co.", and a boiler house, kitbashed from the

pump house from that Lionel water tower kit, which I always replace with a round or

octagonal stone base, with an Ameri-towne water tower, and tall stack added to it.  The parts came in for the retort doors, but are too small for the PVC pipe that will be the retorts, so I had to create a wider ring for them.  The PVC pipe/retorts have to be big enough to run track with a couple of flatcars into them, so the corrugated metal building that covers them will be LARGE.  I just got the closed ends on the retorts

tonight, so no light at the end of those tunnels.....

Finally finished the prep-painting of the new engine servicing facility, ready for turnouts, track, and structures.  Then ground covering of some sort ...

 

 

I claim the lines are where the water pipe system was laid ...

My cousin came over and I helped him install a track lighting system; 12 positionable spots. This replaced a ceiling fan with 4 tulip lights. And then there was light.

The layout room is a bedroom in the apartment of our two family house; so I couldn't go hog wild with multiple lighting circuits. This is a 1000% improvement. While my rolling workbench was out of the room I reconfigured the power supply.

Looks like work has slowed on a lot of our layouts.  Summer is here and we are all spending more time outside.  I haven't done any work to the layout itself in awhile but I have been working with Alex Malliae on the design of my future car ferry he is building me.  He is just about done with it and I will be out to his place in July to pick it up.  I have designed the trackwork on how it will be installed.  The ferry itself will be on a cart so it can sail away.  The loading ramp will also be on the cart and will fold down when the ferry is sailing away.  

 

Here is a RR tracks pic of my trackplan.  I hope to be building the cart soon.

 

Placed the recently received taxi cabs on the layout. This completed the cab holding lot.

 

Patrick had to work yesterday, so I was on my own. I started hanging the main T's for the ceiling. Suddenly I was on a roll and decided to climb on the layout in order to hang the center most one. I just have 2 more 12' sections that are hard to reach, and then it's smooth sailing. I'll get those tomorrow. The whole north section of the grid should be done by Sunday. I hope to order the tiles on Saturday so they can be delivered next week.

 

Once the ceiling is done there will be no more distractions, layout construction all the way.

Put the last of it out to the street

 

 Frank,

 

I have saved that photo and am going to model it somewhere on my layout.  In the meantime, this is what I just finished:

 

   

 

This week was a good work session on the G&O lines...the inner and outer loops of the O are tuned and ready for our show next weekend, June 8&9...staggering the outside rails and placing jumpers on each rail joint has been a great improvement to the continuity, signal strength and power distribution of the layout.

Next is to shore up the wall south of the yard and begin filing in the dirt to cover and support the inner loops road bed and risers.

I promise to add photos next week...

 

jz

yo big boy 4005 your email seems not to be working? another fine windows 8 issue??

 

glad to see your getting the ceiling closed in as it was a real distraction when I ran a train with you LOL. by the way folks if you get a chance go see big boys layout. online pictures are nice but in person it is huge and setup to be run as a real railroad the shear size would have overloaded the rr track software programs.

hope to see you Both in August and see what you have accomplished on the layout.

 

I haven't worked on my own layout since May 1 hope to get back to it while the temps in phoenix ramp up our form of winter LOL.

 

$oo

Yesterday and this morning I repainted the one creosote retort that was misprayed

GLOSS black vs. flat black, painted the Ameri-towne kitbashed drygoods store, outside

and trim....still working on that, and am mulling over adding a chimney and a leanto or other expansion, and, while waiting for paint to dry, I put together and painted a Blair Line Conoco sign to go with this Conoco gas station kit I got at York last October.  I am also going to reconsider using larger pipe (PVC) for the retorts, which

would mean doing them over, but I'd like to be able to run bulkhead flats into them.

I think some of these plants used dedicated narrow gauge cars to run into the retorts,

but I want to move cars around with three rail locos.

well for the last week i've removed all fastrack and im buying up super-O and super snap products as well as postwar O-22 switches.

 

will miss the realiability of fastrack switches but have fell in love with the looks of super snap and especially super-O track.

 

going to use cork under the track now so i know the noise level will be entirely different as opposed to the fastrack.

 

terry.........

Replacing a problematic curved #6 with a new one ... moving the problem to a location where I can access it without crawling over a tabletop.

This will be an all-day adventure ...

New Update from Patsburg .... Home of the Free State Junction Railway.  

 

Today I glued in place an interior wall inside one of my new tunnels. Covered the top of the tunnel with foam board.  Also did some tidying up in the train room.  Ran a 26 car mixed freight with a Williams by Bachman Trainmaster ( powered ) and two Williams non powered ( Balwin sharkdnose and Alco FA 1 ) diesels on the point.   

 

Keep driving the spikes and running the trains on time.

Patrick W

The past couple of weeks I haven't done much with the layout. And have been ordering parts for some kits I just got in. The DR. wants me to keep off My stump of a leg for a couple of months with very few hours of standing on it. So I figured that I might need to get into building some kits.  So tomorrow I will get into trying to add some  Roberts brick formula and see how I do at that.  I do love seeing all of your work on some of these kits. And someday hope to join you guys in posting some photos.    Scot

Spending quite a bit of time putting in the trackwork and switches in one end of the new Engine Terminal area.  Thinking about backing up a bit and weathering the track as I put each piece in place.

$oo, my email is fine. Did you get the one I sent you Sunday afternoon?

 

I did finish the grid in the north half of the room, and the tiles were delivered Monday. I need to take some pictures.

 

Unfortunately, because of the swelling in my right arm, I'm supposed to spend the next three weeks in compression bandages. It's only day one and they're driving me nuts. It's hard to grip or carry anything. There's nothing special or particularly urgent about this treatment. I may just reschedule it.

 

Patrick is coming over Wednesday. I want to get the south half grid started, and begin the process of moving the 2 rows of lights in the north half. They're not centered over the aisles. Moving them over 2 feet will make them look better, and more effective. Thirteen years ago, I thought I had them in the right place.

Cleaned, dusted, and vacuumed, and decided to tidy-up some wandering ballast with a paint brush. Mundane but necessary.

I took apart my Atlas O 0-6-0, and stripped the tender for a repaint.  Have it in the booth now with the 1st coat of paint on it.  It will be painted and lettered for the Michigan and Great Lakes RR and be the locomotive primarily used to load up my car ferry.  

 

I also plan to convert it to kadees, and already have removed the front piolet.  It is an easy convert on the front coupler because Atlas had the 2 rail front piolet in stock.  The tender is pretty easy also. Just remove the speaker and drill for the kadee coupler.  

 

I also plan to replace the speaker with a much higher quality one and build some baffles to get better sound.  

 

Today a glued in some styrofoam supports.  Maximum of about 10 minutes.  That all.

Cheers,

Patrick W

Building the subway station.......

 

Painted the warning stripes this past weekend.

 

Peter

I was able to get all the decals applied to the tender last night.  The shell is just sitting on the frame for the photo.  I need to add a real coal load and do the kadee couplers this week.  I will also have to order a new speaker.

I ran some trains for a very short while.  No construction today.

Well I laid out all the finished wall sections and painted the window sashes. All I can say is whoa!

 

All 22 walls hand painted and assembled, ready to go UP.

 

That's a lot of laser cut window sashes. 1 external sash, then clear styrene, then the interior sash for all the windows. I haven't counted them, I don't even wanna know lol

Patrick was here today. Normally I would say "we" got a lot done, but with my "mummy arm", most of the doing was done by Patrick. For warmups, he placed 3 rows of ceiling tiles. Then I lent a hand (literally) hanging the 2x4's so both rows of lights could be moved. We even got one row moved.

It was a rather slick operation. We disconnected the wire from the feed end because it was going to be too short for the move anyway. Then we went to the far end of the chain, removed the romex staples and loosened the clamps. This allowed us enough slack to reposition the fixtures without ever disconnecting any wires. When everything was reassembled, we added a junction box and a short piece of wire to bridge the gap.

Next week we can repeat this process on the other row.

This was before we started today. I hung all the grid last week.




The lights are back on after being moved. Patrick is hanging more tiles.



The room seems darker, but it really isn't. The camera is being tricked into flash mode. Some of the light is being lost above the ceiling. I have the material to make some reflector panels which will direct the light down into the room.

Absolutely nothing!

 

My bad.

 

 

 

 

 

 

Looking really good Big Boy!   

 

 

I added a real coal load to my Atlas O 0-8-0's tender.  I made sure to sprinkle around some loose pieces of coal on the foot board and on top of the tender.  I am really surprised at the level of detail that the Atlas O has but they used a molded in coal load.  I guess that is why it is their one and only steam locomotive.  

Good going big boy ceiling looking nice. Am wondering if you will need some rope lights under second level to eliminate shadows while running the trains?

$oo