What did you do on your layout today?

mike g. posted:

Hi everyone, I would replay to everyone's post. But to be honest I am to tired today so all I can say is!

GREAT JOB BY EVERYONE!

I totally hear ya Mike I feel the same way, whipped. Fourteen hours on the layout over the weekend.

Mark - There's nothing like not having a mortgage. I love it!

Thanks to all of those who hit the like button. It seems that scenery is very popular with this crowd, far more than electrical.

I took these this morning, showing yesterday's progress.

I added the embankment along nearly the entire length of the scene.

I also ballasted a good chunk of the lower track. That's all glued and the rails cleaned.

Before I added the embankment, I attached some scraps of OSB to the bottom of the roadbed. This will allow me to support the bluff along the backdrop. Haven't decided on the material yet, but there's a good chance it'll be foam. Take pieces of 2" and stand them on edge and do a little carving.

Here's the long shot looking west.

This is the long shot looking east, but there's something noteworthy in this one as well. In the lower left, there's a small line of ballast on the upper track. Because the embankment is so steep in that area, due to how close the tracks are, I placed a small line of caulk to act as a ledge to hold the ballast. Eventually there will be some carved rock there.

Tonight, I might ballast the upper track, down to the far switch. Can't go further than that until I get some kind of dam in there to hold the ballast on the back side. That's an issue I'm frequently fighting.

mike g. posted:

Adriatic posted:

Looks good Mitch, but I have to wonder .....

I've improved the body of the bench work on Brian's design for Mike too. Running on beer seems to be the wave of the future

LOL thanks for the idea! Brian is right about the coors, but that's a lot of kegs!

Ninety nine kegs of beer on the floor, ninety nine kegs of beer, roll one out and pass it around...

as long as the layout is still standing, even if the engineer isn't.

Looks good Elliot- Shout out for the electrical work. I like it

Bob

I agree with Bob, Elliot. Things are looking really good! I love all your post!

Elliot, I should just get a rubber stamp saying looking good LOL. Your forward motion is unreal. The stamina that you show day in and day out just shows your conviction to getting it done. Also how great everything is coming together. You are right about people liking to watch scenery going in rather then electrical. I think the majority of us get anxious on that segment of building, sort of like a last resort putting it off as long as possible. Lazy day for me today I did more surfing the net for stuff and had to make a run to get a ink cartridge because I ran out. I did manage to get the other tunnel portal cover with foliage. I then decided to glue down two sheets of brick. Later I'll mix up some plaster to do that area to the left under the bridge and coming out to the road. Pics...................Paul

"Ninety nine kegs of beer on the floor, ninety nine kegs of beer, roll one out and pass it around...

as long as the layout is still standing, even if the engineer isn't."

           party at MIKE's house

Thanks guys! There's still some electrical left in me. 

Time to get moving, my dialysis run is winding down. Later!

paul 2 posted:

Elliot, I should just get a rubber stamp saying looking good LOL. Your forward motion is unreal. The stamina that you show day in and day out just shows your conviction to getting it done. Also how great everything is coming together. You are right about people liking to watch scenery going in rather then electrical. I think the majority of us get anxious on that segment of building, sort of like a last resort putting it off as long as possible. Lazy day for me today I did more surfing the net for stuff and had to make a run to get a ink cartridge because I ran out. I did manage to get the other tunnel portal cover with foliage. I then decided to glue down two sheets of brick. Later I'll mix up some plaster to do that area to the left under the bridge and coming out to the road. Pics...................Paul

Paul .. that look good!  So that is a road tunnel eh?  Looks cool.   Where is that road coming from? 

Jim 

Finally got started laying track.

Thanks Jim, as to your question I have no idea. It most certainly goes somewhere and comes from somewhere. When I was doing the upper level road way and was deciding on the flex walls as an after thought I found portals from Chooch that were very close to the height of the walls with a bit of cutting off the bottom and almost match the brick pattern. So the road comes in and out, or will come in and out to a lower level of buildings. A little more rundown area of town. Because of the width I cut the brick both on the upper and lower roadways they will be one way traffic except for the upper road that comes off the end of the table. That would be two way traffic with no parking  allowed.............Paul

carsntrains posted:

paul 2 posted:

Elliot, I should just get a rubber stamp saying looking good LOL. Your forward motion is unreal. The stamina that you show day in and day out just shows your conviction to getting it done. Also how great everything is coming together. You are right about people liking to watch scenery going in rather then electrical. I think the majority of us get anxious on that segment of building, sort of like a last resort putting it off as long as possible. Lazy day for me today I did more surfing the net for stuff and had to make a run to get a ink cartridge because I ran out. I did manage to get the other tunnel portal cover with foliage. I then decided to glue down two sheets of brick. Later I'll mix up some plaster to do that area to the left under the bridge and coming out to the road. Pics...................Paul

Paul .. that look good!  So that is a road tunnel eh?  Looks cool.   Where is that road coming from? 

Jim 

Come on Jim, if you look to the right you can tell its coming from the laundry Matt!

Looks great Paul, Its nice how you were able to hide the seams, wonderful work!

mike g. posted:

carsntrains posted:

paul 2 posted:

Elliot, I should just get a rubber stamp saying looking good LOL. Your forward motion is unreal. The stamina that you show day in and day out just shows your conviction to getting it done. Also how great everything is coming together. You are right about people liking to watch scenery going in rather then electrical. I think the majority of us get anxious on that segment of building, sort of like a last resort putting it off as long as possible. Lazy day for me today I did more surfing the net for stuff and had to make a run to get a ink cartridge because I ran out. I did manage to get the other tunnel portal cover with foliage. I then decided to glue down two sheets of brick. Later I'll mix up some plaster to do that area to the left under the bridge and coming out to the road. Pics...................Paul

Paul .. that look good!  So that is a road tunnel eh?  Looks cool.   Where is that road coming from? 

Jim 

Come on Jim, if you look to the right you can tell its coming from the laundry Matt!

Looks great Paul, Its nice how you were able to hide the seams, wonderful work!

OK Mike you got me on that one....   LOL 

Jim 

Big_Boy_4005 posted:

mike g. posted:

Adriatic posted:

Looks good Mitch, but I have to wonder .....

I've improved the body of the bench work on Brian's design for Mike too. Running on beer seems to be the wave of the future

LOL thanks for the idea! Brian is right about the coors, but that's a lot of kegs!

Ninety nine kegs of beer on the floor, ninety nine kegs of beer, roll one out and pass it around...

as long as the layout is still standing, even if the engineer isn't.

Nice Elliot, I guess I will have to hold off so I make sure the building can stand alone!

Well I did what I said I was going to. After dinner I went down to continue. Before I mixed any plaster I put my Cooter's building down and marked the footprint. After mixing a small batch I started under to overpass and worked my way out stopping at the brick road. I had already glued the brick road down but I decided that since I had some sidewalk left over from doing the upper level I added two pieces to the side Cooter's is on. Glue down the sidewalk, got some pieces of wood, laid them on top and then placed a jar of plaster on top for weight. Then I finished plastering around the footprint. I still had a small amount left so I added to the brewery area in a couple of spots. Tomorrow I'll start adding coloring to the plaster and then later add ground turf. Pics..................Paul

Looks good Paul! It sure is nice how you make things look so easy! LOL

We're moving right along. Paul hooked me up yet again, so I swapped my old crummy O27 for the better stuff he sent me.

I fixed the other Marx Switch Tower (the brake light tape works well) and moved it to the other side of the track. Got the accessory transformer in place and in phase and I'm ready to run the bus wires.

I had purchased a couple of blinking yellow LEDs that could be used with the Just Plug system. Broke out one of my Plasticville Signal Bridges and I think it'll look ok. I'm going to hot glue that LED in place.

Today is my Birthday!  52..  So we went and got Mexican for dinner.   Packed the wrongly packaged reindeer cars up to be mailed back to the dealer tomorrow! They sent me a prepaid shipping label today.  As soon as that is refunded I can order the A pack of reindeer cars from a new dealer!  Waiting on the Menards American power, and small feed store to come in.  Interested to see where I'm going to put them : )   

Jim 

Deuce posted:

We're moving right along. Paul hooked me up yet again, so I swapped my old crummy O27 for the better stuff he sent me.

I fixed the other Marx Switch Tower (the brake light tape works well) and moved it to the other side of the track. Got the accessory transformer in place and in phase and I'm ready to run the bus wires.

I had purchased a couple of blinking yellow LEDs that could be used with the Just Plug system. Broke out one of my Plasticville Signal Bridges and I think it'll look ok. I'm going to hot glue that LED in place.

Deuce.  I ran my grounds from transformer to transformer.  Uses a lot less wire.     The went directly from the transformer to the bus wire.   When I ran my last bus, I drilled holes in the bench work big enough to slide wire through.   So when I had to take it apart my dang crimp on ends wouldn't fit through the holes, nor would my solder joints to drops connected to the track from the bus wire.     BOOOO   silly Jim!!   Learned a lesson lol 

Jim 

carsntrains posted:

Today is my Birthday!  52..  So we went and got Mexican for dinner.   Packed the wrongly packaged reindeer cars up to be mailed back to the dealer tomorrow! They sent me a prepaid shipping label today.  As soon as that is refunded I can order the A pack of reindeer cars from a new dealer!  Waiting on the Menards American power, and small feed store to come in.  Interested to see where I'm going to put them : )   

Jim 

Happy birthday

      Arms don't grow on trees so I made them from trees. Sprue, see?

So you sprue-ced him up?  ;-) 

Mitch 

carsntrains posted:

Deuce posted:

We're moving right along. Paul hooked me up yet again, so I swapped my old crummy O27 for the better stuff he sent me.

I fixed the other Marx Switch Tower (the brake light tape works well) and moved it to the other side of the track. Got the accessory transformer in place and in phase and I'm ready to run the bus wires.

I had purchased a couple of blinking yellow LEDs that could be used with the Just Plug system. Broke out one of my Plasticville Signal Bridges and I think it'll look ok. I'm going to hot glue that LED in place.

Deuce.  I ran my grounds from transformer to transformer.  Uses a lot less wire.     The went directly from the transformer to the bus wire.   When I ran my last bus, I drilled holes in the bench work big enough to slide wire through.   So when I had to take it apart my dang crimp on ends wouldn't fit through the holes, nor would my solder joints to drops connected to the track from the bus wire.     BOOOO   silly Jim!!   Learned a lesson lol 

Jim 

carsntrains posted:

Today is my Birthday!  52..  So we went and got Mexican for dinner.   Packed the wrongly packaged reindeer cars up to be mailed back to the dealer tomorrow! They sent me a prepaid shipping label today.  As soon as that is refunded I can order the A pack of reindeer cars from a new dealer!  Waiting on the Menards American power, and small feed store to come in.  Interested to see where I'm going to put them : )   

Jim 

Jim, Happy Birthday! I hope you have a great day with the family and find some time to run trains also!

"HAPPY BIRTHDAY" Jim. Have a great day...............Paul

M. Mitchell Marmel posted:

So you sprue-ced him up?  ;-) 

Mitch 

HAPPY BIRTHDAY JIM!!!!!!

This morning got downstairs right after breakfast. I wanted to get earth color on the plaster. That will be it till I get back home. It's the second Tuesday of the month and it is getting together with a bunch of others for a lunch. On the way home from that I am going to stop at Hobby Lobby to get some Balsa wood for the grade crossing. I basically have cardboard cut for the templates and I figure that this would be easier to cut in curves then Basswood plus I can stain it wood color for between the tracks and paint the rest concrete color. I tried to find photos of the transition from brick road to  going over the tracks. So far no luck so I will more then likely just used the aged concrete paint. Pics......................Paul

Looking great Paul! I'm sure you will make something great for the crossing!

Paul you could always try this!

Mike that looks like fake brick on the crossing??   Maybe poured and stamped concrete??   Still looks cool.  And yep Paul will do something great with his crossing!

Thanks folks for the B-day wishes!   

Lots of medals in the Olympics for us last night!   WOOO HOOO   We need an Olympic train!!! 

Jim

   That is a sharp edge on some very smooth brick.

It does look like model brick road mat.

Maybe someone can make a yellow brick road and an animated Judy Garland in O Scale skipping along it.

Arnold D. Cribari posted:

Maybe someone can make a yellow brick road and an animated Judy Garland in O Scale skipping along it.

And make a video playing  ''Goodbye Yellow Brick Road"  : )

Jim

carsntrains posted:

Arnold D. Cribari posted:

Maybe someone can make a yellow brick road and an animated Judy Garland in O Scale skipping along it.

And make a video playing  ''Goodbye Yellow Brick Road"  : )

Jim

Great idea, but it just so happens that IMHO the greatest song ever written is Over The Rainbow. So I’ll take Teenage Judy singing that over Elton John singing Goodbye Yellow Briick Road.

This is a matter of taste and purely subjective.

carsntrains posted:

Today is my Birthday!  52..  So we went and got Mexican for dinner.   Packed the wrongly packaged reindeer cars up to be mailed back to the dealer tomorrow! They sent me a prepaid shipping label today.  As soon as that is refunded I can order the A pack of reindeer cars from a new dealer!  Waiting on the Menards American power, and small feed store to come in.  Interested to see where I'm going to put them : )   

Jim 

Happy birthday, Jim!

mike g. posted:

Looking great Paul! I'm sure you will make something great for the crossing!

Paul you could always try this!

They are pre-cast covers

Found the company listing

http://www.centurygrp.com/Prod...Pedestrian-Crossings

Test ran the new Legacy NW2 switcher, back from warranty repair at "the Lionel dealer".  After about two minutes the grinding got louder, so I stopped it and when I removed it from the rail the rear truck fell off, dangling by the coupler wire.   Called Lionel who said send it to us this time ... and that this "model" is much nosier than the other engines Lionel offers.  At least this time I don't have to pay shipping .... Don't think we'll be buying more ... this is the 5th new engine in a row we've had to immediately send in for repairs.  Enough is enough.

Kerrigan posted:

Test ran the new Legacy NW2 switcher, back from warranty repair at "the Lionel dealer".  After about two minutes the grinding got louder, so I stopped it and when I removed it from the rail the rear truck fell off, dangling by the coupler wire.   Called Lionel who said send it to us this time ... and that this "model" is much nosier than the other engines Lionel offers.  At least this time I don't have to pay shipping .... Don't think we'll be buying more ... this is the 5th new engine in a row we've had to immediately send in for repairs.  Enough is enough.

That’s outrageous.

Kerrigan posted:

Test ran the new Legacy NW2 switcher, back from warranty repair at "the Lionel dealer".  After about two minutes the grinding got louder, so I stopped it and when I removed it from the rail the rear truck fell off, dangling by the coupler wire.   Called Lionel who said send it to us this time ... and that this "model" is much nosier than the other engines Lionel offers.  At least this time I don't have to pay shipping .... Don't think we'll be buying more ... this is the 5th new engine in a row we've had to immediately send in for repairs.  Enough is enough.

Looks like the repair person at the "lionel dealer" would have been aware that those were shipped with screws that were too short that hold the trucks on....... from China.  Ive been fortunate.  I have bought 6 and only one went back because I broke it.  

Knock on wood! 

Jim 

carsntrains posted:

Deuce posted:

We're moving right along. Paul hooked me up yet again, so I swapped my old crummy O27 for the better stuff he sent me.

I fixed the other Marx Switch Tower (the brake light tape works well) and moved it to the other side of the track. Got the accessory transformer in place and in phase and I'm ready to run the bus wires.

I had purchased a couple of blinking yellow LEDs that could be used with the Just Plug system. Broke out one of my Plasticville Signal Bridges and I think it'll look ok. I'm going to hot glue that LED in place.

Deuce.  I ran my grounds from transformer to transformer.  Uses a lot less wire.     The went directly from the transformer to the bus wire.   When I ran my last bus, I drilled holes in the bench work big enough to slide wire through.   So when I had to take it apart my dang crimp on ends wouldn't fit through the holes, nor would my solder joints to drops connected to the track from the bus wire.     BOOOO   silly Jim!!   Learned a lesson lol 

Jim 

Jim, happy birthday!

As for wire ... well, I have a bunch of it. More than I may likely ever need (even after I expand) so a few extra inches won't kill me (or the budget) at the moment.

I didn't do much on the layout today other than wire a few of the accessories prior to drilling holes and getting them under the layout. My issue is what I'm going to do with the controller wires. I think I could slip them under the tracks. That would be "less intrusive". If I drill, the holes will have to be pretty freaking big. I don't feel like drilling a 1/2" hole in the layout (three of them to be exact).