Stockrington - Mojo ignited. Thanks, Heljan!

[Jack P]

after seeing them used by the late Graham Jowett-Ive (Capt. Jango) on his Hannem layout.  Hard to believe it will soon be six years since he passed away.

 

Do you know, I was just thinking about him the other day. My god that layout of his was really impressive, and what a nice chap he was. I can't say I ever met him, but every interaction I had with him, he went right out of his way to offer as much help and guidance as possible. I've got the Hannem Central thread open in another tab and am going to have another inspirational look through.

 

It's really sad that he's no longer with us, do you have any idea what his family ended up doing with the railway?

 

The 'Hannem' Retaining wall looks excellent by the way!

Edited June 15, 2018 by Jack P

[jukebox]

Looking really good there Scott. Can’t believe it’s been six years since Graham passed. I used to really enjoy his videos and it was an excellent layout too.

 

Cheers

Tony

 

Thanks Tony.  I went for a look at his thread that has been preserved over at MRF, when I put the wall up... that's when I saw the dates.

 

 

Do you know, I was just thinking about him the other day. My god that layout of his was really impressive, and what a nice chap he was. I can't say I ever met him, but every interaction I had with him, he went right out of his way to offer as much help and guidance as possible. I've got the Hannem Central thread open in another tab and am going to have another inspirational look through.

 

It's really sad that he's no longer with us, do you have any idea what his family ended up doing with the railway?

 

The 'Hannem' Retaining wall looks excellent by the way!

 

Hi Jack - thanks for the kind words about the wall.

 

Yes, Graham was a true gentleman.  I loved how that layout of his could switch between Grouping companies so readily!  He had a mountain of stock, and I would have loved to buy a few of his LNER locos as a tribute, but no one ever made mention of where they ended up - they would have numbered in the hundreds.

 

I, too, never met him, but even at the distance I was from him, considered him a friend - he was always positive, and supportive, and will to share advice - and was shocked when I heard he had passed away.  So that wall will indeed be my tribute to him.

 

Regards

 

Scott

[BWsTrains]

The start of a four day weekend - but sadly, neither of my shipments of static grass have arrived, so I busied myself elsewhere.

 

Call me old fashioned, but I like the look of lichen as model vegetation, so when five bags of the stuff were going cheap locally on eBay, I snaffled them.  But when they arrived, I suspect they may have been *very* old shop stock that had faded badly... although the photo on the WS website is close to the mark:

..........

Hi Scott,

 

just picked up on your topic from your comments to Jeff.

 

Re the lichen this looks like an idea I can use as my bags are not the ideal colours I need for a similar end use. How exactly did you get the shade intensities you show, presumably some dilution of acrylic paint in water? Full immersion or sprayed on etc? Any help will be appreciated.

 

Thanks,

 

Colin 

Edited June 17, 2018 by BWsTrains

[jukebox]

Hi Scott,

 

just picked up on your topic from your comments to Jeff.

 

Re the lichen this looks like an idea I can use as my bags are not the ideal colours I need for a similar end use. How exactly did you get the shade intensities you show, presumably some dilution of acrylic paint in water? Full immersion or sprayed on etc? Any help will be appreciated.

 

Thanks,

 

Colin 

 

Hi Colin;

 

The paint I used was a sample pot from my hardware store of acrylic wall paint (actually the same wall paint I used to paint my backscene - which meant the lichen perfectly matched). 

 

It was diluted about 1:1 perhaps a touch more, and I filled a take-away food container half way.  Then I dunked lichen in until it was level with the fluid. It sat briefly ~ 5-10 mins, and then I started fishing pieces out.  I actually squeezed the lichen and let 80-90% of the absorbed paint drip back into the tub.  This left the lichen still saturated, and dyed.  I spread it out on greaseproof baking paper, and left it a couple of days.

 

The less paint I used, the "fluffier" the lichen stayed.  On some pieces, where I didn't squeeze, they lichen became quite stiff, and dried with a flat face on the downward side - okay of you are sticking it to a backsense.

 

So long as you used a strong paint mix, the colour will stay fast when you squeeze it out.

 

Once I'd finished one batch, I was left with about 1/3 tub of dilute paint; I added more water to the tub to bring it to half way, and did a second batch.  This gave me a lighter shade. I then added a different shade of green... Rinse and repeat.  That gave me a large selection of shades to chose from. 

 

 Hope that helps.

 

Cheers,

 

Scott

Edited June 17, 2018 by jukebox

[BWsTrains]

Thanks Scott,

 

Just out of interest what was your shade / brand?

 

Colin

[jukebox]

Thanks Scott,

 

Just out of interest what was your shade / brand?

 

Colin

 

 

The two greens I have are Dulux:  Licorice Green and Government Green

 

The respective mix datas are:

 

Licorice Green

A310-S S30A9 P30A9 

Base: Dulux Blue

EE 0Y  5N  M  OY  18N  SS 0Y  25N

 

Government Green

A286-S S26A9 P26A9

Base: Dulux Extra Bright

EE 0Y  17N  M  OY  12N  SS 0Y  17N   W   OY  2N

 

But the reality is you can pick a paint chip from any of the ones off the colour wall that you like, and get a small 250ml pot for $5-$8.  A bargain!

 

Cheers

 

Scott

[BWsTrains]

Thanks Scott,

 

The 2nd green works very well in your setting.

 

Back on pps23-4 I find the blue shade you used for the distant hills far too vibrant. As per the photo, distant hills tend to appear a washed out dull grey rather than showing any brightness or distinct tint (unless you come from NZ but that's another story!). I think it'd be even more relevant where clear bright days are few and far between in your location.

 

BTW In the Dulux shades, Teahouse Grey is very good. SWMBO chose it for our patio timbers and I use the leftover for Tarmac finishing over fine sand / PVA (KNP technique) and blended down with vivid white for all manner of light grey needs e.g. finishing dry-stone walls

 

Colin

[jukebox]

Thanks Scott,

 

The 2nd green works very well in your setting.

 

Back on pps23-4 I find the blue shade you used for the distant hills far too vibrant. As per the photo, distant hills tend to appear a washed out dull grey rather than showing any brightness or distinct tint (unless you come from NZ but that's another story!). I think it'd be even more relevant where clear bright days are few and far between in your location.

 

BTW In the Dulux shades, Teahouse Grey is very good. SWMBO chose it for our patio timbers and I use the leftover for Tarmac finishing over fine sand / PVA (KNP technique) and blended down with vivid white for all manner of light grey needs e.g. finishing dry-stone walls

 

Colin

 

Thanks Colin. 

 

I don't disagree with your thoughts on colour - but at the same time, I'm not distracted by it on the layout in real life.

 

As I opined at the time, it can be hard navigating what is intended to be a model of North East England, when my perspective is skewed by my references being almost solely faded photos reprinted in magazines, and a colour palette out my window that is anything but Westminster.  I recognise the compromise in my approach - I've recently bought a book about backscenes, and whilst it is useful, the logisitcs of applying the level of detail they espouse to 28m of backscene is not practical - there are only so many hours in a lifetime, and I'm focussing on getting to a point where I have 75% of the scenery at 75% completion, so that I can run some trains.

 

My goal is for the backscene not to be noticed at all, really...  it should be there so as to disguise any end of the world in layout photos I take. Any more than that is a bonus.

 

Cheers

 

Scott

[jukebox]

A few more baby steps with the wall.

 

I found a seller in the US on eBay charging fixed price shipping, so have four more bags of lichen on it's way, and need that to complete the rock cutting at the North, and dress the ends of Hannem Wall.

 

But in the meantime, I've added ground cover to the base:

 

 

 

 

...and then made up some draping foliage to cascade down it, and cover the joins.

 

 

In reality 75% of this will sit behind the overall roof of Stockrington Station, and so won't get a front row seat, but I'm happy with the result and may try and sneak a few shots of trains on the avoiding lines every now and again...

 

Cheers

 

Scott

[jukebox]

The flocking has been progressing around the perimeter - still very much a work in progress.

 

 

 

The good news is my supply of lichen has arrived safely from the US, so I'll be able to add my finishing touches to the top and ends of the wall.

 

In the meantime, it was back to the timber and jig saw down the other end of the room, and the timber scenery formers were extended near the river:

 

 

These then were covered in chicken wire, and once I was happy with the general shape, borrowing an idea from Brian D. from Deneside, I soaked some newspapers in water and lay them down as sarking, so the plaster won't drip quite as much:

 

 

I've taken this work front all the way along to where the embankment becomes a cutting:

 

 

And I also have the large vertical cliff face ready:

 

 

So the next few days will be messy, as these get plaster soaked cloth cover, followed by a skim layer of plaster.

 

I'll also need to do a mass casting of more rock face material...

 

Cheers

 

Scott

 

 

[David Todd]

Caught up with your thread Scott.

Very impressed

 

dt.

[jukebox]

Caught up with your thread Scott.

Very impressed

 

dt.

 

Thanks dt - appreciate all those "likes"!

[jukebox]

Yesterday was a bit of a wash up - just a few short windows to work upstairs, so I set to tidying up and sorting out the place so I can work on two fronts.

 

Today was much more productive as a result.

 

Plastered cloth is now down on 90% of the new area:

 

 

I don't have a lot of a say in how the cliff faces forms here - it's very steep, and the chicken wire and plaster tends to sit wherever it wants.  But as it took shape, I was pleased to see there are some less forced / more natural contours appearing, and as with the far side, there are parts that will lend themselves to grass or ground cover and others to sheer rock face.

 

 

One of the things that struck me as I was taking this next shot, is that the size of that mountain face is actually making the bridge look small.  That's no mean feet for a 1300mm span.

 

 

The river bridge is also now looking like it's part of the scenery

 

 

...and an overall view of the North Eastern corner of the room as it now stands.

 

 

Next week I'll mix up some proper brown, and lay a skin of plaster over the top of the cloth layer for strength.

 

Meanwhile, at the south end:

 

 

 

I spent the afternoon session applying a bag of lichen to the wall.  The medium green blended in nicely with some of the other treatments I has already used.

 

 

 

and I continued the lichen along the backscene around the corner

 

 

This view shows the state of play - fencing is needed, and some static grass to break up the open space a little, but this area, too, is looking close to complete.  I'll need to find/make an NER signal box at some point to go in that hole.

 

 

Cheers

 

Scott

Edited July 6, 2018 by jukebox

[manna]

G'day Folks

 

One heck of a hill, all looking good.

 

manna

[jcredfer]

Lookin' better every post.  The U-shape valley effect, with the shoulder line above is very effective.  You must have been awake in that Geography lesson then.  :jester:

 

I note, in the first 2 pictures, that the Engineers have been working on cutting away some of the slope near the base of the cliffs.  It looks just about wide enough for a small road to meander along the side of the valley, just high enough to be away from any Winter flood waters. 

 

Kind regards

 

Julian

[jukebox]

..and the plaster skin is now on,

 

 

 

 

 

 

The scary thing is, I am running low on Hydrocal.

 

I will need to make a trip to Perth, to buy another 50kg.  I'm a little shocked how little it has covered... considering how much I still have left to terraform.

 

Cheers

 

Scott

Edited July 8, 2018 by jukebox

[jukebox]

Something of a consolidation day or days over the past 48 hrs.

 

50kg of additional plaster now on hand.

 

The same supplier had some epoxy resin for water casting, so I grabbed that while I was there.  I'll need to get some dye and wait for a warm day to have a play before I pour any on the layout proper.

 

Upstairs, I made a small batch of plaster to finish the embankment, as this will let me push on and finish both river banks:

 

 

In doing this, part of the skin was rather thick - around 10mm in places.  I knew this would shrink as it dried.  It did.

 

 

No harm - it's be filled before I add the ground cover.

 

***

 

Downstairs in the laundry, I have been batching rock castings:

 

 

...and decanting *another* 4L of "Dark Master" into drink bottles so I can more easily add it to plaster batches upstairs in the near future.

 

 

I've also been making some temporary shelves under the layout to hold the scenic materials - as I am running out of space on the layout itself.  I'm not keen to store stuff on the finished areas... I think that's inviting disaster.

 

Cheers

 

Scott

[jukebox]

Burning the midnight oil on a Friday night here in Perth.

 

With the rock castings painted to (almost) match the ones already on the layout, I set about forming up the South face of the bridge approach.

 

Starting is the hardest part - once I placed one or two castings, things sort of became self apparent.  By lunchtime, I had almost all the rocks all stuck up.

 

The bottom right corner will be filled with the castings I've left on the river bank, once the cement has dried.

 

 

Because the face is almost pure vertical, and I wanted to try and get the lines of rocks similar to those already on, I drilled some screws into the plaster to act as reverse-pitons. These held rows of rock in place, along horizontal lines that I needed to follow. Tomorrow, when the adhesive has fully cured, I'll back them out.

 

You can see them in the close up here:

 

 

While the rock face was curing, I batched up some plaster, and began to bring the terraforming around the West wall.

 

 

This embankment rises up to the rear of a long row of terraces - I have removed the temporary ones I had in place, and will need to make up about twenty-five Scalescenes low relief terrace backs, plus a half dozen or so full relief terraces to fill the back corner.  It's not a task I'm really looking forward to.

 

Clearing this area of tools and supplies, and filling in the gaps in the benchwork with plaster land surface, make this stretch look really long.  Like the other areas I am doing in this phase, this will be 1200mm from the front of the layout, behind  Northmoor MPD, my loco depot, so not a visual focus, but important nonetheless.  The pallette for this part of the layout will be muted - the opposite of the river valley.  Olive drab green grass, brown and yellow dead grass.

 

 

In the overall view of the activity today, you can see the track on the left rises slightly to the bridge span.  Northmoor bank, perhaps...

 

 

It's good to see things starting to take shape.

 

Cheers

 

Scott

Edited July 14, 2018 by jukebox

[jcredfer]

Clever use of the securing screws, was that borrowed from temporary fixing of track whilst the glue dries? - A little smaller and you might have left them in there and added some old fashioned climbers, in Tweed Jackets,Plus Fours and Hob-nailed boots.

 

Kind regards

 

Julian

[jukebox]

Clever use of the securing screws, was that borrowed from temporary fixing of track whilst the glue dries? - A little smaller and you might have left them in there and added some old fashioned climbers, in Tweed Jackets,Plus Fours and Hob-nailed boots.

 

Kind regards

 

Julian

 

Thanks Julian;

 

Funnily enough, I'd just watched an episode of Great British Railway Journeys before  went upstairs, and that pill*ck Michael Portillo was at Snowdonia, being shown scrambling / rock climbing 101 while he was wearing a duffle coat and leather loafers.  He does get on my nerves so badly, that I can't stand to watch whole episodes of the show...

 

As for the model, I can't say where the idea came from to use screws - it just seemed obvious that to start half-way up the rock face, I was going to need something to support the initial row of castings.

 

I must confess that whilst some visitors to exhibitions apparently seem to like novelty scenes like houses on fire, car accidents, and the like, I'm not normally a fan - so not sure about rock climbers.  Part of me sort of likes the idea, as it gives a sense of scale and human interest. But part of me squeals "twee"!  But I'm going to give it some thought - and if I do add some climbers, I'm calling the lead fellow Julian!

 

Cheers

 

Scott

[jcredfer]

 

- and if I do add some climbers, I'm calling the lead fellow Julian!

 

Ouch, dangerous in those days!  Oh well, I suppose I did rather ask for that.    You would have fun painting the individual cleats on the hob-nailed boots.     Maybe they could be excused for the [then] highly modern Vibram rubber soles. 

 

 

I must confess that whilst some visitors to exhibitions apparently seem to like novelty scenes like houses on fire, car accidents, and the like, I'm not normally a fan - so not sure about rock climbers.  Part of me sort of likes the idea, as it gives a sense of scale and human interest. But part of me squeals "twee"!

 

I have to agree about this, too.  It's interesting to try to fathom out what makes one vignette look perfectly natural, as if it had been part of the "life" of the layout, but others look concocted, seemingly just to place something on the layout, almost a deliberate attempt at a distraction.  Moments frozen in time are very difficult to portray and seldom done well.  People stood / sat at a station awaiting a train look fine if done nicely, but the kids playing footie in the park, nearby, just screams "Don't!"  Likewise folks chatting in a group can easily be made to look perfectly natural, but having the same figures in a more or less symetrical circle looks contrived, people seldom look at each other in-the-eye when communicating.  Jaz quite often refers to painting colours that are what you see and not what you think is there and I think the placing of vignettes is very similar.

 

I like the perspective of the whole layout, in the last picture, it's all going to be good to see as it develops more.

 

Kind regards

 

Julian

 

 

 

[jukebox]

*snip*

 

I like the perspective of the whole layout, in the last picture, it's all going to be good to see as it develops more.

 

Kind regards

 

Julian

 

Absolutely!  This is something hard to convey with just photos, but especially this last week, as I've brought the "backscene" plaster work around the room, and started to clear off the tools and matériel off the scenic level,  the clutter has been reduced, and the open space I have in my railwayroom is starting to feel much more expansive. 

 

I have to say that this is where my decision to simplify the track plan is paying dividends - the layout always was four distinct areas in my minds eye form the planning stages, and with what is essentially just a double track mainline around the perimeter of the room, the sense of a railway running thru, not on top on, a landscape, is really starting to gel.  

 

***

 

Another consolidation day today; I have decided to push on and complete the plastering work on the West side of the viaduct, so spent a few hours wrestling with chicken wire to form up the last of the contours.

 

If time permits, I'll have a marathon plastering session tomorrow, covering it in dipped cloth, and then give that a week to dry before I come back and apply my 5mm skin that makes up the bulk of the hardshell.

 

Cheers

 

Scott

[jukebox]

As I posted yesterday, I'd had a session fixing chicken wire in place on the Western face of the gorge.

 

That meant the area looked like this, this morning:

 

 

This view in particular seems to demonstrate the depth of the scene here... that will be a lot of river to cast.

 

 

Three batches of plaster later, and the contours are visible:

 

 

 

Because the river is on a bend, the bank is wider here, and so the slope down to the waterline is a lot less severe.  As a result there will be much less rock required on this side.  I was hoping to use none, but can see I'll need to make a few castings for that upper right corner.

 

I will surface most of this face with static grass.

 

The strategic can of baked beans is because some of the chicken wire did not want to sit flat, and with my hands covered in brown plaster, it was no time to use the stapler.

 

Also done; the ramp up from the storage yard has been given some rock treatment.

 

 

This will not be visible from the front of the layout, but if I ever get a video camera van - a possibility I'm certainly considering - I didn't want in glaring anomalies.  Especially in unreachable areas.  So I used some casting that I made, that after the fact I did not think were appropriate for open rock faces.  But were perfect for a confined space cutting. 

 

I will paint the exposed timber black, and also add some more scenic treatments to fully camouflage the line as much as possible.

 

In the fictional history of Stockrington, this single track line may have been the original route North, leading up river to a much less demanding river crossing. 

 

Cheers

 

Scott

Edited August 5, 2018 by jukebox

[jukebox]

I've been working on disguising the rabbit hole that leads to the ramp down to the storage sidings

 

First up, I took all my scrap lichen pieces, and stuck them to a PVA schmear on greaseproof paper.  When it dried, I had a low profile foliage mat.  I split this in two, and glued it to the cutting sides near the rabbit hole.  A cloth, protected by more greaseproof, was rolled up and wedged in so the mat stuck to the sides snugly:

 

 

 

When the cloth was taken away, I had some nice thick wall covering, using lichen I may have otherwise binned:

 

 

It's in an area hard to see, so again, was more for my own benefit as anything scenic.

 

This weekend, I set to work disguising the rest of the hole.

 

I figure some of you may not have used lichen before, so here's a little tutorial.

 

I start with a bag of Woodland Scenics lichen.  It's not quite as simple as open it and use it - tho I guess you could...

 

 

I spread the contents out, to grade and clean it up.  You get a good amount in each big bag, with some variety to the shade and texture - some pieces are coarser than others:

 

 

What I'd never read about was the detritus that comes with this stuff.  There are woody peg-like spines, that are all through the lichen: you need to pull all these out so they don't spoil the effect on the layout.  There's lots. This is the pile from one bag:

 

 

Doing this also creates a pile of small pieces of lichen that has broken off.  Save these - to either make a mat like I did, or use them to poke into crack in walls.

 

 

Here's my sorting board, once I had the packet cleaned up, and ready to use:

 

 

I used a couple of stiff wires, hammered in to the plaster, to help keep some lichen upright and looking tree-like.  Lichen is a plant, so you can look at some pieces and they have an obvious trunk - I glued a piece like that over these.

 

 

And here's the rabbit hole, with an improbably clean 63443, being used for clearance testing to make sure nothing fouls.

 

 

and earlier, checking the cutting walls for clearance...

 

 

 

And the effect seen from ground level

 

 

Cheers

 

Scott

Edited August 8, 2018 by jukebox

[jukebox]

The postman delivered this just in time for my birthday.  How thoughtful!

 

 

The box underneath is the interior detailing kit.

 

Just the ticket for here:

 

 

 

I'll take some photos as I build it up.

 

Cheers

 

Scott