RMweb Gold The Fatadder Posted April 6, 2013 Author RMweb Gold Share Posted April 6, 2013 The first thing to say is don't do it the way I did I used pva, and the templates changed size I think a spray mount or superglue would work better. There is a very good thread on the scalefour society website on this topic. (Available to view to non members if I remember rightly) All the track is built insitue, this is the first time I've tried laying sleepers first then building. I've yet to fit any rail/chairs yet so not sure how well it's going to work yet Link to post Share on other sites More sharing options...
Ian Fisher Posted April 6, 2013 Share Posted April 6, 2013 Hi Rich, Also worth thinking about is using a contact adhesive, I have used UHU bought cheap in large tubes from shops selling things for 100 pennies. For a plan that will be peeled off a bead under a timber does the job, for a permanent job a line under the sleeper, affix template with spray adhesive or more contact adhesive and jobs a goodun. Looking good with progress todate. Ian Link to post Share on other sites More sharing options...
buffalo Posted April 6, 2013 Share Posted April 6, 2013 The first thing to say is don't do it the way I did I used pva, and the templates changed size... Yes, first time I tried that happened to me. Next time I painted undiluted PVA thinly onto the ply trackbed, let it dry a bit, then pressed the templates down. Once dry I again used a thin strip of neat PVA on each sleeper. There probably was still some distortion of the template but it was minimal. I also printed a second set of templates just to check measurements when laying the track. ...All the track is built insitue, this is the first time I've tried laying sleepers first then building. I've yet to fit any rail/chairs yet so not sure how well it's going to work yet Don't worry, it works fine so long as you have good access to anywhere you are laying track. Ideally, do it before adding buildings, bridges, etc. Nick Link to post Share on other sites More sharing options...
dave_long Posted April 7, 2013 Share Posted April 7, 2013 A trick I learnt from Jim SW was that once the templates are glued down run a paper roller spike over the template to allow air to the glue below. Although I would recommend spray mount. Link to post Share on other sites More sharing options...
tender Posted April 7, 2013 Share Posted April 7, 2013 Ok, so it's stick template to baseboard with contact adhesive (spray mount), glue sleepers, turnout timbers to template with PVA, ballast, then add rail and chairs. Sounds good but how do you know where to place the common crossing etc if you can no longer see the template? Or am I missing something. Link to post Share on other sites More sharing options...
dave_long Posted April 7, 2013 Share Posted April 7, 2013 That is the disadvantage to ballasting pre rail installation. However if you print out another copy of your turnouts you can work out the location of such things as common crossings and check rails by the timbers. Plus once 1 rail is installed you should use gauges to place everything else. Link to post Share on other sites More sharing options...
RMweb Gold The Fatadder Posted April 14, 2013 Author RMweb Gold Share Posted April 14, 2013 Disaster strikes... I hate wood work, the construction of baseboards and the associated legs is the one part of this hobby that I truly hate. Unfortunately all the other demands on the disposable budget mean that buying off the shelf baseboards just isn't economical so I am stuck building them. It looked like the foam board / ply construction had solved this, until today. Yesterday I picked up the bits to build the legs, As the layout is going to be in the dining room I wanted something that looks ok (so no pasting tables/saw horses etc). While looking for planed 2 by 2 soft wood in B&Q I came across the decorative parts used on staircases. these were the perfect height for the layout (again being in the dining room I am aiming for around table height, these posts were just over 3 ft). So I prepped the baseboard drilling slots to accept M10 bolts (the idea being that you could get 10mm of height adjustment by setting the bolt position. Once bolted in place the legs were very ridged, so I thought that they would be ok without further cross bracing (thus avoiding any more working with wood). As I rotated the layout onto its legs (having been working on the table with the layout resting on its backsceen), one end collapses. As a result it then snaps along the bonded joint at the inner baseboard joint, ripping the inner face off the board so that it is only hanging on by one corner. Thankfully I haven't started fitting the rails or the damage would be a lot worse (the ballasting and the earthworks now look a real mess.) Along with fixing this damage (along with other damage caused at the same time). Working out how to hide the dents in the dining room table caused as the layout hit it. and then sorting the legs out so they actually stay up right. Just really cross with the whole thing! Link to post Share on other sites More sharing options...
artizen Posted April 14, 2013 Share Posted April 14, 2013 Man... I thought my day had been sh...t until now! Been there but no so bad as it sounds in your last entry though. Maybe a quick stiff drink followed by a couple of days of thoughtful TV watching usually gives you a fresh perspective on things when you get back to it. Link to post Share on other sites More sharing options...
Danemouth Posted April 14, 2013 Share Posted April 14, 2013 Rich, I won't ask what you said when disaster struck . I too hate woodwork and am really c@ck-handed at it! Luckily I was able to purchase baseboards otherwise I don't suppose I would have ever started a layout! Hope you are successful in hiding the damage to the dining table, Regards, Dave Link to post Share on other sites More sharing options...
RailWest Posted April 14, 2013 Share Posted April 14, 2013 Well, I love woodwork Mind you, I wouldn't buy timber for baseboards other than in a proper timber merchant - I've been known to go through the entire stock of timber on the shelf in our local Homebase and reject it all as rubbish for the job in hand. Not that this helps you, but.....just so that you can gloat instead and feel better about it, my "trouble of the week" is having a 'mishap' on the waty to the local 'recycling centre' when a full 5L bottle of used cooking oil fell over and spilt in the boot of my almost-brand-new car It got down under the back seat as well.....Now THAT is a clean-up job and a half.......... Link to post Share on other sites More sharing options...
RMweb Gold The Fatadder Posted May 21, 2013 Author RMweb Gold Share Posted May 21, 2013 Finally got on and fixed the baseboard, and until I get round to building the new legs I have placed the layout on the legs from the old layout. Once that was out the way, it was back to work on the interesting bits. Trackwork bits will finally be ordered next week, so the key job was to get on with preparing for track laying. I have been working on the siding, applying clay following Chris Nevard's method to get the track looking old and rarely used. My thinking is that this siding is only going to be used in the summer months for Strawberry traffic, and hence would be in pretty poor condition. Once the clay has dried the sleepers will be repainted, and the clay painted, before adding grass. The signal box is now nearly finished, although an unfortunate slip with a brush of mek means 3 window pains need to be remade..... On the right hand side, there has been much less progress. A lack of South East Finecast stone sheet has prevented the completion of the bridge. It does show some of the other work on wagon construction though. I now have a decent number of GW wagons lettered up (on one side), although getting the numbers in a straight line has been a bit troubling. Link to post Share on other sites More sharing options...
RMweb Gold The Fatadder Posted May 25, 2013 Author RMweb Gold Share Posted May 25, 2013 Only a little progress today, Having once again failed to make it to RailEx and Expo EM I have missed another opportunity to buy the track which is needed. Must try contacting C&L again and see if they will let you stop buy their property to pick up an order (given I drive past it on the way to work...) Anyway, the focus of todays work was on the strawberry siding. I started with a coat of grey paint (made up of some magnolia emulation left behind by the builders with black gradually added until I got a shade that I was happy with. This was painted all over the area which had been covered with DAS. I started applying it between the sleepers, but given the intention is that the track will be fully overgrown, I changed my mind and left it with the red clay. I then added highlights using weathering powders, and a mix of GW, LMS and roof greys as I cleaned brushes from wagon painting. Once dry I then applied some glue and started with the static grass. Looking at the section that was completed, I think the grass fibers I have are far too short for the desired effect. so more work will be needed. at any rate I am now out of pva..... I also found an old packet of Siflor tufts, which have been randomly glued down throughout the yard. Having started I think I will probably now continue down the whole length with the short fibers to apply a base. The next step will be to add the rails and paint the rail sides and chairs, before applying a second coat of static grass (with long length fibers) to finish the effect. maybe mixing in more of the siflor tufts. The other area of work has been more wagon painting. Having now finished my LWB mink, I have got on with finishing off the last complete GW wagon in my todo pile. a Parkside Fruit D (which incidentally was also the first wagon I built for the steam project.) This has been brush painted in GW brown (for wooden wagons I like the effect hand painting gives with any brush marks helping to give texture to the planks.) It now just needs a final coat on the roof (which will go on in a minute) before painting the chassis black in the morning. This is shown in the Strawberry siding in the photo below, along with a Siphon which is still lacking bogies... Wagon wise I now have the following requiring only buffers and couplings to finish, Ratio: iron mink, 2 5 plank opens Cooper Craft 2 5 plank, 1 7 plank Parkside long wheel base mink, Fruit D (almost,) Cambrian:steel sided open Bachmann Conflat which needs breaks and Toad (still needing handrails) LMS Cambrian 2 LMS vans, 1 Midland van,1plank open, and 2 5 plank opens (one of which needs new solebars after 'borrowing' the included ones to rechassis the conflate.) LNER Parkside: 1 van, 1 5plank open, 2 1 plank opens Bachmann: 1 van SR Cambrian 7 plank PO 1 Parkside Yeoman, 1 Bachmann 7 plank (which needs weathering), one Bachmann steel sided (again needs painting and weathering) Still have 3 more kits in the todo pile, along with a couple more PO wagons to re chassis. Along with some coopercraft minks and another 5 plank that were purchased off Ebay this evening. Really need to get another load of Bill Bedford units to get building. Also found a part built Ratio GW van, which has now had its chassis removed new solbars fitted and awaits springing units to finish the job. I think once this batch is finished, attention really needs to turn back to locos, and getting something working to haul them with...... Link to post Share on other sites More sharing options...
RMweb Gold The Fatadder Posted May 26, 2013 Author RMweb Gold Share Posted May 26, 2013 The next step of the scenic process, the carpet underlay baselayer on the grass area is ripped off and tidied up. after this a layer of glue was added to the lower half followed by a coating of static grass fibres. For the top half I have used a range of different matting material's from Green Scene, the intention being to create a longer grass. One area I am still unhappy with is the grass covered track, too much grass has stuck to the sleepers and there is too much grass on the sleepers themselves. Its going to need a bit of the grass removing before gluing the chairs in position, I have done a quick test with an offcut of Exactoscale sleeper and it seems that the solvent does a pretty good job of getting rid of the grass.... Having treated myself to a digital SLR last week as a post bonus treat, I think the photos are starting to look a bit better than with the iphone... Link to post Share on other sites More sharing options...
RMweb Gold The Fatadder Posted May 28, 2013 Author RMweb Gold Share Posted May 28, 2013 Not yet got the photos, but work has finally started on the platform. It has been built from a length of scrap 12mm ply with an additional layer of 2mm plasticard on the top. This gets a height of 2ft 9 above rail height (taken from the s4s data sheet) The front face was finished with some slatters dressed stone embossed plastic, with the top being finished in slatters paving (with slabs at 90degrees on the edge. A plasticard ramp was cobbled together for the goods shed end. Once it is all dry I am planning to use some das clay to cover over one end of the slabs with a new finish in the style of a couple of stations on the branch The final issue to resolve is the width at the rear. The platform has been aligned based in existing track laying, however the final 6 inches of the rear track has not yet been laid. The plan is not fit the rear wall, or edge stones until this is in position allowing the clearance to be adjusted accordingly. Link to post Share on other sites More sharing options...
RMweb Gold The Fatadder Posted May 28, 2013 Author RMweb Gold Share Posted May 28, 2013 Quick update with a photo showing the WIP platform, prior to gluing down the top surface (speaking of which its about time I started getting on with it...) Link to post Share on other sites More sharing options...
RMweb Gold The Fatadder Posted May 28, 2013 Author RMweb Gold Share Posted May 28, 2013 Another hours work this evening and the platform is starting to come together. The remaining wall has been added to the rear edges, and the near side edge stones have been glued in position. Following this I have marked out the locations for the rear edge stones, and then cut the main paving to size (seen in the below photo placed in position). Tomorrows job will be to glue down the main paving, and then add the edge stones, after which it will be ready for some clay. The ramp needs a little further adjustment to ensure a good fit (I hadn't placed it properly in the photos, but it needs a slight refinement on the top at the joint). After which the top will be covered in clay. One slight issue is that after gluing on the plastic spacers on the top of the ply, it has bowed slightly (alternatively it may have already been bowed, it did come out of a skip after all...) I think a good coat of no nails (solvent free of course) along with a lot of weight aught to do the job once it has been fully painted As for the station building, I am starting to have thoughts about loosing the left hand wing to get an L shaped building similar to that at Sandford, alternatively I may just start from scratch and then see which I prefer. Either way the wood supporting the rear half of the station needs to be cut to size as its currently about 2 inches too long Link to post Share on other sites More sharing options...
RMweb Gold The Fatadder Posted May 30, 2013 Author RMweb Gold Share Posted May 30, 2013 Keeping going with small steps... The platform top has now been glued into position, using evostick to hold the centre in place and plastic weld down the front edge against the edging strip. This is intended to avoid the problem with large sheets of embossed plasticard where air bubbles get trapped in the plastic where the glue does not bond fully. I have also added a stone facing to the remainder of the rear platform face, this area along the back wall of the station building requires a little more thought, as to whether or not to raise the height of the station approach (requiring a ramp down to the yard), or to have steps up to the station entrance. The latter would be a lot easier, but I am tending towards thinking the former the more realistic. I think a job for next week will be diging out the remaining pink foam and having a bit of a play carving something to shape... I have also been playing with platform fencing, after finding a pack of Ratio GW platform fencing. (still needing to be painted in the appropriate colour (light stone?) I intend to use this for the rear of the platform, but also for the boundry at the exit of the rear yard. I have also laid it out around the perimeter of the station masters house, and the front yard, but I suspect it is inappropriate here. Either way, the main reason for having the fence out is to enable the drilling of post holes after which it will be put away for fitting at a later date once all the high risk activities are out of the way. Hopefully will finally make a start on building track next week..... Link to post Share on other sites More sharing options...
RMweb Gold The Fatadder Posted June 8, 2013 Author RMweb Gold Share Posted June 8, 2013 A bit of progress on the station building after picking up some Wills stone sheet at the modelshop yesterday. I have removed the left hand wing to shorten it, resulting in a structure more along the lines of that at Sandford & Barnwell. I have then started to clad it in the stone sheet, carefully cutting the gaps for the corners (which will be added from either plastic or das clay pending the outcome of a test piece with the latter) The doors were taken from the scrap box, while I now need to work out how the windows will be fabricated (although that can wait until the construction is finished and painted. Makes quite a difference getting some stone work on the plasticard carcass! Link to post Share on other sites More sharing options...
RMweb Gold The Fatadder Posted June 17, 2013 Author RMweb Gold Share Posted June 17, 2013 Finally picked up the track components last Friday and have been busy building track... So far the front siding, half the cross over and a section of the through line have been finished, currently working on the next point (leading to the line through the station.) However before the next lengths of rail can be added I need to get the remaining ballasting completed along with cutting the left hand fiddleyard entrance, The other job today was to get the paints out and paint up the remaining track bases which were glued down last night. This means that it is now ready to get the ballast down tomorrow evening. Wiring has proved very easy so far, soldering a length of wire to the rail section before adding the chairs and gluing into place. A hole in the ballasting was scraped out with a file, which was then stabbed through to get a hole for the wire to fit through. I will now need to get the ballasting repaired to hide the wire and fill the hole. I am hoping the same approach will work for the turnout operating units..... A slight issue for the future is going to be connecting up the wires, as the current support legs don't give good access... Tomorrow I plan on running the first test train comprising a Hornby 08 (as the only working 060 I have at the moment) along with the first 3 finished wagons using a couple of wires twisted to the track Finally for Tim, A couple of photos of the buildings for the signal box and station, both of which have not really progressed much since I got the rail... Link to post Share on other sites More sharing options...
RMweb Gold The Fatadder Posted June 23, 2013 Author RMweb Gold Share Posted June 23, 2013 Track laying continues... The biggest issue so far has been a result from gluing down the templates and ballasting prior to building the track As a result any slight discrepancy in alignment has resulted in the moulded pips on the sleepers getting in the way of the true alignment. In addition to this, the odd lump of ballast which has got where it is not wanted every so often will get stuck under a chair. The net result has added a lot of adjustment needed to get everything satisfactory, so I think in future the traditional off layout construction will more than out way the benefits in easier ballasting that you get with this method. Construction has now completed about 3 yards of track, with 2 points finished (excluding the switches which will be added later). This has enabled me to test fit the bridge on the right hand (Cheddar) end to ensure the clearances were correct I have then temporally wired up the dropper feeds to do a bit of test running Given that the DCC system is not yet wired in, I resorted to an old Hornby trainset controller and a Vi Trains Class 47 (fittingly in Great Western Trains livery) which performed well. After that success, it was time to try with something closer to the steam locos that will be used on the layout, so I temporarily removed the decoder from an 08 shunter which also performed well (seen below propelling the track tester) Still a long way to go before getting it operational, On the through line there is approximately a .8mm step between the tracks on the two boards. Where as the front and rear tracks appear a good fit at the joint. as a result a number of sleepers are going to need to be lifted and raised slightly to get a decent joint. Also on the left hand board the hole through the backscene is yet to be cut out (need more cutting disks for the dremmel, plus an afternoon when my fiancée and dog are out so they aren't affected by the noise / smell) Link to post Share on other sites More sharing options...
tom82 Posted June 23, 2013 Share Posted June 23, 2013 Coming along great, keep it up! Link to post Share on other sites More sharing options...
buffalo Posted June 23, 2013 Share Posted June 23, 2013 That's beginning to look like real progress, Rich. ...The biggest issue so far has been a result from gluing down the templates and ballasting prior to building the track As a result any slight discrepancy in alignment has resulted in the moulded pips on the sleepers getting in the way of the true alignment... I hadn't realised you were using plastic sleepers and I've often thought those pips were more trouble than they are worth. I've been very happy with the results of laying track in situ and ballasting before adding the rails, just as you've done here, though I've only done it with ply sleepers. Nick Link to post Share on other sites More sharing options...
RMweb Gold The Fatadder Posted June 23, 2013 Author RMweb Gold Share Posted June 23, 2013 That's beginning to look like real progress, Rich. I hadn't realised you were using plastic sleepers and I've often thought those pips were more trouble than they are worth. I've been very happy with the results of laying track in situ and ballasting before adding the rails, just as you've done here, though I've only done it with ply sleepers. Nick I'd completely agree. I think for the remaining work I am going to take a scalpel to the pips for one rail at the very least. Link to post Share on other sites More sharing options...
Penrhos1920 Posted June 23, 2013 Share Posted June 23, 2013 (seen below propelling the track tester) Testing 2.jpg How does your track tester truck work? What track defects does it show? Link to post Share on other sites More sharing options...
RMweb Gold The Fatadder Posted June 23, 2013 Author RMweb Gold Share Posted June 23, 2013 How does your track tester truck work? What track defects does it show? Its a Masokits item, the main use is that it will show any areas where track is higher or lower than flat (indicated by the pin on the scale). I've then used a plus or minus 1 bar on that scale and anything outside of that will be rectified. Its very light weight has also made it rather sensitive to any gauge issues, at which it will typically derail. Very useful, though I think I will adjust it further to add some buffers to aid propelling. Link to post Share on other sites More sharing options...
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