In-Side Layout Construction

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Early Stages

Railway construction started on the 2nd to last week of December 2006, the builders finished up the shed in the morning & I had one wall lined that night & trains were running the next day! I decided to have the Railway elevated about 8 inches to clear the bottom plate of the shed when exiting outside, also to hide all the wiring required. The base board is off cuts from the wall lining, being only 10mm it needed ribs to surport it, an extra bonus  with the elevation is the sound it creates when the train enters the shed!!

Above Left; Looking to the East Tunnel Portal, Above Middle; looking toward the West (Hole yet to be cut) on both shots you can see the baseboard construction very basic but sturdy. Above Right; Eastern tunnel portal, I decided to use a slide just behind the portal with a peg & hole method to hold it up when operating. The Western portal is of the same method, we recently decided to add another loop on this section mainly as a storage siding & a 'Put On & Take Off' siding for when visitors come to run.

Above 4 Pictures; From start to finish, extra base board being put in place to take the loop, Getting the exact measurement before the cut was made for the new turnout, Turnout in & half the loop laid, Loop completed with the Garrett on the ore train for a try out. I used manual turnouts as a safety measure in mind, if you change a turnout manually you remember it longer that you have done so & when we run 2 train operation we don't want any head ons or nose to tails!!

Scenery

At long last I am under way with some Scenery, the first job is to tackle the rock face which measures 12m x 400mm. I must admit that scenery is not one of my strong points, hopefully the result will be a quite good looking rock face to break the long flat 12metre wall! As I wasn't looking for perfection I decided not to go with the rock moulds & make seperate rock clusters! I needed a quicker method as I didn't want to do this longer then I had too so decided on the polystyrene coated with gib plaster option, so down to the Mitre 10 store I go & got 2 sheets of 50mmx1200mmx2400mm. I then set to & split them into 400mm strips & glued to the wall with an exterior PVA glue & wedged in place until dried. After drying I attacked it with a cooking fork taking chunks out of the flat surface to rough it up to make the appearance of a rock face. (What a mess this process was!!) 

Above Left; This shows the Poly that has been roughed up & the first coat of plaster being applied, this was done with a wet-ish solution of plaster put on with a paint brush. Above Right; The second coat is now being applied, this was coloured with oxide pigments. Now this is the dark coat & will form the shadows of all the recesses of the rock. (Or thats the plan!) Below Left; The final coat has been added, now on to the ballasting & some greenery on the rock face!

Above Right; This shows the Ballast grading Plant layout!! 1st; was to sift the crusher dust & take out the coarse stones, what was left in the sieve throw-out. 2nd; put remains through a finer sieve & save whats left in the sieve. Doing it this way gives you a nice uniform size to ballast with, for securing the ballast I used a 50-50 mix of water & PVA glue with a wee bit of dish wash liquid, a tried & proven method in all scales! Below Left; The finished result of the ballasting! Below Right; The rock face & track has now had some bushes added, this could be an on-going project!! I am happy with the result! But I also know it could be better, as scenery is not my thing but you just have to give it your best shot!!