Don- Thanks for all the help, again! I do know some about brushes as I have some experiences painting oil/acrylics on canvas. Slightly off topic: Do any of you have a picture of where to solder feeders to a #4 Kato turnout? (don- I think I asked you already..). But I can't seem to find a pic anywhere, or anyone who has done it for that matter... (Noah proceeds to shake fist at pesky #4 turnout!s)
Noah, The #4's are not in the pictures I took for you, but I'll get some done. You do not want to solder the feeders to these until you do the modifications to the switch points. The easiest way to do this requires the rails to be able to move. They won't do this after the feeders are on. It's been a really bad (LOOOONG) week at work and I'm going to teach a seminar over the weekend, but will try to get some of this together for you on the airplane on the way. Retirement's a couple of years off, but beginning to look good.
In all the replies up till here only one has been about landscaping, and that one said "put in your hills and rivers". However I think planning the landscape should be done at the same time the trackwork is being planned and laid out. Otherwise so much "stuff" is already in place that putting in natural-looking scenery becomes impossible and the layout winds up with haystack hills, almost vertical slopes, and usually most ground flat as the base level of the town and yard. Looking at this layout right now I see river walls steep as a rock canyon -- however I see no rock mountains rising up above the track level. If there's any creeks or streams feeding into this river (which looks pretty robust) I don't see them. If there were, the RR would have to bridge or put culverts over where the track crosses them-- even little creeks. The land is cut through where the river goes but nowhere else is there a hint of rise or dip, no matter how shallow. And with such steep rock-cliff river banks you'd expect some rock outcropping to stick out above ground level.....
Very solid point. I suppose I was mostly interested in my plans leading up to gluing the track down. I assumed foam work [mostly adjacent to track] was to be done prior to gluing track, but I didn't note in this post. Nevertheless, I was searching for some guidance in overall planning, included the foam-shaping stage(s). Also, maybe I should have noted and differentiated between my base foam work for tunnels/hills/depressions/etc, and surface landscape improvements. Before I made a major revision with this layout, I had planned and began construction of the hills, tunnels, depressions, etc. (see picture of prior layout below). Of course, I re-did nearly everything about the layout since that time. On the revised layout, I have been working a lot to determine how I want to do the hills, depressions & a potential tunnel. I've been really torn on this one. I don't want the layout to look as you described; with features like a toy-ish tunnel plopped over a corner of the track in an obvious fashion. I also really do not want the layout to be mostly flat. I want it to have an organic rolling-hills type of terrain with occasional rock outcroppings. I prefer that the landscape dominate the built environment. I do not want the layout to be [at all] overly crowded with man-made structures. Here is an idea of what my old layout was like -which has since been rebuilt from the floor up. However, it was great practice working with foam! Cheers, Noah
Highly impressed by the "above ground" terrain in your last posting. There are, in fact, high rocky cliffs next to the river. Don't know if you're done with the mountain building, but having another high rocky cliff opposite the existing one would round out the picture of a river through a mountain range. I'm talking about putting it inside that half-circle of track between the two bridges -- not as tall as the back mountain but up against the river with the same steep canyon walls as the big mountain. And the ground contours between that half-circle and the outer track that curves around the corner -- is that going to be a creek or stream feeding into the river? Because one would certainly fit there, scenic and track-plan wise. The RR would follow any canyon or watercourse it could through rough terrain, and here it would be a creek. Though "creek" sounds like a small feature, in really steep terrain even a little creek can cut a big notch -- in this case all the way down to the plywood, and look plausible. For a more interesting scene the creek could then curve under the track toward the corner of the layout. You don't even need to alter the existing corner rock much, just make a shallow notch where an underground spring provides the water to run down and start the creek. And cross this creek with a small curving trestle, which lets you use curved track on the deck. Plus with rock the creek banks are as almost as steep as the river's, so you still have room to lay track -- though a retaining wall or cribbing supporting the creekside part of the roadbed would look fine. Put a small shoulder of rock matching (in shape, not size) the one at the RH end of the truss bridge side and you have a realistic "gateway" scene like real mountain areas steeply ending at much flatter land. The creek thus empties into the river between the outer track and this small rock outcropping. These are very small changes but you'd be amazed at how realistic it makes the scene. Also -- looks like a highway through this scene? Scenically speaking, in real life very unusual to have a nice wide flat natural groove through mountainous terrain, luckily right where a road was planned. Moving the road to go through the same rock cut as the truss bridge line, paralleling it, and with a highway bridge right next to the RR one -- more realistic. Then once the road's over the river, curve it to come out where it does now on the layout edge. Though for a fancier version start the road climbing at the river to get to an overpass crossing over the outside track, right where the track is crossing over the creek, and come out onto that existing shoulder on the hill in corner. Highway grades can be pretty steep, so that works. And things crossing things crossing other things give you a really 3D scene. It would also help the "mountainy" look of the scene. As for the "organic" look, make the ground along the track rise and fall slightly here and there over the layout, meaning you have to build small fills or cuts for the roadbed. That helps a lot. In real life the track itself is always on flat or gradually-inclined ground. Nothing else around usually it is. Not sure what's going on on the RN side. Backdrop/divider through the middle of the layout?
I think you missed where I wrote that was the old track plan, and old layout. The track plan didn't work for a variety of reasons. So I now have a new track plan, new benchwork, and a rather blank slate of flat foam. Although, I don't figure my terrain will be high mountain. Probably more like coastal rolling hills. Something like a small coastal town of Dillon Beach or Bodega Bay in Nor Cal. This would perhaps be a small creek feeding into an inlet in a bay. But I haven't confirmed that idea either. This will give you an idea of my current layout:
Hmmm ... except for the half-circle of inner track the new layout looks (generally) like the old one in that corner, so all my suggestions would still work. In fact, have you pried off all the mountains from the old layout and tried positioning them on the new? Mock-ups are really helpful planning devices. The fact that the rocky cliffs now end at the ocean would make them seem even more realistic.
I never glued down the mountains on the old foam, so I still have them. I've tried placing the main back-left-corner mountain/tunnel on it and it fits. However, I'm still not sure. Here's something I've been thinking: As I've said, I think I was more rolling grass hills with rock outcroppings as opposed to rugged mountain terrain. I was thinking of still having a hill/tunnel over the back right corner, but smoother/rounder & not quite as tall. Then, I'd have the main vehicle road sweep around/through the hill (above the tunnel), and come down next to the far end of the yard. This road would parallel the yard and exit the layout the right. I'd also extend that hill to the right/center of the layout (connecting to another hill in the center of the layout to the back of the two mainlines). My biggest concern is an excessive use of retaining walls for the road coming in off the hill.
As for excessive retaining walls -- no law saying you can't have a RR tunnel and hiway tunnel opening right next to or slightly higher than the opening of the other. If the RR had to blast a tunnel to get through, quite possibly that was the only way to get a road through, too, other than a whole series of steep switchbacks up and down the mountain. This option keeps you from having to build impossibly high retaining walls - tho a trestle worked for highways, too (depending on the era you're doing).
Here is a copy of my post from my thread in the Layout Design Discussion category. But it's relevant to the current discussion here as well... - - - It's been a little while since I have posted. I don't have much in the way of visual updates to provide. Most of my work has been Dremeling out the slots on the underside of my Unitrack pieces to prepare for soldering [nearly] every piece of track. The only pieces I won't be soldering are those ≤60mm in length, and bumpers. I'll be out of town this weekend, but I'll likely spend most of next week, soldering feeders, and drilling/dropping them the following week. I am simultaneously planning for the contours in my terrain. This has been quite a brain buster for me. Once again, I would like the layout to resemble the coastal green rolling hills north of San Francisco. The area typically has oak and sycamore trees -other areas consist of mostly Coast Redwoods. Granitic rock outcroppings, and cliffs are also fairly common, and definitely a feature I would like to include. Refer to the image below; the major difference from previous plans is the road coming into the layout from the upper left side of the layout. In this new design, I have the road coming in on the hill and descending down to grade-level. The mainlines run through a tunnel in this hill as well. This would be a pretty steep 12% grade -but that's not completely unheard of for a country road in this area. To support the road, there would likely be some retaining walls closer to the hill, and some levee fill as the road approaches nears the at-grade level. This is DKS's conceptual rendering with a few modifications made by me: Here is an overall shot of the layout with the mock up road grade in the back left corner: And a close up of the mock up road grade:
I know how you feel! This is an issue I am struggling with for my layout. I also have a "hilly" layout. My trackplan didn't account for roads/towns/scenery so I have to engineer everything as I go. In real life roads far outnumber rails and I just can't get over some layouts I have observed that have little to no roadways chris-crossing the rails every so often. But its pretty darn hard to work them in since they are just part of the scenary on a layout. haha
Amen! I re-worked the foam a bit on Friday. I feel like it's starting to take shape and move in the direction I'd been hoping for -including the roadways. I'm out of town until Sunday night, so unfortunately I won't get any work done this weekend. However, I'm at my Dad's beach house in Santa Cruz, so I'm capturing beach town and harbor images for layout ideas.
