Tonight's work session highlights include pouring our first resin casting of concrete median barriers. It starts with SmoothCast 325 and color tints, in this case black and white. You mix the color first, our goal was a medium gray. Once ready, pour equal parts A and B into separate containers. Add the color to B, then mix everything together and pour. One thing to remember, spray the mold with mold release before the pour. After 30 minutes the resin is hard and you can demold the parts. Up close you can see it needs a bit of TLC, but on the whole it's a pretty decent casting. We have learned a lot about using these products and I'll put together a separate post to address those. Wain was back in town so he added the Masonite fascia to the mainline/staging divider in South Seattle Yard. He also filled what gap still existed with spackle. This will provide a nice flat base for the rock wall top cap and a bit of room for ballast. He also brought with him the Plastruct rock walls that he precut to fit each Masonite section. This is going to look fabulous when done. As for me, once the mold was poured and was hardening, I went over to the SSY bridge and began detailing the "lumberjack" scene. I have a 3d printed wood chipper on order from eBay and I'm going to kitbash a box truck for the chips. In addition, I have some trees branches I'll "green" up and scatter to simulate the branches being felled before the tree trunk is. Scott and Doug made good progress on the Renton access road, I'll get pics of that next week. Well, that's it for tonight. Thanks for checking in!
Lots to cover about tonight's work session, so let's dig in. As mentioned last week, Scott and Doug collaborated on installing the concrete median barriers along Renton Yard. The first section includes 3d printed barriers I bought off Shapeways. After that, they are the new resin barriers. The new barriers look right at home. Wain, with a big assist from Doug, completed the install of the Masonite barrier along our staging tracks. It wasn't your average install. He finished the evening painting our basic brown on all unfinished surfaces. Scott tackled a new project, stacking and gluing our 3d printed pallets. He set up a jig to assure they were attached in a uniform manner. We settled on a 20 scale feet for height of the stacks. I spent the evening planning my next building, the Republic Services transfer and carload facility. As I always do I started with a template. I'll use the template to kitbash the Rix Products/Pikestuff, U&K Plastics building. Not sure as yet how much of the warehouse and office building I'll use, but should be a fun build. There's more to discuss but I'll end here for now. Thanks for checking in.
Fun night at the RGW, as we welcomed Ed back after an extended absence. Spent a good part of the early evening getting caught up. It was a great start to the night. Once we got going it was all hands on deck. Scott continued making our pallet stacks using a relatively ingenious jig. The pallets are a prototypical 20ft high, code here in King Co. We anticipate making as many stacks as we can. Wain brought in the Plastruct rock walls. He is using 7 colors to paint the mortar and the rocks. He then gives the sheet a coat of india ink and completes it with dullcote. He has three complete with 6 to go. I put some extra touches on the lumberjack scene; adding branches awaiting shredding and limb stubs on the trunks. I also added the modified shredding truck. Still waiting on the Asplundh decals, but painted the roof safety deck black and swapped out the yellow boom for a white one to match the prototype. We'll have the actual shedder next week. Two other things of note, Scott brought in the "laugh" of the evening with his flatbed of port-a-johns. And I mocked up the main building at the Rabanco/Allied Waste transfer station. Ed was able to get one of our strings of LEDs back up and running by swapping out the main feeder line. It probably got a kink in it over time, but everything "works as intended" now. Well, that's it for tonight. Until next week, thanks for checking in.
Here's a recap of last night's work session. Scott brought in the completed 3d printed shedder. He added a flapper to the exhaust, put in a tree being shredded, and weathered up the chute. It looks great. I immediately put it to work. Doug made a plaster pour for our concrete Fire house location. He'll sand, paint and detail it starting next week. Wain brought in another painted wall section and the stone cap. It's styrene chiseled every 4ft HO. He also put masonry filler in the cut grooves. I spent some time cutting out the face of the Rabanco refuse facility, then glued all the walls together. Here's the prototype, although significant compression is in play. Well, that's a wrap on another week's work. Thanks for checking in.
Short recap from last night, as most of the things we're working on have been highlighted in prior posts. I spent the evening filling tubs with cars from around the layout. I purchased three of these tubs and I am filling them to the brim, using foam core in between layers. As you can probably guess, it's time, long past time, to clean the layout and run it for a while. Ed is relocating a fascia mounted switch that will control the electronics for our scale house and speed recorder. We decided to combine the switch to control both versus having a second fascia switch. One fun addition to the layout is this Diecast Masters wheeled excavator with hirail wheelsets. They are no longer on the DM website, but you can find them online through various retailers. I literally found mine on Amazon. That's it for tonight, sorry there isn't more. We'll see what direction we go next week. Thanks for checking in.
Hey Michael! If you need some one to store a tub o them cars, let me know!!!! LOL As always, great things going on, on the RGW!
Here's an update on my progress with the Rabanco/Allied Waste building. I have built the garbage shed and the office shells. As you can see I've covered the interior of the garbage shed with 010 styrene to cover all the cut marks the Rix building includes for kitbashing. Normally this would not be necessary, but the shed interior is visible, so the styrene was added. I also added an I-beam at the roof joint of the shed so the roof panels will have a place to rest once installed. I'm not sure the office is complete, I'll probably add an exterior door on one side and a set of windows. More tomorrow. Thanks. M
A quick update on where we are in the RGW. All open projects are being brought to a close and we have started cleaning the railroad in earnest. As I type this, all cars and locomotives are in tubs and off the tracks. Now it's up to us to clear the tracks of construction items, scenery, tools and the like. The one "on the layout" project still in progress is Wain's rock wall along the mainline and staging. He needs roughly three hours to paint each panel and he has three more to install before being done. As you can see he's also adding sand and real dirt along the tracks. He'll also add ballast and spray everything at one time. That will bring current projects to an end. As a part of the clean up phase, you never quite know what you'll run into. Here is a testament to the UPS moto, "We Logistics." They apparently will go to great measures to deliver. More next week.
Michael, you guys are making some seriously good progress here. Everything is first class all the way. It’s fun watching you guys move along. The RGW is going to be a showcase model when you finish! Dale
Due to new covid restrictions, Wain and I were the only participants last night. We decided to tackle painting the inside wall of the peninsula fascia board. Wain drew the short straw as you can see: The transformation of this section is stunning. The blue sets off the track and creates way more light in this otherwise dark area. Not sure if we'll leave it this way, add a photo backdrop or paint landforms on it. We'll see. After getting this done, Wain started gluing down sand, real dirt and ground foam along the tracks in staging. Meanwhile, having received new shelves from Model Designs Ltd., I went over to the workbench to reorganize my paint racks. They sent me shelves that accommodate larger Tamiya paint jars. That's it for now, Happy Thanksgiving to you all. M
It seems that Wain always gets the short straw here..... I’m starting to be reminded of the old Mutual of Omaha show.... “while Jim wrestles the giant man-eating Aconda in the rapids, I’m going to wander down the path and watch the gazelles forage peacefully in the meadow....
