I was worried for a while that the Copper Ridge Railway was going to have to meet an untimely end. As I mentioned in another thread, our landlord is building a new house that we are going to move into in a couple of months. The house is bigger, but the space was arranged such that even a layout as small as the CRRy would be awkward. But, after an 11th hour change to the house plans, it looks like the Copper Ridge is going to live!
So, construction is continuing... I was having a problem with most of the second-level track along the front of the layout. When I put in the expanding foam, it tilted the track severely to one side, and engines were having a difficult time getting good electrical contact. I pulled up the track with the intention of trimming the underlying foam, but quickly realized that I wasn't going to be able to get any kind of blade into the area. So, I took a tip from the real railroads and used ballast to level the track.
But how would I know if the track was level? I was having a great deal of trouble trying to get an accurate reading with my level. But then I had an idea: I took a couple of the little bubble thingies out of my level and taped them to the flat car that I had made to carry The Box. By placing a track pin between the rails behind the car, I could park it over a section of track while I arranged the ballast underneath with a pick. Below is a picture of my levelling car.
Also, I put the new bridge into place. I wasn't satisfied with the old one because it looked too thin to hold hundreds of tons of ore cars. So, I made a thicker one. Construction was the same, except that I used two pieces of the blue insulating foam. The new one is made to look like its composed of random stone. After the ballast dries, I'll spackle the ends into the cliff faces and paint the abutments. Then I'll post some more pictures...