Don't laugh too hard...It's my first attempt!

mountains - oh yeah!

Steve -

Now we're talking! So what sort of bridge do you have planned or envisioned for the spot where the loco is sitting in the pictures? A big curved timber trestle could be nice, but if you're going for a more 'modern' transition era layout perhaps a deck girder with concrete piers? That would give you a neat view beneath the bridge into the river valley between tracks beneath the tipple. Very cool.

Galen
 
Steve i have been looking through this thread a lot now and i am finding that i like it a lot you are doing really good do you think this layout could be modified to fit into a 8' x 12' space in HO?
 
13Mtrainer, If you look at the attached pic, you will see that the lay out is 14.5'x6.5'. You will also notice that there are only very short straight sections between all the various curves. Couple this with the fact that all of the radii except one are 18" and I would have to say that this particular layout couldn't be "shrunk down" more than a half ft. or so. However, that doesn't mean that you can't incorporate many of the elements that you like best into a smaller space. Why not post a graph paper style pic of the available space you have, along with what you would like to have on the layout, and let the people here help. They all have helped me!.......Miles, thank you for the encouragement. Galen, I'm planning on a deck girder with piers. I'll post more pics when I can....

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Nazgul said:
13Mtrainer, If you look at the attached pic, you will see that the lay out is 14.5'x6.5'. You will also notice that there are only very short straight sections between all the various curves. Couple this with the fact that all of the radii except one are 18" and I would have to say that this particular layout couldn't be "shrunk down" more than a half ft. or so. However, that doesn't mean that you can't incorporate many of the elements that you like best into a smaller space. Why not post a graph paper style pic of the available space you have, along with what you would like to have on the layout, and let the people here help. They all have helped me!.......Miles, thank you for the encouragement. Galen, I'm planning on a deck girder with piers. I'll post more pics when I can....

My mistake, I couldn't read the dimensions at the bottom of the pic, and I counted squares as 12" instead of 6".
 
Hey RUSS, I wish you were right and I had 29' to work with...now that would be a layout!!!
 
I think it'll be easy to alter for 8x12. Remove the yard section from the right, flop it, connect it to the lower left instead. Then you'll need to compress the lower-level loop on the middle section to maintain aisleways - I think that can be done while maintaining 18" radius.
 
thats what i was thinking and just put the yard along the bottom maybe and then extend the top another 1' to make it 12'

Nagul: would you mind if i altered your layout i won't if you don't want me to.
 
13Mtrainer, If you want to use this layout, i certainly don't have a problem with it. It would be fun to see what others would do with it. Ocalicreek (GALEN) is the designer of the layout so he should get the credit....Anyway, I just got a new computer and I'm having trouble resizing photos. I used to just "shrink them to 600x420 and I would wind up with about 60 KB or so. Now when I shrink the photo to 600x420, It still is about 200 KB. So I have to make then much smaller than I want to in order to get an exceptable KB number. I'll try sending them to work and resizing them there. Talk to ya soon...
 
Nazgul said:
13Mtrainer, If you want to use this layout, i certainly don't have a problem with it. It would be fun to see what others would do with it. Ocalicreek (GALEN) is the designer of the layout so he should get the credit....Anyway, I just got a new computer and I'm having trouble resizing photos. I used to just "shrink them to 600x420 and I would wind up with about 60 KB or so. Now when I shrink the photo to 600x420, It still is about 200 KB. So I have to make then much smaller than I want to in order to get an exceptable KB number. I'll try sending them to work and resizing them there. Talk to ya soon...

I think if you have Microsoft, you can go to their homepage and download MS picture manager, an windows tool, for free. Thats what i use to make my pictures smaller.
 
I don't know what the deal is but I used MS picture manager and it still doesn't work like my old pc did. I have to make the pics much smaller to get to 65kb than I used to. Oh well, here's some pics of my progress....I'll keep trying....good luck 13Mtrainer! Oh, by the way, RUSS, thank you for your kind words and all the good advice from the begining.

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Miles, I just went to your web page...:eek:...I hope to capture a small part of the artistry you have...I would love to see more pics! Speaking of pics, here's a few more.

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Hey, I know some of you do your scenery before you ballast. That's what I'm planning to do, but I have a question. How do you get your ballast into the tunnel openings? I'm assuming that I have to do that before I close the tunnel in. So do I ballast the tunnel entrances and then go on with the rest of the scenery and finish the bulk of the ballasting later? Thank you
 
Hello All,
Been working with a littler plaster cloth and Sculptamold. Both products work great and are sloppy ( or am I sloppy?) or both... The waterfalls are presenting a real challenge. trying to make them believable is a slooooooow process. I bought some water effects from W.S. and will begin to experiment with it and also colors for the water itself. Talk to you soon.

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Isn't the mountains the best part. Looking real good there , are you putting some color into your plaster stuff while you mix it ?
For the ballasting I think its a more of a for looks think although it makes it solid. In the tunnel I wouldn't think you would ballast probably just spike the rail real good:wave:
 
Wickman, the mountains ARE the best part. It's a whole lot of fun to do. I'm not mixing color into the plaster. I painted the sculptamold with a brush in various shades of gray. unfortunately the pics do not really convey the true coloration (I'll work on my picture taking). In regard to ballasting...I just want to run it into the begining of the tunnels (7 or 8 inches) to give the impression that it goes all the way through.......I've also been checking out your layout progress.. AWESOME!!!!! Keep posting updates........Still working on the waterfall, it's a slow process. I should be done by Fall.......2008!