Eastern Tn logging on the DG CC & W RR 1928

[Bill Nelson]

I had a lot of fun painting that. Used a sea sponge to get a lot of the foliage effect. It went pretty quick . I'm looking forward to doing the backdrop behind the Station in Harlow, and the big curve between the Harlow yard and the south wall on the mid level. Those will be hugely important, this one was a dry run.

 

[Bill Nelson]

Back at the farm from the lake. one sheetrock screw, and the newly painted back drop is in place. this is a huge improvement!! now I can't wait till I can paint some mountains on the back drop behind the front side of Harlow TN. , directly below, which will go a long way toward tieing this whole mess together thematically. Losing the massive vertical drops on the old split level central peninsula, gives me a much longer, and civilized run, but I will be relying on backdrops a lot more to establish the mountain railroad feel.





#21 on top of Iron mountain is a testament to the new design. Rod locomotives just did not get on the upper deck of my old railroad. It will be very nice to have #21, the J. H. Morgan able to operate over my whole system.

 

[Bill Nelson]

As scenery creeps into the new Perry's Gizzard I have been working on finding the proper placement for some of my signature structures for that location, primarily the water powered sawmill, whose old foundation won't out with the old Gizzard. It was not as nicely done s the rest of the structure, so I did not bother to save it.


St. Joseph's church had no foundation, but it set perfectly on some big rocks in the pre existing scenery . That wasn't likely to happen so well again, so I figured it needed a foundation as well.

I made forms for casting the foundations out of some blue extruded insulation foam, glued together with tachy glue to fill voids, and fastened together with bamboo skewers.


I poured the forms with hydrocal, let it start so set , and removed it from the forms. I started to try to draw mortar lines in pencil, as a reference for carving. But the mill foundation was still soft enough the pencil worked as a carving tool.

 

[Doctor G]

Hey Bill. I really really like the carving you are doing in picture #1......incredible. I got a little lost in the printed word and wondered what you said that would be??? Church? Sawmill? Whatever it is it will sure be nice!!! Tom :Bravo:

 

[Bill Nelson]

Tom the tall foundation is for the water powered sawmill, and the short one is for the church.

 

[Bill Nelson]

here is the sawmill being auditioned on it's new foundation, which still needs some carving on the back side. As well as a door on the backside to cary out the sawdust. I may carve some of the inside walls, and put a wood floor in. am debating as to weather I should power the water wheel. connecting the sawmill with the rest of the Gizzard, is the Gizzard road, which I cut some logs for at the lake. I need a bunch more. I cut the logsa at the lake as I have my dad's workbench there, with some built in vices, that makes cutting the logs to size easy. I'm fastening the logs to the handi wipes with hot glue, and will glue some rocks in the spaces between the logs, and then pack all the holes with ballast soaked in white glue, which will be plenty strong, and look good too.

 

[Gandolf50]

This is sure looking good and moving right along!

 

[Bill Nelson]

Working along with a pair of yard clippers and a hand clipper, along with a hot glue gun, my cribbed retaining wall for the gizzard road is progressing faster than any of my other cribbed walls have. after the logs are in I will glue or hot glue some rocks in the voids between the logs, and then back the remaining crevices with ballast soaked in white glue. I will have to cover this thoroughly when I carve the rocks on the cliff above the road, which will be pretty much vertical up to the level of the narrow gauge main line.

 

[Bill Nelson]

I got the logs in on the cribbed retaining wall for the Gizzard road, shown here directly over the back side of Harlow, at the skinniest portion of my central peninsual.

 

[Doctor G]

The cribbing is turning out very nicely. I like the effect. Tom

 

[Bill Nelson]

I started filling in some of the voids between the log cribbing in the gizzard with limestone gravel from the driveway. I stopped when my fingers got too big. wi;ll continue with tweexers later, and finally pack any remaining voids with ballast material soaked in white glue. this is going to look good.











Nelson

 

[Doctor G]

That is looking real good, Bill. I like that dandy climax locomotive with the Red Hat too. Tom

 

[zathros]

Bill, you truly are an artist. You technical prowess established, you artistry magnificent!! :Bravo:

 

[Bill Nelson]

I had a chance to stay at home last weekend, as the wife had to work on Saturday, and we had hockey tickets in Nashville on Sat night. I got the hot glue gun going and applied a bunch of handi wipes to the cardboard wicker work. I used to use white glue, but the hot glue is faster

there is a joint in the benchwork sections directly to the left of the log retaining wall. no cardboard , or handi wipes are going to cross that divide, so hopefully if this is ever disassembled, the scenery will crack on that line relatively easily. I made no such provisions on my last build, and there was much destruction of fine scenery as a result.


I have started plastering this stuff. I have three 100 bags of house plaster I had gotten for house repairs ( my house is a 130 year old farm house, and I have plaster lath walls. we are thinking of redoing the worst walls with sheetrock, so I thought I'd use some of the house plaster. ) the house plaster is way coarser than hydrocal, it does not carve well, but it does make a good solid base, that thinner layers of hydrocal can be put on top of for carving. Also in places that won't be carved it has a good gravely texture, which may require less ground cover to get a good looking surface.




I spread a big thick layer of the house plaster, over this, and let it dry. I then came back and dampened the house player with a spray bottle, and then slathered a thin layer of hydrocal over the house plaster. the next layer of hydrocal, I should be able to start carving rock formations, and that is where this gets really fun.

In the bottom photo note the newspaper. a trick Dr.Tom and I have been doing for ages is to spay both sides of a sheet of newspaper with some of the wet water from a scenery spray bottle, and then lay it on top of whatever you want to protect. the damp newspaper lays a lot flatter over uneven surfaces, and when you layer up three or so layers, there atre no gaps, and you get pretty nice protection of finished, or partially finished areas, like my log retaining wall.




This is going to be a lot of fun. next time I'm working up there, likely I'll be carving rock formations, and that is when things start to look good. It will be great to start to get that massive bridge anchored firmly on the mountain!

 

[Doctor G]

I remember that old trick with the wet newspapers. Nice explanation for the folks tuning in. Doc Tom

 

[Bill Nelson]

Some work carving some rocks at the beginning of the Gizzard High Bridge. I'm doing a first heavy layer of house plaser. then a skim coat of hydrocal, followed by a thicker coat of hydracal, whicch I arve. before adding another layer of plaster I use a spray bottle
to dampen the previous layer of plaster to help the newer layer to adhere to the old plaster, and sr=et well. if you don't wet the older plaster , it wil sck too much maostuer out of the new plaster, and the new plaster won't set right at the joint.







The last photo shows the black plastic on the mid level to protect the buildings and track form errant p;aster from above.

 

[zathros]

What you're making here is fantastic, I've never seen anything like this, or ever anything like this in the making. You techniques transcend model making, and go into mold making. I was a Mold Maker, Tool and Dye, Master machinist, and ended up programming CNC machines and Robotics. You are doing things by hand that I saw Manufacturing Engineers pull there hair out trying to figure out. My respect you you and you art flourishes.

 

[Bill Nelson]

I have spent a bunch of time with cardboard, a utility knife, some bandage scissors, and a hot glue gun, working to get a lot more cardboard landforms into the Perry's Gizzard area, underneath the two ridiculously long HON3 bridges spanning the valley between these two ridges. The Wife has a medical conference, so I won't be going out to the lake this weekend, have lots of other stuff to do (some firewood on the front porch would be handy about now, the hose needs a lot of cleaning, and the Dogs need baths, but hopefully I can get some stuff doen on the mountain this weekend as well.

 

[Bill Nelson]

I have made a trade! I converted an Bachman GE 70 tonner to HOn3 for use at the club. the club has since moved, and they decided they don't have room for any HOn3, or much of anything else I'm interested in, so I had this surplus Hon3 70 ton GE unit laying around the Georgia staging. It showed up in a photo on the HOn3 facebook group, and a retired gentleman had been hunting for one, but lacked the confidence to begin the conversion. he offered me some mine , and sawmill buildings in trade, but I have those in spades. In the corner of one of the photos he sent of a mine tiple, there was a string of company houses, and I made a counter offer. I traded the little GE 70 ton unit for five extremely well done scratchbuilt styrene company houses. when the next narrow gauge shelf goes in there will be an iron mine, and a coal mine on it. and I have a start on a nice little town now as well

 

[Bill Nelson]

I spent considerable time in the Rr room, after washing the dogs, and getting some firewood on the front porch. I have cardboard land forms wrapped all around the northern approaches of my massive HOn3 bridges across Perry's Gizzard. next to get up there and get a lot of handi wipes hot glued onto the shapes so I can slather them with plaster and start carving rocks. once I have the rocks in I can paint them, and start getting the narrow gauge tracks in up there. it will be cool when I can run trains across that monster bridge.


Nelson