This past week I have spent some time trying to figure out what I am going to do about a backdrop. As I plan to have tall trees along the back of most of the railroad I do not need a lot of scenic details. With few exceptions I just want to have the area directly behind the trees to be shades of green to give the impression of a dense forest even if I only have a few inches to add model trees in front of it.
Because the back of the railroad will have an elevated railroad line running along it I have to establish the height of the track above the bench work. This way I will know how high up the wall I need to paint my green background. In order to do that I have to figure out the where the roadbed will be and in order to do that I have to plan how steep the grades will be on the high line.
Here is my progress on that plan.
I have sheet rocked the new wall separating this stall from the rest of the garage. I only rocked it half way as I want to be able to open the garage doors at each end of the garage to take advantage of any breeze that comes through. When the basic scenery is done I will sheet rock the other side of the wall and seal off the room. I will be installing a room air conditioner in the hole at the upper left of the wall. As you can see I have painted the walls the basic sky blue. I will try to get some haze airbrushed in along the horizon when I figure out where the horizon is.
At this point I have installed some risers and cut some roadbed which for now is just laid in place. The roadbed along the left wall is level but climbs along the back wall and the right wall at a grade that is about 4- 3/4% at the steepest. I did some grade test on my engines under load and quit when I got to 7-1/2% and they were still pulling well so I am happy with grade.
I have also been cutting and placing 2" blue foam along the back of the roadbed. At this point I am just roughing in the scenery so that I can draw a line on the wall that represents the horizon. Since I chose not to round the corner of the room I will build up the terrain in the corners and place several tall trees in the corners to hide this fact. Once I have drawn in the horizon I will pull the foam and roadbed out and work on the backdrop. As I have no experience at all on painted backdrops I will have to see if I can recruit some help from friends and family. I may have to reread Tom Sawyer to work that out.
I hope to have more progress next week. Check back if you are so inclined.
6 comments:
Wow! Larry, you don't waste time. I see your enthusiasm has motivated you well. As I look at this, I wondered a couple of things: The garage door seems to open up and over the layout - have you noticed any grease or dirt/grime dropping down from the wheels or tracks? How much vibration will the up and down cause?
Also, the exhaust of the wall unit AC will be toward your other two cars? What about the condensate drain? Will this cause a puddle, or anything that may wet the sheetrock?
The benchwork looks great already and you seem to know what you're about... looking forward to follow your progress.
Thanks for checking in Norm. I was planing on starting this railroad last year but injured my back and had to put it off.
The garage door is only open during construction to capture a breeze through the garage. I will be closing it and putting weather striping around the edge and hopefully not open it again. There is a door off the laundry room to the left in the photos so I really have no need to open the garage door once the heavy construction is finished.
I had the room air conditioner in my hobby room venting into the attic for about three years and there was no sign of condensation. In fact the air conditioner really doesn't get that cold in our 100+ degree temperatures here in the San Joaquin Valley. It will be doing great if it can cool the room down to about 80. The good part is its only bad for about 2-3 months.
Progress is going to bog down a little while I figure out what I am going to do about the backdrop.
Larry you are making great progress and are so neat!Don't you ever make a mess? You know what my layout room looks like.
Bill
Bill
Laurie got on my case because I didn't clean the room before I took the photos. Guys sure see thing differently.
Larry, looks great. Now please stop by and make my train room look as neat as yours. Can't wait to see more progress.
Doug Foscale
Thanks, Doug. You realize it only looks like that when I take a photo.
Things are a little slow this week but I will post something Friday.
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