Building a Mountain

Here I present a brief photo history of my first serious effort at building some landscape.  "Mountain" is perhaps overstating it, but it's a substantial piece of terrain all the same.

Earlier this summer construction began:

And then track was laid:

Jump ahead to September and I've decided that the space would be more useful if it were divided into two vistas, one inside, one outside.   So, for the outside scene I extend a track and build a base to build upon: 

An as yet undetermined structure will go here:

The plastercloth is painted, a step that I later find has little value, aside making this temporary state look a little nicer.

Next I start building other bits of wooden platform to support the hillside I plan to add.   In retrospect, I should have built higher so I could rely more on the wood then the newspaper for the form.

And here's a mountain of rolled up paper, taped down in bundles:  You can see my rolls of plaster cloth perched on top: 

The plaster cloth is now drying.  A lesson I later learned: don't build this close to your tracks!   It really limited my rock options later on.

Unfortunately I have no more intermediate photos to share.  My next step was casting about 70 rocks, gluing them on with white glue.  Then I tried embedding them into wet spackle, but that proved ineffective.  I then switched to a hot melt glue gun, which seemed to work for the most part, but in the end I went back to white glue.  

After the rocks were well and stuck, I started painting them.  I used a series of acrylic washes, about 1:10 mix.  I used a spray bottle, as recommended by an impressive Australian on YouTube.  I'm pleased with the results.

Once the paint dried I began my first foray in adding ground surfaces.  I'm pretty happy with the results.  I had some trouble with the glue, initially I hadn't sufficiently diluted it to spray it as a mist, but eventually I got it all sorted.  I plan to add a few more trees, and then a barn, some fencing and sheep etc. but that will have to wait till the environs are a bit closer to done.  The last thing i want to do is finish a space and then wreck it  as I work nearby.

Progress

Been a while, sorry.  Rather then bore yo with explanation, I'll just pass along this link:  http://hyperboleandahalf.blogspot.com/2010/06/this-is-why-ill-never-be-adult.html

So, here's what's new:

Abroad:

- I visited the (English) National Rail Museum in York.

- I shopped the Monk's Bar Model Shop in York, and I recommend it to you all.  Lots of stock, lots of supplies, friendly and knowledgeable staff, and prices lower than at home.

- I visited a large rail museum outside of Naples, and was turned away at the gates.

- I visited a regional rail museum outside of Barcelona and had a wonderful time.

- I took a regional train from York to Manchester and back.  The scenery was nice, and both stations were very impressive.  The rolling stock less so.

- I took a regional commuter train near Naples.  It reminded me of the stereotype of the NYC subway, as depicted in early 80's TV action/dramas.  

- I rode a funky monorail type thing at Heathrow T5, for a 90 second journey.

- I rode Vancouver's Skytrain, which is a 4 car EMU with no driver.  

In my basement:

- I brought back from england a souvenir: a Graham Ferish N scale British Rail Class 40 Diesel locomotive and 5 matching period cars.  I will post a review eventually, but the short short version is that I am quite pleased.

- I also bought some supplies: N scale cows, sheep, a level crossing, some stone walls, some wall and brick and road textures and a little road car too.  

- I removed a pair of switched near the base of one of my hills, ripped up the track, removed a portion of the ramp coming down, rebuilt the whole thing and laid new track without switches.  Previously this area had been a source of infrequent but reliable derailments, it is now 100% reliable.

- I removed a switch in the NW corner of my layout that had given a bypass track access back onto the main and instead extended it into a longer spur that now provides adequate space to park a long train.

- I added a new siding by my north station, on the north side of the tracks.  It too provides space to park a full train.

I extended the length of two sidings on my east yard and narrowed the gap between them sufficiently to allow them to terminate into a double engine shed.

- I build a wooden foundation inside my loop and then constructed a mountainous hillside on top of it, using plastercloth on a newspaper base.  I then cast about 70 rocks, mounted them, painted them, and then applied terrain.  

- I added skirting about the edge of the loop, and painted all of my benchwork edges black, giving everything a much more finished appearance.

- I removed the insulation foam structure in the south end of my layout and replaced it with a modular wood construction that will lift out in segments. I plan to build a small town and roadway on top here.

- I constructed a low relief house for the above town, so, maybe 12 more to go.

- At my local hobby shop I picked up two used N scale structures, the Kibri Castle and an alpine house of unknown make.  Both will take some work to not look out of place among my other structures but some pain and rebuilding should do the trick.

- I installed 5 new tortoise switch machines, connected with dcc decoders, and so now all turnouts are powered and DCC controlled.

- I installed 5 sets of red/green lights with the above new switches.  When the turnout is diverging, the light is red.  I love them.  At a glance I can see the status of the far side of the room now.

- I purchased 4 new passenger cars that entirely do not fit my layout, it's pure nostalgia on my part, they are Canadian Pacific Canadian cars, which I traveled on as a child.  These augment my existing Canadian train of a F7A+B and 4 cars.

That's about it for now.  I will attempt to expand each of the above points into a post of it's own with photos.   If anything above strikes you, please comment, and I'll try to address it first.

JA