Model railroad layouts plans

Jim’s been in touch again with his DIY model train mountains. They are really coming along.

(His last post is here if you missed it.)

“Hello Alastair

Its Jim again from across the big pond with a great idea to save money when building a layout.

For those of us who have bridges, bridge piers are a must. So to cut expenses I purchased a bridge pier from Walters, paid $13.00 US. Now I needed 10 of those piers, six for the 6 foot span on my layout with a couple left over for other area’s. Now purchasing 10 of these would have been $130.00 US, so I got creative, and made my own. How you ask? Very simple, make copies of them.

Now there is a very cheap and easy way to do this. Purchase a rubber mold kit from a craft store. The kit I use is called “ALUMILITE AMAZING MOLD RUBBER” It is a two part kit, the rubber substance and a small bottle of hardener. What I do is mix the entire kit, you will need all of it. I use a plastic container that I get soup in its about 16 oz. liquid tall, any tall container will do as long as it is equal size. Place the original part in the container with the wide side facing up. Once the rubber substance is mixed, pour it all in the container with the original. It will take up to 2 to 4 hours for the rubber to solidify. Then you can demold the part from it.

Now to make your copies. Mix up a batch of HYDROCAl, according to directions, pour the HYDROCAL into the rubber mold, and wait for plaster to set up and become hard. Remove the casted part and it is ready for paint. And there you have it. Save the mold, you never know when you may need it again.

Here’s today’s update on the mountain for the Starrpoint Railroad part two.

Now just a recap! Everyone remembers how the mountain looked before the plaster cloth was applied. Just for a reminder is a picture of it.

With three layers of plaster cloth applied the mountain now looks like this.

The lighting in the room hinders the look of the mountain. I will try and correct it.

Now for the plaster painting! What I use is joint compound, diluted with water, to make a semi-thick paint. Now some modelers use plaster of paris, which is ok, but I find for me a least the diluted joint compound works best. You can work the mixture into all of the nooks and crannies.

This is what it looks like diluted in the pail.

I use a cheap sponge brush that you can purchase at any home improvement centre in you area. I had a friend of mine use a spatula and it did not work out too well for him. So he decided to try my method and it worked, took some time to complete but it is well work it.

Now the reason for using this mixture, it will fill in all of the pin holes on the mountain. No matter how hard you try, you will get pin holes showing, and those tine pin holes can be a nuisance when you work on you scene.

Here is are some pin holes on the mountain.

And no pin holes once the plaster paint is applied.

I am letting the first half of my DIY model train mountains sit for 24 hours, before I finish the rest.

I plan on painting the whole mountain with a base coat of white paint, and then will decide what colour I will use after. I plan on trees, a working radar station (more on that latter), deer, bears and whatever else I think of.

Stay tuned for part 3 of my DIY model train mountains coming in a week or so.

Jim

“Hi Al-

I just started subscribing and haven’t had much chance yet to read your posts but it looks interesting.

My favorite part of modeling is scenery and my tip for scenery is to pay a lot of attention to modeling people.

Nothing bothers me more than to see a photo of a wonderful scene- beautiful loco, amazing scratch built structure etc- and few, if any people! And many times, if there are figures, they are randomly placed, with no thought about do they fit? The same applies to vehicles, we are lucky to have a huge selection- so keep the era correct!

Think of it this way- we pay a lot of attention to prototype- getting the era, the numbering, the correct paint all accurate. People and vehicles have prototypes too!

The good thing is- fixing this is easy. Look at photos of your layout and just look at vehicles and people. Are there enough? (Usually not). And do they look right? Small changes and additions can add a lot to any scene.

Best regards,

Tony”

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“My tip would be not to wait till you have it perfect in your mind just keep doing it and the improvements will keep coming. Its more fun that way.

Noel”

A big thanks to Jim for sharing his DIY model train mountains, and to Noel and Tony.

Regular readers will know how much I love an update, so I’m really looking forward to seeing how Jim’s layout comes along.

That’s all for today folks.

Please do keep ’em coming.

And if today is the day you get started on your layout, the Beginner’s Guide is here.

Best

Al

PS Latest ebay cheat sheet is here.

PPS More HO scale train layouts here if that’s your thing.

Jim’s been in touch with a fine example of how important it is to get the HO scale tunnel clearance right.

It’s also wholesome reading as you’ll see.

If you missed his first post and want to get up to speed, it’s here:

Jim’s layout.

“Hi Al

And all of my fellow model railroaders, this is Jim from across the big pond in Buffalo NY, USA.

It has been a long time since I posted anything to the forum so here we go.

It has been a hard year for me and my son, with health issues that I have and my son who is in recovery. He has been clean of any issues now for over a year and I am very proud of him. Since I have not been able to work on the layout for so long, I was anxious to get back to it.

For starters, the mountain had to be rebuilt. All of the engines, steam and diesel kept hitting the rear wall of the mountains tunnel and either stalling there or derailing. So a real issue with HO scale tunnel clearance.

The upper section of the mountain track also had to be repaired. So I removed 90% of the mountain to rebuild it to eliminate the issues. The only section of the mountain that was not touched was the front face of the mountain. A picture of the front of the mountain is below.

The structure of the mountain was very flimsy, so that is another reason for the rebuild. Now in the picture of the webbing below, illustrates not a very good job, however it is very sturdy, and when I say sturdy, our cat Mango who is 7 lbs. decided to take a short walk on it, after I lifted her up to the top and it did not falter.

The mountain size is 4 feet wide and 2 ½ feet deep. There are two sets of tracks in the mountain, the lower track travels to the train station that will sit outside of the mountain, and the second track that will climb inside the mountain to the six foot bridge that crosses to the other side of the layout over the lake, over the main tracks, pass the steam engine facility ( still under construction ) and back to a container yard, cement factory, freight station, and for passenger service, a second passenger station.

Now for the plaster cloth application! Now I know many of the modelers have used Woodland Scenic’s plaster cloth, which is a little expensive. So, I went to Amazon and found a 5 pound roll of Plaster Cloth that is 16 yards long, 11 inches wide for $16.00 with free shipping. What a huge savings. I cut each piece to 4 inches by 11 inches for ease of application.

I am doing three layers, the first going horizontal, the second going vertical, and the last horizontal. I let each application dry for 24 hours before applying the next layer.

Below are pictures of the work that has been done to the mountain, including a drawing of the entire layout

I have a lot more to accomplish before I can even think about running the trains again. I will keep everyone up to date on the progress.

Here is a drawing of Starrpoint Railroad I sent this in some time ago. I thought you might want to see how the layout looks in real life.

As I mentioned, it is not the most beautiful webbing ever seen, but it is sturdy.

Here is the six foot bridge that leaves the mountain to the back of the layout.

Here is another view of the bridge as it leaves the mountain portal over the lake in front of the mountain.

Here are two of the entrances to the interior of the mountain. The right one is for the lower level to the train station, while the one of the left leads to the six foot bridge crossing over to the back part of the layout. The tracks are covered until the plaster cloth is applied to protect them.

HO scale tunnel clearance:

This is the front of the mountain, the part that I wanted to save during reconstruction. As you can see the top portal that leads to the bridge .

This mountain is four feet wide and 2 and 1/2 feet deep. I saw a video of the Alaskan Railroad crossing through mountainous tunnels, where the portals were of natural rock. They looked unique and so I decided to keep mine the same way. The portal on the far left of the mountains lower level leads to the train station that will be placed there.

As you can see I have started to cover the mountain with the plaster cloth. It is going to take some time to complete. I am letting each layer dry for 24 hours before applying the next layer. I plan on using three layers for the mountain. Once all of the layers are applied, I will then cover the entire mountain with a coat of dry wall compound diluted with water to make a sort of paint solution. This will further stiffen the mountain structure.

I mentioned before, this is the plaster cloth that I purchased from Amazon for $16.00. There is more than enough to complete the mountain and for any other projects for the Starrpoint Rail Road that may come up

I have some other projects in the works for the layout, and I will share them as I proceed with them.

Hope you enjoy.

Jim”

A huge thank to Jim for sharing the danger of not getting your HO scale tunnel clearance spot on – a wonderful narrative and pics too.

Jim’s narrative reminded me of Malcolm’s excellent post on derailments:

How to stop derailments.

Also, once you have your clearance dimension sorted, Bill’s “tunnel jig” will save you hours of heartache:

Model train tunnel.

It just goes to show, a layout is never really finished…

That’s all for today folks.

Please do keep ’em coming.

And if today is the day you get started on your layout, the Beginner’s Guide is here.

Best

Al

PS Latest ebay cheat sheet is here.

PPS More HO scale train layouts here if that’s your thing.

Dick’s been in touch with some stunning pics of trains:

“Alastair

Thought you might enjoy some pictures from the Railroad Museum of Pennsylvania located with the Strasburg Railroad just outside Lancaster Pennsylvania.

Truly a day-long adventure at a very modest admission. Lots of historical exhibits and information; even a “hands-on” for the little ones.

Dick”

(All images are clickable.)

What stunning pics of trains – looks like a fantastic day out to me.

I’m very keen to hear more about the engine in the last pic. If anyone knows please do leave a comment below.

And now for Jon. He’s got in touch after seeing a ‘how-to’ from another John:

“Thank you for the post.

I decided to use John’s idea and make my own model railroad switch machine. I added a light system to it.

I’ve attached pictures.

If you would like more information just let me know.

Thank you,

Jon”

My word – clever stuff – all I can say is yes, please do send more info Jon, look fantastic.

There are lots of posts on the blog now about switching machines. The one that springs to mind is Dean’s:

HO scale switch maching.

And there’s John’s post too:

HO scale turnout switches.

Please do mail me if you’d like to share anything – even if it’s just some train pics of your day out.

Thanks to Jon and to Dick for sharing his pics of trains.

That’s all for today folks.

Please do keep ’em coming – it’s all getting rather sparse in my inbox.

That’s all for today folks.

Please do keep ’em coming.

And if today is the day you get started on your layout, the Beginner’s Guide is here.

Best

Al

PS Latest ebay cheat sheet is here.

PPS More HO scale train layouts here if that’s your thing.