Now that the soundtrack that I've been working on for the last year and a half has finally been completed, I can get on with the layout, and try and get it ready for the show at the beginning of May. Well, it definitely won't be finished in time, but hopefully it'll be somewhat presentable!
So, the first thing I decided to sort out this week were the various holes that still needed filling in. One of these was by the loco shed - between the concrete roadway and the setts. Both of these still need painting as you can see.
Next on my list was to begin work on the lighthouse. More specifically, chiselling out the windows and door apertures. My carpentry leaves something to be desired, but the end result doesn't have to be perfect since it will all be covered anyway. Time to put the wooden former into the vice (with an old T-shirt to stop it making marks (although looking at the base, it looks like it's already been through a war!).
The process is straight forward - using the smallest carpenter's chisel I could find, the first step was to cut around the perimeter of the windows and the door, to the depth required. This was actually done in two steps - first just by hand (easier to be accurate), and secondly with the help of a wooden mallet. Once that was done it was simply a case of taking out small sections of the waste material at a time (again with a mallet), before final clearing up with the chisel by hand.
And now my attention turned to the track. After numerous failed tests with trying to paint the sleepers, I'm afraid I gave up! So, out with an 8 year old spray can of Plastikote Suede Touch (first used on Calshot all those years ago!). After 30 to 40 minutes of making sure everything was properly masked and taped up, the layout was taken outside and given two coats. As you can probably make out, I taped over the moving parts of the points, so these will (somehow!) needed to be painted by hand - I didn't fancy clogging up the points and motors with spray paint. This obviously means that all those hours spent painting the sides of the rail would have been wasted, but to be quite honest I'm just glad that the sleepers are no longer black!
The colour isn't quite the sunbleached look I was after, but it's damn close! A bit of dry brushing will hopefully sort this out. Also the keen eyed ones among you, may notice some small circular magnets in locations for uncoupling. I installed them to the depth stated in the instructions, but unfortunately any wagon that goes over it gets pulled into the magnet and derails! I'm going to have to carefully prise them out and dig a deeper hole.
Over a week ago I started building the beach hut... well... that is until I decided I wanted to be able to make more of a scene out of it - so it's going to become some sort of tiny tatty seaside food kiosk/cafe, or perhaps a fish stall would be more suitable. Either way, there should be just enough room for a counter and shelves and I think that's about it! There will also be a canopy by the large window, and other small details outside. Still loads more work to do on it (including the roof ridge, door, and interior amongst other things).
You can see that there wasn't enough space in it's original location, due to the proximity of the wooden retaining wall. The sand dune behind has since been slightly cut away, to give it more room.
And now moving back to the track, today I decided to make a start on ballasting trials. So to make sure I didn't rush into it, I started in a place that won't be too visible from most angles - the platform area. The photo below shows it just after I had tamped the ballast down (just gentle vertical touches with a soft brush), but before gluing. Despite adding a couple drops of washing up liquid, there still seemed to be some surface tension which dislodged bits of the ballast. I cannot work out why it happened, especially since it seemed to be random - even the same mixture in the pipette would give varying results!
It's worth noting that more experimentation will be done. I should perhaps have gone with a much smaller area at first, but current thinking is to add some play sand (either by mixing it in with the ballast, or by scattering it in key locations afterwards). I think after that's done, I'll experiment with a pipette containing a watery mixture of sand-coloured paint to help bring the two elements together a bit better. Either way, the key will be trial and error, and will probably need further weathering after it's all laid down.
And so that brings us to the conclusion of this mish-mash of an update. I've already made a start on covering the lighthouse with a thin layer of clay, ready for scribing the stonework. The rest will hopefully be done tomorrow, but we'll see. I took the photo above just as the sun was setting, which always brings out the best in the layout - helping to hide a multitude of sins. Which reminds me, I must get that loco shed roof sorted out - it's too short. ...oh, and the lean-to and clerestory. Still a lot more work to do before the layout is presentable, and not a lot of time to do it in!
So, the first thing I decided to sort out this week were the various holes that still needed filling in. One of these was by the loco shed - between the concrete roadway and the setts. Both of these still need painting as you can see.
Next on my list was to begin work on the lighthouse. More specifically, chiselling out the windows and door apertures. My carpentry leaves something to be desired, but the end result doesn't have to be perfect since it will all be covered anyway. Time to put the wooden former into the vice (with an old T-shirt to stop it making marks (although looking at the base, it looks like it's already been through a war!).
The process is straight forward - using the smallest carpenter's chisel I could find, the first step was to cut around the perimeter of the windows and the door, to the depth required. This was actually done in two steps - first just by hand (easier to be accurate), and secondly with the help of a wooden mallet. Once that was done it was simply a case of taking out small sections of the waste material at a time (again with a mallet), before final clearing up with the chisel by hand.
And now my attention turned to the track. After numerous failed tests with trying to paint the sleepers, I'm afraid I gave up! So, out with an 8 year old spray can of Plastikote Suede Touch (first used on Calshot all those years ago!). After 30 to 40 minutes of making sure everything was properly masked and taped up, the layout was taken outside and given two coats. As you can probably make out, I taped over the moving parts of the points, so these will (somehow!) needed to be painted by hand - I didn't fancy clogging up the points and motors with spray paint. This obviously means that all those hours spent painting the sides of the rail would have been wasted, but to be quite honest I'm just glad that the sleepers are no longer black!
The colour isn't quite the sunbleached look I was after, but it's damn close! A bit of dry brushing will hopefully sort this out. Also the keen eyed ones among you, may notice some small circular magnets in locations for uncoupling. I installed them to the depth stated in the instructions, but unfortunately any wagon that goes over it gets pulled into the magnet and derails! I'm going to have to carefully prise them out and dig a deeper hole.
Over a week ago I started building the beach hut... well... that is until I decided I wanted to be able to make more of a scene out of it - so it's going to become some sort of tiny tatty seaside food kiosk/cafe, or perhaps a fish stall would be more suitable. Either way, there should be just enough room for a counter and shelves and I think that's about it! There will also be a canopy by the large window, and other small details outside. Still loads more work to do on it (including the roof ridge, door, and interior amongst other things).
You can see that there wasn't enough space in it's original location, due to the proximity of the wooden retaining wall. The sand dune behind has since been slightly cut away, to give it more room.
And now moving back to the track, today I decided to make a start on ballasting trials. So to make sure I didn't rush into it, I started in a place that won't be too visible from most angles - the platform area. The photo below shows it just after I had tamped the ballast down (just gentle vertical touches with a soft brush), but before gluing. Despite adding a couple drops of washing up liquid, there still seemed to be some surface tension which dislodged bits of the ballast. I cannot work out why it happened, especially since it seemed to be random - even the same mixture in the pipette would give varying results!
It's worth noting that more experimentation will be done. I should perhaps have gone with a much smaller area at first, but current thinking is to add some play sand (either by mixing it in with the ballast, or by scattering it in key locations afterwards). I think after that's done, I'll experiment with a pipette containing a watery mixture of sand-coloured paint to help bring the two elements together a bit better. Either way, the key will be trial and error, and will probably need further weathering after it's all laid down.
And so that brings us to the conclusion of this mish-mash of an update. I've already made a start on covering the lighthouse with a thin layer of clay, ready for scribing the stonework. The rest will hopefully be done tomorrow, but we'll see. I took the photo above just as the sun was setting, which always brings out the best in the layout - helping to hide a multitude of sins. Which reminds me, I must get that loco shed roof sorted out - it's too short. ...oh, and the lean-to and clerestory. Still a lot more work to do before the layout is presentable, and not a lot of time to do it in!
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