The GnATTERbox

Will Vale

...but something is afoot on my kitchen table:

It all looks a bit cabalistic really, with the crossed sleeper strip and arcane geometries of the bits of rail and on the cork. Twisted Evil

You can also see my Mk2. rail bender - the Mk1. was my finger and thumb but I cut myself on the rail web quite unpleasantly last time - hence the small piece of cardboard for this attempt. Safety first!

Apologies for the protracted absence, I've been doing standard gauge stuff (layout in progress, some rolling stock weathering, etc.) and have rather neglected the minimal gauges in the meantime. Hopefully this project will provide a bit of light relief Smile

Cheers,

Will

DCRfan · Posted: Fri Oct 09, 2009 8:35 am Post subject:

Display card - not being used as intended.

Track - not being used as intended.

You have made a perfect start Laughing

_________________
Paul
Gnu Zealand

Will Vale · Posted: Fri Oct 09, 2009 9:46 am Post subject:

I failed to summon any demons with my arcane geometries, and ended up with this instead:

It moves! And the wiring was a bit of a relief after the DCC madness of my other project. Two power wires, two frog wires in case I want them later, and one insulating joiner.

It's not the most exciting plan, but it's hard to do much with sidings if you want an oval as well in the given area (A3). The idea is that the back half will be tunnels with a modelled scene at the right rear, a connecting track through an open-backed engine shed on the left, and a spoil tip at the front left. Not a lot of operational possibility, but it'll certainly work and it might be possible to automate loading at the top right and tipping at the front left at some point in the (far far) future.

Laying the track onto cork with nothing else under it is quite fun - it makes it easy to change things, but it's just about strong enough to keep everything in the right place. It's now been trimmed back and laminated to some thin MDF since I like to have something solid to fix things to if I need it.

Will

michael · Posted: Fri Oct 09, 2009 7:40 pm Post subject:

It doesn't look like the regret is getting in the way so far Wink

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Regards Michael
If you believe you can make something, you can make it.

http://users.xplornet.com/~macton/index.html

Steve Bennett · Posted: Fri Oct 09, 2009 9:18 pm Post subject:

Ah, the pleasures of a small oval of track Smile

cant beat it Laughing

_________________
Steve Bennett
Sidelines
http://www.pepper7.co.uk

Glen A · Posted: Fri Oct 09, 2009 9:34 pm Post subject:

A3 size you say.
Is this for the NZ Model Railway convention competition next year?
_________________
Glen Anthony.
Gnew Zealand

"The Stamping Ground"
http://www.trainweb.org/nzgr/Gn15/Gn15.html

route29 · Posted: Fri Oct 09, 2009 11:19 pm Post subject:

Looks great so far!
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John

Will Vale · Posted: Sat Oct 10, 2009 7:34 am Post subject:

Thanks for all the comments!

Glen A · Posted: Sat Oct 10, 2009 8:35 am Post subject:

Will Vale · Posted: Sat Oct 10, 2009 9:55 am Post subject:

That's a good idea - thanks. I'll file it away for next time. Is piano wire that's fine enough to go around corners also stiff enough that you can just turn the end up and stick it through the hole in the tiebar?

(The cotton buds weren't too bad in this case since the wire run is dead straight - I only used a couple at key points.)

chris krupa · Posted: Sat Oct 10, 2009 7:38 pm Post subject:

I don't like piano wire since it is so hard that eventually it snaps (at least it has on one of my layouts - three times) due to the extra work hardening of point changing.

I prefer to use square section brass rod running in square plastruct tube. I find that brass has much less tendency to work harden and snap.

Certainly you can't take it around corners, but I think that doing so risks extra hardening and sooner snapping. I prefer to design the layout so the point rodding runs are straight.

Chris

DCRfan · Posted: Sat Oct 10, 2009 9:19 pm Post subject:

Will Vale · Posted: Sun Oct 11, 2009 6:18 am Post subject:

Sounds like someone forgot to multiply by 1.5!

I've been testing my sanity today replacing some crazy-track sleepers with square timber for a bridge, and then fitting some chairs/spikes cut from On30 track. It's done now, but I pray they won't come off before I get some supporting bridgework underneath Sad

Edit: They're at least a bit overscale, and it's more noticeable than I thought. I think I might try and trim them back so that they'll just be wide rather than long... Hmm.

Will Vale · Posted: Mon Oct 12, 2009 10:38 pm Post subject:

Bit more happened over the weekend and last night:

I finished the wiring and got the point frogs powered. I made the usual mistake and put the iron away before testing - I'd forgotten to feed one side of the second siding from the frog of the first, so had a short when both points were set in a particular combination.

The wiring runs underneath and will be inaccessible, but all the termination is on the top so it should be possible to fix problems after the fact, or run new wires on the surface if necessary.

I then got the layers laminated up. When I built Igelfeld (the Z layout) I had a lot of trouble shaping the rising ground below track level since I glued the Styrofoam to the frame before shaping it so couldn't cut from both sides. This meant the river ended up exactly as wide as my pocket plane Smile

To get around this, I cut out the recessed portions of the terrain en bloc when the sheet was loose. The idea is to carve them on the workbench (kitchen table) and use the angled cuts as a key to put the pieces back in.

You can also see the deeper bridge sleepers in those pictures - what a fiddle they were!

I've also started boxing in the tunnel - this is a bit scary since it shows how much elevation I'm dealing with in a small area - lots of rocks required:

It's not quite as precipitous as it looks since the removable piece of styrofoam is intended to slope up from the front to the back - there won't be a near-vertical cliff, but there's still around 150mm elevation overall.

Finally I've painted the track, or at least made a start. Since this is a desert setting I figured the wood would weather to grey, so painted the track with grey primer. There was a bit of panic since it looked fairly terrible - I think the paint was quite old, or else it's just different to the Tamiya lacquers I've used for this before, and I didn't put on a very good coat - a few clumps. It didn't help that I was outside in the dusk at this point so had to guess quite a bit of what I was doing... Anyway, I've cleaned everything up and the trains are running OK. I then went and brush painted the rails and chairs with raw sienna tube acrylic, and it still looked terrible since any missed bits were bright rather than dark.

After that had dried I made up a dark wash from Tamiya thinners with GW black acrylic ink and "Devlan Mud" wash. The Games Workshop washes and inks have a great range of colours but they don't flow very well on large surfaces - adding the thinner (alcohol works too) rather than water makes a huge difference. I splashed this on liberally with a big brush, and at last it's starting to look like I imagined. (Phew Smile

) Next step is to touch up the rush and drybrush the sleepers.

Coming soon: Ballast, hopefully. I'm planning to use Klear for this as seen on RMWeb - I did a little test and it was pretty good, and less hassle than PVA since you don't need to wet it first.

Will

Will Vale · Posted: Tue Oct 13, 2009 9:57 pm Post subject:

I couldn't find a ballast colour I was happy with from my motley collection, so I tried an experiment. I mixed a relatively neutral ballast (Hornby light tan, which is a very slightly warm grey) dry with Mig Gulf War Sand pigment, and it works really well. The pigment seemed to adhere to the ballast so that when I spread it over the sleepers, it didn't rub off onto them. I dribbled on some Johnson's Klear and it set hard overnight. It's very slightly darker now that it's dry, which I guess is to be expected since Klear is gloss. There's no gloss finish on the ballast though.

One thing to watch is that if the Klear gets on the sleepers they will be slightly glossy. It doesn't creep, so it's just down to being accurate with the eye dropper. I got one glossy one, but it doesn't matter since my experimental section is in a tunnel Smile

I suspect a light drybrush would kill the gloss very quickly, which is what I'll try - or I suppose you could always apply some matt varnish.

[edit]

A picture speaks a thousand words, so here's a cruel closeup. The ballast on the cardboard on the left is the dry mix, on the right is the result after fixing and drying:

I think it's possible to see a slight gloss on the grains at this level of magnification, but it's not noticeable at any kind of distance, and will tone down with more powders and/or drybrushing anyway. I'm happy enough with this result that I've gone ahead and ballasted the rest.

Will

mud magnet · Posted: Wed Oct 14, 2009 5:02 pm Post subject:

Will,

Track work and ballast looks great. Colours work well. I've been using the Games Workshop paints myself recently (having been using them for Warhammer 40,000 orcs and space rangers - another modelling interest with my 12 year old son) and have some good results. I will try the Tamiya thinners with the washes - useful idea.

Look forward to seeing progress.
_________________
Richard

Steve Bennett · Posted: Wed Oct 14, 2009 5:20 pm Post subject:

Interesting the use of Johnsons Klear, not used that since I needed shiny boots in the armed forces, a long time ago Smile

Have you tried it with ground foam yet Will, curious as to wether it will penetrate without a wetting agent of some sort Question

_________________
Steve Bennett
Sidelines
http://www.pepper7.co.uk

Pandy · Posted: Wed Oct 14, 2009 6:23 pm Post subject:

Looks good to me ! will have to remember that one Smile

Steve, I thought your lot all used Tornado nose cone paint on their toecaps Smile

I've heard of it used in an attempt to stiffen combat jumper elbow & shoulder patches but never tried it myself.
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Dave & Lorraine, more ideas than space, time & finance permit !

Will Vale · Posted: Wed Oct 14, 2009 9:42 pm Post subject:

dieselwater · Posted: Thu Oct 15, 2009 2:30 am Post subject:

The track looks great will. I like the colour of the ballast combined with your sleepers, track and track ties Cool

That's a friendly looking set of figures you have there Laughing

The folks here in Taiwan seem to like painting robot figures, alot of them in the model shoppy here Rolling Eyes

Good progress on the layout. The structures toward the back look interesting Cool

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Little old lines to somewhere.

David.

Cross Kitter · Posted: Thu Oct 15, 2009 9:45 pm Post subject:

Hi Will Vale and co,

I read somewhere, I've got over four hundred railway related publications Rolling Eyes

so could have been anywhere Embarassed

that one professional model layout builder actually prepares the baseboard as usual and then dry lays all the track and fixes it into the complete formation by soldering/gluing all joints and some sleepers to the rails (no I think he uses glue for the sleepers. Rolling Eyes

) He marks exactly where he wants the ballast to go onto the layout, removes the complete track (I'm guessing he does this in sections Question

) spreads neat PVA where he wants the ballast to go, puts the track back in place (he didn't say how he managed to get it in the correct position with all that white glue obscuring where he had put it before Question

) and then just pours ballast over the whole layout Exclamation

He waits 24 hrs for it to dry and then hoovers up the loose ballast with a dedicated hoover Shocked

and recycles the ballast back into a container.

Not tried this one myself yet but especially with our small layouts and card that could fall apart with too much wet it does appeal to me.

Has anybody else tried it yet Question

_________________
Simon the "very" cross-kitter.

I know what happens if you cross a 1:48 loco kit with a 4mm chassis, only a mother could love it. If it's a kit I'll bash it, and use bits from anywhere in anyscale.

Will Vale · Posted: Thu Oct 15, 2009 10:21 pm Post subject:

I haven't tried that. I do stick my track down with PVA so I guess it would be possible to ballast at the same time. In fact for this layout the rail joints are all soldered (apart from one insulated joiner) so it *might* be possible to lift + replace the track. Like you say, I wouldn't be confident about my track being in exactly the same place after removal and replacement, given that even with pre-curved rail I tend to get some stresses at joints. I'd worry about not getting curve radii right, and minimum gauge tends to be closer to the edge in that department Smile

A couple of things to watch for if you give it a go:

* I can't imagine you'd get much depth of shoulder with a single layer of ballast on PVA. I noticed with the 009 track that the sleeper strip was quite evident and I needed to add a bit more ballast in a couple of places where it wasn't quite at sleeper top level in order to hide it.
* I've found that when gluing track with PVA, it's very easy to get heavy tarnish on the rail if there's too much glue or the air can't circulate. I don't know if the ballast would help this (absorb glue) or hinder it (require more glue). This might be something that only happens to me though - I've never seen other reports of it.

Not saying it wouldn't work though. I must also admit that I quite like the drudgery (Mrs. Doyle accent Very Happy

) of diluted glue ballasting - it's hard on the eyes, but very satisfying to do.

W

Steve Bennett · Posted: Thu Oct 15, 2009 11:55 pm Post subject:

Will Vale · Posted: Fri Oct 16, 2009 4:43 am Post subject:

Jon Randall · Posted: Fri Oct 16, 2009 3:57 pm Post subject:

I have glued track and ballast down with this method using neat waterproof pva with success but supplemented with the pva/water/washing-up liquid after the bottom layer of glue has dried.
The rails did turn green though Rolling Eyes

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Jon Randall

Gno dear, I'm gnot building another layout.
Ok just one more for luck.....

Size is gnot the important issue here