11-01-2010, 12:42 AM
Okay so October has come and almost gone here on da wess cose and I had mentioned I'd be getting to more work on the layout by now. Actually I have and so here's a small update. Monthly hobby spending cash went to purchase furring strips and 1/8" hardboard (smooth one side - cheaper that way) for the backdrop. A fellow modeler with a table saw was kind enough to help me rip the 4x8 sheets into 2x8 sheets. Next I need to measure, cut and assemble them into backdrop sections.
A bit of operating, just switching various cars into the sidings as if the industries I mentioned above were there, has shown me I don't like the schematic I'd drawn in the photo, for a few reasons. One is the passenger depot. Typically a passenger train up to Pinto will just be a drover's caboose or combine stuck onto a freight, mixed train fashion, or a passenger car on a milk & mail train. Even so I don't like that I can only fit one car, and a short one at that, in front of the station.
I have an idea for a new configuration in my head that eliminates the grade crossing through town as well as the two industries along the rearmost siding. Deciding what would fit back there wasn't working out and I really wanted more town structures - non rail served buildings - in the scene. PLUS, if Pinto is to be a place for interchange with the Big Tujunga Lumber Company, I needed more space for those cars. So eliminating the rear industries solves that problem.
Losing the industries is no biggie since I'm just trading them for a different traffic stream (more lumber loads & BTLC traffic) and I'm gaining a better opportunity for modeling part of the actual township of Pinto in 3D, not just on the backdrop. I really want to try forcing the perspective here, like Earl Smallshaw does on his Mystic Mines layout. See the clinic video on that topic over ath the Model Railroad Hobbyist site.
So if I had a copy of the original picture on my current computer I'd sketch off a revised city plan right quick but I don't so not tonight...later. Sorry no pics on this post. I'll have more when I get the backdrop up or the city plan sketched, whichever comes first.
Galen
A bit of operating, just switching various cars into the sidings as if the industries I mentioned above were there, has shown me I don't like the schematic I'd drawn in the photo, for a few reasons. One is the passenger depot. Typically a passenger train up to Pinto will just be a drover's caboose or combine stuck onto a freight, mixed train fashion, or a passenger car on a milk & mail train. Even so I don't like that I can only fit one car, and a short one at that, in front of the station.
I have an idea for a new configuration in my head that eliminates the grade crossing through town as well as the two industries along the rearmost siding. Deciding what would fit back there wasn't working out and I really wanted more town structures - non rail served buildings - in the scene. PLUS, if Pinto is to be a place for interchange with the Big Tujunga Lumber Company, I needed more space for those cars. So eliminating the rear industries solves that problem.
Losing the industries is no biggie since I'm just trading them for a different traffic stream (more lumber loads & BTLC traffic) and I'm gaining a better opportunity for modeling part of the actual township of Pinto in 3D, not just on the backdrop. I really want to try forcing the perspective here, like Earl Smallshaw does on his Mystic Mines layout. See the clinic video on that topic over ath the Model Railroad Hobbyist site.
So if I had a copy of the original picture on my current computer I'd sketch off a revised city plan right quick but I don't so not tonight...later. Sorry no pics on this post. I'll have more when I get the backdrop up or the city plan sketched, whichever comes first.
Galen
I may not be a rivet counter, but I sure do like rivets!