Hi Simon, and to Big Blue.

Yup, all of us the Northern Hemisphere are experiencing the shorter days and cooler temperatures, and while there are still plenty of reasons to be outdoors throughout the winter, those dreary days and crappy weather make it especially nice to have our trains. The sun is always shining in my layout room, and the workshop is bright and cosy, too.

One of the nicest things about this hobby is that it's so multi-faceted: if you don't feel like working on freight cars, perhaps some trackwork would be more enjoyable. Or some scenery or a little time spent running a train, even if it's back and forth on only the few feet of track you might have in service. I sometimes hit that "block" where I just can't get into a project, or am stumped by some problem that has arisen in an on-going job. Often, a little time in the layout room, not running trains or working on something, but simply sitting and imagining what's "going to be", is enough to re-ignite the spark.

Wayne

Welcome to the Gauge, Simon. I am honored that you like my layout and that it made you give up lurking and joining us. Space is at a premium in our small house, so I have to make the best of it. But even if I had a big train room, I think I’d rather work on a few different switching layouts side by side than building a big one. Long trains and those big mainline engines are cool, but my favorite engines are small swithers. Looking forward to see you making progress with your NW US/Canadian border project.

Wayne, I do that quite often – just looking at my layout and thinking about it and visualizing my next moves.

Just a short update to keep this thread alive and to show that I was not totally idle . After I ballasted the track on the left side extension, I built the first background structure for this side of the layout. Again it is a simple shoebox design and was very easy to to. That is why I only show the picture of the finished (but yet unpainted) structure and not how I built it. The structure is about 2' long and covers about half of the back of the extension.





Today I assembled these two 40' trailers from an A-Line kit. I need them for another scene I am planning. These 40 ft. trailers are too old for the era I am modeling to be still in service, but they will look great on a lot with cracked and overgrown tarmac, left there to rot and fall into pieces. I don’t know if Roadway ever had trailers that looked like these, but I had the decals at hand and what can I say ... I really don’t care if they are prototypical or not .





I still need to build a background structure for the other half of the extension on the left side of my layout. Then I can start to put it all together.

I LOVE the little details like that electric meter, boxes and cables!!! Amazing!
Ralph

Glad to see you are still at it. I think some of us are suffering from fits and starts modeling these days.

That back ground structure looks great. I like the different use of materials on it.

Hey, some flat tires and some rusted rims would really make those old trailers look like they've bought the farm. So to speak.

I' m speechless for the moment....

Kurt!

This is absolutely FANTASTIC! First time I have seen this thread.

I can only hope to have a layout that looks HALF as good as yours. I will be referring to this thread once I get to the scenery stage.

It's just plain beautiful. Thanks for sharing!

Ralph, I love doing these little details and I think they can make even such a boring structure look interesting.

Shane, you are right, a litte rust on the rims would not hurt, but to flatten a tire that is made of solid rubber is beyound my capabilities .

Gray, glad you found my thread and even more that you like it.

cnw1961 Wrote:Just a short update to keep this thread alive and to show that I was not totally idle . After I ballasted the track on the left extension, I built the first background structure for this side of the layout. Again it is a simple shoebox design and was very easy to to. That is why I only show the picture of the finished (but yet unpainted) structure and not how I built it. The structure is about 2' long and covers about half of the back of the extension.

Hi Kurt,

I'm wanting to start scratchbuild some buildings... is this building really as simple as it looks? Sheet styrene plus strips? Can you post your measurements here?

Thanks,

Colin

If you have 40 foot trailers, and are modeling a more modern era where the majority of trailers would be 48 or even 53 footers, 40 footers can still be used for beer or batteries. There may be other commodities that are just too heavy to use a longer trailer as well. If a company is using a leased owner operator's trailer to move a commodity, they would probably end up loaded into a longer trailer; but for company owned equipment, using 40 feet of a 53 foot trailer instead of special ordering a new 40 foot trailer is probably not very common. 40 footers are much easier to maneuver in tight places than a 53, and thus less likely to suffer accident damage. A friend of mine here in So Cal works for a local beer distributor, and they special order 40 foot trailers, even paying an extra price for something "non-standard" because they couldn't load all 53 feet in a longer trailer anyway.

Russ, thank you for that very interesting and useful information. So even though my trailers are old, they could still be in service – looks like I don’t need to flatten the tires .

Colin, welcome to The Gauge. This building is really as simple as it looks. I used 1,5 mm (.060") styrene for the walls and the strips and some small pieces of corrugated styrene for the rolling doors. The electrical boxes are made of 2 mm (.080") styrene and the wires I cut from a 0,3 mm (.013") sheet. For the downspout I used a 2 mm (.080") square brass tube. The door is just a few thin strips of 0,3 mm styrene I glued to the wall. If you build a structure like this, don’t forget to brace it with styrene strips on the backside to prevent warping. Please feel free to ask if there is anything you need to know.

Kurt, how do you do the grass cluster? I've tried to pick some grass with a pair of tweezers but it is not aligned at all.

Reinhard, I am using Heki wild grass (for more information on it please go to the top of page 8 of this thread) and as you are from Germany just like me, you should not have any problems getting it at your hobby shop.

cnw1961 Wrote:Reinhard, I am using Heki wild grass (for more information on it please go to the top of page 8 of this thread) and as you are from Germany just like me, you should not have any problems getting it at your hobby shop.

Thank you. It is on order

Kurt, the trailers as well as the new structure are awesome! I cant wait to see the trailers on the layout in the abandoned yard!!

cnw1961 Wrote:... This building is really as simple as it looks. ...
Please feel free to ask if there is anything you need to know.

Kurt,

Thanks for the info! I like how the building is angled to the backdrop.

Just one more question, which size corrugated styrene do you use for the doors?

Cheers,

Colin