Stein's Minneapolis Warehouse district 1957 (HO)

[steinjr]

Progress is slow, as usual. This weekend I mostly spent my "modeling time" on cleaning up my workshop/train room - now I have a much better idea about what kind of stuff I have available for scratch building and kit-bashing.

Ran out of brick sheets, so I toyed a bit with the Evans model builder program to try to make a placeholder facade for the mill building along the backdrop just for the heck of it. Not much to show for the weekend.



Smile,
Stein

[nomad]

Looks good Stein.
How do you like that Evans Model Builder program?

Loren

[steinjr]

Looks good Stein.
How do you like that Evans Model Builder program?

Loren

Well, it produces nice enough output (especially for background buildings), and it is easy to make a building front fast.

But the program itself is kinda slow, uses quite a bit of memory and a little clumsy to use in some respects, and has a few quirks (like it sometimes rearranges windows when I have saved a file and reopens it, or that it seems to ignore how many copies I ask for when I print - it seems to print one copy no matter how many I ask for).

On the whole - it is okay, and probably worth the $35 I paid for it a while back.

Smile,
Stein

[nomad]

Thanks for the info Stein. It's $45.00 now so I think I will pass.

Loren

[steinjr]

A little update on my layout, just to show I haven't fallen off the face of the planet, even though things have been moving slowly lately:

I've been mucking around with two things lately:

Urban canyon scene to the right of the entrance.

I've tried various buildings to create the look I want on the right side of this scene - right inside the door.

I will make the wall with the big red panel that sticks out from the right side a little narrower, so there is a little more room for the RR, and make it one story higher. Ignore the white thing sticking up at the right rear - just a piece of styrene that hasn't been cut off yet from a wall piece I plan to reuse.

Now:


Before:



Harbor scene to the left of the door.

I decided to cut down on the amount of water/dockside, and add a warehouse to the harbor scene, moving over what used to be Williams Hardware from the milling district to the right of the door.

Changed the way the second (closes to the main) dockside track branches off from the siding, to make both tracks longer, and to make it possible to spot cars at the dockside warehouse without blocking access to the second track.

Also decided to axe the warehouse track I had planned along the lower wall, and instead try to squeeze in a couple of hidden staging tracks along this wall:

Track plan now:


Picture now:



Track plan before:


Picture before:


Smile,
Stein

[steinjr]

A little more progress on my milling district scene - got the walls for another couple of buildings built (got a big box of Walthers Modulars a couple of days ago) - walls for the front building is just taped together at the moment, to get the platform up against the track fitted.



In the back left (w/ gray and red walls) is part of the milling complex. I decided to make an internal loading dock for this building. There will also be an elevated walkway from somewhere up on the wall above the tank car over to the grey building in the center of the picture.



Next step - putty, sanding, wash in warm soap water, and then primer and paint for the walls, before I add windows etc.

Wish I could work with Josh's speed and craftmanship, but it goes slower with me - probably won't happen any more until next weekend.

Smile,
Stein

[eightyeightfan1]

Looking good.

[cnw1961]

I really like those big structures. Great scene . Looking forward to seeing it finished.

[Ralph]

Those mills are shaping up nicely! It will be fun to watch switchers moving among the concrete canyons.

Ralph

[Trucklover]

Cool Stein!! I like that gray one, is that from Red Wing Flour Mill kits?

[steinjr]

eightyeight, Kurt, Ralph and Josh -

Thank you all for your kind comments - I am also looking forward to getting the scene more finished and starting to run trains among the concrete, brick and stone urban canyons.

The grey primed one in the center of the scene is indeed has a front and right side based on a couple of walls from Walther's Red Wing and/or Centennial Mills (the corresponding background kit). I've kitbashed it a little bit to change it a little, using bits and pieces from two walls and some plain styrene to replace some wall sections with doors and windows with plain sections without windows and doors, and built a little L-shaped loading dock along the track and along the parking lot. Back, other side and roof is just plain styrene.

None of the buildings are done (except possibly for the paper building along the back wall) - I just wanted to see the whole scene mocked up fairly accurately before I started on painting the walls properly.

Smile,
Stein

[steinjr]

Didn't get to do much more than just barely make a start on a kitbash for the Robinson Manufacturing company along the rear (top in plan) wall of my layout - was too busy enjoying the first really nice weekend this spring.

This morning I worked a little more on changing the top left corner of my layout plan, inspired by the bridge Bob (foulrift) used as a scenic divider in his plan here on the gauge (http://www.the-gauge.net/forum/viewtopic...9&start=15).

This is what the plan looks like now - see the upper left hand corner for changes. I think it would improve the plan.



Smile,
Stein

[steinjr]

I haven't gotten any more work done on the actual layout for a while - I have been struggling with wanting to make some changes to the track plan in the warehouse district (along the top of my layout) to remove more of the "everything parallel with the layout edge" effect, and working in some hidden staging on the layout.

Now I finally feel again like I have a plan and can proceed with layout work:


Smile,
Stein

[ocalicreek]

I like the changes, especially around the yard office. Road access always adds realism, IMO. Plus, looks like you've got an opportunity to use a mirror where the road meets the chimbley.

Your new stub yard kinda reminds me of the Inglenook sidings switching game (a compliment )

Galen

[steinjr]

Hi Galen --

I like the changes, especially around the yard office. Road access always adds realism, IMO. Plus, looks like you've got an opportunity to use a mirror where the road meets the chimney.

Good point. I already have a couple of mirrors from an earlier track plan for an earlier layout I could reuse. Will have to look into that when I get that far.

Your new stub yard kinda reminds me of the Inglenook sidings switching game (a compliment )

Mmm - must be the angle for the team track that makes it visually similar - the three sidings are not really 5-3-3 in length. More like 6-5-4. But the lead is engine plus 2 if you don't want to foul the main. So - yes - I can definitely see the similarity.

Edit: yet another change - to make it possible to switch both the yard tracks and the warehouse district while a thirds train is moving around and around on the mainline track:




Smile,
Stein