Wait line clear is good way to describe progress on the layout at the moment.
I've decided I wasn't happy with the painted background as I had compromised smoothness for malleability. The grooves in the timber are just too obvious. If the viewer was going to be a meter away, I'd settle for it. Instead, I've written to a company in the US who does custom, self-adhesive backdrops to produce an all-sky backdrop which I can splice the trees and mountains over from the current 'Barinore' backdrops I have. The bloke at the other end produced two samples for me overnight (!):
Expensive perhaps, but I'm planning on keeping this layout for a while and adding to it as I get more space. For now though, Backdrop, wlc.
Keen to press on with something else while I wait for that, I've been starting to form the scenery at the right where the track exits the module under a bridge. This would allow me to then measure up the fascia, cut it, fit it, and paint it. In making some initial attempts at forming the scenery, I've found that until the Trackrite and track is down I'm going to be guesstimating where the loading bank for the cattle siding will be, as well as an appropriate height for the bridge. I prefer to get the tools out and do it once, so, Fascia, wlc.
My LED lightstrips arrived from China a few weeks ago. I've figured out how to wire them and this weekend I had planned to install them as per this post on the Stonequarry Creek blog by routing a groove in some timber and sliding them in. If I only had the right router bit. You guessed it, special order required. Lighting, wlc.
On the upside, I've had some fantastic coffee while standing in the garage staring at the modules and figuring out what to do next. You just can't beat an espresso machine for smooth - sorry. Back to model railways. Putting the train controller hat on for a moment, if you were to look at these jobs converging on one of the old paper train control graphs, the router bit is probably going to arrive before the sky backdrop, but I want to tackle the latter before anything else.
Current plan: backdrop, lighting, Trackrite, track, landform, fascia, wiring.
Looking forward to the Epping Model Railway Club's exhibition at Thornleigh next weekend too.
Plenty to do. Now to wlc.
Cheers,
Ben
Ben,
ReplyDeleteI may have missed it but do you happen to have a link to the US company. I too am contemplating a custom back drop although I have created an image including both land and sky from photos I took a while ago.
Like you, looking forward to Thornleigh this weekend.
cheers Phil
G'day Phil,
ReplyDeleteIt's from www.backdropjunction.com
One of the pages there has a price calculator (albeit in imperial). Shipping for mine was US$40 as an example, as they don't list the shipping cost to Australia.
Hope that helps!
Cheers,
Ben
Thanks Ben. Will follow up
ReplyDeletecheers Phil
Great reaad thankyou
ReplyDelete