Building rough in

Did someone say Jigsaw's?

This weekend I spent time reviewing and revising the plan for the industries on the layout. This includes the products that come and go along with the car types and the possible on line or off line destination. This then helped with the planning of the buildings. I had completed this time ago but it needed review, revision and enhancement.

Once this was completed I then searched out all the buildings that I have been hording for a number of years. This includes a number of Walthers cornerstone modular kids, 2 x Superior paper kits, other Walthers kits and a number of DPM kits.

I already knew what types of buildings I was after per the plan so set about playing jigsaw puzzles with buildings to make up what I needed.

I managed to cobble together a large power plant from part of the Superior paper kit along with a large long main paper mill building. I then used the remainder of the red brick parts of the paper mill to make a power station for the glass factory across the isle.

Some of the kits may be recognisable. Some not so much.

I wanted to use the long plaster warehouse flats that I had, so plan on adding a old unused track next to where the building is in Whitehall.

While some of the industries are correct (in name only) to those on the D&H, the others are made up based on the types of industries that were on the D&H. So not strictly to what was there and a fair bit of modellers licence. I am on the other side of the planet compared to up state New York and it is my layout..

Here are a few pictures of the building walls taped together to get the feel for them..

TOFC Facility

Ball Metal Container Co

The yellow heavy duty crane will be along the front of the building.

Power plant for the Glass Factory

 General foods

Lay-Z-Boy chairs

Lay-Z-Boy Chairs

 Pt Henry Doors

 SL Scrap

Pt Henry Doors

SL Scrap steel

 Loco facility in Whitehall

Post Star Printing - Whitehall

Cement - Whitehall

 Paper Factory. Further down the town, there is space for tank and pulp logs.

 Power plant for the paper mill

Propane gas dealer

The Glass factory will go here and still needs more planning

Now to get building..

Somewhere for the Laptop

A place for the Laptop.

As I use JMRI to manage the signals and routes on the layout, I needed a place to sit the laptop.
When I get to operating sessions the panel will be managed by a dispatcher in the other part of the garage. While I am running the layout myself, I needed a central place to locate the laptop so I could do some loco programming / speed matching (if needed) as well as run the JMRI panel.

This weekend I build a roll out shelf / drawer for the machine. If needed the screen can be closed and the machine left running and it can be pushed back under the layout and out of the way.

The Loco buffer and power supply for the layout are tucked up under the layout to save on messing around with cables.

Here are a few pictures on the finished product..

Next up.. Building planning (I think)/.....

Start work on the scenery

Foam, Foam, more foam and a hot wire cutter.

I finally have my mojo back and with Covid-19 lock down and a full 4 day Easter long weekend I decided to get stuck into cutting up the loads of foam that I have been storing for some time.

After searching for about 2 hours for my cheap and nasty hot wire cutter (that I bought off ebay from China a few years ago) I got stuck into it..

Four days later all foam is roughed in and about 1/2 of the foam is now painted brown.

Some parts on the top level I will look to change over time by adding a few bridges and river beds etc.

Here are a few pictures with a train running through them to enable a sense of size.

The last picture is bags full of off cuts of the foam.. Now to gradually get rid of them in the rubbish bin 1 bag per week.

Now onto building planning..

A little bit more on the presentation

Found more Carpet.

While fishing out some tools for a bit of car maintenance today, I found more carpet off cuts that I stored in the garden shed.
So it was time to play carpet jigsaw and see if I could cover the floor in the Railroad room (at least as far as the eye can see,up to the edge of the new skirting.

As the pictures will attest.. I succeeded..
This is only temporary until I can get out and source some old office carpet tiles.

The carpet is not fixed down and could move.. While it is OK for me, it wont be if I have people over..

Now back to JMRI.. (oh and work)..

Its all about presentation

Skirting

Due to lock down as part of Covid-19, I decided to take a break from JMRI and seek the assistance of Michelle to add skirting to the layout.

A quick run down to Lincraft armed with Michelle's discount card. 23m of black material at $6 per meter.. We set about hemming the ends and tacking it in place with push pins..

See the pics attached. It came out rather well.

The material used is the cheapest verity called homespun. This is a thin material, but it does not matter as it is dark behind the material so is not see through..
The thin material has an unexpected advantage. I can see the LED's on the DCC control boards behind the skirting. I then discovered that the voltage readouts that I had under the layout can also be seen.
I expecting to have to move them to the fascia.. But, now I dont need to. They are not meant to stand out, They are just intended to be a reference point and for use if there is a short.

The top display is a RRAmp meter on one of the Digitrax boosters.
The bottom row are various power supplies that power the layout.
16V bus, and multiple 12 volt power buses. I was using the 5v power bus to drive 5v relays, but changed them to 12 v so the 5v power bus is not being used.

If you look along the part of the layout where the LED display is located, you cant see them. It is only when you get parallel with the layout and the displays that you can see them..


Now to find more carpet of the same colour or dark carpet to finish the look.

Back to JMRI.