Nothing New (Almost)

After the end of the NC Rail Run in September, I closed the doors on the train room and pretty much did nothing except for the November and January Ops sessions. I then got the idea to expand the area over Charlotte Yard. I added onto the benchwork there and expanded the Thomasville Beltway.

There will be 2 sections to the Beltway track, one here and the other on the opposite side of the pit.

Buildings At Speed Rail Industrial

I know, I know, months between posts is not exactly an up-to-date blog. Have spent a good part of 3 months down with my back. Was diagnosed with 3, yes 3, herniated discs in my lower back (in addition to the one in my neck).

I did manage to get some scenery and buildings done around Speed Rail. One represents Airgas and the other Southeastern Packaging.

Maybelle Scenery

I've been working on the scenery around the old Maybelle Bulk Transfer plant on South main Street in Lexington. I know they do some work with HFCS which is affiliated with Corn Products in Winston Salem. HFCS stands for High Fructose Corn Syrup, used in colas and other products as sweeteners.

Linwood Hump Yard

Well, it's only been 4 months since my last post....... So, in that time I have participated in the first NC NScale Rail Run. We had participants from as far away as Utah. We had a good session and I think everyone was pleased with the layout. Two weeks after that was my normal March Ops Session. For that, I managed to install a Team Digital SMD82 which allows you to join several turnouts together into an assigned route. This way, you can push 1 button and 3 to 4 Tortoises will move together.

More Work On The M-Line

In the last month, I completed the benchwork for the M-Line (as well as the Thomasville Beltway), added fascias, lights, splines, track, the crossover across the pit and connection into High Point Yard.

Have also started scenery to hide the higher branch behind the NS mainlines as they pass by Thomasville. I think the generic undergrowth helps the scene a good deal.

NS M-Line

So, after the May session I had the bright idea to fill in the old dispatcher's corner with a branch line. But what to model?

Marcus suggested that I look at the line running thru Asheboro as it included a plastics plant that supposedly had a lot of traffic. Did some Maps Live work and WOW! The plastics plant is called Starpet. On one satellite photo I counted over 125 hoppers setting in the plant and showed their own switcher.

I talked Tammy into riding that way one Sunday and took pictures of several places along the way. There's a Georgia Pacific plant, Chandler Concrete, Dahalia Plastics, CMC Metal recyclers, Metals USA and several more.

These are cumulative from beginning construction on May 02 until May 18.

North End Of Linwood Yard

I worked on the northern end of Linwood for a couple of days adding a few scene breaks in the form of small hills. One, to break the siding for Kimberly-Clark, the other to separate the yard tracks from the mainlines.

This section is in the middle of the winter and makes it hard to "hide" things like seams and horizons and such. Compounding that is the fact that the mainlines pass just 2 inches from the skyboard leaving little room for anything.

As a last thought, I dabbed on a dirty brown wash behind the "trees" to try and hide the horizon. Wish I had done a bit more. I wanted to cover with Supertrees, but there just wasn't enough room. I had to rely on the Cinnamon scented decorative broom to do the job. Mmmmm Cinnamon.......

Snow Scene On The Winter Side

As a train travels through the CCSB, it travels through time as well as space. All 4 seasons are represented. Winter was the hardest to do as you can't hide things behind trees and ground cover.

Just like Disneyworld, it's all about the illusion.

Here's a couple of picture of a section I did with some snow. Being as we haven't had a really good snowfall in years, I kept it real with just a dusting.

Scenery Around Linwood Yard

After we returned from Hatteras at Thanksgiving, I spent some time cleaning up for an appointment for a newspaper article.

I had also been working on scenery north of Kannapolis thru Salisbury, but got stopped when I realized I couldn't picture the Innes Street to Salisbury Depot in my mind. I skipped around Salisbury and also bypassed Spencer since I don't have the Roundhouse ready.

So, that put me across the river at the entrance to the Linwood Yard. The side from north of the Yadkin to Lexington is to be a winter scheme. I added some small ground effects (couldn't do much as this is all on plywood, not splines) and added the winter trees. Here, I used the Super Trees bare but sprayed light brown and the twigs from the Cinnamon decorative broom I had saved.

I had toyed with the notion of trying snow, but was really reluctant as I have heard quite a few horror stories. I masked off the track and ballast and sprayed a heavy coat of 4x Hair Spray on all the trees and ground.

I sprinkled on Woodland Scenics Snow very lightly. Here in Central NC, our snows have been rather sparse the last couple of years. I was immediately impressed with the look and took a couple of pictres and then moved along with more snow.

For now, I am keeping it off the track and right of way hoping to keep it out of the engine motors and mechanisms, With the light ballast, it is not as noticeable as I thought.

Kannapolis

Moving north from Speed Rail Industrial are the stations Kannapolis and North Kannapolis. Somewhere in there is Glass, but it's not on the NS track plan I have.

The first picture is from around N. Kannapolis, looking south towards Speed Rail. Just another wooded area to provide the scenic break between locations so as to get a feel of distance. That was a lesson I learned on my first "layout". It was more like a test bench for anything and everything.

I tried creeks, mountains, overpasses, underpasses, buildings, dirt roads, asphalt roads.... whatever to see what I could make and what to stay away from on the one that counted.

The second picture is the same area as the first, but taken from the right side and just as I put down the first layer of groundcover. I use dried basil and oregano. Yep, that's right. Smells good too. I get the plastic shaker bottles 2 for a dollar and this pic is about 75 cents worth.

I am getting fairly happy with the fall colors. I have finally learned to tone them down and mix in a lot of green with a little red and less yellow.

I've set a couple of houses in place, but have got to go back and level and set them into the grass. The bottom picture is looking north with the Kannapolis station sign to the right. You can see how much the houses need to be leveled here.

Speedrail Industrial

Speedrail Industrial is a business park located off Hwy 49 north of Charlotte. I plan to model 4 industries there. To the left is the beginnings of laying the trackwork last week. Below are actual pics of the 4 industries and what I have so far.

Foils, Inc - A metal recycler which is actually just north of the industrial park. Served by a single siding running thru the property.

The next business inside the park is Mallard Creek (Chemicals I think). Just a small pumping station manned by camera surveillance.

Next in the park is an Gas Company, but I don't have my notes with me, and the name won't come to me. They always say the mind is first to go. Anyway, the gas company will be located in the rear of this picture.

The track leading off in the foreground is Foils.

Southeastern Packaging is a rather large facility, actually located on 2 different sidings. This must be a warehouse of sorts. The tracks disappear under the building roof so that they can be unloaded out of the weather.

Station Signs

During the first Ops Session, John Barnett suggested that I make station signs in the prototypical Southern Green. I had made a highway sign with an online program called SignMaker located here.

I went back there and figured out how to make a simple name sign without all the highway markings, printed them and mounted on some plastic. There are quite a bit bigger than scale size, but I made them for the benefit of operators.

One of the goals I had building the layout was to minimize the amount of labeling on the fascia so as to keep the operators' focus on the layout. This should help in that regards.

Between High Point and Thomasville

This is a small area between the High Point Yard and Thomasville. Just opposite of it is Southern Film .

The bank rises a bit more than the prototype and there's actually an illegal garbage dump to the left. I may try to add it in later.

Jamestown Scenery

I continue to work on the upper NS level. Starting with the Danville staging
yard, thru Reidsville and on to Jamestown. There are a couple of industries served there, one being Univar and the other Homeland Container. There's also a siding probably a team or house track.

I have been putting in what scenery I could leaving room for the buildings which will have to wait until I can kitbash or scratchbuild them.

So that operators can have clear access to the turnouts and sidings for cars, I've had to make the aisle side scenery pretty sparse. For the most part, it is just grassy areas. The static grass seems to hold up well to resting arms, and objects laid on it. I just have to keep undulating the ground so it doesn't appear to be just flat.

More Fall Scenery

Continuing to get the feel for the fall scenery. Tammy keeps telling me to hold down on the reds and let them blend into the green. I've learned that some people have a red/green colorblindness, which makes sense as I can't tell a red LED from a green one. I hate it when I look at electronics and someone asks "Is the light red or green?" IDK.

I'm not finishing the scenery 100%, just trying to cover some of the blank foam in between where the industries will be. It'll be easy enough to come back later and add more trees and details.

I think I hold up on the NS line and go back to the WSS/HPT&D island and work there for awhile. There's a good bit to be done on the upper level. I've learned that it's easier to finish major work on the upper before doing the lower.... less chance of dropping plaster and glue down on finished scenery.

Scenery On The NS Line

I've spent the last 4 months laying track, and can tell you it gets old after a while. So... I took a break this week and started on some scenery.

I started with the area just out of Charlotte staging on the lower level and just out of the pit on the upper. The area on the upper represents track between Bowers and Lake.

Both upper and lower levels on this side of the building will be done in fall colors. The opposite side of the building will be winter and the center island will be Spring/Summer.

I got really tired of laying track, so I took a break this week and worked on some scenery. For this section, I am trying a fall theme.

Splines and Track On The NS Sub

Another weekend passes with what seems like no progress. After running some errands Saturday morning, I finally got into the layout room around 1:30. Not long after I started I had some visitors that had been to one of the club shows.

After they left, I made a second pour on the Abbott's Creek water. The initial pour was rather brownish and I made this one lighter.

While the matte medium was drying, I took to the table saw cutting 40 or 50 splines which I used to start laying out the NS roadbed.

That was about as far as I got on Saturday. Sunday morning I checked out the now dried Abbott's Creek. Still a little brownish, but as good as I can do for now. I went ahead and mounted the shoreline and poured the finish matte layer. I'll follow later with a gloss layer for a wet look.

Went back to the NS roadbed. I lined and glued about 12 feet of roadbed and realized the best thing for the High Point yard would be plywood and tie that to the spline stringers.

After mounting the plywood, I went back and started soldering and laying track for the dual mains out of Dundee Yard (Danville). I left a #7 turnout for Jamestown and widened the tracks for the future High Point Depot.

The mains have been laid as far as the High Point Yard. I need to double check the sidings needed going into Thomasville and I can go ahead and lay the splines around the back corner heading into the pit opening.

2nd Yard Complete

The second yard has been completed. It will represent Charlotte as one end of the point-to-point.

The other end, Danville, was completed several weeks ago. Both will be ballasted at some point, but I think I'll wait until everything up and running.