PROJECT ONE - After I posted the above picture on my Facebook page. I got to thinking that maybe I would like to unbox the rest of my SPR Figures and kit them up in time for the August SSCC meeting in Cincinnati. So that is what I did and here's the squad taking five on the kitchen counter. Haven't quite figured out yet how I am going to set them up at the meeting, but I was hoping to come up with something clever... oh well, I've still got a few days. One thing I appreciated about all of these figures is that shoes and leggings were already done for you. That cut the time considerably. PROJECT TWO - At the June SSCC meeting, I brought my original SAS Desert Jeep, bashed several years ago and the current WIP SAS Jeep (which. then sat on the work bench for 7 weeks before I decided I wanted it finished for the August meeting). Here it is, at the beginning of the week, details finished and tires taped up for spray painting. The finished JEEP - painted, weathered and detailed with lots of goodies. I should mention that on the original Jeep, all of the gas cans were a combination of Dragon and 21st Century products. On this newest Jeep, all of the US cans were cast from resin, taking quite a bit more time and adding significantly to the weight of the vehicle. Note: For the fellow who would like to tell me that the seats are canvas and not leather... don't bother. I know that, I have a real MB. I painted the seats brown to create a little bit of contrast. Everything is tan, including the uniforms. I like the way it looks to have a darker color under those Limey Butts. Once the paint was good and dry, I added the crew and we are ready to roll (to Cincinnati for the meeting). PROJECT THREE - I have been interested in the whole FOAM carving thing ever since I saw what club member SCOTT CELENDER had been doing with his foam dio pieces. I emailed him for details and he sent me some links to some great videos on the subject. So yesterday, I pick up knife and gave it a try. This is my first attempt at creating a foam vignette. You can't spray paint foam with enamel paint; it will melt. I had to slap on some acrylic paint first to seal it and when it dried, I was then able to spray paint it with a gray primer, which I wanted to be my base color. This is where I quit for the day yesterday. Today I pulled out the brush paints (acrylic) and started trying to give it some life. The dio is intended to be the intersection of two walls on the exterior. of a building with a bit of cobblestone walk. If I were continuing the scene, on the right would be another wall and a stretch of road next to it (thus the road sign attached to the building). Well that's my story and I'm sticking to it. It was a good week for me. It showed me what I can do in seven days when I get. my butt off the couch and actually do something. Thanks for looking - PM
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Not too long ago someone I was talking to told me about this place online that sells better looking mannequins than the 'boy band' ones I had purchased from retailers like Walmart, etc. This place is called Yank Mannequins and they do in fact sell better looking mannequins for militaria displays. The mannequins are shorter for one thing, more in keeping with the shorter stature of most folks back in the '40's and the faces are a little less...well, 'boy band'. Anyway, long story short, I decided it was time to upgrade. The other nice thing about their mannequins is that they have some different poses as well. We start with my machine gunner... he needs to be holding a cigarette I think. Here's my infantryman, kneeling... can you believe it? My infantryman and my tanker. The tanker is like five feet tall; perfect for an armored crewman back during WWII. Look who dropped in, my paratrooper. Not much taller than the tanker. Okay, this is not a new mannequin, but since I was replacing the other ones, I thought I could take my seated mannequin and change him back to WWII War correspondent once again so that he could sit at the field desk. This guy replaced my previous German mannequin, and this guy just looks so much more...well, German. This is my new Vietnam trooper. I think he's looking up, hoping the Hueys are going to appear over the tree line. CLICK HERE TO RETURN TO HOME PAGEI brought these guys to the March SSCC Meeting in Cincinnati. These troops are my Vietnam era 11th CAV unit. I created them to go with my M-113 and M-151 Mutts. The two fellows on the left are my M-113 Commander and Driver. Right now they are Cavalry Troops in need of a ride. When I first got my Monkey Rabbit M-113 it came with two broken road wheel supports. Monkey Rabbit was quick to furnish me with new pieces to replace the broken ones, but in the meantime I had repaired the broken pieces (well, at least I thought I had). When I moved back in July, I noticed that they seemed to have broken again with the strain of the move. I set the vehicle on the work bench and didn't give it too much thought. Then a couple of weeks ago when I was rearranging some stuff in the basement, I found that all but two of the road wheel supports had broken. I guess the stress of having a road wheel on each side out of commission undermined the other supports over time. Well... it's the only explanation I can come up with since it hadn't been handled since the move. Anyway, I have a massive repair job to do before my M-113 will ever see the light of day. In the meantime, here are the troops that will eventually be attached to that vehicle and the M-151s. The Vietnam era tanker helmets are bashed on vintage style JOE pilot helmets, the patches were all created on the computer and printed on fabric paper. Looking forward to warmer weather so I can work out in the garage on the M-113 (it takes up a lot of room). Okay, now back to my other passion - TRAINS. I have continued to lay cork roadbed and pretty much had it finished by the end of the weekend. I ready to start laying track and wiring. Well... truthfully, I'm not really looking forward to the wiring part as I am not particularly experienced in that area. The town of Deer Creek keeps evolving (pretty much every time I go in the basement). I've already made changes since I took these pictures. The bar and the little general store are no longer in this location. I've found something I like better. That little general store may be converted into a station before it's all said and done. This is the start of the wharf at Misty Bay. You can see that there is a wood walkway from the wharf to the little railway station. Passengers can transfer from steamer to railway at this end of the line. There will be a structure on the end of the pier - a bar for thirsty passengers and fishermen. It will be called PHIL'S BAR when it is completed. And that's it for this update. Thanks for looking - PM CLICK HERE TO RETURN TO HOME PAGEPromise I won't keep bombarding you with Model Railroad stuff everyday, but I did a couple of things today and I wanted to record them. This morning I made a trip to the local train store and bought some cork roadbed so that I could start laying track. Also picked up a couple of Woodland Scenics pre-done tree sets so that I could get an idea of what they might look like on the layout. They are not the most realistic. trees on the planet, but mixed in with other stuff, I think they'll look okay. On the way home I stopped at Menards for a couple of sheets of 2'x4' plywood and ended up bringing home a couple of their brand of O scale structures. I actually have several other structure kits sitting on the shelf at the moment, so I am n to sure that the saloon and the general store will be in the final lineup, but the barbershop will stay (once that silly base is gone). Below, looking down the Main Street of Deer Creek, back toward the station. I can't wait to get working on the scenery, it is my favorite part of the hobby and I have a ton of detail stuff that I have collected over the last several years that I can throw into these scenes. Below is the other structure I purchased today, the Cripple Creek General Store. Like the brewery sitting next to it and most Menards train items. It needs a little work. We'll start with getting rid of those figures. I intend to turn the general store into a boarding house/hotel that serves the railroad. We are right on the waterfront here and to the right of the shot there will be wharf area and a small station that serves both the lake steamers and the railroad. This picture shows what I actually accomplished today. On the left is a section of cork roadbed and a small section of On30 track. As the cork is actually intended for HO Scale, I was anxious to see how it would work with the track. On30 is the same gauge as HO and represents a 30" gauge in the real world. The space between the rails in HO and On30 is the same, but the On30 ties are larger. Fortunately it all works. The second thing in this picture is on the right side of the image. I have added in a section to fix that awkward place in the benchwork. It gives me a little more "water" and a little more "land". There will be some small structures in that area and a wharf for the boats. That's all for this time. Thanks for looking - PM CLICK HERE TO RETURN TO HOME PAGEMy frustration with Facebook has continued to grow and so I've decided that I am going to use it only to direct folks to updates on this website. This blog use to be the On30 Model Railroading section of my website. You will find the stuff I did a couple of years ago below, but it is now going to be my update section for 1:6th, Model Railroading and whatever else I decide to throw in here. Hope you find it interesting and helpful. - PM Above is the drawing that I did of the new layout. The area on the left is not to scale, that cinderblock wall is actually quite a bit wider that what I drew. The wall is actually supporting the fireplace on the main level of the house. On the other side of it are some built in shelves. The layout will have a loop that will pass through the shelves and come out on the other side, as seen in the drawing. I actually did three different layouts to fit this space and this is the one I ended up choosing. My decision was based on which version fit the best... and well, this one won. The railroad is essentially a point to point with a loop thrown in for good measure. The loop allows passenger and freight trains to come from parts unknown to interact with the point to point. Essentially the point to point is two water terminals that are connected by a local railroad. It allows folks from the top water terminal to make their way to the lower one. There are also several interconnected industries that allow for shuffling freight back and forth. I used a made to order benchwork that can be assembled to fit your plan (I'm not very good with wood). This was then covered with 1/4" plywood and a traditional modeling surface, a fiberboard called Homasote. The areas that are cut away to expose the plywood will be water features as shown in the drawing at top. I have a number of plastic structures that I have purchased over the last few years that I played out on the benchwork and that was how I determined which plan I would choose. While the buildings were still in place I set down scale printed switches so I could get an idea of where the track would run. Once I was satisfied it was going to work, I moved the structures out of the way and began drawing the track plan on the fiberboard. Drawing in ties probably seems a little over the top to most folks, but it was important to me that I considered the track as a whole and not just where the rails would be. I am new to O Scale, having only modeled in HO previously. Things take up considerably more space in this scale and I wanted to know for sure that it was going to work before I started laying track. Below, on the left is where the loop will enter the shelving on the back side of the wall. A hole will need to be cut of course. On the right side the track nearest the wall is the front side of the loop. Part of it will pass though a tunnel (still kind of working that out in my mind). This is the top end of the layout and the exposed plywood will end up being water. Once I had the areas of fiberboard cut where I needed to cut them, I used wood screws to secure it to the benchwork. All of the screws and seems between the sections will be covered with joint compound before any scenery work is done. When all the track work was drawn on the fiberboard and it was secured to the benchwork, I then put the buildings back on the layout. The buildings that you see in the following pictures are only part of the structures that will eventually be part of the layout. There are several kits here and some pre-made structures that will receive modification before they are done. Most of the rest of the structures will be scratch built. In the photo below, the barn is currently sitting on the edge of the layout. There will be a one foot extension added to the left of where it sits, giving me a little more space for the "farm". In the photo below, there will be a portion of a "mountain" through which the train will pass under. I would like to do the tunnel portals in such a way that it looks natural, rather than looking like it belongs under a Christmas Tree. Still working that out. As shown in the very first photo at the top of this post, I am going to extend the benchwork on the right so that it flows a little better and adds some additional land and water scenery. There will be a wharf here with a lake steamer. There will be a small station, a bar and who knows, maybe a bait shop. Below the future town of DEER CREEK, for which the railroad is named. The large factory in the background will have a siding eventually. I did not draw it into the plan, but I have an extra switch to make it work. Originally part of the town was going to go back in this corner. The corner is hard to reach, so other than the factory, it mostly just going to be some scenery. To one side of Deer Creek sits the engine facility. There will be a two stall engine house, a turntable, water tower, coal facility structure and a sand tower. Finally, here is that upper end of the layout with the other water terminal. Besides these two industries, there will be a small station, a wharf and a small hotel. There is room on the other side of these two buildings for additional structures, but I haven't really given much thought to that yet. And that is pretty much it for this update. As I said up top, there will be 1/6th scale, O scale and who knows what else in this blog. Essentially it is going to take the place of my Facebook postings. I will alway let you know on the Facebook page when there is something new here... I'm just tired of fighting with their platform when it comes to posting pictures - thanks for your patience, PM CLICK HERE TO RETURN TO HOME PAGEWell... it has been a good long while since I posted anything in this section and I haven't really made any progress... but since this is project journal of sorts, I thought I might get down what I have been thinking about. I have been messing with layouts for a long time now and basically rejecting each of them after a time for one reason or another. The problem always comes down to space, but I might have a solution. There is a space in our basement "storage" room that is roughly about 11'x11'. If I am able to eliminate some of the "storage" that is in the room and remove the current plastic shelving for shelving that goes around three walls and is roughly 4' in height. I have a spot for a point to point railroad that could look something like the plan that is shown below. I am not going to go so far as saying that the above is my final plan, but I think I might finally be on to something that could work for me. I would have the room to include the scenic elements that I want as well as have a track plan that would have some operational potential. I want to spend some time comparing this plan to other plans that I have been accumulating from various sources to see if there are some options that would work even better. The rest of this post is about Christmas. It's bigger than any of my other locomotives and I am not sure how I am going to use it on the layout at this point, but I do intend to have fun finding out. It comes with multiple smoke stacks for different looks and is equipped for DCC running.
And that's pretty much it for this post... kind of a short one. I am hoping to make some progress before too long. I'll let you know when I have something new. - PM Well... I got in and landscaped the base of Deer Creek Brewing, effectively finishing the building until it gets "planted" on my future layout. I used a mixture of grey and brown ballast for the stretch of track in front of the warehouse and the jury is still out on whether I like it or not. It looks a little better this morning now that the glue has dried I do like the effect of the weedy grasses growing up in the roadbed at the end of the track however. It gives it a nice "un-cared for" look. The landscaping is a combo of fine sandy ballast (like I used on the depot and the gas station), static grass and these weedy grass clumps, what I would call prairie grass. The back of the warehouse includes a scratch built bass wood loading dock for truck deliveries. The trashcans are a casting, as are the crates and the pallet. The barrels on the trailside dock are a 3D printed piece that was bought online. And as mentioned before, the rock foundation was a piece that I carved, made a mold of and then cast in resin. Above, the finished warehouse sitting on my table top. That's it for this update. Thanks for looking - PM
I'm kind of working on layout ideas for my On30 Model Railroad (so far I am not making a lot of progress). But... I wanted to run my engines a little bit, so I purchased some Bachmann EZ Track and Switches so that I could mess around a little bit. I am hoping that in the process of moving stuff around on a 30" x 8' table that I will start to get some ideas about a track plan and how it can work around the structures that I am accumulating and building. Well... If nothing else, it sort of feels like I have a train layout. This is that warehouse structure I blogged about previously. I pretty much have the building done except for some details and I plan to "landscape" the base this weekend if I have time. The building doesn't have an interior, so I made a little fake room behind the door and there are some crates and a forklift in there to make it feel like a real business. Well... That's all for this update. Thanks for looking! - PM
I've been working a little bit on this structure kit when I've had a few moments here and there. This will become the "DEER CREEK BREWING CO." on my train layout (if and when I get around to building one). If you have been following my blog at all, you will recognize this structure from an earlier posting when I was describing my stone wall casting. When completed, the "Business" will have a rail spur on this side as shown and a small dock on the back side of the building for truck deliveries (and that's where the concept comes in... ... This end wall will get a second sign that will say - "DEER CREEK BREWING Distribution Center". The... uh... "product" will come in by truck, be repackaged in the Distribution Center and then go out by rail to the various points of consumption. Where it will be coming from initially is shown below... These two pictures are shots of cast products available from an online company called Rusty Rail. I am going to pick up these two items to create the Deer Creek Brewing "Bottling Plant". They will have a location somewhere along the landscape feature, Deer Creek on my layout and will use trucks to cart the moonshine to the distribution plant. I thinking that perhaps I can reproduce that crate of moonshine bottles and create a small mold with mold putty to produce inventory for my delivery truck and both company locations. And that's it for this update. Thanks for looking - PM
I threw a couple more "Building WIPs" into the setup to flesh out my idea just a little more. Eventually what I am thinking is that the town will consist of a "Main St." and a harbor area. The harbor area would consist of a group of scratch built structures and wharf and would sit behind the Main St. The house, which is elevated in the background would be up on a hill overlooking the town and harbor. I will probably re-arrange this a hundred times between now and formalizing a plan, but as I put together more structures, the whole thing is sort of coming together in my mind. - PM
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July 2023
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