Portola Valley RR

[Noah Lane]

My work on the PVRR was all but nonexistent in December and January. Work, travel, family, and holidays consumed most of my time. However, I have gotten back to work this past week.

I must say, the layout lighting is really poor in these iPhone shots. I took down my overhead lighting when I painted, and the stormy weather outside makes the layout lighting look grim.

First off, just up the street from my house on Friday in East Sacramento, I caught this Santa Fe (BNSF) local parked on the passing siding. If you look closely, you'll notice the Southern Pacific badge on the H Street Bridge. This is a pretty rare sight for our area.


Standard overall shot taken a few couple weeks back; I was in the process of re-painting the lumber yard pad.

I made and planted another batch of ~50 trees. And I have another ~50 that just need to ground foam foliage.

I striped the road -or at least the center yellow stripe (white outer striping may be added later). I'm not overly excited about how it came out, but I didn't have a much better technique in my arsenal, so I'm gonna live with it and move on. I later aligned, and glue'd that wood grade xing panel.


The lumber yard pad work slowly continues. I re-painted and weathered it. I still need to add score lines in the cement -any advice on scoring lines in Smooth-It/joint compound?


I really hate the lighting in this photo -it makes the landscape colors really blotchy and harsh. But you can see that I had added several more trees. They just looked too evenly spaced. With the next batch, I'll be able to fill them in more to do randomized clumps in places -following some prototype photos.
One of the next projects on my to do list is this grade xing. Sitting off to the side is a modern xing detail laser'd by Baron, that needs to be installed.


Not the most glamorous of updates, but I needed to show the thread some love!

-Noah

[Noah Lane]

Update part 2 of 2, I suppose…

I deviated from my other regular to do list, and worked on the retaining wall for this eventual “wharf” area.


I made these frames for mounting the Chooch rubberized retaining walls.






Once the joint compound dries, I will glue the retaining wall panels to the wood frames. I’m going to do some over-grown vines or bushy plants, in between the ballasted track (above) and top of retaining wall.  The terrain will be sloped, almost like a levee bank, to the right of the retaining wall.

[Philip H]

you know in that last close-up, the fibers of grass having over the edge of the track above . . . looks surprisingly close to nature.  A little earth tone paint and some roots growing out of the embankment over the retaining wall and you are good.

[Noah Lane]

Phillip- what's funny is that static grass should be all messed up because it sees so much traffic. It was some of the first static grass I did on the layout. I use that little flat 'wharf' area as counter space for tools/materials while working on various projects, so it's taken a good trampling over the past year and a half.

[RBrodzinsky]

Looking great, as always, Noah. Great to see continued progress (just wish I could get my butt in gear to do the same)

Rick

[Mike C]

  I think that if you plant the trees closer together in clumps you will like the effect much better . They tend to grow together naturally , and odd numbers seem to look better .
  What kind of layout lighting do you have  ? A single track light kit that has 4 lights would probably work real well for you , especially if you use the newer daylight CFL's or even daylight led bulbs ( more expensive , but will probably last 10 years ) . I use 4' shop lights with 5500K daylight tubes and find that my pictures look well lighted , although a bit greenish , which is easily photoshoped out .

[Noah Lane]

  I think that if you plant the trees closer together in clumps you will like the effect much better . They tend to grow together naturally , and odd numbers seem to look better .
  What kind of layout lighting do you have  ? A single track light kit that has 4 lights would probably work real well for you , especially if you use the newer daylight CFL's or even daylight led bulbs ( more expensive , but will probably last 10 years ) . I use 4' shop lights with 5500K daylight tubes and find that my pictures look well lighted , although a bit greenish , which is easily photoshoped out .

Mike-  You're absolutely right about the trees.  I wasn't referencing photos when I planted those trees -thus I was punished for not following Rule #1 of scenicking.  However, with my next batch(es) of trees, I will be able to clump the trees together and achieve a more natural look.

The lighting I have right now comes from a light above the stairs, and a ceiling fan light in the center of the room. So the lighting is not intended for the layout at all. I previously had jerry-rigged two IKEA spot lights onto a single piece of wood mounted on the wall. Those lights were somewhat directional, and actually created some neat shadowing. However, I really need some new lighting.

Any suggestions for a cost-effective, and somewhat temporary lighting system? 

Looking great, as always, Noah. Great to see continued progress (just wish I could get my butt in gear to do the same)

Rick

Thanks Rick!  Are you planning to make it out for National N-Scale convention in Sac this June?  I hope to be there.  I am also planning to help out Ryan with the Silicon Valley FreeMoN setup at the Sacramento GTS later this month.  Hope all is well with ya.

[RBrodzinsky]

Noah - I plan to be up there in a couple weeks for the Great Train show.  Glad to hear you will be part of the "local crew".  I also plan to be part of the N-scale meet in June, and if SVFMN doesn't end up participating, will come at least one day.  Look forward to finally meeting you in person

Rick

[Noah Lane]

Sounds good, Rick.

- - -

I mounted retaining wall panels. Now I need to figure out some vines/foliage to "plant" just above the walls.

[Noah Lane]

Continuing to chip away at the projects. Hopefully I can keep the workflow going again.

Last night I sculptamolded the road sections for the grade xing into place. The sculptamold was mixed with some dark grey weathering powder, tan sanded grout, and india ink.

I still have to blend/texture the shoulders of the xing, and then insert the lasered xing details.

[Miles]

I hope you'll add some wider dirt shoulders to your roads. The road as it is looks like it would erode fast in a rainstorm and god help you if you went off the road there. 

That said, the weathering on the asphalt is excellent!

[Mike C]

The lighting I have right now comes from a light above the stairs, and a ceiling fan light in the center of the room. So the lighting is not intended for the layout at all. I previously had jerry-rigged two IKEA spot lights onto a single piece of wood mounted on the wall. Those lights were somewhat directional, and actually created some neat shadowing. However, I really need some new lighting.

Any suggestions for a cost-effective, and somewhat temporary lighting system? 

  Noah , I just did a lighting upgrade last weekend . What I used were inexpensive tracklights from Lowes . 20 bucks for the track , 9 bucks for the light cans( I used 5 for an 8' layout ), and 10 bucks for the plug in power cord . I used LED 65 watt bulbs 12 bucks each , but CFL 65 watt bulbs would work just as well and cost less . Oh , and you will want to use 5000K Daylight bulbs , not warm OR cool white . They will look horrible . Also use the reflector type bulbs ( they look like the old style flood light bulbs) .

[LIRR]

The lumber yard pad looks great, nicely weathered. I would use a sharp pin to score the lines. Just barely scratch it tho....then weather lightly with dark chalk dust, it'll collect in the scratch and be visible......

[Noah Lane]

  Noah , I just did a lighting upgrade last weekend . What I used were inexpensive tracklights from Lowes....

Mike- thank you. This sounds like a totally viable option.

The lumber yard pad looks great, nicely weathered. I would use a sharp pin to score the lines

Thank you!  And I've been wanting to score lines into the pad. I'm just scared to! What is the trick for doing that and making it look good?

- - - -

Okay, last time I jinxed myself on keeping up with frequent layout work and updates  Work and weekend travel has kept me very busy! I've been sneaking in a little layout work, but nothing major.

First, I stopped by the Great Train Show to help out the Sacramento/Silicon Valley FreeMoN guys with set up. It was really cool finally meeting Ryan Wilkerson, Rick Brodzinsky, Dustin, and others. Very nice dudes. I wish I could have spent time during the show to run trains. Next time!


I bought the Showcase Miniatures 40' telephone poles, and started working on them. I first spray painted them with primer gray, then a light coating of brown. I sanded the brown down so more of the gray would show through. And finally I weathered them with Bragdon powders. I also glued a small 3/4" section of 1/32nd aluminum tubing on the bottom of each telephone pole for mounting on the layout. I have Berkshire Junction EZ-Line that I will string to each pole once more of the layout is finished -i don't want to have to work around the strung wires.








It's not shown in this picture, but I've finally installed the grade crossing detailed (layered for me by Baron Jutter). I've still got a bit of touching up to do, but I'll post a photo of the finish sing soon. I'd really like to add crossing signals eventually. You can see in the picture below that I added gravel shoulders to the road sections between the tracks.

[Noah Lane]

I got more done on my grade crossing. I can't say that I'm 100% satisfied with it (like most projects I've done). But often times I realize that I just gotta be content, and move on!