1960's OWNY/NYCish 7'x17' Layout

[tom mann]

Nice, professional work!

[M.C. Fujiwara]

Thanks!
The most difficult part is not scoring into the top-ten on the video bowling or the car racing game while he's out of the house running errands 

[pwnj]

Definitely some awesomeness goin' on here, but when you gonna quit messin' with them HOs and get back to the Normal land? Don't you know we haz needs? 

[35tac]

MC, how do you generally cut the hardboard for the facia. It looks quite pristine and perfect. I assume you use 1/8"?
Thanks
Wayne

[M.C. Fujiwara]

MC, how do you generally cut the hardboard for the facia. It looks quite pristine and perfect. I assume you use 1/8"?

Thanks.
I get a 4'x8' sheet of 1/8" hardboard off the rack at Home Depot and take it down the aisle to where a HD employee throws it through a saw to create 12" and 8" strips.

Tah-Dah!

To cut the strips into shorter sections I just free-hand a circular saw over a line.
Any little wobble will be patched up when I dab the woodputty along the seams and in the screwtops.

If any irregularity still exists after sanding, I can just Tammy Faye the surface with layers of thick primer and paint.

Some black / dark curtains will hang from behind the fascia to hide the legs & shelves.
Thinking about using this fabric:



Or this:



You know, something subtle and tasteful. 

[35tac]

MC, thanks very much for the reply. Just fabulous work. I enjoy your follow ups.
Wayne

[M.C. Fujiwara]

Thanks, Wayne.

Finished installing the fascia:



Had to replace a support with a longer one and with the end cut at a more acute angle.
Groovy thing about open-grid benchwork: easy to adjust as you go!

More foam, more woodputty:







Will sand down & paint when I get back from watching USWNT vs Mexico down in La La Land on Sunday.

Have also found that it's a good idea to caulk & seal around any area that will have a water scene, as the Magic Water seems to find every seam and spill onto the floor:



Thanks for looking.
Back to the workbench!

[M.C. Fujiwara]

Started in on carving the foam.
Thought I'd try the @Mark W technique of using a wire wheel in a driver to speed up the carving.

 

I may be dumb, but I'm not stoopid: I wore a mask & safety goggles, got a thin plastic paint drop and covered myself and the section I was going to wire wheel.
It did protect the room from the pink fuzz, but not me & my driver:



Imagine my t-shirt, arms, & head coated with pink fuzz just like that driver. 

Tried to hold just the driver under the plastic, but the wire wheel just got up and whipped the plastic into a pile. 

I'm sure I could construct a simple framework that would hold the plastic up & away from the drill:



But I'll just go back to hacking away with the utility knife & forming tool.

Started filling in a lot of gaps with foam, with the idea of plastering on some Sculptamold later to patch any cracks:







As you can see, I've also painted the fascia an initial coat of flat black primer:







After the layout is done I'll go back and paint an eggshell black to make cleaning easier.

Miles is continuing to rock the Monticello main drag:



While I build other structures.
Thanks for looking.
Back to the workbench!

[M.C. Fujiwara]

Started building interiors for buildings:



And installing lighting:



I've about given up soldering the small LEDs and will just use the larger ones from now on:



You can see (or imagine) the small LED below the larger on and between the wires.
The small LEDs just don't give out enough light for the layout room to justify me going nuts trying to solder the little buggers.
Small ones better for some N scale buildings anyway.

On the layout, started filling in some gaps with cardboard strips hot glued to fascia & ply:



Then covering with some extra-wide & cross-wove fiberglass tape I found at Lowes:







Gonna get plastered tomorrow!
Woot!

[M.C. Fujiwara]

Finished carving & sculpting the slopes, so time to fill the gaps between ply & foam.

Tried to "brush" plaster on the fiberglass tape, but it fell through (despite the added cross-weave).
So, to not waste the plaster, I slapped some paper towels on there:



Then tried tinted lightweight spackle:



Didn't fall through, but too easily pushed through, and would use a lot of spackle.

So here's what 4 lbs. of tinted Sculptamold can do:





Meanwhile, client's dog left me a sample of his own landscaping:



Reminds me of "The Critic" in History of the World, Part I:

Just glad the dog is only about 1/2 lbs., & not a Great Dane.

[dnhouston]

Nice work M.C.  I really enjoy following your progress on these projects.

[M.C. Fujiwara]

Been building the depot & installing LEDs:



That's an LED over each freight door and one to light the interior on the left.
(3 LEDs & a resistor = 12V happiness)

In a classic case of hot dogs & buns, the sheet of shingles is 1/2" too short:



Which made shingling the roof even more funner.

On the layout itself, I've installed rock castings (plaster tinted grey with craft paint) using tinted sculptamold as "glue" then painted/stained the rocks/sculptamold with grey washes and painted the pink foam tan latex found for $3 on the mis-tint shelf at HD:











And I removed the temp bridge, test-fitted the truss bridge, then built up the rocks & water scene:







Will be getting the town of Monticello from Miles on Monday (awesome alliteration!) so will be able to install and build up the other lobe next week.
But now it's back to the workbench!
(Well, right after watching the Champions League final  )
Thanks for looking.

[basementcalling]

The "Fujiwara" effect is in full application, I see.

[Philip H]

"Hum, judge me by my size do you?  The Fujiwara is strong with this one."

[tom mann]

I like it.  I'm wondering why all the foam, when you are also using cardboard strips (and would no doubt find them superior).