Hoboken Manufacturers Railroad Micro-Layout

[DKS]

David,what did you use for the leather factory?It looks very useful for a large plant I need for the Onandaga Sub.

It's bashed from the back walls of DPM's Reed Books kits (three-story walls) and Erik's Emporium kits (two story walls), four kits each. Same combination that I used for the American Box Company on the JCIR.

[peteski]

[sarcastic] Good news, DKS!  You can place the layout outside tonight and get free snow! [/sarcastic] 

But the flakes would be out of scale!    That just wouldn't do on DKS' layout.

[Catt]

Thanks for the info David,it will come in handy,

[Chris333]

You must buy those scenic ridge building sets in bulk.

[DKS]

The 3 track section where its going up and down looks odd to me right now and I'm not that into it.

Better?

[davefoxx]

Holy crap!  I get to be the first to say, "Holy crap, that looks incredible!"

[dnhouston]

Hot Damn! (or should I say "Cool")

[M.C. Fujiwara]

Won't that frosting attract ants? 

Looks very groovy.
Can't wait to see it dirtied up!

[Chris333]

I said "Holy crap" and then scrolled down and Dave beat me to it. 

That looks great!

[eric220]

I'll change it up.

"Holy crap in a hat!"

I want to know exactly how you do your snow process, as I have quite a bit of that planned for my layout.

[Chris333]

How do you keep the marker lines from bleeding through?

[DKS]

I want to know exactly how you do your snow process, as I have quite a bit of that planned for my layout.

I start with a base layer of untinted Sculptamold to get the basic contours down. For pristine undisturbed show, I then apply a thin layer of Smooth-On DuoMatrix (a gypsum/polymer hybrid sculpting material). For plowed or otherwise disturbed snow, I use more Sculptamold, which I leave lumpy. Next, a few coats of gesso to make everything pure white. Finally, a couple coats of Liquitex Sand Gel (a translucent semi-gloss medium loaded with ultra-fine sand) which makes it glisten subtly.

I arrived at the above recipe after an awful lot of experimenting--so much so that the snow in this scene wound up deeper than I'd planned. It's also very hard to photograph the glistening effect, so it tends to be a little better-looking in person. I'm still not totally happy with things, but it's getting pretty close now. Haven't cleaned the rails yet, but I've cleaned and tested them after applying each layer of material, so there's not a lot of work to do on them.

Can't wait to see it dirtied up!

Most of what's in these images will be left clean; the dirty stuff will be along the streets.

How do you keep the marker lines from bleeding through?

They couldn't possibly bleed after all of the crap I pile on top of them.

[pwnj]

That looks a !@#$load better than what's out my front door. AWESOME! 

[Scottl]

It looks hawt!  Or should I say, cold....

[Chris333]

Holy crap all over again