My Layout :)

[Bernard]

I enjoyed reading your blog and I like the changes from your original design. I see you've added a bridge and a tunnel, are you planning on having a road or a river on the layout?

Do you know what you plan to use to cover the ribs on the risers and inclines? I used sheets of hydrocal cloth which I got from WS and also a medical supply company (used in making casts) If you are going to use hydrocal sheets, do this before you affix the Unitrack to the risers and wear gloves, hydrocal is messy.

 

You layout is really coming along nicely! ;)

[serenityFan]

Thanks Bernard. Yeah, the bridge is another impulse buy, that what happens when you go to the actual shop. It was decided at the shop to have a bridge and incorporated into the layout afterwards  ;D

 

And I am planning a road going under the bridge, and as I was exercising on the treadmill this morning, I thought I would go ambitious and also add tram tracks along the road. I think it will fit, I'm trying to work out some drawings now  ;)

 

For sceneries, at the moment I am leaning toward hydrocal sheets.

 

Research shows WS has plester cloths, which according to the instrustions you just dip in water and apply on surface. No mixing involved. How is this compared to the ones where you mix yourself, and dip your own paper towels in for the surface?

[Martijn Meerts]

Plaster cloth is excellent to work with, but it only forms a base of the mountain. It's too rough to get a mountain that looks like well, a mountian ;)

 

I generally use chicken wire to form a sturdy base and the overal form (I know, I know... I'm old-skool ;)), plaster cloth on top of that because it holds onto the chicken wire real well, possibly add some rock castings where I feel they could be useful, and then seal it all with lightweight hydrocal. I add extra, smaller details with the hydrocal, and then use some sculpters tools to add tiny details and texture to the thing before painting.

 

I recently went on a rockface watching trip, checking out the detailing in the bases of the smaller rock faces here in Norway, took some pictures and some close-ups, and I noticed that you really only need to add model some fairly rough lines, most of the detailing can be done with paint.

[bill937ca]

If you are going for a really Japanese scene there will not be a lot of mountain showing.  Japanese mountains are usually covered with masses of green in which you cannot distinguish individual trees.

Here's an example:

 

http://www.tetsu-cafe.com/nippou/up_images/01160010022nihonkai.jpg

 

Attempts to clear cut Japanese mountains have resulted in landslides and floods because of the very steep slopes.  So they are just left alone.

[CaptOblivious]

For the very reasons Bill states, My wife and I are not going through all that trouble that Martijn does with Shogatsu. We're stopping at the plaster cloth, with maybe a little sanding to smooth really rough parts out. Then we're going to paint the hills, and then cover the mountains with Woodland Scenics clump foliage to simulate dense forest.

[Bernard]

Bill - Thanks for that link on mountains! You just saved me a fortune and a lot of time making trees! What do you guys recommend in getting the effect from the link Bill posted?

[Martijn Meerts]

Depends a bit on what you model. A tunnel entrance for example will show some man-made "naked mountain" so to speak. Some mountains might also have clearings where a village is/was located, things like that.

 

The way I described above is what I'm doing for my diorama that has a tunnel entrance, for larger, prototypical mountain ranges I wouldn't add hydrocal to smoothen the thing out. That said, my first several modules (the ones based on Ghibli movies) have non-Japanese mountains and actually show a lot of the rock surface ;)

[bill937ca]

Bill - Thanks for that link on mountains! You just saved me a fortune and a lot of time making trees! What do you guys recommend in getting the effect from the link Bill posted?

 

Working on top of plaster cloth, I started with a muddy brown coat of WS Earth Undercoat which I covered with WS Green Blended Turf which gives a good average green color.  I have just purchased Light Green Clump-Foliage  which I plan to add to the mountain soon.  I haven't got an adequate photo available.

 

Scenes in Japan are often comprised mainly of different shades of green.  Here's some examples:

 

 

[bill937ca]

Depends a bit on what you model. A tunnel entrance for example will show some man-made "naked mountain" so to speak. Some mountains might also have clearings where a village is/was located, things like that.

 

The way I described above is what I'm doing for my diorama that has a tunnel entrance, for larger, prototypical mountain ranges I wouldn't add hydrocal to smoothen the thing out. That said, my first several modules (the ones based on Ghibli modules) have non-Japanese mountains and actually show a lot of the rock surface ;)

 

That would make a good European mountain but not a Japanese mountain.  In many cases all you will see is green, brown ballast and the tunnel portal itself. There is little if any exposed stone at a tunnel portal.

 

Tree coverage in Japan is the highest in the world at 66.8% of land coverage.

 

http://web-japan.org/nipponia/nipponia24/en/feature/feature01.html

 

http://web-japan.org/nipponia/nipponia24/en/feature/feature02.html

 

Here's some older tunnel portal photos from Japan.

 

 

 

 

Here's a couple of short videos with mountain scenes.

 

 

 

It all depends on the type of effect you want.  I have noticed many Japanese layouts lean heavily tones of green and brown and little else.

[Martijn Meerts]

Bill, I'm not doing everything prototypically though. Those Studio Ghibli modules I mentioned for example are based on various movies by Studio Ghibli (more specifically Hayao Miyazaki's movies). In Kaze no Tani no Naushika for example, there are some valleys where you can see the rock surface itself. In Mononoke Hime, they're clearing a lot of the forest, so obviously there'll be quite a bit of visible mountain there as well.

 

Newly installed tunnel portals will generally also show the rock surface for a perdiod of time at least. Pretty much all tunnel entrances need some work to even out the surround area, but eventually they'll get covered by various bushes again.

 

 

Anyway, I don't really want everything to be 100% prototypical, it would impose far too many limits for my taste, not to mention that you won't be able to model people walking on the platforms and getting on and off trains anytime soon =)

[SubwayHypes]

I like the risers!  What are those made of?  Did you just cut them from a big foam block? 

 

i would just hit them with some RUstoleum "textured" spray paint to give them a cement look.

[bill937ca]

WS risers and inclines are made of styrofoam, or more specifically expanded polystryene.  Solvent based glues and paints can eat some types of foam so you might want to check before using rustoleum paint.

[serenityFan]

I like the risers!  What are those made of?  Did you just cut them from a big foam block? 

 

i would just hit them with some RUstoleum "textured" spray paint to give them a cement look.

 

The risers with ribs are WS, as for the solid ones on the main straight, I did cut them from a big foam sheet. The main thing is the foam sheet was already 2 inches tall like the WS risers, so I just need to cut them to the required width.

 

So for mountain covered with trees, you don't need to make trees but simply use folliages?

How about the edges of the forest, or where the forest meets the road, would you be able to see some trees there?

[CaptOblivious]

I like the risers!  What are those made of?  Did you just cut them from a big foam block? 

 

i would just hit them with some RUstoleum "textured" spray paint to give them a cement look.

 

The risers with ribs are WS, as for the solid ones on the main straight, I did cut them from a big foam sheet. The main thing is the foam sheet was already 2 inches tall like the WS risers, so I just need to cut them to the required width.

 

So for mountain covered with trees, you don't need to make trees but simply use folliages?

How about the edges of the forest, or where the forest meets the road, would you be able to see some trees there?

 

It's all up to you. I'm flocking a portion of my layout as I type this to photograph and post to this thread, so you can see how just straight "clump foliage" works. I won't be doing anything fancy in the foreground.

[Martijn Meerts]

Another option would be to use the cheaper trees that come in sets of 50 or 100 or something, although I think that only really works well for a pine forest. For the foreground you get get several more detailed trees and place them in strategic places. Spots of the layout that draw the attention of the viewer.. Around tunnel entrances, bridges, lakes etc.

[CaptOblivious]

Here is what the cheap and easy route yields, for what it's worth.

[bill937ca]

Here is what the cheap and easy route yields, for what it's worth.

 

Looks good, Captain!

[serenityFan]

Here is what the cheap and easy route yields, for what it's worth.

 

Looks good, Captain!

 

I second that ... cheap, easy and looking great  ;D

[serenityFan]

Latest update ... I was originally undecided whether or not to procede without a detailed plan for the scenery, however I finally decided to move ahead and just decide things on the go.

 

I took the left most section of my layout and started working on the landscape. You should be able to see the main lines disappearing into the tunnel on the right hand side. The 'other' risers/incliner set which goes accross the middle of the picture is for the tram line, which wasn't on any of the last pics you've seen.

 

I followed the newspaper scrunches method and this is how far I got today. 2nd photo shows the back of the layout with large openings so I can reach inside the tunnel.

 

[Bernard]

This is looking fantastic! I like that you are making it in sections which will come in handy latter.

A couple of questions:

1) I used flex track in my layout and I don't know if it's the same for Unitrack, but I had to lay down the flex track first before I covered it up in my mountain. How do you lay down the Unitrack in your mountain?

 

2) I see there is one area in the first photo where you have a crossover with 2 elevated WS inclines. (I'm writing this because I really can't see the angle in the photo very well and I don't want you to have any problems when you lay down the track)

Have you test fitted it with one train on a track on the bottom section and having the bridge in place on the top section just to make sure you have enough clearance? This was a problem I had in one of my earlier designs and found the flaw when I tested fitted it. All my trains have enough clearance expect an Mintrix "Old Timer" steam engine, which is fine because what would that train be doing on a hi-speed main line.

 

Also what material did you use for your sides? The sides came out extremely well.

I really look forward to seeing more of this layout, great job!!

[CaptOblivious]

Lookin' good!! ;D  It's all down hill from here (ba-da-bum *ching*): cutting those profiles is the hard tedious part. The plaster cloth and the rest is just fun.

[serenityFan]

To be honest, I am not sure how I'm going to lay down tracks inside the mountain ... Maybe I can just lay the unitrack without any glue, just put it loosely on the layout.

 

On the secondary line (the tram line) however, it's a different story because I plan to use flextrack there.

So if you lay the flextrack first, how do you cover the sections of the riser below the flextrack which have holes?

I have sort of tested the crossover, however it is going to be close. I would probably end up with a very thin bridge over that section  ;D

 

Materials: The side-board and back-board are 3mm foam core.

 

And as for the plester cloth fun: hehe, I still have to test it again before going to the plester cloth part. Is it actually better or worst to have a lot of the tape over the newspaper? my beautiful wife commented that my mountain looked better before I put all that tape on them  because all the tape made it looked flat.

 

To do the plester cloth, you just cut a smallish sized patch, dip it in water and put it over the taped-newpaper-mountain. is that correct?

[bill937ca]

 

To do the plester cloth, you just cut a smallish sized patch, dip it in water and put it over the taped-newpaper-mountain. is that correct?

 

 

Yes, that is correct.

[CaptOblivious]

 

To do the plester cloth, you just cut a smallish sized patch, dip it in water and put it over the taped-newpaper-mountain. is that correct?

 

 

Yes, that is correct.

 

Place it bumpy-side-up, and be sure to smooth the plaster around to fill in gaps and holes in the cloth. Also, I find more tape better than less tape, generally, but that's just me.

[serenityFan]

Yes, i thought more tape would give you a smoother area ... anyways I've put the layout back together for some test run and everything seems to be running okay. I've also updated my blog with some more pics ...