Thursday, July 28, 2011

Finally TRESTLE BRIDGE TIME!!!!!

Gday All!!
Work has begun on the star of the layout, well the shorter one at least. Paul has built the bridge surprisingly quick, over just 3 evenings after work!
He used 0.9mm tee tree for the uprights and north-eastern hobby timber, that he then had to cut even thinner again, for the cross sections. The shallow end, near the road crossing, is shortest on the layout at 3mm high.
Progressing to 3.5, 4, 4.5, 5 & 5.5mm at the deepest end. Every trestle bent variation is in order and as per the real bridge, being modelled strictly of photos. The majority of the large bridge is 5.5mm to 7mm deep. There is 38 piers in this bridge and 157 in the large bridge!!!!

Firstly here are two photos of the actual location. These photos assisted in the construction of the piers.





A close up photo showing the huge amount of detail put into such a small structure.

















Here is a photo of the bridge prior to attaching it permenantly to the layout.


Paul has also been working on the hill overlooking the Snowy River valley. This is the first of many steps involved in creating this area.







Overview of the progress on the first two modules. AMAZING!!! You can also see Paul has commenced work on the road bridge. This structure will be deserving of its own post so ill explain it in detail then.



At this rate Paul will have the main bridge completed in a matter of weeks!!!


Stay tuned as im sure ill be posting again VERY SOOOON!!!!!


Take care and Happy Modelling!!


Adrian

Sunday, July 17, 2011

And now we have COLOUR!!!

Gday all,
We would first like to welcome and thank our new blog followers. We appreciate all the kind remarks from the Morwell Model Railway exhibition and various forum.
Progress on the layout has been delayed slightly due to Paul working on a VR 5" L class locomotive (pictures of this will soon appear on the 5" blog).
We assure you that Orbost is still underway. The following pictures are evidence of this.




This photo demonstrates the effort Paul has put into this area. The undulation of the land is more defined and the colours and textures of the ground layer are spot on!!



Looking towards the train as it moves along the land fill in between the two bridges. The road still needs surfacing and shrubs and trees added.

This photo shows the third module. GPS and visits to the area were used to model this hill as accurate as possible. The closer hill is almost ready for ground surfacing to match the second module. New information has recently been obtained showing an error in the hill in the background. This hill will be replaced with the correct one.

Overall shot showing the colouring of the two modules. Very fine coloured foam was used in conjuction with half water half PVA glue. to create this layer.

This photo shows the detail put into the plowed field. A comb was used while wet and again while dry. The fence posts are AMAZING!!! Paul has measured fence opst in the area and these are to scale. 2mm high, 0.4mm thick and 10mm apart..........WOW!!!

I hope you enjoyed the introduction of colour to this rapidly developing layout.

Adrian