I have built several kits recently.  The first is a Downtown Deco Palace Card Room.  This is the first time that I have built one of these kits and I liked it very much.  All the work is in the finish and I added lighting to it.

I started a new project which is the Scale Structures Roundhouse.  I have always liked this kit, since I could never get my hands on the South River brick or stone roundhouse nor afford it.  I was very fortunate to pick up this kit at the 2017 Narrow Gauge Convention in Denver.  This was an old kit that was sitting on somebody's shelf for many years and it had never been opened.  The price was right and I couldn't resist. 

The third bridge for the canyon area is a Micro Engineering Lightweight Tall Steel Structure.  This bridge will go in front of the Howe Truss Bridge and behind the Arch Truss Bridge.

I started construction of a Hunterline Howe Truss Bridge.  It will go on the layout as shown in the picture below.



The kit is for a 170' Bridge but I only need a 150' bridge and therefor eliminated two panels in the middle.  What I did was to take a set of plans and cut the two middle panels out and taped the remainder of the plans back together since the plans are used as a template for the construction of the bridge components.


Box Cover


Kit Contents


What the completed Bridge looks like


Plans


Installing /spacers between timbers


Chord Assembly


Completed Bottom Chords


Completed Track Bed


Completed Truss


Close up of Truss


Standing Truss

I have been working on the Sierra West Logging Camp Essentials kit to fill out the structures that I need for the sawmill and logging camp on my layout. The first, structure is a bunk house; second, shower and latrine; third, cookhouse; fourth, fuel depot; fifth tool shed; and sixth, the rigging shed. There also is a another bunk house.


I still have all the details to complete for these structures and am working on the railroad depot.

Does anyone have a Sierra West Logging Camp Essentials Kit that they would like to sell to me.  Thanks

I have switched gear as I await materials for the bridge.  I have been building an A-Frame Turntable base on the articles in the Model Railroad Hobbyist in March and April this year.  I have been using the A-Frame Turntable in El Portal, California for the Yosemite Valley Railroad.

The base of the pit is made from 1/2" birch plywood, the lower portion of the pit is also 1/2" birch plywood and the upper part is from 3/8" plywood and I had it sanded to 5/16" thickness to match the height of 3 layers of railroad ties which line the pit walls. The Code 70 rail around the pit was bent into a circle using a Fast Tracks rail bending tool. 







The pivot is made from a guitar jack socket  and plug. The long threads on the socket allows for accurate vertical adjustment.  The center spindle rail is also Code 70 rail bent to a 2" diameter. To represent the spider I used n scale wheel which I fastened to a strip of styrene and wrapped the styrene around the top plywood disc.

In order to take care of the polarity issue when the table is turned 180 degrees, I am going to install an auto reverser unit

Guitar jack and socket



Top spindle




Socket mounted in base of pit.




The turntable was built from HO scale dimensional lumber
































 

I  have started construction of an Arch Truss Bridge for my layout.  I have an area on the layout that will require three bridges to cross a canyon and river.  The picture below shows this area and the arch bridge will be located in postion 1.  It will be 200 ft long.



My inspirations for the bridge are the Vance Creek Bridge in the State of Washington that was built for the Simpson Lumber to open up the Olympic Peninsula to logging.  It was built in 1928.  John Allen's, Squaw Bottom Bridge is the other one that influenced me.






So I used the 3rd Planit software to draw a construction plan and to provide templates for ease of construction.




So for its construction, I used the Central Valley laced girders for the vertical members, for the horizontal chords, I ripped the laced girders on a saww attachment I have for my unimat, the glued the halves together, and for the diagonals, I built them up from 1/16" styrene angles and strips of styrene as show on the right of the picture below.



The remaing pictures are the steps I did to construct the bents.

I recently started construction on Sierra West Scale Models Shelby's Marine Service.  This kit was released in 1998.  I wanted to take a break from the layout construction once the track was completed.  But I still have 50 switches to install.

I am starting a new HO gage layout in my garage.  SP RR in this case is short for the Suphrin Pathetik.  When I was in high school my father and I were in the process of building an HO layout in our basement.  My father worked for the Southern Pacific in San Francisco.  We belonged to the local model railroad club and made several excursions to see John Allen's layout in Monterey.  Of course everyone knows the name of his layout was the Gorre and Daphedid.  I then  suggested to my father that we name our RR the Suphrin and Pathetik and he liked it.

So after some 50 years and retirement and other hobby diversions, I am starting on a new layout in the garage.  But first I had to clean out some space in it which included and experimental airplane kit which I never finished.  I finally sold it last year. 

I changed the lighting in the garage.  I removed the old fluorescent fixtures which didn't produce enough light and had installed new LED fixtures.  Home Depot had a new 48" LED shop light in their store last week.  It has 3100 lumens and the color is 4000 kelvin.  I bought 11 of these fixtures. The layout will cover 230 sf.  The new fixtures will provide about 148 lumens per sf.  I read an article which said that you should have about 100 lumens per sf of work area and it also said to allow for a loss of lumens on the work surface.  So I have allowed about a 33 percent loss.  The new lighting is fantastic.  The fixtures are hung by chains from the ceiling.  The garage ceiling slopes from 11 ft. 

I needed to build one more scratch built structure towards my Master Builder - Structures certificate so I free-lanced this old dilapidated barn and the scenery surrounding it.  I researched old barns and prototypical construction methods on the internet and drew some plans.  I wanted to share the results with everybody. 

Frank/Erieman twisted my arm to put pictures of my model on this forum.  I won the Best in Show at the PSR Convention in Scottsdale this weekend along with the Favorite Model Award and Presidents Award.

My model is based on the Sturgeon's Sawmill located in Sebastopol, California.  It is a working museum of a steam powered sawmill.  It is open to the public about four times a year when they have it in operation.

I was able to get a set of plans from a modeler, Boone Morrison.  I adapted the sawmill for the rail delivery of logs to the mill for a future layout.  I drew my own plans and templates to construct it to my needs.

I am including pictures of the original sawmill so that you get an idea what it looked like.


I want to thank those that have helped me in this project.