Justice City Dioramish

[MartyO]

It is amazing how taking time off from modelling does to one's clarity of why you stopped modeling. My model railway, or should I say diorama, has undergone many revisions and modifications to make it look better and more realistic. The trouble was I was trying to do too much in a limited space and time, it just did not feel right.

I was trying to fit models into a scene that would never be there. Plus me trying to do realistic mini scenes where was not looking good. I was in a candy shop of kits, with no place to put them. So it was time for me to change the layout to be more manageable and easier to work on without having 10 turnouts, block detection and computer control with miles of messy wiring that the cats love to scratch on.

So here is the newest plan,

- eliminate Gran's Yellow house and farm section
- eliminate the mine inn the corner
- reduce overall length from 132" to 120" to fit against the wall better
- reduce the depth from 30" to 19-20" to make it easier to work on
- have only one track with 4-5 turnout at the max
- eliminate the legs and mount it on the wall with 4 20" shelf brackets
- create a central location for all wires to be routed to control electronics
- extract the welty marine and make it a separate diorama for sale
- exractthe Gran' farm into a separate diorama and sell it, whole or in parts
- extract the mine structure into a separate diorama and sell it
- the two stall will not be used but completed as a separate diorama anf sold
- organize and sell NCE block detectors and sell tortoises
- possibly sell all NCE controller, detector and computer cards

The following posts will show the current state.

[MartyO]

Here are some before pictures

[MartyO]

Here is the shipyard, which will stay.

[MartyO]

So far I have removed all the wires and things thatvwill nit be needed or were in the wrong place.

The next phase will be to started extracting the mini dioramas.

[Mark Dalrymple]

Sounds like you have a good plan, Marty.

All you need to do now is stick to it!  BTW - are you breeding reading glasses?  Handy skill if you are.  If that was my series of photos there would be two pairs in the first photo, one pair in the second and none in the third!

Good luck, and keep us posted, cheers, Mark.

[MartyO]

Mark, I have another breeding pen in the garage, you just can't have enough of them.

[jerryrbeach]

Marty,

It seems like you have planned for a specific focus and an attainable layout goal that should keep you motivated to move forward.  Turning some of the unnecessary structures into dioramas sounds like a great plan.  I'll be tuned in to watch your progress.

[MartyO]

The end L-section is gone and ready to be cut smaller diorama.

[MartyO]

And marine diorame was tough to get out but I won. A few details need to be cleaned up.

[Keep It Rusty]

I love that marina. Lovely work Marty.

[GPdemayo]

I can understand your situation Marty, I'm going thru the same with my layout, I'll be looking in.....good luck. 

[MartyO]

It has been a busy day destroying most of my base foam. There were boards screwed on boards and the whole layout was very heavy. Now it is lighter and allows for a waterfront scene if it looks good.

[MartyO]

Today was more carpentry than destruction. I cut off 12" from the end of the diorama to make it a total of 128".

I had used contact cement to attach the sections of foam and it was very difficult to cut. I found the saw that  wiggly back in forth with a small blade the most effective way of extracting the glue from foam a base plywood. I went through 3 blades, gish they are expensive!

A combination of a jigsaw, handsaw and that wiggly saw I got the plywood base cut in almost a straight line. The sander will smooth it out after I cut the depth of the baseboard to 18".

That is the plan tomorrow.

[MartyO]

Another dusty day on the homestead (it seems everything is a homestead these days ). It was one of those tasks that could not be done to perfection without alot more patience then I have. The ADD in my said the fascia will hide my mistakes.

What made it worse was I had to undercut the baseboard to fit the edge and fasten it down.

[Jim Donovan]

Just catching up on everyones posts. I love the scene it is coming along nicely! Thanks for sharing.

Jim