Justice City Dioramish

[MartyO]

The next steps are to get the finer details for the lighting put into place for the structures I will be using.

 The ShipYard is the first to be fit into the new wiring. I use these "Light-it" modules to control the lighting for each structure. Sometimes they are separate from the structure and sometimes that are embedded within the structure. If they are separate the Light-it module is mounted on a printed circuit board with a terminal connection to the lighting wiring (I chose Red and Black wire colours for these). The structure lights are connected to a mini-plug and inserted it the custom light-it module.

There is future work to standardize the structure lighting and possibly controls for each of the structures. I'm still think about that.

[MartyO]

You are now up-to-date.

However, I have tons of NCE electrics that I don't need or want to use anymore. These are,

- 10 Tortoise servo motors ($5 US each)
- 19 NCE BD20 block detectors ($5 US each)
- 2 NCE AUI detectors ($20 US each)
- One Mono Tam Valley Frog juicer ($5 US)
- One dual Tam Valley Frog Juicer ($7 US)
- Two Hex Tam Valley Frog Juicer ($20 US each)

Plus postage to your address. Private message me if you are interested. Job lot pricing available.

[MartyO]

And there is still more to sell.

Lots of Berrett Hill things. See pic for details.

- 4 Touch Toggle T2RG-4 ($5 US each)
- 2 Universal Translator - 8 outputs UT8 ($15 US)

Shipping extra.

[jerryrbeach]

Marty,

I really like the photo you posted with the "Shipyard For Sale" sign.  The weathering is great, and the details really make it "pop".  I hope that one is going to part of your "new" layout.

Jerry

[MartyO]

Jerry, absolutely it is invthe diorama, mostly because it is screwed, under the epoxy water, into the baseboard. 

[ACL1504]

Marty,

I'll be following this layout rebuild. It is sad to remove old work but the excitement of a new revised layout is worth the effort. Been there and have a few t-shirts for each redo.

Tom

[GPdemayo]

Marty,

I'll be following this layout rebuild. It is sad to remove old work but the excitement of a new revised layout is worth the effort. Been there and have a few t-shirts for each redo.

Tom

More than a "few".....

[MartyO]

You know the hardest part of this build was to figure out why the NCE USB adaptor was unreliable. After months of fussing I found out the connectors I was using to make the patch cables were very slightly making and not making connections to the Cab Bus connectors. Time to stop buying those cheap connectors and splurge on the good ones.

Or just don't use NCE USB at all.

Any thoughts?

[MartyO]

Reading through the NCE manual they say don't make your own, buy from us. Hmm, I wonder how much a 6" Cab Bus cable would cost?

[Zephyrus52246]

Years ago I bought cable and plugs and an expensive cutter/crimper and made my own cables for the cab bus.   I think it was cheaper in the long run and I could make whatever length I needed.  

Jeff

[MartyO]

I finally got my 6" Cab Bus cables to work. I don't know how!

[MartyO]

I am a cheap and frugal modeller, I do my best to re-use as much as possible. This was the mantra for me creating the initial scenery for the diorama. I managed to do 95% of the shore line from the old layout and Hydrocal castings that I had in stock.

Here is what I managed to get done over the last week,

- ballasted the track
- create a road by the Shipyard to deliver lumber
- build out the lighthouse shoreline
- create the harbour retaining wall
- and colour the water with a base colour

The following pictures detail that work,

[MartyO]

The retaining wall was a bit of a challenge as I had a bunch of wall sections I got from somewhere. I managed to hack them into 1" height sections and interweave the end into the next section of the wall. I used a file to flatten the blocks so they like more in scale and were straight. 

I then chiselled the front edges of the blocks to be more realistic. I used caulking to attach the sections to the pink foam, so I had to cut away any of that evidence. A large file was then used to get a consistent height of the retaining wall, allowing for a deck surface to be determined later. The filings from the Hydrocal was then mixed with a little water and squeezed into any gaps and smeared across all of the wall. This was brushed with a steel brush to fine tune the blend and give tooth to the future colouring.

The water area needed to get a base coat of colour on it to hide the pink foam. Using 1 part a blue, paint, 1 part white paint and 1/2 part of brown paint, roughly mixed, I dabbed the paint onto anywhere there was pink showing through.

Then phase is to start the colouring of the retaining wall, but that is for the next time.

 

[deemery]

How did you do the dirt road? 

dave

[MartyO]

Dave,

It was so easy, sanded tile grout!

https://www.lowes.com/pd/MAPEI-Ultracolor-Plus-FA-10-lb-Harvest-All-in-One-Sanded-Grout/5013684237