James River Branch: What's New?

What's New?

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13 May 2012

The Major Event alluded to in the previous post (29 March 2012) is that roughly six months of work have been crammed into six weeks of time in order to have the layout ready for the National Z Scale Convention in Denver, its first national appearance. But I couldn't post any updates during this time without giving away the surprise of showing up unannounced. So now I'll compress all of the accomplishments into one great big special Show Report.

The first thing to note is that the layout is now about 98% complete; in fact, the only items remaining on the to-do list are automobiles and street signs. That's it! Otherwise, it's all finished, including the river. (Which means the graphic in the 29 March post would be all solid green, so I've dropped it from the Plan page as it no longer serves any purpose.)

The first item on the agenda was Mirror Road, named for the stream- and road-extending mirror installed under the bridge. I began by making the road bridge, which was bashed from a modified Peco N scale pony truss railroad bridge. Next came the continuation of River Road from the crossing to the mirror, along with the strip of scenery between the track and the river. I wrapped up this leg of the journey by finishing the James River, using the paint and gloss medium technique.

Next up was the pond and waterfalls. The pond was poured using a clear potting epoxy from Smooth-On. In order to give Auger Creek depth, I repeatedly poured it until the epoxy began to thicken. Then I made the various rapids and waterfalls with gloss gel medium tinted with white acrylic paint; the main waterfall is based on a sheet of waxed paper for extra body.

The final and most substantial effort went into wrapping up the town of Naughtright—and no, I didn't make any last-minute changes. Surprise! Although all of the buildings were pretty much done, I still had to install them all, as well as finish Allen's Alley and the scenery around the junkyard. But the biggest chore by far was wiring all of the lighting effects, which included four animated signs, over a dozen streetlights, building illumination, hobby shop layout, and much more.

On the downside, however, I worked so hard and so fast that I hardly took any photos of Naughtright in its last stages of construction. There are just a few images of Dick's Auto Salvage, Spano's Service Station and Emma's Cafe—just enough to provide an impression of the transition.

In addition to (nearly) finishing the layout cosmetically, I also had to construct a shipping crate (two, actually, since I also brought the Geordie & Daphne), which was quite a process on its own. Plus, I ordered custom Plexiglas enclosures to protect them while on display, and I had to devise a means to illuminate them both, since convention hall lighting always sucks, and Red Lion was no exception.

As the convention neared, I pulled a couple of all-nighters so as to get as much accomplished as possible. Alas, I did not have enough time to get trains running, on either layout—that would have forced me to choose between running trains or getting the layout visually to the 98% mark, and I think it's pretty obvious which was more important to me. Besides, having the trains running would have been a fairly significant distraction for me, as I'd have to monitor their performance and remove the large, heavy Plexiglas enclosures to correct problems.

The layout did suffer a few minor disasters. First, the barber pole stopped working at the last minute, and there was no time to make repairs. Then, as I was packing the layout, the Canal Street crossing shanty suffered irreparable damage. Fortunately I had one of Stony Smith's RP shanties on hand, so after a heptane bath, I upgraded it with an etched brass ladder, gave it a quick coat of paint, and glued it in place after the layout arrived in Denver. As for the trip itself, evidently it wasn't as smooth as I'd hoped, since there was some cosmetic damage indicating the crate had either been dropped or knocked hard; but the damage was relatively minor and easily disguised with the emergency repair supplies I'd brought along to the show.

All in all, the layout was a huge hit, often being the center of attention, with crowds jockeying for good views. I spoke to so many people for so long that I came quite close to losing my voice. And I left the booth only twice, once to get a drink, and once sometime later in response to having had the drink.

Best of all, the James River Branch was awarded Best of Show—which genuinely blew me away. For the record, after 47 years of modeling, this is the very first award I've ever received!

For much more detail on the work that's been done, look for UPDATED entries on the Construction page. Incidentally, the layout is currently still on the road, headed my way. Once it's home safe and sound, I can shoot some more images of the work that was done, and make another, more in-depth update. Stay tuned...

29 March 2012

While this update does not constitute work having been done on the layout (that would be a Major Event!), it does reflect my intention to do something. Recently I've improved the efficiency of my product manufacturing process, which has begun to reward me with a few scraps of free time—the first in over a year. I began by reviewing what's left to do on the James River Branch, and in doing so I noticed the graphic depicting the layout's completion status (below) was out of date, so I updated it to reflect the fact that all of the layout's structures are done.

Stay tuned... there may in fact be a Major Event on the way!

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Newcomers may want to learn more about the project. Modelers interested in how things were done will enjoy exploring the many construction pages.