However, back to the quarry. The back story is that the layout represents a small corner of a larger quarry somewhere n North Wales. As I live within walking distance of Dinorwic it has to be said that this is a large influence.
This is the whole thing as I left it shut away for probably ten years.
I had constructed a plasticard carcass of the dressing shed building and then run out of steam, I couldn't think how to make it look like it was made of sawn slate waste blocks as the real things are. the conclusion I came to was that there was no quick way to do it so I set about stone cladding it with small cut up pieces of styrene sheet. It was very time consuming and it occurred to me to give up more than once but in the end I found it quite therapeutic and the result was very pleasing.
Quite a lot of quarry buildings had roofs made from layers of slate slab rather than tiles, this was for two reasons. Firstly, you don't want to waste finished tiles that you could sell. Secondly, tiled roofs are relatively fragile and so where there regular blasting operations which sometimes hurl large blocks of slate about the place a nice solid (at least a foot thick) slate roof is a good protection. Again I chopped up some styrene sheet to represent this.
Here it is after a squirt of grey primer, this confirmed to me that my technique was successful enough.
The other building that was needed was a weighbridge hut, the little brick built hut that came free on the front of the Railway Modeller was the perfect size so I built it and then stone clad it in a similar way to the big shed.
I had intended to put the weighbridge here on the exit tramway but it obscured too much of the dressing shed.
Some detail painting done and a lean too added with the diesel motor to turn the line shafting for the saw and other machines in the dressing shed.
My Brian Madge quarry Hunslet with the new position of the weighbridge. I'd repainted the loco some time ago with the intention of making it look in quarry condition, i.e. filthy but I hadn't plucked up the courage to filth it up. Now I have and it looks perfect, well as perfect as I can get it.
Plan A was to have the slate arrive from an adit in this corner, rather in the style of the Blaenau quarries but as a Dinorwic man through and through I decided that an incline was the way to go, it would have to be only the very bottom of a very steep table type. This meant I had to cut a hole in the baseboard for the table to drop into... this meant taking the whole layout to pieces but will be worth it in the end.
This is the incline in place.
The next job was to paint the incline and then add some basic slatey style scenery with balsa wood and styrene. Unfortunately I've now run out of Mekpac so all styrene work has come to a halt. The next major thing being to construct the incline truck and the plate rail trackwork leading to it. I'll do this with styrene strip as most rail in areas like this in the quarry was only suitable for hand pushed wagons and made of flat steel plate, often using sleepers with cuts in them rather than chairs.
This is the current state of play, the next major job is to start to cover the whole ground and sinc walls with filler. Then a squirt of grey and some more acrylic to pick out some detail. Once all that lot is done I'll be able to add small bits of real slate especially in the tipped areas. The bottom of the sinc will be flooded with the coppery turquoise water that builds up in such places.
Wash your hands and stay safe.
No comments:
Post a Comment