More Progress at Gallitzin

 

I have been chugging along at Gallitzin. I have added some lichen to the completed section of the mountain, added some street lights to Vulcan and a few miscellaneous details.  

Speaking of lights, my LEDs finally arrived from Hong Kong and I have slowly been installing them in a few buildings. The handful that are illuminated look awesome, but that's a subject for another entry.

Busy, busy busy!

The rock outcrop has been installed and stained from Route 53 back Gallitzin.

 

Overall view of the recent work.

An Alco RS3 picks up a load of pipes from Vulcan and passes a Model Power electrical sub station.

A box car awaits pickup at Hitzeman Feed Mill. The feed mill is sort of a local gathering point, in spite of Mr. Hitzeman's disposition. He loves to holler at his employees, especially when they don't jump at his call.

The cement plant got a new parking lot.

Even though I haven't been posting like I used to, I have been busy as a beaver on the layout a of late. As usually happens, a scene starts to take shape and I get all fired up to finish it and things kick into overdrive.

First and foremost I got the rock outcropping running along the westbound tracks. This was a simple matter of slopping on patching plaster, which cooperated by drying and then staining it. Then I set about connecting the gaurdrail posts with thread and painting them Floquil concrete.

Once that was done, I went ahead and ballasted a short portion of the westbound tracks. I also turfed along the top of the rocks and planted some trees. After that, I added a few details and the scene was largely complete.

Next, it was time to pave paradise and put up a parking lot. Three of them actually. For Vulcan and the cement plant, I wen with concrete parking lots. For the feed mill, I decided to go with a gravel parking lot using Woodland Scenics buff colored ballast.

Finally it was time to paint and ballast the siding form the feed mill and Vulcan, turf around them and plant some trees. Last but not least, I ordered some LED street lights from China and installed them near Vulcan. All told I thinks things are coming together nicely. I'm waiting for some more LEDs for the interior building lights at the moment. I'm also working on a Cornerstone "Industrial Office" kit for the cement plant area.

More Scenery Work

 

 

Scenry work in the Gallitzin industrial areas has been chugging along at a steady pace. So far I've managed get the two eastbound tracks ballasted between the Route 53 overpass and the eastern end of the Brewery/Cement Plant complex. Now, I've already used previous blog entries to complain about how difficult Woodland Scenics ballast is to work with so there's no need to kick that dead iron horse.  However, I will say this, if you spray with with denatured alcohol instead of wet water, you do get better results.

I also went and added turf to the west end of the Brewery/Cement Plan complex as well as the side of the Route 53 embankment. Speaking of roads, PennDOT has been busiely installing gaurdrail posts along the road running from Gallitzin to Route 53. These will eventually be connected with cables.

Next I plan to pick up some more joint compound to finish the rock formation beside the westbound tracks. Beyond that, I'm waiting for some LEDs from China to light the buildings in the industrial areas. Those must be installed before I can proceed any further. Stay tuned.

Honoring an Old Friend

As mentioned previously, I chose to move my Life Like country store kit down to Route 53. At any rate I decided to go ahead and complete the scene by adding a pair of Microengineering gas pumps, a gravel parking lot, some turf and trees. Not a bad little afternoon project.

Back in high school, I had a substitute teacher, Mr. Warren Teufel. Like me, he was an avid railfan and model railroader. He had an awesome Marklin HO layout in his basement and was always happy to lend advice and ideas. Even after graduating, I would see him at the library and riding his bike around town. But then I moved to South Carolina in 2007 and more or less lost touch with with Warren.

I was saddened to learn Warren passed away in fall of 2014. I had kept meaning to write him but kept kicking the can down the road and then, it was too late. I am honored to have been able to call Warren my friend and I decided it was fitting to name something on the layout after him . In that spirit I decided to name the country store "Warren's Dry Goods." Now I just need a bicycle to prop up outside.

 

In other news, I been working on some ground cover in the industrial areas by the brewery and cement plant.  This mostly consisted of black Woodland Scenics ballast with some course turf sprinkled to look like the occasional weed popping up. Even partially completed, it's really starting to capture that grimy, sooty look of the steam era. I'c actually excited to get the rails painted and siding ballasted.