hehe
And I’ve been wondering 'bout using rocks 'stead of castings.
Ray Dunakin said:
Beautiful!
I sometimes wish I had done this sort of thing on my layout instead of using real stone. The stone is great and I love it, but casting concrete “rocks” in molds would have allowed me to sculpt realistic landforms with greater precision.
The grass is always greener… I wish there were rocks in Florida (that didn’t cost money to be trucked in) so I didn’t have to use concrete!
I did have to look a while to come up with the rocks I wanted for behind the McKinley Park Trestle on my layout. If I had cast them I could have been done quicker. But I am not sure the colours would have been as nice as real stone.
David Maynard said:
I did have to look a while to come up with the rocks I wanted for behind the McKinley Park Trestle on my layout. If I had cast them I could have been done quicker. But I am not sure the colours would have been as nice as real stone.
Yep, there are pros and cons to everything. Real stone has a look that can only be approximated in concrete.
Ray so true to pros and cons.
Real stones can only be closely modeled by concrete, and rocks can only be used by few to
model mountains. This is a hobby, we use what we can, do it how we can, and do what we like.
We need to remember it is your railroad and we need to do what we like.
I have seen some great looking railroads across the country combining rocks and dirt, creating some of the greatest landscape.
I do not do garden railroading, I tell people I model railroading outside. A good friend of mine that has
some of the best looking GRR that has lots of plants, says, concrete roadbeds are the best, NO WEEDS!!!. now he says I am doing more concrete to prevent weeds.
I love OTHER peoples railroads that have great looking plants, I cant keep up with all the work needed for plants in my GRR.
I like tracks off the ground for looks and ease on the back. I have tracks as high as 50" off the ground, rocks and dirt for that height is tough work. Hollow shell concrete at that height is MUCH cheaper, quicker, and yes you GUESSED IT, NO WEEDS. I have done the stone and now I am covering it with concrete with great, personal satisfaction… That is the key.
For me concrete work is alot easier than stone and dirt. (I have a good tractor and loader too.)
OH YES I LOVE THE MOUNTAINS, tall Mts, tunnels and bridges,
One railroad that my wife and I both have refered to for years as probably our all time favorite railroad, is in Oregon and the wife and husband said they spend minimun an hour each, per day, doing the weeding and plant grooming. I know alot spend more and less time on greenery, and that is great.
It must be what you like and what you want, it is a hobby!!! People that see my RR are amazed at what I have and says how do you find the time, Well some fish ,some hunt, some race cars, some garden, some read books. I build mountains, I estamated I actually only work on my RR 50 days a year. And only a 2-4 hours per day .For me my favorite thing is building it, I seldom run trains, I guess I am working on it. ENJOY, IT IS A HOBBY.
Dennis
Above picture has a 20 ft ring in place, so I can figure out where I want to add the 2-- 30 inch
arch bridges.
The above picture shows the 2 30 inch steel arch bridges in place
This view shows the starting of placing the wooden structures to fasten the wire mesh to.
The first evening of concrete wall added
Concrete added to north east corner
Dennis
Empty molds ready to spray with WD 40 fill with cement
molds are filled in above picture
Molds carried to the mountain range the easy way
Filling around the East Bridge
Propping up the molds for a 8 inch out cropping or over hang
Overhang can be seen on the left side
Just so neat to watch the progress(http://www.largescalecentral.com/externals/tinymce/plugins/emoticons/img/smiley-cool.gif)
It almost makes me wish my chosen prototype would look good in that kind of scenery.
Dennis
Have you thought of making one of these in the side of the mountain .
That would be so cool!
always interesting, how others do it.
thanks for the pics
Dennis Rayon said:
Ray so true to pros and cons.
Real stones can only be closely modeled by concrete, and rocks can only be used by few to
model mountains. This is a hobby, we use what we can, do it how we can, and do what we like.
We need to remember it is your railroad and we need to do what we like.
I have seen some great looking railroads across the country combining rocks and dirt, creating some of the greatest landscape.
I do not do garden railroading, I tell people I model railroading outside. A good friend of mine that has
some of the best looking GRR that has lots of plants, says, concrete roadbeds are the best, NO WEEDS!!!. now he says I am doing more concrete to prevent weeds.
I love OTHER peoples railroads that have great looking plants, I cant keep up with all the work needed for plants in my GRR.
I like tracks off the ground for looks and ease on the back. I have tracks as high as 50" off the ground, rocks and dirt for that height is tough work. Hollow shell concrete at that height is MUCH cheaper, quicker, and yes you GUESSED IT, NO WEEDS. I have done the stone and now I am covering it with concrete with great, personal satisfaction… That is the key.
For me concrete work is alot easier than stone and dirt. (I have a good tractor and loader too.)
OH YES I LOVE THE MOUNTAINS, tall Mts, tunnels and bridges,
One railroad that my wife and I both have refered to for years as probably our all time favorite railroad, is in Oregon and the wife and husband said they spend minimun an hour each, per day, doing the weeding and plant grooming. I know alot spend more and less time on greenery, and that is great.
It must be what you like and what you want, it is a hobby!!! People that see my RR are amazed at what I have and says how do you find the time, Well some fish ,some hunt, some race cars, some garden, some read books. I build mountains, I estamated I actually only work on my RR 50 days a year. And only a 2-4 hours per day .For me my favorite thing is building it, I seldom run trains, I guess I am working on it. ENJOY, IT IS A HOBBY.
Dennis
This should be a gospel. Or at least the introduction to a book about large-scale outdoor (not garden!) railroading.
The project is awesome.
And by the way the coloring on your “rocks” is really good.
Guys thank you for the wonderful compliments, thanks Sean for the suggestion of the horse head, No I have not thought of it.
I have a wolf head mountain and a face mountain,
John thanks for the compliment on what I call GRR profiling, It is a hobby and a person needs to do it according to their likings not according
to someone else’s Railroad.
I will keep posting pics in the future, for any south and eastern travelers going to the NGRC in Tulsa in 2017, I will be on the pre convention tour, so you road travelers can stop by for a small rest time. I am 5 minutes for interstate 44 in south west Missouri.
Dennis