Starting Scenery

I've started working on scenery for the modules. It's all made out of 2-inch foam carved with a hot knife. One hill has grass applied to it and the tunnel is still under construction. They are both removable and interchangable. I installed brass tubing into the module and smaller brass tubing into the hill and tunnel.




Enjoy,
Thom

This is how the scenery connects to the modules.

I like that concept Thom. Just fit inside each other or are there screws to hold the two together? Magnets would also do the trick.

tealplanes wrote: I like that concept Thom. Just fit inside each other or are there screws to hold the two together? Magnets would also do the trick.

Oh, Loren! You and your silly magnets!

Seriously, that tunnel isn't going anywhere!

No Mike,
That's silly rabbit. When I get rich, (IF), I'm going to buy some very fancy, (expensive), Velcro, pleated skirts to make my modules look nicer. That could be a few millennial. I think what Thom has done from where I sit is just a cylinder inside of another one. Well Thom?........give us the skinny.

How about some Velcro strips that would hold.

Now to solve the mystery.........

The hill and tunnel only need to be held in place once the modules are set up so I used 2 different sizes of brass tubing that fit one inside the other. There's no need to secure them since they won't be attached during transport. They don't even have to be on the modules once they're set up....you could make any scene and place it on a base with brass tubing in the right places to keep it from being moved too close to the tracks by little fingers during a show. I'm attempting to make the whole system as flexible as possible. If mountains and tunnels don't fit with what you want to display, you could exchange them with other scenes. I'm only trying to prevent the scenes from getting too close to the tracks and causing a derailment. Magnets in the module and a metal base for the scene would work but the scene would still be able to be moved around too much. You could also make the tubing in the module go all the way through the foam so you could run wiring for lighting or animating the scene.

Did I clear up the mystery ????
Thom

Good explanation Thom. Great ideas.
Thanks

Thom, good solution. How long did lining up the tubes take? Jim

Jim, it went pretty quickly. The hill and the mountain are 3 layers of foam tall. I aligned the edges and corner of the first layer of the hill with the edges and corner of the module and poked the smaller diameter tubing all the way through the hill piece into the module making holes in it. I pulled the tubing back out of the module and did the same thing to the other module and the first layer of the mountain. After that it was a matter of cutting 4 pieces of smaller-diameter tubing and 4 pieces of larger-diameter tubing and glueing the smaller tubing in the holes in the hill and tunnel and the larger ones in the modules. Then I glued the second and third layers to the hill and tunnel first layers. I try to make things as simple as possible and as fool-proof as possible for myself. If I need to duplicate the holes again I would just align the edges and corner and press the hill onto the new location or first layer of the new hill.

Sometimes the solution to a problem is profound in some ways when you look back on how it came to be. This is a good technique for aligning items. Almost fool proof.

ooh, That's pretty smart thinking. Jim

awww....thanks guyz

What a great idea. Really looks nice.

I've got the scenery done on 2 more modules....the pond module

.....and the stream module.

The pond looks great!!! The landscaping looks quite natural.....wish I could get my pond to look that great...

I finished the scenery on the hill module and the tunnel module.
Enjoy,
Thom

I got 8 of the 10 modules sceniced. The layout will make it's debut this Sunday in Indianapolis, IN. We'll only have room for 8 modules, that's why I only got 8 done. I'm looking forward to giving it it's shakedown cruise. Come by and see us if you're in the area.

Enjoy,
Thom

Looks great Thom, Just waiting for the train to arrive!!