Thank you, Craigslist!

Last night DairyStateMom, DairyStateKid-M, and I hauled home four slabs of 4x8 by 2 inch DOW Styrofoam XPS insulation board. I bought the material at a substantial discount from a guy who had it leftover from a siding job on his home. (The seller kindly helped make it easier to haul in our small vehicles by slicing it into smaller pieces under my direction, reflecting how it would be cut up for the layout.)

I'd been looking for a few weeks for a cheaper source of this stuff, the favored scenery and roadbed material for layouts. Now I have enough for the entire layout. I may need to get a bit more either half-inch, three-quarter-inch, or one-inch thick, but even of that I have some other leftover stuff courtesy of a friend.

The final benchwork section is about two-thirds finished. When it's all together -- this weekend, perhaps? -- I'll post pictures.

Now it's time for me to return to the track plan details. Of course it would have made sense to firmly work out the track plan before even building benchwork, but as I have reported previously, the benchwork was originally constructed with a completely different configuration in mind and only repurposed when I concluded I could do a lot better than the first configuration.

As for the track plan itself, I have compiled a ton of different plans from which I can draw particular concepts for the new configuration. I have a clear idea conceptually for the plan now, but precise elements remain to be developed.

If I don't have the plan finished by about mid-August, I plan to take my drawing supplies on a vacation and hope that by my return, those details will be sufficiently finalized to enable me to start putting down cork roadbed and track -- maybe even by Labor Day weekend!

Typefaces: Updated

A couple of months ago, I posted a selection of typefaces, using the HTML editor to render them. I've realized that they were not consistent from one computer and browser to another. So while I am leaving that post up, I decided to make a new post presenting the same document as a graphic. I hope this will show more consistently the various typefaces I am considering in connection with the Wolf River & Nicolet Ry. Co.

As before, if you wish to comment on which you like best, you would be welcome to do so.

A note, too, on time period, as that might be relevant to evaluating appropriate typefaces: My greatest preference would be to set it in the 1930s, just after Prohibition. I am trying to ascertain, however, whether that is an appropriate time period for the scale of logging I would like to depict. I don't mind if this is an era in which logging is in decline in Northern Wisconsin, which by all I have read so far it certainly was, but I want it to be at least realistic and appropriate to have some continuing logging and railroad operations associated with it in this period and locale.

If in time I conclude that is too far removed from reality (even for a freelanced railroad), I will fall back to the first 20 years or so of the 20th Century, before Prohibition.

If you have any knowledge and information you'd like to share on these points, you're more than welcome to do so in the comments.

Never finished...

It's supposed to be the model railroad that's never finished.

But the benchwork?

A couple of weeks ago, I assembled a supplemental section to complete the circuit and allow for continuous running. The added section was built fairly quickly, and used a much more basic approach: essentially, a flat 5/8-inch thick plywood piece with legs. It was further divided into two sections, so that one could be a lift-out.

 When I was finished, though, I wasn't satisfied. Then I finally let myself see another possibility that I had been resisting for the four original sections:  To move the other section A from the right side of the configuration to the bottom, and put a new section along the right side. Because that is the side open to the rest of the room (see the configuration situated in the overall room in this post), that's really what made the most sense for access. See the image just above at right.

Note, too, a couple of very small additions where the main sections have to be offset so that the configuration works properly and that there is overall enough clearance in the room. Those will be very basic, just bolted to the existing sections and needing no major support.

Of course, that changed the dimensions for the new section, which gave me a justification for starting over on it. So the original added section has been put aside (I will probably cannibalize some of the lumber). In its place, I am building a full-fledged section, to be supplemented by a small lift-out to allow easy access to the center:

The principal new section will be 18 inches wide. It will be framed differently than the other four. Those used a modified form of Jim Hediger's popular and very successful ripped-plywood framework, with bolted legs. The new section will be ripped plywood framing, the pieces will be smaller and lighter, and the support will be a simple L-girder system. I've been reading, and re-reading, about this in 102 Realistic Track Plans from several years back, and wishing I had followed my initial instincts to use that system from the start.

So once again, the next step -- putting down a layer of insulation foam -- is being put off...