The Madisonville Sub: Construction Update #14 - State Line Kentucky, Part 1

A Quick Note about scenery

My previous layout was set in Alaska with rocky cliffs and evergreen trees. My current layout is set mostly in Kentucky where the terrain is dominated by rolling hills and meadows in the central part of the state and heavily forested areas of hills and mountains in the eastern part of the state. As a result, I have little or no experience dealing with scenery in the Bluegrass Region. I guess we'll see how it goes.

For reference, here is a picture of the old layout

And here's what I am aiming for.

Pink Foam Base

Unlike the upper level, the lower level of the layout sits on 3" of pink foam. One of the nice things about working on a 3" base is that you can easily remove up 2 1/2" below track level. Along the narrow shelf leading toward the Cumberland River (New Name) and State Line, I wanted the roadbed to look like it was cut into the side of a hill. The roadbed west of the Cumberland River scene is only 8" deep so I decided to cut away the fascia with my jigsaw and then create a slope by cutting the pink foam with a hot wire cutter. The pieces left over from cutting away the foam on the aisle side of the tracks was used to build up a slope on the far side of the track. I apologize for some of the pictures in advance. They were taken with my cellphone with available light.

The Cumberland River scene is about 20" wide. I built up the contours using pink form. Normally I would smooth out the contours with a surform tool but the hills in this area will be covered with a thick blanket of SuperTrees and the abrupt changes in contour won't show.

I decided to cover the pink foam with plaster cloth. My backdrops were made by Trackside Scenery and moisture will damage them. In order to protect them from the wet plaster cloth, I slipped thin sheets of styrene between the foam and the backdrop. Then I taped paper towels over the track to protect it from any dripping plaster. I removed the paper towels to apply the plaster cloth to the aisle side of the tracks.

I cut the plaster cloth into 1-2" strips and 3-5" strips and put them in two aluminum trays. I poured warm tap water in a third aluminum tray and applied the plaster over the foam. There are a lot of tutorials out there on using plaster cloth so I'm not going to go into a lot of detail here. But there are two things to consider: First keep the plaster away from your track. If you get some on the track clean it off; it will show up in photographs. And, second all plaster cloth is not the same. I have found that the plaster cloth sold by Scenic Express is better and cost less than that sold by Woodland Scenics. You can buy the Scenic Express plaster cloth direct or your dealer can get it from Walthers and possibly others.

It took 3 rolls to complete the entire scene. I let the plaster cloth cure for two days before I went on to the next step. I used the time to study up on making SuperTrees and applying static grass on YouTube.

I have found the flat exterior house paint works well for a scenery base coat. I went to my local Ace Hardware a purchased a gallon of flat exterior house paint and had it mixed to a gray/brown tone. I used the same styrene to protect the backdrop and applied the paint with a 3" brush. I removed all the bridges during this stage. I have since replaced the wood trestle but not the concrete abutments and girder bridges. Next up is spraying the track but that will have to wait until tomorrow. The base coat is still wet. I've gotten this far in 4 days working 2-3 hours a day. That's about all my new knee will tolerate standing on a concrete floor.