Tunnel 1- State Line,KY
The state line between Kentucky and Tennessee is about 15 miles south of Bowling Green. On my layout the distance is about 15 feet. Like most modelers, I had to come up with a way to put some perceived distance between these two points. The 15 feet includes a 180 degree turn back curve and the need to transition from an urban setting (Bowling Green) to a heavily forested area along the Kentucky/Tennessee border. The only workable solution was a short tunnel.
I studied prototype photos on the internet, checked out available HO-Scale tunnel portals and settled on one of several versions offered by CC Crow. I ordered the generic concrete portal set. It includes two tunnel portals with a textured liner plus a concrete retaining wall. My tunnel portals came with 18' wide openings; 16' wide versions are also available. The superb masters for these portals were hand carved by Clint Crow and cast in hydrocal. The castings are easily modified and colored using techniques described in the "how to" section of CC Crow's website.
The wing walls were cut from the concrete retaining wall using the scribe and snap technique and stained with Builders in Scale Silverwood. Make sure your hands are clean and oil free when handling the castings. I found that the oil from my hands effected how well one of my castings absorbed the Silverwood. And don't worry about a few cracks or crumbling along the edges of the castings after making a cut. Many of the prototype concrete tunnel portals you see these days are 100 years old or older. The freeze and thaw cycle along with other forms of erosion like wind and water take their tole on the concrete. I took this picture of a Milwaukee Road portal around 1988. Located on St. Paul Pass, in Idaho, the portal was about 80 years old at the time. New and old versions of this tunnel portal are also available in HO Scale from CC Crow. I am planning to use one of these on the upper level of the layout.
The pre-stained components were assembled with yellow carpenters glue and then weathered using Bragdon powdered pigments.
Its probably not necessary to reinforce the glue joints on these castings, but I did it anyway. My portal is made up from seven different castings. The liner, on the right of the portal, is made up of three castings and the retaining walls are made up from another three castings, one on the far side and two on the near side.
The completed portal was moved around until I settled on the final location near the center of a transition curve; from about 60" to 34". I ran a test train to include a 89' flat to make sure the cars would clear.
Once I had decided the exact location of the portal, I cut out a portion of the fascia and replaced it with a new section cut to the approximate contour of the hillside. The area around the tunnel portal was then built up with pink foam
Two layers of Scenic Express plaster cloth were applied over the pink foam.
The plaster cloth was then painted and the initial ground cover of paving sand from Home Depot was glued down. Eventually, this area will be heavily forested to match the backdrop. In the meantime, since it sometimes takes me awhile to finish a scene, I spread around some fine green foam ground cover to add some color and make the area a bit more presentable.
In order to make progress on the tunnel portal, I needed to make
additional Super Trees. I must admit that I am a little disappointed in
the quality of the tree material that came out of the super value
pack, The quality of the tree material was much better in the starter
pack and the smaller value pack. Regardless, I have made about 100 trees so far and I probably need another 50 or so.
I'd say the area around the tunnel portal is about 75% complete. I need to weather the track, add additional vegetation, and add some track side details. I ordered and received a flange lubricator and a hot box detector from Details West. One of them, along with a speed limit sign from JL Innovative and maybe a small phone shanty from Atlas or Tichy, will add some interest. One other thing, and I think it's pretty apparent from the photo, is that it's difficult to create much depth in a scene that is only 8"deep.
A couple of other small projects
One of the projects I have been working on is a propane dealer for Westmoreland. I built it using parts from several Walthers kits. Unfortunately, I did a lousy job of assembling the propane storage tanks. The tanks consist of two pieces, split horizontally, and I ended up with grossly visible seems on each side and ends of both tanks. The complex was mounted on a piece of styrene. This allowed me to build the complex in the comfort of my model room before installing it on the layout.
Fortunately for me, my good friend Kurt Boyd is also building a set of these tanks and he bought them along to lunch the other day. Kurt had assembled his tanks, puttied up the seams, and was in the process of smoothing them out with sandpaper... And, they looked really good. After inspecting his, I went home, removed my tanks from the layout, and followed his lead. I puttied the seams up with Tamiya filler, let it dry, and smoothed out with progressively finer sanding film. The end result, while not perfect, is a huge improvement. Here they are back on the layout along with some basic ground cover.
I also had a couple of old Tomar signals on hand so I decided to set them in place, temporarily, while I wait for the long overdue Atlas/BLMA replacements to arrive.
The Westmoreland Turn
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