Hannah - H0 Layout - The baseboards


A

Alien

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Progress has been very slow on my H0 layout, originally given the working title "Hannah", which has stuck, but progress it is. This is a sectional layout, six sections in all, which fit together to make a hexagon. The sectional nature of the layout has saved it a few times as when the need has arose to to create some space or keep it out the way, it has been packed away in the attic or garden shed.

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The first photo is a shot of the underside of one of the boards. The long side is about 48" and it is about 30" between the parallel sides. All six boards are the same size. It is constructed from 1/4" birch plywood for lightness of handling with the frame beams constructed of plywood strips about 3" wide separated by 3" square x 1" softwood blocks. The theory is that any tendency for one plywood strip to warp will be counter-acted by its pair. The woodwork was painted to seal it and the white color also makes the wiring more visible (and is the cheapest color!). The board is resting on its facia which also doubles as the front beam.

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The second photo shows the acute mitered joint in close up with a glimpse of one of the alignment dowels with the third photo showing square, internal joints, along with a Peco point motor and two NCE Snap It decoders. Note that the spacer blocks have to be in the right place to fix rigidly and that the square spacers can be rotated to screw into the end grain.

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The fourth photo shows the socket for the electrical inter-connections wired out to a terminal board. This is a 6 pin DIN socket (2 track, 4 Xpress net bus). Below can be seen the hole for one of the connecting bolts, going through a spacer block.

So far the layout has survived its various excursions to the attic and shed and has not shown any sign of warping. Despite its lightweight construction, the board is reasonably strong and robust and has not suffered any damage while handling.
 
The first photo in the second batch shows the underside of two boards bolted together.
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There are two bolts holding the boards together, one through the middle pair of spacing blocks and one through the outer pair. (It would be impossible to get a bolt through the inside pair!) Two alignment dowels are also used between each pair of boards. The 'sloping' beams give the structure strength. Unfortunately I do not have the space / height to set up a meaningful photo of the full hexagonal layout at the moment, so here is a substitute.
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A pack of cream cheese triangles

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And now to the upper side of the layout! This photo shows the rails across the baseboard joints. This is the mark 2 version. The short section of track shows where the mark 1 version was cut out. The mark 1 version soldered the rail to pins, but one or two of these got damaged and so was found to be insufficiently robust. All rail joints across the baseboard joints were therefore replaced.

The mark 2 version uses printed circuit board fixed with two-part epoxy resin to which the rails are soldered, then the printed circuit board is 'gapped' with a grinding wheel in a mini-drill. Feed wires are soldered to the printed circuit board and these can be seen in the photo. (Other feed wires are soldered to the underside of the rails). It is planned to hide the printed circuit board in heavy ballasting once it is sufficiently proven.

The track is laid on cork tiles.

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A start has even been made on the scenery! This is a view looking out from the middle, so, once the backscene is in place, it will be difficult to replicate this photo. The hill is a lattice of cardboard strips made from cornflake packets covered with papier mache. This is cheap (only pay for the glue!) and light-weight. It is built on to the front fascia board (Which is an integral part of the front beam). Alternate layers of white and pink newspapers have been used to see what has been covered. Standard covering is seven layers.
 
Progress on my layout continues slowly. It has been some time since I last posted anything about my layout, so here goes. Photos are only with a pocket camera, so they suffer from poor depth of field and flash fall-off unfortunately, but they give a general 'feel'.

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Here is work in progress on my two sawmill boards. I have been painting the track and progressing some of the scenic work. The track was painted first with various brown and grey spray cans then the rails painted rust. I will get round to cleaning off the rail surface with a fibre glass pencil and then ballasting.

As can be seen the layout is now in the utility room which it shares with the washing machine, piano keyboard, a picture which I can't find a suitable place to hang it and all manner of junk stuffed out of the way. If I clear the junk, I might just get the layout erected fully.

I originally planned on having a spur running behind the log pond, but having cut out the log pond at the baseboard building stage, I then found that I could not fit the spur behind it. I therefore built a short spur for the lumber yard. This was a compromise and I found that I was never really happy with it as there was no spot for woodchip gons and the spur just looked too short. The only way to get the spur to run behind the pond was to re-shape the pond. I therefore decided to bite the bullet and go for it. The new, un-painted track can be seen.

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A view in the opposite direction with different junk in the background. The new spur and re-shaped log pond can be seen along with the other spur on the top of the dam and the main line going over the bridge. The pond cannot be extended any further towards the camera due to a support beam under the board at this point. A new uncoupling magnet is setting under the Kaydee setting jig. The baseboard joint will need to be disguised with some logs in the pond. A log pond is probably 'out of period' for the layout, but I fancied the feature.

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A plan view clearly showing where the former spur once was and where its replacement now goes. The new spur is a bit tighter radius than I would have liked, but at least it now fits. After seeing this photo I have now removed the un-natural looking kink at the baseboard joint of the far bank of the log pond - one of the problems of working on the boards separately!

A rock outcrop has been started. This is made from plaster filler made with a mix of water and white wood glue which will hopefully make it more resilient to chipping. I added some black powder paint to the mix so that if it does chip or come apart, it will not be bright white. Variations of the proportions of the ingredients in the mix can produce different textures. The whole lot is painted with washes of artists acrylics. More washes are to be applied.

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Part complete buildings are placed on the layout to gauge the effect. The paint bottles, etc. are where the hillside will go at the rear. The woodchip gon now has a spot, but I will have to wait for the glue to set on the uncoupling magnet. Wire droppers are on the new spur but these are still to be connected up. The other four boards can be seen behind, stood on their edges.
 
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The railjoint where the 2 sections meet, looks like a potential 'maintanence issue,' but the hexagonal design looks interesting. Looks like it will have fewer 'trianglular corners,' that everyone wonders what to do with.
 
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