Logging Equipment

[Nilmadic]

I wanted to share some of the logging equipment I am working on for my lumber mill.

I was tired of shooting pics of the stuff on my desk so I threw this 6" x 12" photo diorama together in about a half hour. Makes the stuff  look much better. 

GHQ Peterbilt 359 Logging Truck & Trailer. Log load is scratch built from various dowel sizes and the chain is 40 link per inch. I still need to add exhaust stacks and mirrors.



I picked up the GHQ Bobcat and trailer kit. I painted the bobcat up to look like a caterpillar. I've seen bobcats before on other layouts and wanted something unique. It is being pulled behind an Atlas F150.



While the F150 hauling the Wiking mini excavator is pretty cool. In real life that probably exceeds the 10,000 lbs towing capacity of the F150.



Here is my L90 about to pick a whole truckload.

[jnevis]

SOOOO not fair
What would take me days to get right you "throw together in a half hour"

...eventually


Those look aewsome

[M.C. Fujiwara]

Dig the logging truck!
And the diorama.
Did some of our shared grout make it in there?
I like the road-to-dirt transition.

[Nilmadic]

Yes I did use a little grout. I think I need a finer sifter. The grout fell throu the sifter I have in big chunks..?. Maybe I'm not using the right sifter? Mostly used real dirt and some fine ballast and static grass. I painted latex down, covered the wet paint in dirt. Painted some matte medium on and static grassed it. Then I layed down the road with fine ballast and sprinkled dirt up to the edge. A little matte to seal it, trees, bushes and as Steve likes to say; Bob's your uncle.

[Ed Kapuscinski]

Nils, once you get the grout down, I've found hitting it with either a sponge (those little makeup wedges work well) to "pat it down" a bit really helps too.

[Dave Schneider]

Looks great Nils. Sorry to go off topic a bit, but a "grout thread" would be really interesting to many. I plan on using it for my Beer Line, which in spite of it being the most profitable part of the Milwaukee Road, had some pretty grungy track.

Best wishes, Dave

[Nilmadic]

I'd be happy to get something started and share what I have done and learned, maybe we can convince MC to reveal some of the tricks up his sleeves.

[The Dalles Hostler]

I like on your diorama, how the gravel on the surface is lighter than the subgrade. It is nice to see details like that. How did you achieve the difference in colour? Did you use a gloss medium or simply use a darker dirt for the subgrade?

[M.C. Fujiwara]

If you put the real dirt down first, both fine & super fine, then the grout, it "fills in" the coarser real dirt and makes for almost-N-scale dirt.
I had the same thing happen first with the sifter: gave it a shake and clumps fell down.
The trick is to place the grout in the sifter while over the container, move the sifter gently to the place you want to grout, and then lightly hit the inside rim of the sifter with a spoon:



Combining different colors of grout (haystack & sandstone, haystack and nutmeg, nutmeg & charcol, grey & blah blah blah) helps give some variety, as does combining sanded and non-sanded grout:



Then, to get a dirt road effect, take your fingers and "sand" the grout by rubbing tracks & smoothing the surface a bit.

Ed: when I got clumps and tried to tamp it down, it cracked later after the diluted glue dried.
But maybe I did that wrong.

Oops: I guess this is the grout thread now