Update on Layout & Life: Boxing in New London Staging

What a crazy bunch of weeks it's been! It may seem like I've fallen off the planet since my last blog post was waaaaay back on October 30, and I've even missed not one, not two, but three Wordless Wednesday posts. That has to be a new record - and not a good one.  So if you've been wondering what I've been up to, or if I owe you an email, etc. this post will let you know what's going on & will bring you up to date.

Long story short: You may have heard there was an election recently. I was pretty heavily involved in the days leading up to it, and then very heavily involved in recounts (all at the state level, btw). After all that was said and done, I got a significant promotion and as a result - and I guess as I should have expected - my life went from being just very busy to hyper overdrive. But I know I'm in the right place since I find that I have to pull myself away from work rather than dread doing it. So that's been filling just about all my time lately. Fortunately for the layout, 1) it won't (hopefully shouldn't) always be this way. This is the inevitable ramping up and steep learning curve time. 2) I've actually been able to get to the basement for a few hours each Sunday.

So Beware! This post is super heavy on photos, but it should be a quick read with just captions. And when you get to the end - whether all in one sitting, or viewed over a couple of days - you (and I!) will be all caught up with where the layout is Right Now . . .

I decided to try and get the last of the layout "heavy construction" finally done. I'd been wanting to "box in" New London staging since it's the only part of the layout that's in an unfinished part of the basement and subject to dust. And I figured this would be a LOT easier than dismantling staging to finish this corner with studs, sheetrock & dropped ceiling. This photo and the next shows the first stick of "roof & valence support" going up.

I spaced the supports around the perimeter and put one in the middle to support the "roof girders" that would come later.

Basement time is usually Sunday afternoon, but if I'm able to get some hobby time on a weekday evening, I'm trying to dial-in the decoder on K-1 #359. It has a Tsunami2, so no chuff cam. Jury's out on whether the new "digital cam" can be made to be as good. I'll letcha know...

Back to the basement! Clamps are your friend when working alone (an unfortunate reality these days). Since this is "only" staging, I decided not to bother painting the backdrop or do any real "finishing" (taping/topping seams, hiding screws, etc). But I did want a little bit of a finished look. So instead of buying regular masonite - and to keep the area nice and bright - I got white finished masonite that's typically used for kitchen/bathroom backsplashes and such. In this photo and the one below, I'm positioning the backdrop and holding it up with clamps.

One annoying reality of doing this after the track is all in, is that you have to have to put up the masonite twice - once to mock it up for marking, then for final installation.

But the backdrop is only the "sides" of the box(ing in). I wanted a lighting valence, and I figured that would support the "roof" as well. Here's the first piece going in over the east end of Saybrook (the only portion of finished layout that's located in the unfinished part of the basement).

See what I mean about clamps? Here, I've already screwed in & secured the far end of the backdrop, and I'm gluing one side of the splice between the two sections of backdrop.

One of the challenges of gluing backdrop sections together is how to clamp them while the glue sets. Here I've used a long piece of wood to "extend" the clamps along the seam.

Once the backdrop was in place, the next step was to add "roof girders." These were made from two 1x3s screwed together to make an L-girder 1) to make it more rigid across the span, and 2) to provide a wider base of support for the foam board roof.

For additional rigidity and support, I added a cross piece and a diagonal brace.

And here's the first piece of valence going up! At first, I lined up the top of it with the top of the backdrop - but then I realized that wouldn't cover the edge of the foam board roof that would be sitting on top of the backdrop. Since the foam board is 1.5" thick, I raised the valence an additional 1.5" above the top edge of the backdrop.

Here's a better view of the "raised" valence. The foam board roof will rest on top of the backdrop & girders and nest in behind the valence.

Here's my trick for making sure the top of the girder lines up perfectly with the top of the backdrop and holds it there while I screw everything together.

Valence finished! Next comes lighting . . .

For the lighting, I decided to try out some LED tubes. I got a 6 pack of 4 footers from Amazon for $35.

They're very easy to install - basically just install the clips & clip them in. But I did run into a problem with the very first one . . . Apparently, the east end of Saybrook is exactly four feet wide. Problem was - the tube - with the plug - was too long & wouldn't fit!

One of the lessons I'm learning over and over again while building this layout is that you can never anticipate every single problem. And trying to is an invitation to Analysis Paralysis. It's often better to Just Get Started and deal with problems as they come up. The problem with the light length was a perfect case in point. I ended up just routing out enough material to accommodate the plug. Turned out to be a fine solution to what I feared would be an impossible problem!

Lighting done!

And now the roof goes in . . . This was a relatively simple matter of laying the foam board on top, snugging it against the wall and corner, and tracing the outline of the valance so I could cut it to fit.

The roof used up two 4x8 pieces of foam board, cut into three sections to cover the whole staging yard.

But hopefully you'll agree, it came out pretty nice!

That last pic there shows the state of things as of November 20. The idea will be to cover the "slot" between the fascia and valence with some sort of curtain whenever I'm doing any cutting in the shop (that's the area I'm standing in in the photo above). There's really nothing left to do with the boxing in, but I will need to do more on the "east end of Saybrook" area: Vinyl backdrop & paint - and of course structures and scenery.

But it looks like Major Construction on the layout is finally done! The only thing left to do is decide whether to add any valence to the rest of the layout. I'm still mulling that over. I really like the shadow box effect here (and I have it in the Saybrook Scene as well), but I don't know yet if I want/need to replicate that effect across the whole layout (see Mike Confalone's Allagash Rwy for an example of not using valences).

So all that's left to do here is to install the 2nd/last shop light over the bench (I moved the two shop lights from above staging), and do a massive cleanup of this whole area. Those who know me well know that I'm pretty OCD when it comes to keeping my work areas clean and tidy - so the state of things here is a HUGE departure from my norm!

And hopefully soon there will be at least a small departure from what's become the "norm" in my life lately and I'm able to post more frequent layout updates. Thanks for being patient and for continuing to follow my progress. As always, I appreciate any feedback & hope you'll stay tuned!

Converting Can Lights to Layout Lighting, Pt. 3 - Installing the Lights

Lots happenin' on the Valley Line, despite it being my busiest time of year at work. Whatever extra time I get I've been workin' on the railroad, so not much time left to blog. But I continue to make regular - and pretty significant - progress. I'm at the point now where I just want all the construction to be DONE so I can focus on things other than benchwork, trackwork, lighting, and wiring (not to mention tape, topping, and painting). For some reason, for example, I've been bit once again by the DCC bug and have been gettin' all crazy with decoder settings. I especially like how my K-1 will coast on momentum forEVer and I have to use F7 to brake. But that's another story....

For now, it's back to lighting. Once all the cans were converted to outlets, it was finally time to put up the lights. But I had to get them first. This is where having a smaller layout would have been nice - on a large layout, EVERYthing is bigger. Including your light order:

I ordered fifteen shop lights and a case of 30 T-8 bulbs from Wal-Mart. Given the quantity I needed, I went the least expensive route I could find - the "Lights of America" fixtures are under $11 each and I've been using them in the other room for over 3 years now with no problems.

To attach them to the drywall ceiling, I used the drywall anchors and screw hooks I described here. I placed the first fixture at the end and at the front edge of the layout and marked on the ceiling where the hanging chains would go. In order to limit the number of anchors/hooks I'd have to install - and because I wanted the fixtures to go end-to-end with no gaps - I decided to have one hook hold the ends of two fixtures.

Here's a close-up of the anchor/hook assembly. The best part of this setup is that you can hang the lights from the ceiling at whatever location you want.

I installed the first lights above one of the modules. Due to the "proscenium" there's a natural valence already in place. I mounted the fixtures close enough to this "valence" so that they'd tilt toward the layout.

I'll try to reproduce this effect over the rest of the layout.

As you can see, the effect is pretty cool - you don't see the lights, just the lighting.

Here's a shot with the rest of the lights on (having been installed):

And some over-all shots, showing how extensively and evenly everything is lit up.

I haven't yet tilted the lights toward the layout - that'll make a big difference in eye-glare. And eventually, I'll install valence to hide the lights even more.

Pretty dramatic difference from this:

Now that all the lights are up, the next hard task will be getting rid of all the empty boxes . . .

Not something the owners of smaller layouts have to worry to much about!

Converting Can Lights to Layout Lighting, Pt. 2 - Can to Outlet Conversion

(click here for part 1)

Once the outlets are all prepped, it's time to do the actual can conversion. I knew drilling holes into the drywall ceiling would make a little bit of a mess, so I covered the scenicked portion of the layout with some really light weight dropcloth/plastic material:

Once I did that, the first step in the conversion is, of course, to unscrew the bulb. And you're left with this:

Next, locate the spring clips that hold the flange/pot to the can and unhook those. It should be pretty clear where they are, but if you pull the flange away from the ceiling, it'll be obvious. Once unhooked, the flange/pot assembly comes right down revealing the can & light fixture.

Locate the wingnut on the side that holds the light fixture assembly in place. Loosen that enough to allow the assembly to slide down - if you leave the nut turned vertical, it'll allow the assembly to slide all the way down and out.

(NOW - if you have not yet turned off the power to these lights, DO SO NOW! To be extra safe, I shut off the breaker and just used a floodlight plugged into another circuit with an extension cord for lighting while I did the rest of the job.)

Once you have the assembly out, it's time to cut it from the wires. Early on, I thought I'd want to convert back to can lighting (e.g. in case we wanted to sell the house) and so I cut the wires leaving pigtails on the socket for reattachment later. That made it more difficult to connect the outlets and I later decided if I ever wanted to put "more traditional" lighting back in, I'd do track lighting instead - and use my new power outlets for that. Once that was decided, I just started cutting the wires right next to the socket and just discarded the socket assembly entirely (along with the flange/pot). Having longer wires made it MUCH easier to wire up the outlets later.

So this is what you're left with:

Next, it was time to mark where the cover plate would go. To make sure the plate would be parallel to the wall (not askew on the ceiling), I used a long T-square and made a small straight pencil mark to give me a guide for placing the plate.

Then, holding the plate in place, I drilled four pilot holes in the corners (1/4"), set the plate aside, and inserted the drywall anchors:

Pete had wired the outlets and left pigtails to connect to the wires coming out of the cans, so it was just a matter of wire-nutting everything together - black to black, white to white, green to ground (in my case, I attached the ground wire to a screw on the side of the can. Oh, and btw, pay no attention to the actual color of my wires).

Once everything is all connected, turn your breaker back on, plug in a trouble light or something, and then flip your (former light) switch on the wall. If you did something wrong, the breaker will trip and nothing will happen (ask me how I know). If you did everything right, your trouble/test light will come on. Success!

I did each outlet assembly one at a time and tested each before moving on to the next. That way I'd be able to fix any problems as soon as they cropped up. After my initial snafu (I had a crossed wire on the first outlet), everything worked wonderfully. And it looks pretty good too (I'll eventually paint the masonite to match the ceiling).

Next time: the fun part - installing all the lights!