New Video Update #13

 I've posted a video update showing progress on the layout to date. You can find it on YouTube HERE

A New Addition to the Layout - Part X - Blending everything together and an unveiling

The Mid-Atlantic Railroad Prototype Modelers meet (MARPM) concluded just over a week ago. As an aside this meet is proving to be a wonderful time and I strongly suggest you consider joining us in 2025! (details for MARPM 2025 haven't been finalized, but it will most likely be in the same hotel as this year (located near BWI). Keep an eye on MARPM.org). 

I once again hosted an open house at my layout and did a "Layout Progress" clinic. This was the unveiling of sorts of the newly incorporated "Northern SNE" section. A couple of months ago my friend Bill Schultheiss offered to build something for the railroad. At first I'd planned to rework the steel girder bridge that had once carried SNE rails up in Massachusetts into a road bridge. But as Bill and I went back and forth on what he could build I mentioned the one thing every New England railroad needs - that I didn't have - was a covered bridge. So he took a couple of measurements and a few weeks later he brought a wonderful model of a classic New England covered bridge. Thanks Bill!

And the extremely short tail track at the stub end of the northern SNE section always bothered me - it was barely long enough to fit a 4-axle diesel and one car - but even my small steam locomotives with a car were too long for the siding - meaning I needed to splice a section of benchwork onto the left side of the town and add about 10" of track. At the same time I extended the road from the diner to the end of the added benchwork.

As I've mentioned before there was a 3 or 3.5 foot section of benchwork we added to connect the Northern SNE section to the existing layout. The track required some rework to get the everything to make sense. 

With the track down I used my new Proxxon foam cutting table to slice enough pieces of foam board to the same thickness as the roadbed, filled any gaps with lightweight joint compound and painted and added the initial layer of tile grout and sifted dirt. This "first layer" scenery is hardly show stopping but I was determined that no pink foam be visible! 

I showed the installation of an old structure that seemed a perfect fit for along the mill run in a previous post (HERE). I wasn't able to complete a couple of things in time for the open house. I had planned to finish a new mill building (another South River Models kit) - but frankly wasn't in the mood to work on it for a few weeks, then realized it was close to the open house and I had to get serious about cleaning up the layout room! 

I did two last minute things in preparation for the open house. The first was to roll a coat of paint on the fascia. I think this really helped blend the Northern SNE section into the rest of the layout. 

I also found myself staring at an open area across the street from Streeters Store. 

I considered placing the feed mill (that was included in the same kit as the store) in that spot - but it looked just a little too tight. Besides, the fact that the feed mill is on a slope would have required some benchwork/fascia modifications and I didn't want to make a whole new mess!

What I needed was something that was quick to build that could then either be redetailed or replaced with something else in the future without feeling like a waste of effort. A little Scupltamold to level some undulations in the ground, brown paint, and a few spoonfuls of tile grout and sifted dirt, along with a small shed and a couple of pulpwood loads, and a pulpwood yard was born. 

Still to come is the aforementioned new mill building as well as a freight house for the large open area to the right of the passenger station. And of course, a lot of grass and other textures. 

Wordless Wednesday #279

 

Mill stream progress and filling gaps

As mentioned in my previous blog post I needed to fill the gap in the surface of the mill stream. Turns out a piece of Gatorboard that I had lying around was the right overall size - some quick work with a hobby knife trimmed it to fit the oddball shape of the opening. This was secured in place with a healthy bead of hot glue. One side of the building has a door and windows on the lower floor so I needed to have some open ground on that side of the structure. I cut more Gatorboard and added some Chooch cut stone material. The photo shows it being rough fit in place. 

Next, I cut a thin piece of foamboard to raise the mill building slightly above the water surface. Actually, it made the bottom of the building just about even with the "water" level. 

When I added the fascia the "Upper Road" (former roadbed on the Northern SNE) ended up with a gaping hole between the fascia and the plywood subroadbed. I trimmed several pieces of pink foamboard and used them to fill the gap. 

Putting the mill stream back together - and a farewell too soon

 After a couple of weeks of not wanting to do anything having to do with model railroading (see below) I forced myself down to the basement this weekend. After about 45 minutes of "puttering" - defined as wandering about the basement trying to figure out exactly what to do - I settled on trying to plant a structure I salvaged from my previous layout into the new river/mill scene. I have plans for another mill building alongside the upper mill pond but wanted another element between the two falls and this old BEST kit seemed to fit the bill. 

Of course the first step was excavating the plywood and foam I'd installed a few weeks ago to make room for the structure. The result was a cavernous hole in the earth - which I promptly filled and patched with a "box" made from Gatorboard hot glued in place to the underside of the layout. The lead photo in this post shows how the building will fit into the scene. 

When the building was pried out of my old layout there was some plaster and other scenery materials that got stuck on the foundation blocks - and some of the blocks popped out. I replaced those blocks, soaked the leftover plaster with alcohol for about 10 minutes and carefully scraped it off the surface. 

I never really liked the coloration of these block so I took the opportunity to repaint them with a variety of Vallejo shades of gray and earth-tone paints. And it looks like some scenery material got on the clapboard siding at some point - I'll do something to cover that up or minimize it. 

Farewell Too Soon

Almost two years after loosing our Basset Hound Beau we once again had to say goodbye - this time to his sister Molly. You'd think this would get easier - but it never does. When we adopted these two clowns we thought Beau was the outgoing one and Molly didn't really have much of a personality. Boy were we wrong! Molly was an endless source of amusement and truly brought joy to our lives for almost 16 years. And, like her brother, she was truly a perfect dog. They never destroyed anything, obeyed every time we told them to do something, and greeted everybody who came through the door with a mixture of unabashed joy and unbridled enthusiasm! 

The photo above of Molly was taken the day our new furniture was delivered to the new house. The movers unwrapped the plastic from the ottoman and within seconds Molly decided this was her new throne. And it remained so until a year or so ago when her legs were just too weak and stiff for her to jump up there. 

When my dad was sick we made a lot of road trips to South Carolina - here's Molly on one of those trips. One stop to stretch her legs between Virginia and SC - and then she'd sleep the rest of the way. 

She was, and always will be, our sweet princess. Rest easy girl until we meet again. 

A New Addition to the Layout - Part IX: An upper mill pond

When we removed the Charlton Branch section from Jason's layout we had to cut through the river. Although it went pretty well, the water did chip slightly and a couple of "chunks" of scenery separated from the subbase. I suppose I could have tried to blend it and add a new layer of Envirotex to blend everything together, but I wasn't sure that would even work and if it didn't work I was concerned it would mess up the remaining section of river and falls near Martin Machine that was in good shape. 

A logical - and easier - solution is to not try to patch the river but instead add another fall and a mill pond at a higher elevation. This has the added advantage of allowing for another mill building/complex. 

I did some rough measurements the other night and mocked things up. That seemed to go well enough that last nights "30 minutes a night" was spent cutting a mill pond surface (the leftover fascia piece - hence the color!) and the "land" - currently some 1" pink foam. 

Yes, I'm still here

I realize it's been a long time - from March 20 until now - since I've posted anything to this blog. I'm not certain, but that may be the longest hiatus ever. 

There are of course the usual excuses I could offer - I was sick for a week or so (back in April, so I'm not sure how valid an excuse that actually is!); I've had some more significant health issues that I've been dealing with; we had out of town visitors for several weeks, etc... 

But the real issue is I simply didn't feel like doing much model railroading - and therefore didn't have anything to share here. 

But on reflection I have done some stuff over the several months - they just haven't lent themselves to interesting blog posts. 

For example, I got the CV boxcar decals completed - although I have to cut the large sheets of decals apart before officially offering them for sale. 

I've also managed to get make progress on the Autumn scenery book ... I'm still hoping it will be done sometime late this year. 

On the layout, I've completed the vast majority of the track - and have even gotten most of it ballasted. The one spot where I still need to ballast the track is in the paper mill complex (which will be rough ballast at best) and the track connecting the main layout to the Northern SNE Charlton branch section (see photo above). 

One thing I need to decide is what to do with the fairly large open area across the street from Streeter's Store in the photo above. It seems to be begging for an industry (and I have allowed for a siding there) - but what should that be? 

I've considered putting the Clear Brook feed mill in that spot. Or a different feed mill I have a kit for. The advantage of the Clear Brook mill is that it's already built! Another option is a propane dealer or a pulp wood yard or bulk material yard - that would of course be the easiest approach to getting some that looks "finished" in that spot. 

Wordless Wednesday #274

 

A New Addition to the Layout - Part VIII: Setting up the Connection

Hit another bump in the road in the process of incorporating the Northern SNE's Charlton Branch into my layout. Luckily this bump was not the same as the literal bumps in the road I experienced driving the Northern SNE section from Massachusetts to Virginia last summer! (see my blog post: https://centralvermontrailway.blogspot.com/2023/07/a-new-addition-to-layout-part-2-voyage.html for more on that part of the adventure. 

In this case the latest challenge was an intermittent short somewhere in the track or wiring. In the end I traced the issue to one or two of the turnouts - and/or their switch motors. Attempting to fix the issues with the turnout would require working under and over all the detailed power lines and the like I opted instead to simply replace one of the turnouts. The turnout I really think had an issue was simply removed and will be replaced with a section of straight track. The turnout led to a very short stub-ended spur - I'll heavily weather the "cut off" spur to make it look like the industry is no longer rail served. 

Removing the two turnouts wasn't easy. After soaking the track in an alcohol and water mixture in order to soften the ballast and ground foam I worked a putty knife in and around those overhead power lines and managed to carefully work the turnouts loose. 

While I was in a track prying mood, I went ahead and removed the track that had crossed the bridge over the river - after scraping off the ballast I used to a sanding block to smooth the area. I plan to use the roadbed this track was on as a basis for a street - more on that in the future. 

The next step is one I've been dreading - cutting a swath out of the finished scenery on the main layout to accommodate the track connecting the mainline to the new layout section. That is going better than I anticipated. 

And although not shown in these photos, I've essentially replaced all the original wiring for both the track and the switch motors. All in all, these it's been a lot of effort integrating this section into the railroad. 

But I keep telling myself I've rounded the corner on "destroying" things and can finally start putting stuff back together - I truly hope that's the case! 

A New Addition to the Layout - Part VII: Hills and trees

Work continues on connecting the Charlton Branch from the Northern SNE* to the main layout. In previous chapters of this seemingly never-ending saga I mentioned how I planned to use several sections of the large mountain that had concealed a helix on Jason's layout - meaning these were large, heavy plaster mountains! I placed the large mountain chunk in a place I thought looked good and would work - and there it sat for at least a month or more. I've learned over the years that if I run into something that stops progress on a project it usually means I'm not taking the right approach. It became obvious that reusing the big mountain chunk was simply not going to work. It was taller than the adjoining hill on the main layout, and would have required altering the existing finished scenery to effectively blend it into place. It was also going to be a challenge to route the track around the thing. So I removed it and replaced it with the salvaged piece that had been the very top of the original mountain. Immediately I could see this was a much better solution. Since the space on the layout was longer than the salvaged hill I sawed it in half and built up a new section of hill in the middle. I also used some of the loose rock castings salvaged from the original layout. 

In addition to the rock castings I was able to salvage a lot of Super trees from Jason's mountain. I did dip each of the armatures in dilute matte medium before coating them with a variety of Scenic Express Super Leaf fall colors. You can find more on what flocking I use and the color combinations in my blog post HERE.

After "planting" the trees I stepped back and admired my handiwork. (Forgive the plaster dust visible in some spots - obviously that will get covered with some ground texture!) I think the renovated hillside nicely compliments the structures on the Charlton section. Next step is to add the track connecting Charlton to the main layout. Then I can do something about that stretch of track to nowhere that runs over the bridge. 

* Jason sent some photos showing the progress he's making  rebuilding in his new digs in Florida. So does that mean mine is now the "Northern SNE"? 

A New Addition to the Layout - Part VI: Basic Background Scenery

Test fitting the background scenery foam panel. I think the road "extension" blends fairly well. 

I haven't touched the northern SNE branch section for almost a month or more since I've been focusing on background scenery on the mainline "loop" around the room. But I'd made a bunch more trees, and I was getting sick of tripping over the two chunks of the mountain that we'd recovered from the helix move disaster - but the mountain chunks were useable even if looking a little dusty and faded. 

We'd built a box framework section to fill the space between the main layout and the branch. I took two of the mountain sections and test fit them in place as seen here:

Obviously there's a need to fill the gap between the "chunks" of mountain! The roof of Charleton station is to the left. I grabbed a quick test shot from the "normal" viewing height looking over Martin Machine as well. 

Mostly to avoid working over the finished portions of the branch I cut a piece of foam board to fit the space between the wall and the finished portion of the branch. I added a couple of small hills to break up the pool table look and added two roads after marking where they connected into the existing roads on the branch section. One road runs straight across the addition (lead photo above) while the road by the station curves and goes up a slight hill. I'll show how these blend into the wall in a future post. I test-fitted the piece (below) before adding the initial scenic texturing in the workshop.  

A New Addition to the Layout: Part V: De-Wiring

Real quick update on the process of adding the Charlton Branch section of the Northern SNE to my layout. 

Took some time over the weekend to really study how Jason had wired this thing. As I mentioned previously it was originally wired for DC cab control, then modified for DCC a couple of decades ago. 

There were also a few things I simply couldn't figure out - a few quick texts back and forth with Jason cleared those things up. I just wanted to make sure I didn't snip any wires that were important! 

If you've ever converted a layout from DC to DCC you know it's not really a "wiring" process, it's more like a "De-wiring" process. Add to that the fact that there were a couple of reversing sections that required auto-reversers on Jason's layout that won't be on mine - and a couple fewer switch motors I started tracing wires and removing those that weren't necessary. 

Essentially I kept the track feeders and the control wiring for four turnouts - all the rest came out. 

The photo above shows about a third of the wiring I removed from this one segment of layout. 

Now time to start putting things back together! 

New Addition to the Layout - Part IV : Back on its own two (four) feet...

 

The stars aligned last Saturday and Stic and I were both in town and had some free time to raise the Charlton section of the "Northern SNE" from the spot on the basement floor where it has sat unceremoniously since the day we unloaded it from the truck. One lesson I'd learned from previously layouts is to paint the legs BEFORE installing them - especially when the layout room is carpeted like mine. So earlier in the week I dug out the fascia paint and painted the four legs for the Charlton section. And while the paint and rollers were out I painted the fascia panels on the paper mill peninsula. 

I'd thought about trying to install the legs on the Charlton section myself - if for no other reason than I was getting sick of seeing this thing on the floor. As an aside - is there anything sadder looking in the hobby besides a chopped up layout viewed out of context? But I waited until I could get some help since (1) It didn't seem like a one person job - in actuality it turned out to be a three person job; and (2) Like most model railroads this thing is heavy, awkward, and delicate. A bad combination when the desire is to avoid as much damage as possible! 

Stic arrived nice and early and after we got ourselves a game plan the first step was to cut out the pieces of the layout section that we knew we wouldn't be using. This included a real hodgepodge of wood on one end that connected to the rest of Jason's layout. There was also some track that had popped from the ties in the process of moving, and a turnout and associated siding that simply would not make any sense in the context of the new arrangement. Those all went into the scrap bucket. When we took the layout out of Jason's basement we cut away more of the river than I knew I could use - I reasoned it would be easier to cut away more of the river than leave it short and be forced to splice more water onto the river. So out came the jigsaw and more water went away. 

Frankly at this point I was doubting even trying to incorporate this into the railroad. We went to lunch, which, for the record, is our favorite part of any work session! 

After using my handy laser level (if you don't have a laser level, get one!) to determine the height the new legs would need to be we got the 2x2 legs cut to length, including two spacers for each. My wife lent a hand as we lifted the section up, slid the sawhorses out from under the layout, clamped the first leg section in place, made sure it was level and screwed the legs into the L girders. 

Actually the first pair of legs went in and were leveled and installed quickly. The second set of legs took a lot longer to get lined up and leveled for whatever reason, but by the end of the day the Charlton section was up on its new legs. 

My task for this week is to get the wall behind the Charlton section painted the match the rest of the layout (sky blue above the benchwork, Riverway below). I've already removed the fascia "extension" in the junction corner of the existing layout and patched and sanded the screw holes. 

Jason had this layout section situated as a narrow peninsula - I plan to place one side against the wall since I think it will fit the space better. I do plan to make the scene a little wider (something like 6-10" or so) where the long side of the section connects to the wall. That way the track won't be 3/4" from the wall - there'll be some space for a transition from the modeled area to the backdrop. 

Another issue we noticed as we worked this weekend was the wiring - there's a LOT of wiring under this one layout section! Not surprising since Jason's layout was originally wired for block control. I know he had NCE for the last couple of decades - and I know the wiring worked with NCE, but frankly I'm tempted to take out everything but the feeders (and the wires to the powered frogs on the turnouts) and essentially rewire the section using my color coding and standard process. 

A New Addition to the Layout - Part III - A New Home

 By popular demand I'll wrap up the story of moving sections of the "Northern SNE" to Virginia. 

A quick glance into the back of the truck at dusk showed nothing had broken loose, and everything seemed relatively intact. 

On the drive back I had texted Stic Harris and asked him to round up some volunteers to help offload the truck. Todd Hermann, Bill Schultheiss, Mat Thompson, and of course Stic showed up on time at 1100 on a hot, muggy, Virginia day. "Friends" show up to help unload a truck - "Real Friends" show up to help unload a truck on a hot, muggy July day!!! I didn't take note of the temperature but it was certainly in the 90s, and the humidity made it feel like it was over 100 degrees. 

We started with the mountain section. We had too since it was in the back of the truck. As I've told Jason he takes no prisoners when it comes to hardshell scenery. This thing had to weigh close to 300 pounds! In Massachusetts we had to remove the mountain (and more importantly the supports for the helix inside the mountain) from the L girder frame. We then constructed a set of braces from 2x4s - meaning the whole thing could be carried like a stretcher. 

The mountain section just before the big lift. You can see the 2x4 "stretcher" arms - as well as the helix sections and helix uprights. These would prove to be less sturdy than we'd hoped. 

We found the section was heavy but moveable as long as it stayed level. Stic had removed both the glass door panels from the basement door - meaning we had a six foot or so wide opening. The only limit was getting through the four foot wide gate into the backyard. That's where the trouble began. 

This thing was too heavy to lift over the fence, even for five strapping model railroaders! So we tilted it slightly - I'd say 20 degrees or so. Then there were several loud snap and crunching sounds as the helix roadbed (which was a fiberboard material not unlike Homasote) broke. That in turn caused the whole mountain to start tipping over. For a couple of seconds it looked like the whole thing may have ended up upside down on the ground, but we got it righted and managed to set her down right side up. 

The fact that the mountain was sitting on those 2x4s that were secured to the floor of the truck created a situation where there was enough bounce on the ride to Virginia to crack some of the helix supports and roadbed. Moving it the 100 feet or so to the backyard was just too much stress for the helix. We also lost some of the mountain, but about 2/3rds or so of the mountain, including the curved trestle and tunnel portals, remained intact. 

We picked up the chunks of helix, and the broken plaster chunks and assessed the damage. 

After putting the mountain aside, we turned our attention to the Charlton Branch section. I was more than a little relieved (and amazed!) that the buildings that were secured in place hadn't broken loose. 

We eventually moved the mountain section into the basement where it's currently sitting on sawhorses. I'm still not sure what, if anything, I can do with it. 

Halfway to the basement - time to take a break! It was HOT!

Like most model railroad sections this one was awkward and clumsy to handle, but we managed to get it off the truck around the side yard, and down the steps into the basement with no damage. 

After it was on the basement floor I checked it for damage - other than some damage to the track in front of the station - that had occurred when we took the layout apart up north, the only other issue I found was a small crack behind one of the retaining walls by Martin Machine. 

Minor track damage.

Would I ever do this again? Honestly, probably not. Don't get me wrong, I'm thrilled I was able to save a piece of Jason's version of the Southern New England, but the only reason I even attempted this was it was a cohesive piece of the layout that fit with mine thematically and scenically. This section also included beautifully built structure kits - I had several of these in kit form that I planned to get to "someday." Now I have them already completed. (If anyone is interested in the kits let me know!) 

In general I don't think it's a good idea to try and combine pieces of layouts since it's very difficult to end up with a cohesive whole. For example, my good friend Paul Dolkos is selling his wonderful Baltimore Harbor District. But as much as I admire Paul's layout, I couldn't combine parts of it with mine and have the result look cohesive. And I pretty firmly believe a cohesive theme is critical to a successful model railroad. But if you're interested in Paul's railroad contact Bernie Kempinski or Mat Thompson or see Bernie's post on his blog HERE for more details. 

Here's the branch on the floor of the basement in its approximate final location. The next step will be to raise the branch on some new legs and attach it to the junction area of the layout. 

A New Addition to the Layout - Part 2 - The Voyage Home

 

This view of the Charlton section in Jason's garage shows the Sherman's necktie
in front of the station!  

Krr-chunk!! Slam!! Krr-chunk!! Slam!! - As I drove the rental truck from Massachusetts through Connecticut and across New York I thought I'd dealt with the worst of the rough roads. Then I hit I-78 in Pennsylvania. The truck managed to find every bump along the way, and the suspension took those bumps just as well as you might imagine a rental truck with almost 200,000 miles on the odometer would. 

I'd already dealt with a remarkably uncooperative GPS - that kept trying to send me off the highway to take shortcuts (that may have saved a minute or two) - including sending me on a 10 mile side trip - halfway through that little sidelight a bridge tender waived me off the drawbridge since trucks weren't allowed across! 

Relying on my old sailor sense of dead reckoning I eventually found my way back onto the highway. And that was just one of the three diversions the GPS sent me on. 

To make matters worse, my phone battery was dropping at an alarming rate (and I was getting an endless stream of text and voice messages from friends checking in to see how the journey was going!) And the truck, of course, had no way to recharge the phone. I considered purchasing a cigarette lighter charger converter, but before I spent any money on that I checked and confirmed that the cigarette lighter in the cab was nothing more than an empty hole...

The phone battery died on I-78 about 60 miles short of Harrisburg - but that wasn't my biggest concern. With each of those Krr-chunks I was picturing plaster pieces from the mountain flying about the rear of the truck like cannon balls - and destroying the finished structures on the Charlton Branch section which were the whole reason I'd started on this adventure. 

Once I got to Harrisburg I found myself on Route 15 south heading towards Gettysburg and the final leg home. 

I pulled up to the house around 9:00 pm. I grew up in Connecticut, went to school in South Carolina, and lived in Virginia for the majority of my adult life. Trips up and down the east coast are nothing new to me - I must have made this drive a hundred times - and this makes the top five worst. Before I went into the house I briefly opened the truck to see if there was any damage. To my immense relief, and shock, everything looked fine. Of course, that wasn't the case but I wouldn't find that out until we tried to move things into the house. 

Upon arriving in Virginia, all I quickly opened the truck to make sure the pieces were still intact. 

But that's for Part 3 ...

A New Addition to the Layout: Part 1

Part 1: Dismantling the Northern SNE:

As I mentioned in my post "Farewell to the Northern SNE" (if you missed that post you can find it HERE) I planned to take some of Jason and Pam Fontaine's wonderful layout off their hands as they prepared to relocate down south. 

I just realized something - with Jason moving the Florida, does that mean the Northern SNE will now become the Southern SNE - and my SNE which was the Southern SNE is now the Northern SNE??? .... ugh, I'm giving myself a headache ...

To summarize the events of the last week: I flew up to Connecticut from Dulles early Friday morning. After hearing horror stories all last week about airport delays the flight was on time (technically we landed a few minutes early) and I found myself in a cab, driven by a pleasant and talkative chap named Khan (no relation to the Star Trek villain of the same name) on the way to the Budget rental truck outlet in Enfield.

The truck was - let's say it was 16 feet long as promised and leave it at that. 

Before heading up north Jason and I came to an arrangement and I would take the Charlton Branch (essentially an approximately two foot wide and 9-10 foot long section of layout with several very nicely done structures and scenery, as well as "Fenton Mountain" - a large - and extremely heavy - mountain with a three lap helix inside. 

I drove to Charlton Mass, to find Jason and Derek (who's taking several other sections of the layout) already starting the process of disassembly. After some considerable discussion of the best place to cut through the Envirotex river we concluded the more "water" we could leave in place the better. 

Since the pieces I was taking were essentially the cork in the bottle, basically blocking everything else from getting through the layout room door, we had to start with them. So after cutting along the base of the mountain that served as one "end" of the Charlton Branch, Jason turned the Saws all on the river. 

Halfway through the first cut into the base of the mountain alongside the riverbank. 

The area of the river that looks like rapids is plaster dust! 

I realize Jason started work on this layout in 1990 - and having tore layouts down in the past I know how painful the process can be. 

The biggest challenge we faced in getting things out of the layout room with minimal damage was the width of the door opening - 31" or so of clearance - and the mountain was almost 45" tall from base of the L girders to the peak. The solution was to cut off the top portion of the mountain. The plan for moving the mountain was to remove the side braces that held the helix baseboard inside the mountain, letting the helix collapse like a slinky, add 2x4 bracing to the underside of the helix framework so we could remove the helix essentially intact, but collapsed, inside the mountain, and then take it out in three pieces - the benchwork holding the mountain and helix up, the mountain section with the helix inside, and the top of the mountain. 

There was one side of the helix that had a weak spot that was especially noticeable when the section was tilted. But we managed to get the pieces onto a dolly, turned 90 degrees, and moved into the garage. 

The (second) worst part of the disassembly process was moving the mountain out of the layout room into the garage. The worst part of the move is still to come! 

After a long day of cutting, bracing, and moving the two sections of the layout I was taking, along with a section containing a lumberyard that Stic Harris wanted, all the pieces that were coming with me were sitting on Jason's garage floor. We retired for a well deserved pizza dinner. 

Next Step: Part 2: A New Home