Following my advice in the Assistant Editors thoughts, I finished the garage and started working on the backdrop. Given the environment that the layout must reside, I built my backdrop with coved corners and coved overhead. This led to making what I term Gothic corners. The Gothic corners turned out to be more work than I anticipated. But more than that a little later on. I began the backdrop construction by installing the shelf brackets and cutting curved sections so that I could cove the backdrop
.
I used a lid from a 5 gal bucket to mark the radius for the masonite to back up against.
Once the pieces were cut out I cut them apart on my table saw.
I had two of the local modelers, Dennis Drury and Jim Petro, help me hang the masonite. This is definitely more than a one man job. I discovered that the radius I used for the arcs was to small. We could not get the masonite to form a tight enough radius to snug up to the arc. It was close, I probably should have used an 8" or 9" radius. The compression of the board was enough that I am not worried about the masonite moving.
For the gothic corners I initially attempted to make it with one piece of hardboard. It didn't work. I ended up cutting 1-1/2" strips of masonite and began nailing them up. The small strips work, but it is a cut and fit for each piece. No two are the same. I used my brad nailer to install the individual pieces. After the masonite pieces were in place I used fiber mesh to cover the pieces.
Once all of the joints were taped I used drywall compound to fill in the joints. I am not 100% sure that this is the best choice. That is part of the purpose of the layout to determine what works as well as what does not. Time will tell if this was a good choice or not. One of the problems that I did discover very quickly was that the unsupported edge was wavy. While I had plan to install a valance the 2" x 2" boards that the masonite is attached to did not seem to have enough material to provide a good anchor for the valance.
So I decided to kill two birds with one stone. I ripped down some three pieces of 3/4" plywood on the table saw. While the saw was still out, I got the stack dado blade out and cut dado's in the plywood to fit over the 2" x 2" pieces. The three inch strips were screwed to the 2" x 2" and the masonite was nailed to the 3/4" strips. Once this work and the joints were filled, It was time to paint.
I painted the backdrop with Bher Little Pond blue. Once the first coat of paint was applied I made a 50/50 mix of Little Pond blue and white to make a lighter blue. Working in about 4' sections I rolled on about 12" of the light blue mix and painted a 4" strip of the Little Pond blue and then used a brush to blend the colors together.
After the paint had dried it is time to paint the clouds clouds. I began by taking the light blue and making a slightly lighter blue by adding 25% white and 75% light blue. This was stippled on with a 3" brush to form the base of the clouds. Once that was done, I made mix of 25% light blue and 75% white. This was then stippled on with a 1" artist brush. I highlighted the the tops of the blue base of the cloud with this color. Finally I painted the tops of the clouds with Bher Steam White. I used one of the sample sizes that cost on $2.99 at Home Depot.
I plan for this to be the finished backdrop. I have some ideas for lighting that preclude anything else. Again this is a part of my less is more philosophy. So until next time have fun
Don Hanley
Proto-lancing a fictitious Erie branch line.
