Building A Realistic Imaginary Desert Railroad

how's it going everyone welcome back to boyle hobby time i've always wanted to build a train layout of my own but i have put it off until now i found this box my local hobby store i chose it because it is a train from my home state of colorado it's not a very fancy set but considering that this is my very first train layout decided to be a good set to start with i would honestly be content to just sit and watch this go in a little loop on this table here but i had something a little bit bigger in mind i began by making a rough sketch to help understand what i wanted the layout to look like as well as figure out the materials that i would need for the build i bought a 2 by 4 foot mdf board to reinforce the base i cut up a piece of xps foam to match i temporarily pinned down the tracks so i could visualize and trace out a path to know how to stack and cut the foam i then flipped over the xps and i used a wire brush to add some tooth to the foam i sprayed it lightly with some water i put down a bead of gorilla glue polyurethane glue likes to expand when it cures so i weighed down the foam with some weights i could have lifted heavier weights if i really wanted to but i didn't want to dent the foam after the glue had cured i removed the weights and i traced out the shape of the second layer onto a piece of foam the same size as the first layer i carved it out with a hot wire the foam is one and a half inches thick and i decided that wasn't quite enough height so i copy pasted that layer and i was much happier with the new elevation speaking of elevation i needed to get the train from one level to the next so i used this curvable piece of foam from woodland scenics they sell pre-cut ramps but i carved my own because i couldn't find an incline steep enough for the space that i had available it's definitely a risk luckily the train is able to make it up and down no problem i then glued down the track bed onto the path that the track will be following the track bed helps set the track above the surrounding surface as well as absorb extra sound made by the wheels once the track bed was down it was time to texture the vertical rock surfaces i used a combination of hot wire hobby knife and dremel to create the look i was going for i was sure to wear a respirator the whole time i was working with the foam to avoid inhaling the dust and fumes next it was time to build the butte and the mesa i use styrofoam for this because it is a lighter than xps and cuts more easily with a hot wire carve the base layers to allow room for the train to pass underneath after i had all of the paths clear and figured out it was time to put down the track which was honestly more difficult than i had anticipated ended up pushing a nail jointer under my fingernail so that was nice but after a few hours of trimming jointing soldering and pinning i finally got the track down i soldered the power supply directly to the track instead of using the connector that they supplied i found this to be a little bit cleaner i tested it to make sure it was working i added a little bit more elevation to the cliffs and started sculpting them to make them look a little bit more realistic the visual inspiration for the landscape is the buttes and mesas of the american southwest i've had the pleasure of driving through that part of the country a few times i've been greatly inspired every time once the formations were done i set those aside for a minute to mask off the tracks and prevent my terrain pace from ruining all of my hard work once that was done i glued the formations back in place i also glued on some plaster rocks that i had made off camera the night before then it was time for the second most exciting part of this build the giant plaster mix this is definitely the largest amount that i have ever mixed up i used a ton of plaster a whole tube of acrylic paint and a quarter of a tube of mod podge i mixed it up and added a bunch of water to get it to a brushable consistency i painted it all over the place [Music] i then began adding pebbles and sand to create a variety of textures at the base of the cliffs i stuck it all down with some watered-down pva glue i used some isopropyl alcohol to help that spread out and seep into all of the rocks and sand this and many of the other tricks seen in this video i learned from luke towin he is a huge inspiration of mine next it was time to build the trusses the tracks didn't actually require any support across those spans so these are just cosmetic and not load bearing which is nice because i didn't have to worry about the integrity so much i drew up a template for the supports and i reproduced that 11 times with some balsa wood i then stained all of those supports with a wash because i was in the washing mood i took the opportunity to give the cliffs a wash as well i used two tones of brown a red and a black wash to achieve the rock tone i was looking for [Music] when that was dry i dry brushed some light tan over all of the edges to help them pop you gotta be kidding me after that i peeled off the masking tape and i was about to assemble the trestle but realized that i wouldn't be able to apply the ballast very easily if it was in the way so i took a little break from bridge construction and i added the ballast i chose the wrong color of ballast and eventually went back and covered most of it up with sand but once that was all down i continued assembling the trusses [Music] the next step was to figure out how to populate the flat open space on top of the mesa i wanted to have a small town with a few buildings and another railroad segment and i thought about making all the buildings from scratch that would have been a lot of unnecessary work i'm already building a town from scratch i'll put a link to that playlist below but for this town i decided to 3d print some normal western buildings and throw some gray blues on them i found these wild western building files on etsy i will put a link to those below as well for the tech editions i tried to stay true to the theme with some antennas cables little machines that looked like they served some purpose [Music] i wanted to do some building with balsa and not have to worry about painting it later so i stained a bunch of variously sized strips in a dark brown wash this is the before color versus the after i saved the wash for later and i left those to dry i wanted to place this church perched off to the side with a little walkway as well as a precarious ramp to get people down into the canyon i painted the buildings and got their placement figured out before adding some ballast to the little track section up top and some sand to the rest of the plateau i then glued down all of the little buildings including the church and we just have to hope that their teaching is more sound than their location choice after i had installed the walkway out to the church i built the ramp that zigzagged down along the large flat cliff face i also made sure to add some support beams to that as well i stippled on some worn walking paths from the ramp and the church into the town and i darkened the main strip then it was time to add some plant life i placed down some little tufts of grass everywhere that looked like it could use a little tuft of grass i also applied some patches of static grass i also applied another color of sand to help add some color variety to the dirt the last thing to do was to clean up the edges with some acrylic that i traced cut and painted black after that was in place i called it good [Music] so [Music] [Music] [Applause] [Music] [Applause] [Music] [Music] that is it for this video thank you all so much for watching i hope you enjoyed this was a very fun project for me it took a little longer than usual obviously but if you'd like to see more bigger projects like this let me know in the comments huge shout out as always to my patrons you guys are great have an awesome week everyone i'll see you next time [Music] [Music] [Applause] [Music] [Music] you

Channel: Boylei Hobby Time

Views: 5,803,359

Keywords: boylei hobby time, building a realistic imaginary desert railroad, diorama, diorama building, diorama train, ho scale trains, hobby, hobby time, lego train, luke towan, model building, model railroad, model railway, model train, model train layout, model trains, n scale layout, n scale train layouts, n scale trains, train, train diorama, train model, train set, trains

Id: lgiGoq0j2m8

Length: 11min 37sec (697 seconds)

Published: Sun Feb 27 2022