[dreinecke]

Just found you all hiding over here and thought I'd poke around to see what you've got going on. Very nice! Like the software!

If you folks can stand another American on this side of the pond, I'd love to stick around. I'm semi-qualified to be here - I lived in Germany for 8 wonderful years, speak the language fluently after a few really good beers, and have visited the UK on more than one occasion! Oh, yeah, and I love slots!

I don't have many opinions that I air publicly, I like almost anything on 4 wheels, and have a permanent layout.

Cheers!

David
http://photo.starblvd.net/dreinecke

 

[Doug]

Hi David,

You're very much welcome here. Please take some time to share your experience with us.

Please tell us how to make those rock cliffs on your layout.

Have fun!

 

[Austin]

Hi David

I love that layout. Great job

Austin

 

[dreinecke]

Thanks for the welcome!

It's a 65' Sport Track layout. I made the elevation changes by cutting the rough area out of the tabletop that I wanted to raise and made a riser underneath the table attached to the table's grid. This allowed me to make as high/low an area as I wanted to.

The base texture is actually aluminum screen with Sculptamold spread over it. I'm getting a pretty quick system down now for doing the turf. Basically, I paint an 8x8" patch with a tan latex paint and sprinkle on a "mixed turf grass". Then when that's dry, I use the spray bottle with diluted craft glue (Elmer's Glue works too) and spray an 8x8" area and add a dark green and then repeat the process with a "burnt grass" color. Those are all Woodland Scenic colors. Then finally I spray the entire thing with diluted glue again to finish the hold. When done, you can actually run a vacume hose over the area, and nothing will come off except the dust that builds up. I purposely don't try to make it a thick, perfect carpet of grass. I like some "dirt" showing through - this is Colorado after all! I've decided to rename the track Palmer Divide Raceway since that's where I live.

For the rocks I used Woodland scenic rock molds. When the rocks are dry and set into the layout, I pain them with a tan/earth latex. While it's wet, I spray it with a diluted black or grey color from a spray bottle. Make it diluted to the point of being watery. It's messy, and it does run, but you'd clean up the base of the rock afterwards anyway. Put some paper towels at the base to soak it up. When dry, the grey/black brings out the contrast in the rocks.

The track has been painted with a diluted grey latex paint. I like the look it gives the track. I'm in the process of weathering some areas and creating the illusion of patches in the pavement.

I also use VRS for my timing system and love it. See, there is some UK based stuff in my layout!

David
http://photo.starblvd.net/dreinecke

 

[Tropi]

QUOTE If you folks can stand another American on this side of the pond, I'd love to stick around.
David
Be very sure that we can stand any amount of Americans around!
The more the merrier - the only thing that anyone needs to be welcomed here is an interest in slot cars.

 

[Doug]

Which Woodland scenic rock molds did you use? I found a couple on the net (look here). Did you get a selection, or re-use one or two?

David, you should write up a how-to for our resources page. This is really good work.

 

[Jamie]

Hi David,

Great to see you here, I recall looking at your album a while back, wow your circuit has come on since - it was bloody good then... now blimey, absolute top notch.

best regards,

Jamie.

 

[dreinecke]

Thanks guys! I'll try to write something up in the next week or so. The sucky thing about my new DSL service is that I've no longer got free webspace. I'll have to think about where to put stuff that is better than Starphoto.

As for the rock molds, I used two. One is relatively smooth, the other very jagged. I moved them all around, broke a few, added pieces, etc. to make them look different. I know where the repetition is to me, but few folks seem to be able to pick them out.

 

[Tropi]

QUOTE I'll have to think about where to put stuff that is better than Starphoto.
David
If you DO come up with any reasonable alternatives, PLEASE post on them!
StarPhoto is incredibly useful, but a standby would be a boon to many of us.

 

[Doug]

QUOTE I'll have to think about where to put stuff that is better than Starphoto.
If you're doing a review or a 'how-to' for the forum, we can easily host the photos on our servers. If you can design the HTML, put all the photos in the same directory then send me the whole thing zipped up.

If you can't do HTML, write it up in Word, for example, indicate where the photos go, and I can put it together. Using Word for HTML is something to be avoided though as it bloats the HTML code with a whole lot of unnecessary code.