Road construction
Workshop
No Laurence this week as he had a major financial transaction to complete.....
Stephen spent 20% of the time cleaning up the walls of the workshop and the rest of the time watching Geoff build a road along the newly completed wall.
The road would be our first use of Smooth-It - a form of fine plaster that is widely used in the construction of roads for 'controlled' vehicles, mainly in OO/HO, and made by Woodland Scenics.
Instead of the recommended foam strip, a thin timber 'kerb' was glued around the area of road to be formed. This contains the plaster and forms a guide for levelling. As an added process, PVA was spread on the card base.
The recommended mix is quite sloppy, but, as a trial, Geoff made the mix a bit thicker. The shape and angle of the first 'pour' meant that smoothing the surface using the kerbs wasn't easy, but an acceptable finish was achieved.
We were quite happy to see a few imperfections as it gives us the opportunity to try out a few techniques described in a book Geoff bought a while ago.
A much thinner mix was prepared for the main are where the kerbs could be used, and Geoff was much happier.
We have accumulated various sheets of embossed plastic setts and paving, and wanted to use them in the goods yard. Deciding which to use and how to lay it required considerable thought about the 'history' of the yard. We ended up with edged, path sections cut into strips, running away of the buildings and plain setts/tiles in the building. A sheet of 2.5mm MDF was glued over the whole area to get the levels correct.
This is how Smooth-It is supplied.
