Paxton Road 2: Putting in the ground work (N part 17)…

The heat wave has only just begun so I stayed indoors and worked on a few of my own projects this weekend. One reward is the photos shared here of Paxton Road’s progress…

Paxton Road 2: This is N

So before moving onto ground work and greenery I like to establish the base line, get track and basic roadways formed. In this particular 'experiment' there are a few 'new to me' ideas and techniques I wanted to try and see how things landed. With the hot temperatures outside, and that in mind, I tool some of the 1mm mounting board card I used for roads on Beaverbrook and found an off cut just the right size for Paxton Road. The idea was to in lay some tarmac between the lines of track, as I'd seen on several 'speed link' era photos where goods yards were 'modified' with some hard standing for unloading and unloading. 

The usual approach worked here, I took a piece of paper and traced the rails, the measured and offset for the sleeper length and cut out some card to fit. This was glued down with PVA and weighted flat (see below) before I sealed it with sanding sealer.

I was keen to experiment with texture on this micro, and so my first hypothesis, that colour and texture are as important as scale is tested here with the same road surface and ballast as I use in OO and H0. The road is painted with Humbrol gloss 5 and dusted with talc (until no more wet paint shines through). In the hot weather this dried quickly and allowed me to move straight onto ballasting. The excess talc is vacuumed and brushed off leaving a varied and subtly textured mottled road surface with, in my opinion, a pretty good shade off the bat. Of course, experimentation with the original colour would allow regional variation in tarmac colour, as well as representing patch repairs etc.

In this higher angle you see the road surface and contrast to the ballast and the pre-painted sleepers. This is looking really good. Note at normal viewing angles you won't see the exposed edge of the card and the surface behind the 26 and TTA is not treated yet, the dark patches are just me wiping excess paint from the brush.

For ballast, I have used the Woodland Scenics fine grey again, applied carefully using a dice shaker and brushed into place first with a finger and then tidied up with a brush. This means you can still see under the bullhead rail which was important. It's interesting, despite the reduction in scale, this texture still seems to work well.

The title shot, less tightly cropped, showing the overall hard standing area (a little under half the length of the layout).

The end result, here above, is showing real promise and is exactly the sort of scene I had in mind. Next up is perhaps a little greening up, because of the layouts small size I'm not worried about working back to front. The longer term plan is to then add some structure BEHIND the 26 and TTA. Initial thoughts are some sort of cement silo and provender store building. I'm not the biggest fan of structure modelling, and even more so in an unfamiliar scale, but I enjoy the results once I've started so as often in life, it is picking up the knife and styrene to make a start that can be the hardest step with constant small rewards that follow. The speed at which this is coming together is so encouraging. I am seeing some benefit for those with small spaces, that still want to model in this cameo style, and I hope that by documenting my journey it will encourage others to perhaps dip a toe in the water.

Although Paxton Road 2 is my own layout, I'm more than happy to help you work up your own scheme. A layout design brief is the result of a two way conversation about your layout desires and constraints and results in some illustrations, sketch plans, component lists and a lasting record of why you're doing it, with prices from around £160. Get in touch for more information, but in the meantime, stay out of the sun! More soon...