Scenes from the Quarantrain
When COVID lockdown began in March of 2020 I knew I’d be spending a lot of time at home. I had begun and abandoned an HO scale train layout a few years previously and figured the time was right to re-start it.
The project began by walling off part of my basement to separate it from my messy wood shop. Following that there were months of bench building, wiring, track laying and infrastructure building before I could begin building scenery.
Childhood memories, pop culture references, fantasy scenes, images from my warped imagination.
All models are scratch-built.
A work in progress.
Gary Larson Tribute
The first completed scene. A tribute to a classic Far Side cartoon. I used pieces from four plastic cows to make one standing cow. It was pretty gruesome.
The JEMP Truck gets storrowed.
There’s a few references here. Seems that ol’ Jon Fishman needs to pay a little more attention when he’s driving under a low bridge.
Andrew Henry’s Meadow
A beloved childhood book come to life.
George Turner’s house
Sarah Lerner's mud cake bakery, Don Peterson’s tower, Stanley Hayes’ racing tent, Jane O’Malley’s castle.
Alice Burdock’s treehouse
Andrew’s house. The first house in the meadow.
Joe Polasky’s dugout house
Margot LaPorte’s house
An Ethical Dilemma
What is the switchman to do? Spoiler: The nun gets it.
Mike’s Amazing Bottomless Pit
At the end of the hellish year that was 2020 I built this and invited all my friends on Twitter to send their negative energy down the pit. I collected all the things they wanted to be rid of, printed them out, and sent them down the pit. Down the Pit!
Who is Mike you ask? Mike is the guy who owns the pit. He also runs the ticket booth.
Established 2020
The Pit!
You can watch “Into The Pit 2020” here. Some language may not be safe for work.
Miscellaneous Debris
A random assortment of one-offs and unfinished scenes
Sneed’s Feed and Seed. A Simpsons tribute.
The pond and river. Painted pond bottom with poured epoxy water.
Unfinished scene. A model of the house I grew up in. The garage contains a miniature replica of my layout. Given that the house is not the same one I’m in now I’m not sure if this violates the second rule of model train layouts.
Just a nice little river and culvert
I was pretty happy with the shading I got on the pond.
Custom built control panel controls the switch motors. LED lights indicate which tracks are active.
Paddle your own canoe.
Rock climbers. The rocks are molded plaster and painted/shaded. I clipped off the eyes of tiny needles for the carabiners and placed realistic protection.
Unfinished scene. I think this may become the Betsy Ross Museum. If so, buddy, the flag will be off limits.
Here’s an overview of the layout. It’s about 10’x9’ or so. My wife, Amy, painted the clouds.