SONIC883s Modules

[SONIC883]

Hi,

I am looking for some pictures of bridges over a river. I have some pictures with big rocks in the riverbed in my mind.

The reason is to build a Module between 920mm to 1200mm. Track system is Tomix and the bridge are two TOMIX 3051 glued together with DS140 at the ends.
Has someone nice pictures or ideas for it=


-Kai

[Tenorikuma]

I usually just start plugging in terms at Google Image Search and see what comes up. Here are some pages with nice bridge shots:

http://mafura-maki.sblo.jp/article/17260251.html
http://tetsutama.blog61.fc2.com/blog-category-9.html
http://sk-gtr.com/scraps/tabi/hokuriku/824/24.html

[SONIC883]

Thanks for your links. That was the first I have done - have a look at Google. But I havent found bridges wich I like.

So I plan my own. The Tomix-Bridges are already guled. So I can't seperate them. an 560mm looks like very wide for a river with bigger rocks. So I decide me for combining road, tracks and river where the bridge goes over.

Modul is 1200mm length, 400mm deep, Modulprofile is 100mm

[disturbman]

Good idea but you know, you can as well have a river spreading under one bridge and half. Leaving room for some over thing, like a pedestrian walkway along the bank or a railway/road.

[SONIC883]

Hi disturbman,

can you explain your idea, maybe with a small sketch?

-Kai

EDIT:

I think I know what you mean:

On the one side a single or double track, in the middle asymectric the river and on the other side the road. The question is: how to make an realistic footpath there? Must there be a footpath?

[CaptOblivious]

I took him to mean something like this, with the river in the middle, and a couple of flat spots for roads or tracks or pedestrians (or all three!) half way up the banks.

[SONIC883]

Okay, then I have understand it correctly (my english isn't very well).
But It is difficult to build a footpath there.

With the river not in the center but 60/40 or 70/30 can look nice, too. On the smaller side a one track lane, on the other a bigger road.
The walls can become green with Woodland turf.......

[disturbman]

Yes that's more or less what I had in mind. A wide side and a smaller one each one with different uses. I quite like the last idea.

But I wanted mostly to show Sonic that the river can be as wide as he wants and be where he wants. He is not obliged to have 2*2 road and a double track. he can have more variety.

I also tried to point out that in Japan there is often walkways/pathways on the banks of a river. Even more if this river is situated in an urban area. If you look at movies or animation you can see that clearly.

Anyway the bridge is not obligated to form a 90° angle with the roads/rails/river. Everything can be also have a more natural crooked look. Even if in Japan Mother Nature seems to have been quite humanised, I mean transformed into unnatural shapes.

I have many things in mind, eventhough it doesn't really fit the "big rocky river bed" description, and maybe some exemples can help :
exemple 1 : The Tobu Bridge linking Asakusa and Sumida-Ku in Tokyo. The Bridge passes the Sumida River, a park on the banks and then road where a Highway pases over him.
exemple 2 : A Bridge in Osaka. Real ass kicker river with green banks.

[disturbman]

At the end, I thought that this thread was more at home here in the Personal Project forum.

And I made a drawing to illustrated one of my ideas.

[SONIC883]

Looks nice, but the biggest problem I have is that the modul has only a high of 100mm. The brigde have a high (to the bottom of the bridge) of 60mm, so I have only 40mm left for the frame of the modul.

The trains need a high of 50mm under the brigde to look realistic, so the difference to the river is only 10mm.
The heigh for cars and trucks isn't critical, so the step for the footpath is possible.

I must have a look to make a clean drawing (draw it to scale) an then I would show it to you.

Thanks for brainstroming.

[disturbman]

40mm seems quite deep enough to me for the frame. Where ther rive is you can lowered it up to 20mm I think. as for the missing height between the modul and the bridge foot you can have it rest on some kind of big rock or concrete formation. After all it's not so unusual for people to lower to the max the layout frame when it comes to cut up like river beds.

Prototypically speaking I have seen some exemples of it in Europe, as for Japan I don't know if they use this kind of tricks.

edit: I attached a new drawing made on the basis of the previous one.

[SONIC883]

Some photos, some ideas ...
http://www.photopassjapan.com/tokyo_scenes_5/image5.html
http://farm1.static.flickr.com/224/468488050_e6cffe4097.jpg?v=0
http://travel.webshots.com/photo/1355772467053531358uJDvjC

Some photos without tracks and/or roads

With green walls, only a small, flat river...
http://www.carto.net/neumann/travelling/japan_2004_09/05_norikura_kamikochi_2004_09_13-16/41_azusa-gawa_river_from_myojin-bridge_downstream.jpg

Or clippy
http://www.gtgtandems.com/images/Japan/18Down_River.jpg

http://babibubebo.com/wp-content/uploads/2006/12/_eap7223.jpg


Many photos missing but the others in this thread are  :o :o :o
http://www.skyscrapercity.com/showthread.php?t=117141&page=5

[disturbman]

With green walls, only a small, flat river...
http://www.carto.net/neumann/travelling/japan_2004_09/05_norikura_kamikochi_2004_09_13-16/41_azusa-gawa_river_from_myojin-bridge_downstream.jpg

Yeah, it's a typical mountain river. Large rocky bed and a small flow in summer but that can become larger during spring (with the snow melting).

Nice catches.

[disturbman]

So, Sonic did you go further with this project?

[SONIC883]

I had moved the layout-building-day (we are 3 people who wnt to build moduls)  to an unknown date because some personal reasons (mother in hostpital since 8 weeks, work is aweful, ...)

Maybe I have some free time in my Holiday. It isn't stoped - only paused

[Bernard]

Kia - I'm sorry to hear about your mother. Having a family member in the hospital can be stressful. All my best.

[disturbman]

I wunshe dein Mutter eine gute Besserung und hoffe das alles wurde bei dir besser werden. :)

Got, ich brauche noch mehr Deutschunterricht.

[SONIC883]

My english isn't very well, too. That's the reason why I am not write big topics.

Thaks for your 'Genesungwuensche'

[SONIC883]

Hello,

some news to this module

The lengh is 920mm. I decide me to build only a small bridge because I had use my 2x280 bridge in my stationary layout 'SHO TOSHI', but I have some small 140mm bridge pieces.

The river get dry and rocky with much green on the sides  like this
http://www.carto.net/neumann/travelling/japan_2004_09/05_norikura_kamikochi_2004_09_13-16/41_azusa-gawa_river_from_myojin-bridge_downstream.jpg

But I don't know what I should build on the top. There are two 40x30 cm free places (with a double track in the middle) which are waiting for ideas.  

- Kai

[Bernard]

Kia - Nice start! Are you still going to add the double track under the bridge and the road on the other side as in the original plan?

[SONIC883]

Hi Bernard,

No, none street or doubletrack, only a riverbed with green sides. But hey, that is an modular layout. Maybe next time.
I use the parts I have over because I actually haven't much money left. New roof, new bathroom, new tyres, ... So the modules become a little bit smaller

-Kai

[KenS]

Very nice. What did you use for the texture on the walls and under the bridge support? The walls in particular look "real" to me.

[SONIC883]

That is styrodur from our local do-it-your-self store.

But I use this in combination with small nails for a better grip of the gipsum. But indeed - It looks like the walls

[cteno4]

Kai,

nice module, always wanted to do modules with bridges like this! been thinking of a triple ttrak module with a single tower cable stay bridge with auto and train in the center.

on your river, if you have the cement wall channels you could also think about having it a slower, deeper river in the town, not sure what your surrounding scenery is going to be, but many channelized rivers/streams like this have those sloped concrete embankments then lots of boats (both pleasure and fishing depending on location) tie up along the embankments. there are small ladders going down to them and some even have small walkways along the edge for smaller boats. sometimes there is like a netting along the wall which i think folks use to tie to and then sort of climb up the 45° incline. i have some pictures in a book i can scan and email you.

whats your plan on the modules, sort of a one track?

cheers

jeff

[SONIC883]

Hi Jeff,

I don't want build a cement walled channel. It will become a natural riverbed. But I am intressed in the pictures of the cement channels.

What I plan do I have... hmm... a plan?

I will start building modules that I can go to some local events with them. They should show a 2 track mainline like the Nagasaki one. More nature, the city will be at the station

Some Infos about the Modules
The modules has a dimension from 920mm to 400mm (this module) up to 1200mm to 400mm (the station module was not become a station module because I used the station for my main layout) and they have a high of 100mm.
The Moduls get legs for a heigh over the flor of 1,0m. The Tracks are Tomix Finetracks because the tracks are easier to disconnect (pull straigh, not break). Between the moduls I will use the V70-Track.

[KenS]

That is styrodur from our local do-it-your-self store.

I mistook the texture of the styrodur for some kind of retaining-wall diagonal block pattern.

My one concern there is that those walls are too even, and too steep, to look "natural" without some kind of reinforcement. It appears to be a 1:1 (one foot or meter over for each down) slope. Dirt could be that steep, depending on its composition, but a man-made slope is more commonly around 2:1, and a natural channel would be less regular.

That doesn't mean it would look bad when it was done, but there might seem to be something a little bit "off" about the appearance.

Slopes that steep in nature would be eroded by water during periods of high water, and would slump down into the channel in places where the material wasn't quite as strong as surrounding areas. Adding some material in the channel to create irregularity in the walls. and some small stones (or Woodland Scenics Talus) in the channel and in "eroded" areas of the bank, to suggest that the ground is very rocky, would help if you want the natural look.

[cteno4]

Hi Kai,

gotcha. just the shape in the foam was pretty much perfect channelized town river shape! i really want to do one of these 'in town' rivers like this as they can be great scenes with a lot of boats on the small channel and usually walkways along the top of the embankment and sometimes many buildings butt up against the embankments as well. great bang for the sq cm in scenery!

i guess something with a rocky cut would work well with that steep of sides unless you are planning on shallowing it all out more. you see a lot of steep river cuts like that in the mountain with very sharp sides. when you get down lower then things either tend to get really wide (with the river being in a channel in the center at low water) and then broadening out into a larger flood plain that the bridget goes over (all pretty low). around the towns you then get the embankments filled in a lot and either stone or cement steeper embankments so then the bridges get short and the embankments steep.

does depend on the geology its going through. if this is a hard rock scene then you could get a pretty steep embankment carved into it.

the module system looks like fun, do you have a group thats doing them around germany now with japanese stuff to run with as well? i remember seeing one show you were at where someone looked to have a layout of modules that size and a 2 track configuration. this an extension of that? always curious what folks are doing out there as we need to think about the v3.0 of the jrm layout now for the future and not wait until the last minute!

I like your using some of the modules on your home layout. a few of us here at jrm are thinking how we might do something like that. the new 3m station on the jrm v2.0 i had sort of thought of doing as the heart of my basement layout im planning, but it was getting difficult to get it to work out just right, but may still have not given up!

cheers

jeff

[SONIC883]

In the moment I am the only who build up modules. The other guys only discuss about them but they are not building up.
One of us has complatible modules (center double track, Tomix, 400 mm wide) at which I can connect with a transform module.

Yesterday I made some styrodur plates on the top. Those plates with a different structure will be add at the river walls this week.

[scott]

you see a lot of steep river cuts like that in the mountain with very sharp sides.

That often happens on the outside of a curve, where the river is cutting the bank due to higher volume and velocity of the water. The "thalweg", which is the deeper route of the main flow, will often form a low-water channel toward that outside edge. On the opposite bank, you can often have a nearly-flat bank where the river is depositing silt and rocks as it slowly moves toward the cut bank.

This isn't the best illustration, but it's all I could find in my stuff on short notice--outside curve & cut bank on the left, flatter inside bank on the right.

<a href="http://www.flickr.com/photos/certhia/697483691/" title="DSCF0303 by scott_clark, on Flickr"></a>

Anyway--Kai, I like the idea of this module. I'm looking forward to seeing more pictures.

[SONIC883]

does depend on the geology its going through. if this is a hard rock scene then you could get a pretty steep embankment carved into it.

My idea to such a river is that after tectonic movements the landscape becomes a crack/gap which was washed out over many years. Like the Grand Canyon, but not so deep :-) IMHO vulcanic stone are soft and light stones the such a riverbed can be realistic.
Okay, The walls are clean in the moment, but they get some more structure in the next days.

Here one picture (with higher waterlevel)
http://images.travelpod.com/users/nelsonduo/1.1247580140.river-in-japan-alps-on-way-to-takayama.jpg

[KenS]

Okay, I see what you're trying for now.

That should be interesting. I'm looking forward to more pictures.

[SONIC883]

It should become a mixture of both. The rocky walls with a low water level and rocky riverbed.

I went to the shop form some flexible tile glue. That will be the base coat for the gypsum part

[SONIC883]

Base coat / primer is on

[SONIC883]

I havent much time in the moment. on this shots you see a try for decoration.
The bushes arn't very nice. I will take selfmade trees.

And the fishermen are waiting for water

[scott]

"Hey, Steve, do you hear a rumbling sound coming from upstream?" 

[SONIC883]

Hehe 

Updtae: Riverbed and Wallstructure added

[Bernard]

Kia,
What material did you use to create the riverbed? I like the texture you've created.

[KenS]

looking good. It definitely has a more wild feel to it now.

[SONIC883]

Thank you!

The material is secret Okay, is flexible tile glue. I use the flexible one because this cement doesn't crack so fast.
The dark color will go after drying.

Which color should I use? The light grey color or a mid brown?

I preffer grey

http://images.travelpod.com/users/nelsonduo/1.1247580140.river-in-japan-alps-on-way-to-takayama.jpg
Here is grey with some brown rock formation

and this one
http://www.carto.net/neumann/travelling/japan_2004_09/05_norikura_kamikochi_2004_09_13-16/41_azusa-gawa_river_from_myojin-bridge_downstream.jpg
looks like light gray with a little bit of blue

[scott]

Those are two very different rivers--one with a wide floodplain, and one in an incised gorge. If you're going for the lower-river, small-flow/wide floodplain look, the gray would probably be  more convincing. IMHO, FWIW. 

[SONIC883]

Sure, they are very different. I will try to make a mixture of them. The riverbed has a hole infront and behind the bridge, there I want make the water quiter. unter the bridge the water will become divided and the riverbed will be not so deep. The deeper areas become a blue-green (tourquise?) water.

To add only a little bit color is very difficult. I think I will try a grey and with the light brown I will make a small piece for trying the coloring (which color with how many water, ...)

[SONIC883]

I have decide me for a brown color, because it looks more realistic.
The color is dark brown wood stain. After drying I add some red sand.

[KenS]

That's an interesting color.  If you hadn't posted that picture of the Japanese alps earlier, I'd say it looks more like the American southwest than Japan, since it doesn't fit my preconception of what a Japanese mountain stream should look like (I favor the gray color too). Obviously, my ideas of what Japanese scenery look like are too narrow.

But it does look real, and I like the way you've used different textures and color-density across the riverbed.  That kind of variation is an important aspect of real-world scenery, and one that most layout scenery (including mine) doesn't get right.

[SONIC883]

It isn't finished yet. The side walls become green. Than it looks like the grand canyon :-)

EDIT:

Looks this better? I had only done the front half. On top where the earth not slide down trees will be planted.

[disturbman]

Looks quite good Kai but god, it's dry! It makes me want to drink an ocean of water. ;)

[SONIC883]

*givedisturbmanastraw*

Thank you. I havent found the right water for me now. 1k, 2K? How to color? Which color? ...
Many questions... I will have a look in local board and have a look how they made it

[Bernard]

Kia - It looks great. What do you plan to use to simulate water and how do you apply it? (Do you block up the sides and if so with what?)

[cteno4]

going to try the white glue technique? seems like it works well for moving water. ive never done it but want to try soon! always seems to be the method of choice for all the japanese diorama projects ive seen detailed.

cheers

jeff

[SONIC883]

I won't make many experiments. At this reason I will use Modelwater for it. But I haven't decide for a product, yet.
Maybe this one http://woodlandscenics.woodlandscenics.com/show/Item/C1211/page/1

All other methodes are good ideas for smaller water, but I think I need up to 100-150ml.

Do you have seen water made with silicone?
http://www.modellmarine.de/index.php?option=com_content&view=article&id=143&Itemid=4338

No, I want use it for this modul, but it is another idea which looks good.

[Bernard]

WS Realistic water is very good but expensive if you have to use a lot of it. (Which I still need to do but the cost has stopped be....)