revisiting the Timber Ridge line .

[dangavel]

Domestic front is normalising , so had more time to knock on with Timber Ridge, this section from Glenview to Montridge has been extensively remodeled , with a long stiff climb up to Montview river summit.


leaving Glenview on the 36 inch track



Entering a section of highline






the route climbs through the gorge and then swings back on itself

[dangavel]

still climbing , through a cut .



aerial view shows the line almost doubling back on itself as it begins the downhill stretch , boards are about 3 wide here to accommodate the rest of the route as it swings back in the far distance.

[dangavel]

theres also a new mine on a branch that goes for about a mile , it was originally a portal after Montridge.







and the other coal mine i added has been dirtied up a lot.


also i had to add boards to cover up gaps so stuck another industry in there as well.

thats yer lot for now ! the forest opposite is the section detailed in the earlier screen shots near Montview and the new mine is off to the right

[Heinrich505]

Dangavel,
So glad to hear that things are getting back to normal at the homestead. That's always a worry that sometimes just takes your breath away with twists of life. When things start to get better, you can suddenly take a breath again.

As for your screenshots, they are spectacular. The long trestle really looks right. I wonder how often trains fell off those doggone bridges.

I think you are recreating the differing terrain at varying altitudes quite nicely. Sometimes the trains have to compete against the beauty of your terrain. Love your work!

Heinrich505

[dangavel]

Dangavel,
So glad to hear that things are getting back to normal at the homestead. That's always a worry that sometimes just takes your breath away with twists of life. When things start to get better, you can suddenly take a breath again.

As for your screenshots, they are spectacular. The long trestle really looks right. I wonder how often trains fell off those doggone bridges.

I think you are recreating the differing terrain at varying altitudes quite nicely. Sometimes the trains have to compete against the beauty of your terrain. Love your work!

Heinrich505

its interesting how terrain vegetation can change quite rapidly ,for instance ,one side of Baxter pass on the Uintah is just low scrub oak and the other is lush aspens and pines. Same height but one side is in a rain shadow, we have the same here in SA when the mount lofty ranges become arid very quickly on the interior side ,the sudden elevation robs the clouds of most moisture and the interior side is almost desert.

[blueodessey]

Good Day all,

Just went thru the Thread too see all the Pictures I missed,

Sir Dan Gavel, your work as always sends me on Magical Journey of Land not seen, I love it......Especially the Ruggedness of Mountains, and the way you can plant your Shrubs in Trees where there is no defined Pattern, each area is unique........

Hope your family member is getting better in the Hospital and that your house challenges are improving as well....

We just had a Main Sewer Drain pipe break (Old Cast Iron from 56 yrs ago) it will cost 1000's probably close to 20K!!!!

Due to the fact the people who built the house have Sewer coming in on one side of house, and the kitchen is on the extreme other corner

I guess they didn't want to balance the distances when it was piped. So the run is about 90 feet guesstimate........Unfortunately I have Slab foundation, and this is one reason I never like Slab Foundations. So we have too notch cut all our Cement outside to get from back of house to the front where we put in new tee to Sewer....And a funnier fact, not 2" pipe, but due to knew Zone rules, 3" Pipe, which for the length of the run I have now, should have always been a 3" pipe to start...

Of course we could Demo several holes in the Slab to get thru at shorter more direct angle......But that would destroy our wood Floors we put in....

The face saving part of this, thank the lord it didn't happen over the holidays..........So will have some time to get this Construction and hopefully approved by the City Zoning commission......

Have a good week Dan, it looks so interesting in the merges and changes you have made so far........

Take care old friend......

[dangavel]

I've been working on a few different areas , I have fixed a few sight lines ( more about this later ) but this is the last extension i think, there was a line going off on one of the merges I made which just stopped in the middle of nowhere, so I made another steeply graded branch line of about 6 boards that ends up at two mines, its heavily timbered and has a ruling grade of about 5% , four tunnels and a rather nice high trestle .

in the background you can see Tollume Pass, this has been extended out by one board on this side and the hills blended so there's not a sudden vertical drop of 600 meters which looks absolutely terrible from this area. its a fair few boards with no track in at all, but it makes the route look a lot better .



On the wat to the new mines, this section is about 80% complete and then there's about 30 or so boards to complete around Tollume and in one of the new merges before I have a limited test release .


I actually had a real scare with this extension ,as I was adding boards, the software had a crash and when I rebooted , it wanted to either revert or apply changes , either option chosen produced a seemingly endless wait as the route attempted to load . Sessions would open but not the route itself , a extended database rebuild eventually allowed me to open the route, but only after a very long wait , and after whooping with relief rather a lot, I then promptly re-saved with a different name.

Then a day or so later , my wireless mouse battery ran out as I was lowering ground and huge depressions began taking place in the terrain as I frantically swopped over mice in an effort to stop the damage, this mouse issue made the computer go haywire, sound was weird , keyboard would not work, I tried six mice but none of them would allow me to do any movements outside the main surveyor window in both the OS or within the program.

I eventually had to force quit the computer and fortunately after another reboot the route appeared again with no damage. I had been working on a some fixes all day and although i had multiple backups none were current, so i would have lost about 8 hours work if i had had to install another backup over the current one. it seems that doing extensive terraforming is an issue as these probs have only occurred when ive been raising or lowering a lot of ground. I am now saving six backup copies every few hours ( including one on a USB ) ,as it think I would probably go insane if i lost it all now, which is what happened to the original Timber Ridge. I know i could go back to an older version, but doing things again is not what i need right now :-)

[dangavel]

Good Day all,

Just went thru the Thread too see all the Pictures I missed,

Sir Dan Gavel, your work as always sends me on Magical Journey of Land not seen, I love it......Especially the Ruggedness of Mountains, and the way you can plant your Shrubs in Trees where there is no defined Pattern, each area is unique........

Hope your family member is getting better in the Hospital and that your house challenges are improving as well....

We just had a Main Sewer Drain pipe break (Old Cast Iron from 56 yrs ago) it will cost 1000's probably close to 20K!!!!

Due to the fact the people who built the house have Sewer coming in on one side of house, and the kitchen is on the extreme other corner

I guess they didn't want to balance the distances when it was piped. So the run is about 90 feet guesstimate........Unfortunately I have Slab foundation, and this is one reason I never like Slab Foundations. So we have too notch cut all our Cement outside to get from back of house to the front where we put in new tee to Sewer....And a funnier fact, not 2" pipe, but due to knew Zone rules, 3" Pipe, which for the length of the run I have now, should have always been a 3" pipe to start...

Of course we could Demo several holes in the Slab to get thru at shorter more direct angle......But that would destroy our wood Floors we put in....

The face saving part of this, thank the lord it didn't happen over the holidays..........So will have some time to get this Construction and hopefully approved by the City Zoning commission......

Have a good week Dan, it looks so interesting in the merges and changes you have made so far........

Take care old friend......

That's an extreme drag Blue, a friend had a termite infestation that cost about 20 grand a few years back , the first he knew about it was saw a bulge in the wood around a door and when he investigated , a bunch of flying termites swarmed out. he ended up replacing all the floors and the only reason the roof wasn't ruined too was he had concrete walls that stopped the little critters from getting into the rafters .Then when he moved his bathroom he had the same issue you had, a leak under the slab , cost another small fortune to fix.
i hope it isn't too invasive or expensive to fix your problem.Best to you and your family !

[blueodessey]

That's an extreme drag Blue, a friend had a termite infestation that cost about 20 grand a few years back , the first he knew about it was saw a bulge in the wood around a door and when he investigated , a bunch of flying termites swarmed out. he ended up replacing all the floors and the only reason the roof wasn't ruined too was he had concrete walls that stopped the little critters from getting into the rafters .Then when he moved his bathroom he had the same issue you had, a leak under the slab , cost another small fortune to fix.
i hope it isn't too invasive or expensive to fix your problem.Best to you and your family !

Wow Dan,

Do you bring back some old memories in Termite infestation! Been there also, get this, one night, me and the Mrs Blue are watching TV and in our living room in the evening. And for some reason during a TV commercial, I happened to look up at our Ceiling which is Popcorn sprayed (old school according to Grand kids, LOL) and I see these funny dark small spots coming thru the Ceiling, so I tell the wife, this looks like Insect eggs or something, I get up on Chair, and touch one of them, and a Termite comes and looks at me, shuttles back in....I am dumbfounded, what the heck is Termite doing coming out thru Drywall????

Come to find out in 2 days, by Pest Contractor we had, it was Subterranean Termites, now whats the difference, well these nasty little critters, can come as far as 200 feet away and 50 feet down in the earth......They had come from somewhere in our neighborhood and come up through one of the cracks in the Slab Foundation, only needs be 1/8 inch or so.....But these Colonies unlike the Critters that fly and Swarm, is in the Millions, not the 1000's so when you get them, you don't wait 2-3 or 5 years to see the damage, and....They are dangerous to your homes structural health.....We were fortunate to have detected them in our 2nd story floor, so they shot Pesticide down in the ground about every 5 feet through very high pressure Steel Rods, to fume the Soil, and hopefully, it has been about 15 years now, none ever seen except the Dry-wood, (airborne Queens in Spring or late Winter show up), we thank heavens never got them again, I think it was 1500-2000$ for treatment of 30 feet of Slab area, only other thing, they carefully took up our Carpet and then relaid it for us, you would never know.......

There is a portion of the Community, according to Termite friend, who says, well it is just termites, I don't worry about them, it takes a long time for serious damage, and the Contractor told us, the larger part of their business is do the 15-40$ K bearing wall repairs to homes, where the owners didn't care or realize the true damage of these (will eat you out of our house and home Critters) couldn't be truer statement, in any scope of imagination. So since that time, we get yearly inspections, and usually either in Attic or one of the Roof Overhangs outside, will have these pesky critters invasion. And our guy will come and show me.......Before he treats it.....Very honest and up front folks......

I should tell you the main reasons for ongoing Termite issues, We and other neighbors thru-ought the Valley we live in, it at one time 100 yrs ago, was all AG area, Citrus and other type fruit trees, Farmers let some of trees Rot out, perfect for Termites to grow their huge families, and now you know the other page of the Story, WALTER Cronkite.

Now back to our Drain, we got it in on last Friday, and today, Tuesday we have final inspection by City, I am biting my nails here, hoping it goes OK......140 Foot run when all was said and done, and once Concrete where we sawed it out is filled back in, well, could be about 20K.....Ouch.......Hoping my House Insurance might help, but that is a Maybe, you know how Insurance Co's work, grab your money, monthly, and pay as little or none out when Claim comes in.......Well it seems that way? I spoke to them today, it is under determination......

Take care my Friend, I'll let you know about our final Inspection....

BTW,,,When you got that Scare on Mouse Glitch, my problem, was slightly different, but still I lost the first time around, lots of work on my Merge project with Wilson Mills and 4 other tiny Routes I merged on. It seems, that sometimes, when you do lots of Terra forming, adding Tiles, whatever, sometimes the Drive doesn't complete all the Drive updates on your Route, and I bungled it worse, by deleting a few of the wrong Route Files....User Error.

Only thing that saved me, I had a week old or 2 week old, don't remember now, of Route CDP export backup, so I just ended up, redoing a lot of the same lost work, I had done. Only this time, I am keeping lots of Files in reserve CDP exports so I can go back over time. Mine got corrupted, in Sessions too...Where they would open correctly, basically, layers of Track and or Texture were missing.........Oh what fun, but now, I have my act together, and I have more proper backups as I do my work......Takes a little more work, but is well worth the alternative of recreating.....LOL

Bit of insomniac tonight, it is 1:00AM in the morning, and here I am typing to my friends........Going back to bed now........Have a great week, and good luck on your repairs with Route......We sure are not bored are we.........Will see what tomorrow brings.....

[normhart]

Looking great Dan!

[dangavel]

a few more shots of the coal branch now I've worked on it a bit more, trouble is, this older section in these shots has bare patches from when old textures have obsoleted. I keep on covering them up and then find more later on , most annoying .......










You can see a bare patch here and I've gone over this section 3 times so far.....




From here on, trackside needs more work.......engine is one of Paulz trains creations ....

[Heinrich505]

Dangavel,
The trestle is spectacular, as are the other shots. If you made the screenshots black and white they'd be close to period photographs. They look wonderful!

Your judicious placement of extra boards is a very nice touch, as those precipitous drop-offs in the distance do detract from the immersion factor. Your distance shots are showing off the terrain very nicely.

The route and additions look so good. I have to admit that even the "bare patches" that you noted were not detected by me. I must have stared at that screen shot for a good five minutes and never spotted anything that looked wrong. So, having said that, you really must be doing something right!

Keep up the good work. I'm really looking forward to your completed product. To me, it looks completed already - it's showing off your talent and attention to detail.

Heinrich505

[dangavel]

Been working on one of the merged sections between Screed, Dire junction -which connects to Como and Krool pass on the way to Ironton. This is the last section that needs a lot of work. it began as arid scrub but has mutated into mostly Ponderosa Pine lightly forested hills. The river next to the track feeds into the main river that is shown in the last lot of pics of the high trestles. The original Timber Ridge had very few waterways, now there are quite a lot, which makes more sense as most mountainous terrain has rivers and creeks .

overview of Dire Junction area, the route to the left leads to Ironton ( which is about 2 miles long and still to be completed) via Krool Pass, the top right line leads to Como and Tollume. On the bottom right is the line to Screed .

During times of high traffic , even RGS stock was pressed into service as the DRGW had control over the Rio Grande Southern . the Timber Ridge sub functioned as a feeder line, linking to various Colorado New Mexico narrow gauge routes.

Near Screed , where the river feeds into the river that runs to Prosper.

Leaving the hamlet of Dobro, which contains a ladder and barrel works as well a sand mine.

ole number 203, some of these fine locos lasted until the late 1940s

[dangavel]

Altho i stated that I'd stopped extending the route, i have added another 10 boards as the line after ironton just ended in the middle of nowhere. I'm in the process of building a terminus with a sizeable town and with several more major industries, but meanwhile here's a few pics of the line after Ironton, the final climb on the route. Not completed ...
but getting there.


this stretch is similar territory to Osier on the Cumbres and Toltec.



five trestles and a ruling grade of 6%

[normhart]

Altho i stated that I'd stopped extending the route, i have added another 10 boards as the line after ironton just ended in the middle of nowhere. I'm in the process of building a terminus with a sizeable town and with several more major industries, but meanwhile here's a few pics of the line after Ironton, the final climb on the route. Not completed ...
but getting there.

LOL, No one is saying that you have to stop but I'm getting mighty old and I'd hate to kickoff without getting to travel this version of Timber Ridge Line and the Unitah Railway.