You have this great idea of a train rolling over a mountain, a train running beside a mountain, and a train running through the mountain. That’s great! This should all be simple enough to do. However, did you think far enough ahead about how you would clean the rails or handle a derailment?
On the mountain or beside the mountain, there is not going to be any issue with cleaning or fixing a derailment if one should happen, but what about inside the mountain?
If your tunnel is longer than your hand, you will get frustrated when it comes time to clean your rails or if a troublesome car derails and uncouples inside the tunnel.
There is a pretty easy solution to that problem, but it will take a little bit of preplanning and prep. When you are finished, you will have open access to that tunnel.
What I am suggesting is a removable top for the tunnel. You can create a tunnel and be able to take the top off so you have full access to the track, and then sit the top back down. The only one who will know that the top comes off will be you. It’s not hard to do, but there are extra steps that need to be taken as you create the tunnel.
You start by doing your basic mountain building up to the point when you are ready to close off the top of the tunnel. At this point, you will want to stop what you’re doing and let your mountain and tunnel side dry.
After a couple of days of drying time, depending on what you’re using, it could take longer. We will start working on that top that we can easily remove while hiding the seams so it’s almost undetectable.
You will need either wax paper, parchment paper, or cling wrap. It won’t matter which one you choose, but you will need one of the three.
What you are going to do is take a long and wide enough piece of one of the three mentioned above and place it over the edge that is going to contact the already built part of the mountain. Now, go ahead and sculpt the rest of the mountain, being careful not to get any wet material outside of your paper. Blend the material you are using for your mountain like you would normally do while staying on that paper. When you have it how you want it, let it completely dry before you go any further.
After it’s all dry, now you can lift off what you did. That paper you put down was to let you sculpt the top and match it with the rest of the mountain without it getting permanently attached. Remove any remaining paper. Now you have a perfectly matched removable top for your tunnel.
The next step is to hide or blend in the seams between the mountain and the removable top.
Here are some suggestions: You can add trees or ground cover above and below the seam to help hide it. You could create a rocky lip above the seam down to the original part of the mountain without connecting to it. (Because you’re going from top to bottom, it will look like a natural formation). You can also attach moss to the removable top and let it hang loosely over the seam.
That’s all there is to it. You have created a way to have access to the rails that go through the mountain.
On my layout, I have an area where I have four turnouts under a small tunnel. It was a little bit of poor planning and running out of room, so I needed a way to have access to those turnouts. I get comments from family and friends when they ask how I get under that section if I have a problem. They are always amazed when I pull up the top and show them the access. Unless you know it’s there, you can’t see it.
Having that access is a time and frustration saver. Sure, it takes a little longer to complete the overall tunnel or mountain, but it saves you from having headaches and regrets of not having access to these rails.
Until next time,
Happy Railroading!
