hillflyer

Making seemingly slow progress but actually quite a bit is done. The two halfs of this circle have been permanently connected and the rest of the ledgers (diagonal boards that immediately support the track and catwalks) have been installed. Next is to weave the track in between the two ends. This is where the spiral bottoms out. The track in the background is soon to creep across the new ledgers in the foreground.

Photo 1: At the car after an afternoon of working at the coffee shop where I finished the main frame for spiral's mid-section. Photo 2: At home, trying it on for size. Photo 3: Another angle that shows the two ends of frayed track that I have to 'weave' together. Making them meet is sure going to be an interesting challenge. Next I have to draw a full-scale section of the complete spiral so I can be sure all the footers are landing in the right place. At the car after an afternoon of working at the coffee shop where I finished the main frame for spiral's mid-section. At home, trying it on for size. Another angle that shows the two ends of frayed track that I have to 'weave' together. Making them meet is sure going to be an interesting challenge.

Nothing Earth-shattering this time. Biggest news is my wrist is much better, flexibility still a little tight. I'm able to pick up where I left off 2 months ago which was building the Airplane's infamous whirlpool-dive. Photo 1: Working towards closing up the spiral. It's not hard to imagine the entire track in place with a train zooming on down - swwiiiish! Photo 2: Just an interesting angle, although I can see I need to tighten up and straighten some of the cartouches. Photos 3 and 4 - Comparing an old photograph against the model. This process helps me determine what I need to adjust or tweak.

Fixed and ready to proceed! I also have to raise all the ledgers on the lift hill up 18" (scale). Something went weird. The Grease 2 DVD is Dennis'.

A couple of recent pictures: ONE is the beginning of the lift hill almost connecting two of the turn-arounds. TWO is what happens when my green-eyed partner gets upset because I gave MY phone number to an old friend who recently went homeless. A broken wrist, a broken model. What to do...

The bad news was, I needed surgery for my broken wrist. GOOD news is, I don't have to wear a cast and my recovery will be much quicker. I can't quite work on anything really complicated, but I can still make bents! Guess what section the top row is is going to be?

Random

I go in for surgery on my right wrist tomorrow. Since I'll be out of commission for a few weeks, at least as far as the model goes, I thought I'd post a photo of where I left off matched against the real thing. Wish me luck! It'd be awful if they slipped and cut off my hand. My hand is swollen and bruised ow ow ow

Saturday I visited my partner in the hospital being treated for pancreatitis. I got to spend about 5 hours with him and i got a really good start on the structure for the remainder of the spiral. I took a dinner break. When I returned an hour later, My partner was flipping out after he heard a nurse call him 'fag'. A huge melee involving several security and Police. While trying to get him to calm down I fell and broke my wrist.

Well guess who broke his dominant arm and has to put the model on the back burner?

Photo 1: This part of the structure is done and we're on the eve of the process of laying track. Photo 2: The subtrack layer with staggered 2x2s per Fred Church's patent. This was all done in about 4 hours.

WOW finally got through watching all of them. Really fine job. I'll bet this is a LOT more fun than trying to recreate an original that won't run.

This is getting ready to make the cartouches for the rims of the outer circles of the spiraled track. I'm still looking for someone who might want to design the sixth for me!

Here is a photo looking down the lift hill with clear view of the goosenecks. Comparing this photo with the one above, it seems I need to find thinner base poles, that would look better. But the gooseneck lamps are perfect. Has anyone seen, or have an idea for what I can use for light bulbs? I bought thin beading wire and some clear beads. I'm scared to research making it actually light up, (that's possible) so maybe if someone can point me in the right direction? Thanks~

One of the classic features of the Airplane Coaster were the gooseneck lamps that stood high with that big wide curl. I had NO idea how I was going to make 100+ exact shaped wires. The answer to my question fell in to my lap! Almost literally. I was even more thrilled that is TO SCALE! Fred Church must be really watching over me. I just put these on a sort of a test fit.

I'm about to marry the spiral section with the base of the lift hill. The long white stick is where the track for the lift will be. The others are just fun shots of the crank house and the sprocket/roller assembly for the chain.

This is my first attempt to include a link to you tube. These are clips from the San Diego Giant Dipper restoration set to a music video I made in 1992. Being this close to Fred Church's work has been of immeasurable help with the Airplane.

Do you have any photos posted on TPR? I'd sure like to look at them, I love photos of other coaster models! Tim

That's probably because I'm creating an actual scale model and not some computer generated creation seen only on a screen. Most younger viewers can't comprehend that. It's kind of like, why waste your artistic talent to draw thousands of cells to make an animated film when you can just shortcut on a computer?

More often than not, whenever I’m about to enter a stage of construction…I’ll start…and then I realize that…wait, before I build that, I have to build this first, and before I can put this there, I’ll need to make that part too. And to make that part, I’ll need… You get the idea. That’s what happened to the little lift hill section I built. Before I could permanently thread it though the main spiral structure, I realized I’m going to have to first add everything related to the lower chain drive…or else I won’t be able to reach in there later. And before I do that, I had to make the motor house (see page 14 - the black and white photo). And before that I had to add the extra row of bents that make up the climb to the second hill. This is now that’s coming along so far. I have NO idea why these photos keep flipping to reverse order. The motor house, with board and batten exterior about to be painted and assembled. Test fitting before trimming and painting. This is probably what the motor house looked like new. But this is probably how it looked 25 years later.

That is what I hope to do with it.

Here is a photo of the two pieces placed about where they'll be in relation to each other.

A side view of the base of the lift hill before I start adding the gears and wheels that loop the chain. Since this is a dirty area, and usually neglected cosmetically because of such, I'm showing a little extra dirt and weathering. I'll add some more grease stains after the assembly is completed - you WON'T believe what I'll be using! This small section will get tucked through the spiral I've been building. But to do that I'll have to carve a path...

The lift hill is starting to take shape. I'm building this part now as it will soon become part of the spiral section I'm currently working on - it's supposed to go through the structure where the arrow is.

Here are the most recent pics I took last night of how this part is coming along so far. I was able to finally figure out how I'm going to add steel rail on top of the wood track. I think I found a suitable solution. This is a really hard section because there are so many cross overs in one area. 3 months on this section so far.