Good Morning, good evening, where ever you may be. Welcome back to the gateway to the weekend! I hope you all had a great week and like me, are ready to do some model railroading. Let's get started. Saturday: I plan to get off work a bit early today and my main motivation is to work on the HO shelf layout I started last fall. I would like to get hardboard sides mounted and smooth out the top, fill in any cracks and prep the top for paint. I'm taking Angela out for dinner tonight as Sunday's high of 3 degrees has us hibernating on Valentines Day. This should give me the reprieve I need to work on train projects. If all goes well, Saturday will be spent painting the top of the layout and drawing out the track lines. Sunday: As stated earlier, the high is supposed to be 3 degrees, air temp even lower with winds projected to be 10 to 15 MPH out of the NW. A good day to enjoy a hot cup of Earl Grey and some train videos for inspiration. With the anticipation of inspiration, I hope to start laying the Micro Engineering code 70 HO track and turnouts along with soldering all the track feeders. There are only three turnouts on this layout, and they will be hand thrown for simplicity. Any spare time will be spent looking through the Walthers catalog and trying to decide which industries to choose. So how about you? What is on your list of things to get done in the train room? Let us know. We'll assemble again on Monday the 15th to see how we all did. Until then, have a great weekend, be safe, stay healthy and and as always... High Greens!
Happy Friday all. Other than Valentines duty this week, I plan on spreading some love into the trainroom as well. 1. Maintenance. Track cleaning. Plan trying out the combo of the CMX tank machine and dragging a centerline cleaner behind to "mop up". I have read this works really well, so may as well put this equipment to work! 2. Getting back to some buildings and advancing some details and progress. 3. The Digitrax DB220 I ordered last weekend is due to arrive tomorrow. So, time permitting, I will get that hooked and paralleled with the DCS 200. DISCLAIMER: As always, the morning cup of coffee tomorrow "coupled" w/ a brain-cramp or 2 can certainly alter any or all of the above.
WIth rain and declining temperatures all weekend, I may get a crack at the layout, after I cover the plants so the tropical ones don't freeze Sunday night.
FRIDAY I've taken care of the most important thing. I've had flowers delivered already. Since we are still not vaccinated, we are still in quarantine. (PA is ranked 49th for vaccine roll out. Way to go!) That being the case I'll be making a Valentines card tonight. I should finish up the temp control panel tonight. SATURDAY Test out the control panel. If all goes well, I'll straighten up my little train room, put the boxes of extra track and wiring stuff back in the attic. After that locate the Structo Lite and Sculptamold, mix up some samples to see if they are still good after all these years and do a very simple test diorama. SUNDAY Since the move to This Old Dump six years ago, my acrylic paints are still in several locations. The plan is to gather them in one spot, get a bottle count and start on a mixing chart while watching Daytona 500. If the diorama is dry, put on a base coat of earth colored paint.
After finishing up my St.LSW FT project - I may get back to my layout. I have some turnout motors to re-install. Report on Monday Y'all have a great weekend, Wolf
Somethings this weekend are weather dependent. According to the weather mystics we have a chance of a wintery mix on Saturday and freezing rain on Sunday. If the weather is not bad, the wife wants to go look for a pair of Guinea pigs. Our Guinea pig of almost six years passed away a couple weeks ago. On the layout I need to start cutting wood to build the frame for the extension this weekend. If all goes well begin laying pink foam.
Good morning all, Rainy weekend forecast here as well. My wife and I are still being very very careful because of the China virus and will stay home. I will try to get out to HD early Sunday morning when there should be few people there to pickup some tempered hard board to complete the fascia for the recent layout expansion. That has been a hold up and when I get that I can spend Sunday installing it and begin to get that area finished. Other than that I plan to continue work at the bench on some Military vehicles and a couple of flat cars I have started while running some trains on the layout. Got some paints on the way as well as more 3D printed vehicles. Hope you all enjoy the weekend whatever you are doing and stay healthy.
Tom, Mainline Animal Rescue may have Guinea pigs. They are on PA 113 Chester Springs/Phoenixville area. The website only lists cats and dogs, but I know they have all sorts of animals, large and small. They have amazing facilities and wonderful staff. Good luck with whatever you decide.
Wet weekend predicted in the ATL as well. Have some curb side picks to do for the wife tomorrow morning. No other venturing out that I am aware of. Have chocolates and cards for the wife and will probably cook up one of her favorites for Sunday. For the rest of the weekend, plan to run trains while I finish decaling some pick up trucks I started a couple of weeks ago and then see what I can do with the grain elevator project. Probably work on the rolling stock inventory as well. Getting close on that project Got my fist of the 2 shots yesterday afternoon. Arm is a tad sore today and just starting to get a mild headache as I type this. About right on what the nurse said I should expect. Hopefully that won't affect any plans. You all have a great weekend. Be safe and have fun!
The big objective is, again, to make some really small holes. After pondering the setup required, I am now awaiting materials. Tracking says the package should arrive tomorrow. Only time will tell. Meanwhile I have a Valentine's Day gift to prepare. With Sharon helping her mom I am under no pressure to get that ready. I will fill the time sorting some stuff into "On hand" and "Storage" categories. If that goes well it will be off to the storage unit. Then finish rearranging the local shelves in the workspace. Any bonus time I earn will be spent setting up power supplies and throttles followed by some loco prep. A full report due on Monday. Stay safe,
No modeling time for me this weekend, prepping for new gigabit ethernet wiring, a 6U cabinet for my NAS, FTTH ONT, wired Router and Switch. TDS tore out my sprinkler system and ran fiber, so I signed up for the 600Gbs plan locked into the 300Mbs price for life deal. Going from 40Mbs DSL, I should be able to stream 4K easily.
At last the four boxcars in the "car shop" got upgraded. I began testing operations with longer consists and have experienced friction issues. More research is needed. We will get 'er done. Also, pondering the next project. So many to choose from. All be well and Happy Valentines'.
Well spent most of the day waiting for my wife to have her colonoscopy then it is to bowling tonight. Going to the club for the first time in weeks to run a few trains and then I plan on painting some cars this Saturday. Sunday will be decaling along with car construction. Rick Jesionowski
No modeling this weekend. Had to make a quick trip up to the Armadillo Ranch to blow out the water system before the big freeze. Don’t want to go through the broken pipes rodeo again. Got a nice fire going to enjoy things while here.
Today was prep day for a visit from the NMRA on Saturday. I finally received the fence material amd some UPS vehicles and figures I ordered two weeks ago. I spent the morning installing all that. Saturday will be spent working with three evaluators to get some models evaluated for the AP program. Sunday I hope to get a little more work done Then I go into my long work week where most of it is spent in a hotel. I hope to get some modeling done there as well.
I am hoping to make some progress for my mini-switching/diorama layout (18" X 60"). I had some scale lumber for the trestle come in and managed to get some basic ground cover down during the week:
Sunday, wife will decide if she wants to go out for chinese (her favorite sweet and sour chicken) or maybe I'll just get takeout. Beyond that, there's work around the house and I'll try to get some structure modeling done. BTW, I generally don't post here on Mondays. Instead, I post about my progress on the Winter Layout Party thread.
My original plans were to assemble an ESP32 CS PCB this morning but due to the Chinese Lunar New Year celebrations my parts are not going to arrive until likely Monday. So with the plans being changed up today will be a bit of work related activities this morning followed by an NMRA Zoom get together. The only other plans for this weekend are to get our seeds started for the garden so we can get them in the ground at the end of March or early April.
This is perfect weather for a great indoor hobby! I plan to finally unpack the box I received a few days ago, which contains some HOn30 car kits. With any luck, I might even get started on assembling one...
