We had a fun and busy weekend. On Saturday we took the train into Philadelphia and visited the Christmas Carol display in Macy’s (used to be John Wanamaker’s). The display uses dolls and animatronics to tell the story. The display started out in Lits Department store and sometime after Lits closed Strawbridge & Clothier took over the display. It stayed at Strawbridge’s through the different owners until Macy’s bought them. Macy’s closed the old S&C store and moved the display to their new store at the old Wanamaker’s store. We also had lunch in the café and watched the Holiday Light Show from our table. Sunday we had to go and order new in the wall double ovens. Our top oven is no longer maintaining the set temperature thus nothing will cook in it. Here are a couple of shots from the Light Show. I worked some on installing grab irons on the Walthers coil cars. After breaking two 0-80 drill bits and losing a couple of grab irons I came to the conclusion that installing them is just not worth it. Also the drilling is very tedious and eventually my hands ache too much. When I apply the 3 foot rule the cars look fine without them. I did, however, add the railings to the hoods since it involved no drilling. I began painting them.
I'm struggling with my first Central Valley turnout. I build it not following strong the instructions, I make some modifications of course. :angel: Wolfgang
Another 10 feet or so ballasted. Preliminary cuts made into the foam for the river. Next: Adding hills and topography changes.
AAAARRRRGGGGHHHH!!!! I had planned to finish laying/gluing down the track and roadbed in my combined yard/industrial area. HOWEVER, after staring at it for a couple of hours before starting, I decided that I wasn't really happy with it. Access to the yard was by a very sharp curve (about 7" radius) under a bridge. Also under the bridge was a road and a small river, between hills, hence the sharp curve to fit it all in. WELL, I decided to redesign the area. I moved the access road to the industries to the other end of the yard and enlarged the curve to about 10" radius. This will require me to slice about 2 inches from the mountain. Luckily the area is bare foam with no scenery done yet! Opening up the curve then required me to redesign the whole yard and industrial section. That's done and it looks better. SO, the weekend is over and no progress was made. BUT, now I have my plans for NEXT weekend. Dave.
I am modifing two Demi Sugar Beet cars I got at different shows and never put together. First I cut the tops off and turned them around so the bracing is on the outside. Looking at photos and a DVD of Sugar Beet trains, several cars are done like this, maybe after a rebuilding or replacement of old rotten wood.
If you look at the older cars on the end at the top, you can see what I mean about the braces being reversed. [ame="http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zGtBuRf0TbM"]YouTube - Sugar Beet Train part 2[/ame]
I relearned the art of tile laying, in this case 12-inch granite tiles. First batch of mortar was too thick, causing me to invent new swear words. Second batch was too thin, posing another set of problems. Got about 20 sq. feet done, with 90 sq. ft. to go. I'm doing it one counter at a time, so as not to destroy kitchen operations during the holiday season.
O.C.Eng'r/Jerry, Without a doubt you've captured the essence of the SP Beet cars. In my hometown of Hollister, CA., I used to go down to the station and watch them bring in the empty sugar beet cars. Of course it wasn't long before local politics and farmers went head to head and the city folk won out. Most of the car loads including stock for cattle, tankers for two oil companies, reefers for the canneries slowly died out. If memory serves me correctly it was in the late 50's when farmers gave up growing sugar beets. It wasn't long before the loaders were removed followed by the track. However, most of the tracks are still in town serving the last cannery and a leather goods outfitter. Time will tell. The spur line into Hollister would make for a great point to point model railroad. Hemi, I do like your Rio Grande Units. Nice work. Do try and keep them clean...grin!
Pete .. would love to see the finished product .. I am planning on doing the same thing .. so lessons learned are good .. now back to the regularly scheduled thread ..
Thanks, Rick! Based on the era I model, I'll keep a set clean, as they wouldn't be very old. I'll dust up the trucks and tanks, but that's about it.
Nothing this weekend- I battled a cold that hit me Thursday night, and I spent all my spare time Sunday in bed, doped up on Nyquil, shaking this crap off. Musta worked, since I went to work last nite feeling fine.
Below are a couple images of the weekend sound decoder installation project. Now 2 of my P2K BNSF GP60s are full fledge sound units. These two units will be run together at all times so the speakers were installed on opposite sides to spread the sound (ie. the speaker in the lead unit was mounted on the left and in the the trailing unit on the right). Here is the annoying video clip of the test run. [ame="http://www.dailymotion.com/video/x3qagc_bnsf-with-newly-fitted-sound-decode_family"]Video BNSF with newly fitted sound decoders - BNSF, SF, GP60, Locomotive - Dailymotion Share Your Videos@@AMEPARAM@@value="http://www.dailymotion.com/swf/66CVB9uDtdObqqhVG"@@AMEPARAM@@http://www.dailymotion.com/swf/66CVB9uDtdObqqhVG[/ame]
Quote from Tompm: "I worked some on installing grab irons on the Walthers coil cars. After breaking two 0-80 drill bits and losing a couple of grab irons I came to the conclusion that installing them is just not worth it. Also the drilling is very tedious and eventually my hands ache too much. When I apply the 3 foot rule the cars look fine without them. I did, however, add the railings to the hoods since it involved no drilling. I began painting them." Use a #78 or 77 bit instead of the #80, the CA will fill the hole and once you touch up the grabs you won't even see the slightly larger hole and you won't break as many bits. It also makes it easier to insert the grabs, you can adjust them after the glue dries.
I'm sort-of back! Must be the whole Warmer Weather gig; I start thinking about trains again... The trip to California and spending loads of money on real cheap stuff (usd75 for an engine? Instead of up to 120-150?) has nothing to do with it! Looked around my office / library / computer room / "train room" and decided I could probably redecorate. Before: or (click for larger version. wow I'm a bad photographer!)
During: or (again click to enlarge; still bad photography :camera: ) All photos taken from the same point (doorway). I might post some "after" photos tomorrow, after I've put up more shelves; and when the lighting is better. Sun sets about 8pm this month, so means I need to haul out the camera before then. Left is old shelves (well, the brackets), and right is all new shelves, all new holes in the wall for the shelves. If the brackets are rated at 55kg per 20cm (120lb per 8" ), how many books can I have before the wall breaks? edit: These really belong in Monday 17 December's thread. My bad.
