Well as NPR's Car Talk Guys would say, it's happened again. Another weekend is in the past. Not as productive as I wanted for me. I spent most of Saturday deep cleaning and packing. By Saturday afternoon I realized no shops in my area sold Woodland Scenics Foam Risers so hopefully I can get those at the Springfield show. Later that night I sat and watched my Patriots win. Sunday I did start my progress thread in the N scale forum and I started cleaning up the work shop getting ready for the big move. How about you? Maybe you got a bit more done on your layout. Any shows? Progress on structures. Anybody see some real trains? Leave your responses below and any pictures you may have of your progress. We'll do it again this Friday the 20th. ​High Greens!
Your Patriots? And here I thought they were my Patriots. Anyway, football season is ideal for certain types of modeling, the ones that allow me to work upstairs in the train room slash family room, like doing interiors and light assemby work on structures. I sit on the couch with parts spread over the coffee table, tools on one side and beer on the other, and watch the game. I did get the first "booster" layer on top of the Mooseport area. The Proto 87 girder rail I'm using for the street running track needs a 5/16 lift above the base level to bring it up to the railhead height of Atlas Code 83 flex track on top of WS foam roadbed. So, I'm using 3/16 foamboard and 1/8 inch hardboard to keep the track level. (I may have those numbers wrong - something seems off. Anyway, I got this seedy waterfront bar pretty much finished: It's at the front of the layout, so I did the interior and installed lighting, too.
I installed some track feeders and turnout controll wiring. Not complete as I still have over half the layout to do and then actually run the DCC power bus and actually connect the feeders. I also installed the addidtional shelving outside the train room. For now, this is the holding area for my locomotive empire (to me it is an empire) they are destined for the someday attic layout and some at the club. I still have 16 locos in boxes that are stowed away as these are waiting DCC & Sound, mainly SD70MAC locos. Long term plan for this shelving is for additional holding area for rail cars for the basement layout. So nothing too fancy but it is modeling progress: For those who suggested I had way too many locos for the layout, this next photo show the motive power for the basement layout less two locos (two MN Commercial
Here are some photos of the wiring mess in progress: Also repaired my grain elevator that took a spill while stored outside the train room onto the concrete floor.......good as new (pretty much)
Ha ha, eh, I have an in with the Kraft family. No not really. Still working on a way to put a Patriots logo in my Potter Place portion of the layout, however since it's 1976, it will have to be the old logo, not the "Flying Elvis" of today.
I got my ballasting/weathering done on a replacement area of track and turnouts, and started work on my scratchbuilt strip shopping center. It's three stores, and I need to come up with some tenant ideas...
I weathered my track in the area of my paper mill, as well as cut and painted parking areas for the mill. Also built my Deluxe trailers. Now trying to find some appropriate trucking decals for them.
Made the abutments and painted and weathered the Lemon Creek pony truss bridge for the Slocan sub. Rust weathering was via the "salt technique" described by Tom Mann. ...and the prototype in a shot by my friend Scott Calvert who models the area in HO. md
I got the new On30 0-4-0 Porter on the programming track and fiddled around a bit with the settings, and one of my daughters perked up hearing the sounds and so I showed her how to run it on a piece of test track.
My dad finally got sick of my hobby stuff intruding on his space, so he finally gave in and gave me my own space. Two tables worth of space and some shelves that I need to clear off. One of which will be where I'm putting my N-Scale switching layout which I worked on a bit, although my main focus has been my 16"x24" On30 layout. Now, the question is where will all my RC stuff go when spring comes around?
Thank you for the kind compliment. No secret. The bridge is my first try at using the "salt technique" Tom Mann explains in his weathering book (available from Amazon or Lulu). Basically under-coat with rust and grime, wet the model, sprinkle on crushed sea salt to act as a mask where you want rust flaking and blistering, overcoat with final colour, then brush the sea salt away. The book is beautiful btw...as I have to start weathering my fleet pretty soon, I needed all the help I can get! md
Thanks for the pointer. I too have a fleet of way too shiny freight cars and locos Sounds like a great reference tool, thanks.
I built more trees, this time from Bumpy Chenille. I had to revise my technique so they don't look like bowling pins. I'm pretty stoked about the way they turned out. I'll have to do a tutorial.
I lowered exactly two N Scale freight cars this weekend - one Roundhouse/MDC 50 foot boxcar, and one very old Trix gondola for the MOW fleet. I used appropriate Atlas trucks with factory installed Accumates and then went for FVM wheels. LAziness compelled me not to take photos, but perhaps I'll do a batch later this week.
I am having a heck of a time finding this book on Google or Amazon. Any help would be appreciated, is "Weathering" the title?
