Welcome back everyone. I hope you all had a nice Christmas weekend and you celebrated any way you could. Let's see if any of you accomplished more than I on this last weekend of 2020. CHRISTMAS: Well it was different this year but still nice. Just easy finger snacks to keep things easy and a brief appearance from the kids and our granddaughter. It was nice to have limited family over for short bursts. We ended the day by eating cheese and crackers and watching my favorite Christmas movie, A Christmas Story. Saturday: Took it easy most of the day. Ang had to work so I mainly cleaned and we later watched a movie. Sunday: I spent most of the day working on the gift for Angela's dad. The body of this RC car is polycarbonate so you paint it from the inside. Those who have dabbled in RC or even slot cars know what I'm talking about. Prepping the body, painting and subsequent detailing of the body took me most of the day but the gift is almost done now which is good cause we will be celebrating Christmas and New Years with him soon. Other then running the Christmas Train, no real modeling was done and that was expected. So how about you? Did you have a good Christmas? Did you get what you wanted? Let us know. Because of New Years this week, we will come together this Thursday, the 31st to start the new year off right and plan our modeling for the new year. Until then, have a great week, stay healthy and safe and as always... High Greens!
I finished my vacant lot by making it a lot less vacant: Some nice scruffy static grass (getting the hang of the thingamadoodle ), a few freshly made trees, bushes and shrubs, and a bit of artistic inspiration with the dirt path splitting it down the middle, using some acrylic artist's paint. I'm fomenting more plots to fill some vacant areas in much the same manner. There's still a week of Christmas vacation left!
Added a few pieces to an ongoing box car project. Boxed up another, as I continue awaiting detail parts to finish and paint. Eyed an ongoing critter project. Decided to change course slightly and do a different cab on it. Otherwise just relaxed and enjoyed a few quiet moments.
Over the weekend I was able to get the first turn of the helix out of staging completed: I'll be doing some additional testing today of the two tracks before I add the next turn of the helix. Still TODO: Add CT coils to the feeders for block detection. Connect feeders to the DCC bus. Add a DCC bus for the main deck (exact placement TBD) Also created the initial work on a 12 channel BOD expansion board for the Esp32OlcbIO board: This will connect up to 12 CT coils and generate occupancy events on the OpenLCB (LCC) bus. The current plan is to use one (or two) of these in the helix to show progress of the train up/down through the helix. On the main deck I'm planning on using a couple of these and RailCom detector boards.
Well, for the long weekend, Friday of course was Christmas, didn't do any modeling. My wife and I had our grown twins over. We all got tested early last week, all were negative and we each quarantined until Christmas day. I grilled a center-cut beef tenderloin, "chateaubriand" and the Mrs. had some great sides and desserts. Between the dinner, boozed-up egg nog, and dinner wine, I did some serious napping as well. Saturday and Sunday I did manage to work on the HW Meyers kit. More ground cover. I am getting close to getting the ground cover where I can permanently mount the buildings and then build the steps/attached sheds and other details that need the buildings "fixed in place". But it is coming along. Also did some permanent wiring for a few the signals I've installed. Have a great week all.
Christmas was nice. Since I had to work Christmas Day we celebrated on Christmas Eve. My weekend started Sunday. I was able to build another kit. The feed mill. As before it still needs paint touch up and decals and weathering like the others. To save paint and time I will do that when everything is finished. Also waiting for the decals I ordered to come in as well. Monday I have to take a test then a Dr appointment. After that I hope to do a little modeling if not in pain too bad. I need to clean up my mess so I can pull out a finished module and do a couple small things on it.
Our Christmas went just about as expected. My wife fixed our seafood favorites - crab for her and lobster for me. We stayed safe at home and had a couple of nice phone / facetime chats with our family. Modeling wise I focused on those bridge abutments. Got the 3D printed bridge shoes on one of the bridges so I could gauge the correct heights. I am making the abutments out of 1/4 inch plywood and hard board with Tamiya putty to fill in any gaps or seams trying to resemble those in some reference photos I have of this particular spot. When comparing to prototype photos I have never been entirely happy with the concrete colored paint that is available so I ordered several bottles of various light shades of gray and am going to try to make these a closer match. One distraction I did have from working on the bridge abutments was that on Christmas Eve my LNWI arrived so I did some running with my phone as a throttle. These things work great and this is nothing to set once you have the app on your phone.
A quiet Christmas here. Did get a little work done on my grain elevator project. Also spent a little time going through some cars that have been boxed up since before we moved to the current house two years ago. Also unboxed a whole box of RR DVD's as well. Slowly making progress on several fronts
Outstanding work! Had a very nice Christmas. Saturday before 6:30 am the neighbor woman "accidentally" knocked of my driver side car mirror. One of the "benefits" is that I have been working on the repair. Less model time. It could have been worse. She said she would pay for it. Part arrives Jan. 6th. Just working along on Omega Scale maintenance and two cabooses. Am making a cutting guide for the sides. We will get it done.
We had a very good weekend. Christmas: We went to our daughter's house. Our granddaughter was beside herself!! Awesome Saturday: I was tasked withe putting together everyone's gifts. Sunday: I worked a bit on my F7 project. Swapped a couple of shells. Installed decoders in an ABBA set. Hope Y'all had a great an d joyous Christmas!! Wolf
Very good weekend overall. We were prepping dinner for a second "household" which made everything a little more complicated and a little slower. All that was good since the prep time is when we are together in the kitchen. The best part of any holiday to me. Spent some time in Garage Bistro with my son on Friday and my wife's aunt and uncle on Saturday. Seemed to work very well. Neighbor received a new drill press for Christmas. Some assembly was required so Sharon and I set the head on the column for him. He is a bit older and it was too much for him. He was excited to drill some holes. That was as much fun as watching a model railroader open a new locomotive. As to accomplishments, my objective was to unwrap some hobby gifts. Check! I won't have to compromise as much to fit those little screws. These knives don't roll around so easily. Pretty sweet gifts actually. Stay safe,
Worked on decaling a 50' Kadee PS Boxcar and a 52'6" Proto 2000 Gondola. Put the finishing touches on an Athearn 2893CF Covered Hopper kit and it is ready for the paint shop. Received a lot of tools for Christmas including pin vises and drills, clamps, hemostats, tweezers, and sanding sticks, can't ever have enough tools! Started work on a Walthers Thrall Gondola kit and am trying to decide on what other car I will build during the week. Rick Jesionowski
Well, it was an interesting weekend! My brother and sister in law came up for a visit on thursday, so that day was largely dedicated to getting ready for them to visit Friday -- was mostly relaxing with family -- I did fiddle with the layout a bit, getting roadbed laid around the main loop Saturday, I had to go get a covid test preperatory to a procedure on monday, I also hit the LHS for a couple more sticks of track and some roadbed. Sunday was mostly relaxing after church, I wasnt feeling real great so I didnt get any work done on the layout Monday, Spent the day at cleveland clinic getting a heart cath done -- turns out I'll be having at least a triple bypass in the next couple weeks so we'll see how much layout work I'll get done Hope you all have a great week TIM
Decals. I finally got started on the decals on two GE models: A long way to go yet, but the decals really make the models come together so I'm inspired once again!
I mostly just ran trains. Did some measurements for the Walthers buildings so we can shim them to Unitrack height. I decided the yard had logistical issues, so I ripped it out. I need run-around tracks to keep my switch engines from getting trapped. Going to have a lot of holes to cover, and a few more to drill. D'oh! . Added tracks to the engine storage side of the yard. Still haven't gotten around to the spackling to raise the roadbed now that I have all the track geometry problems solved. Maybe this week while the yard is under redevelopment. I will need more switches... imagine that. I'm going to have to get a bunch of DS64's for phase 2. Way too many switches to throw for the yard and station. Biggest problem I have now is short circuits due to incorrect switch alignment. Sent from my SM-N950U1 using Tapatalk
