Random picture from the layout. We have a couple of boxcars unloading the the team dock. It looks like someone had one of those “truck stop torpedos” for lunch…… Thank you Tom and Mike for the compliments, I am getting better at restraint when it comes to weathering cars. Not everything out there is a rust bucket! FYI, as of Friday last week I retired and am spending way more time in the train room. So I can start some projects I have lined up. In the paint shop row is a SD 45 to be de rated and painted in SKOL colors. A GP 40 that will get the same treatment and our newest locomotive will be receiving a patch over from UP to WAMX to be included in the OPS line up. I also have another SD 60 that has been stripped and primed, it may get the new WAMX scheme in yellow and black. I haven’t quite made up my mind on that. Coming in last will be another 44 Ton switcher at the port. I have a source that thinks there may have only been 1 of them used, but I’m pretty sure I have seen a picture of 2 of them. Busy Days ahead!
Photo of the patched SD 60 soon to be on the layout! Provided by my friend Zach Hilton real life throttle jockey and technical advisor on all things SKOL and all around great guy!
Congrats on the retirement Dale!!! Enjoy it. Nice looking scene and sounds like you have some fun projects coming up.
Congrats on the un-tiredment Dale. I had to retire. Not my idea, but I am liking it so far. I sure miss pulling a throttle and most of the guys I worked with, but man, I dont miss those 01:00 calls. Now I dont know how I ever had time to work. Great to see your progress.
I added a tail track and drop-down section at the end of the peninsula to get rid of that abrupt end of track out the back of Gavilon West elevator. Then Fastenal decided it would be an excellent place for a new store location. More pictures once I get it done. See you all soon! Dale
Last Saturday son Sean and I were coming home from the train club and got caught on the wrong side of the tracks in Owasso. We got to watch the SKOL put the southbound haulage from Kansas away in the yard. There was quite a bit of back and forth on the south end of the yard and 76th street was blocked for a bit. We noticed a hopper car used for gypsum transport coming south, but what really made it stand out was the word “hole” painted on the A end and an arrow pointing at the A end of the car. So, not letting a chance to put something unique on the layout slip by (especially at no cost)…… Sources say it was easier to spray paint the car than weld a piece of steel over the hole….. Proving once again, there is a prototype for everything! Have a good weekend everyone!!! Dale
That is really neat Dale. Nice work. I trust when you say "caught on the wrong side of the tracks", that you mean the bad sunlight side?
Wellllll, we were on the opposite side from the hobby shop we have in town! Small, but he does have some items.
Ok! I tried to upload some pictures of the on-going expansion of the layout that will include Owasso Oklahoma and the SKOL yard there. Pushed the wrong button and the rest is history! I’ll regroup and post again! Thank you Michael for the moral support!!! LOL
I have begun the expansion of our layout to include operations of the SKOL railroad that connects to the port from Owasso Oklahoma. The attached photos will show you where I’m trying to go with this. If you Google maps Owasso, on the west side of downtown is the WATCO SKOL yard. You will also see the wye and the spur that runs about 5 miles southeast to the Port of Catoosa. While I can’t do the yard true justice, I can get enough track in to allow for operations. You see there are 5 tracks in the yard. Track 1 on the west side of the yard serves as an arrival and departure track. Looking at the first photo you will see track 1 is actually agains the wall. Where you would be standing you are viewing the yard from the west side. All the photos orient so left is North and West and right is East and South. This differs from the Port side of the layout as North in there is really North. The room is 12.5’ by 12.5’ and we go around the walls. The rail height is approximately 53” off the floor. Sure makes it easy to work underneath. We have run one OPS Session on it with 4 crew for both the port and Owasso. The session ran almost 4 hours. The next session will call for 5 or 6 crew. We also have 4 spots to switch on the section, Green Hill (rock quarry and cement delivery), Ash Grove Cement (storage silo), Bama Pie (flour), American Alloy Steel. Bama and America are located on Cherokee Industrial Park. SKOL shoves cars out and pulls them back. There are no runaround tracks out there. I will locate the photos below. Overall layout of room. This is staging area right now, that will move as soon as I get more benchwork built. At the right end you see the blue silos for Bama Pie, and beyond that is American Alloy. This is the middle to north end of Owasso yard. South end of Owasso and the 76th Street North crossing. The port spur where it crosses US Highway 169. To the left is Bama and American Alloy.The center 2 tracks are the north end of yard tracks 1 and 2. The far right track is staging for BNSF. This is the midsection of Owasso. The south end and Ash Grove Cement. The last photo link is where we run down the hallway to the Port of Catoosa, Green Hill is a trailing point switch on the return trip. A turn to the port takes a minimum of 40 minutes time. That is the fastest we can run it. Well, this was a long post and if you got this far my hat is off to you! Thank you for looking! I’ll put more up as I progress! Dale
