The Empire Starts..............Sorta

Well, I've decided to do it. It all started a couple of months ago when I was at a flea market in a near by town (I live up in the mountains 27 miles from the nearest stop light). I spotted a box with HO train track on top. Underneath the track was a bunch of turnouts and below that were 8 assorted cars and then some engines. I thought back to when my boys were still kids and we built a layout on a piece of plywood. I'm now 66 years old and over the years I've thought about building another one. Never actually got around to doing anything except very occasionally buying a Model Railroad magazine. So there it was, the makings of a layout. I offered the guy $15 for the box of “junk”.Sold!.


To make a long story a tad shorter, I have a spare room (some would call it a junk room). I cleared it out a bit so I could actually walk into it. I found the desk under a bunch of boxes and turned it into my railroad “workshop”. I then set of my photography outfit so as to sell a few things on the bay to finance my, only in my head, railroad empire.


I'm want to build an around the room layout with a duck under. I'm going to use code 83 for the mainline and code 70 for everything else. It's going to take a while to accumulate the track and turnouts to even start. So in the mean time I'm going to build a switching layout on a piece of left over 30” x 72” flooring material with the code 100 that came in the box. It will also give me time to hone my model building skills.


So far I've just tacked down my track with pins what waiting for a couple of pieces of flex track. I needed cork for roadbed in the “yard” and found some 3/16” squares at a hardware store for $.69 each. Way cheaper than regular model railroad cork. With my track plan, I should be able to move 3 car cuts to most anywhere on the layout. I tried my hand at weathering, but I as of yet have no model paints. I made a wash using printer ink and alcohol. I made rust with red clay dirt from my front yard and alcohol. I put the black wash in an old cologne spray bottle that had a very fine mist spray. Worked great! Anyway, here is a picture of my “weathered” box car. Obviously the railroad isn't spending much on maintenance.



I'll keep you posted on my progress.

 

Looks like a good start on the empire and great weathering on that boxcar.

 

Oh i like it very much. i always admire someone using what they have at hand instead of having to buy everything new. Good job!

 

I must confess to having purchased some weathering powders today. I was at Dollar General today and as I was looking for tooth paste I noticed some $1 eye shadow things with 8 colors per plastic box. Some pretty nice rust and brown colors. I'm not altogether sure why the ladies would want to "weather" their eye lids, but what do I know. Anyway, I spent $2 on my finds. Well, they really work quite well. You can "weather" a set of trucks in less than 60 seconds. As soon as I find some dull cote, I'll set the colors so they wont come off.

 

Today the mailman brought my flex track and a pair of track cutters. I figured I should get some track cutters or I'd just be mangling my track. So now I can start lying my track, weathering the rails and painting the ties. I also listed my weathered box car on the bay just to see if someone will give me $7.50 for it. You just never know.

 

I glued down a bit of the track last night and ran into a problem. It appears some of the turnouts I got in my flea market find don't work well. My SW 7 stalls going over them. So, I may have to buy (choke) some turnouts. I like Pecos and wanted some advice as to whether I should get insulfrog or electrofrog. DCC might come in the future, so I want to plan ahead for that possibility. Need some advice here. I'm getting old and would like to finish this layout before they fit me with a toe tag.

 

I think the electrofrogs can be tricky at first because they route power through the rails coming off the frog according to how the switch is thrown. It means you have to add more wiring to your layout and also put in insulators or you get track that can short out.

Does your Sw7 only have power pick up on one truck? Maybe you can rig it to pick up on both trucks. On my N scale layout I used all wheel pick up deisels and I did not run power to the metal frogs on my siwtches; I never had problems.

 

Power isn't getting passed some of the switches at all. I don't have any trouble with my Atlas switches. So I'm thinkin' those switches are just junk (you get what you pay for) and I suppose those junk switches cost me about 25 cents a piece. Therefore, some new switches are in order and Pecos are spring loaded, unlike the Atlas switches. Being that I'm on a meager amount of SS, I figure I can get 2 a month, maybe more if I sell a few things on EBay. If my weathered boxcar sells, maybe I'll weather a few more.

 

Peco switches will not let you down. The spring loads are fantastic I agree.

If the track in the cheapies is working and it's just a power issue, why not add more feeder wires and just use em? I suppose they are laid now so you can't look underneath to read what brand they are huh?

As to the low funds. I've been under employed for some time now and I plot and wait for that special item. I had my eye on a train engine I had to have and waiting for it has made it even sweeter. It's been around ten years now I think. Last night i ordered it. It was my first new purchase in years, everything else has been super low priced deals off ebay.

I scrounged all the lumber for my layout bench work from alleys. The screws were left over from home repair projects. Most of my trains are old 70's era stuff.

So yeah, just build what you need to the best of your abilities. Save some cash for that special item you want. In the end you'll have a really wonderful layout.

That's cool you're selling weathered cars. I found my weathered cars sold for more money on ebay.

I guess I'm preaching to the choir here but I always love to hear that other people are scrounging up a layout. It's kind of fun.

 

The problem switches are Casaido. The frogs are 1/4 " longer than Atlas and the rail color is a tad different than Atlas. I could put in a feeder wire to the dead section, but they are right at the front of the layout and don't look good to begin with. Looks like by the end of the week, I will have sold enough spare junk on E bay to buy maybe 4 Pecos. Besides, they will be transferable to the big layout (when I start building it) as I can use code 100 in the hidden staging area. I hope the boxcar sells. Seems to me $6.99 is reasonable.

 

Well, I ordered 2 Pecos today. I may have enough from my ebay sales to get 3 more next week. Looks like part of my problem was my sw12 Athearn. It appears it doesn't have all wheel pick up. I had a old FP7 and it ran much better over the problem areas. It has all wheel pick up. I will need to buy a switcher some time after the track is laid. Since my big layout will be SP in the mid 1950s (both steam and diesel). I'm thinking a GP9 in black widow colors. What are your opinions of Proto 2000, Athearn Genesis, Atlas/Kato? Other suggestions?

 

My ebay sales have been going pretty good. I had lots of junk that I have no use for. Lots of payment hit, so I ordered 4 more Peco turnouts. When they all get here, I will be able to lay most of my track. I'm thinking of eliminating the run around track on the mainline as I have one in the yard. Take a look at pic #3 in my first post and tell me what you think of the idea.

 

Well I'd keep the run around in the switching area just because eventually you'll be having trains running on that mainline.

As to loco brand names, all those brands are good. I have heard some issues with cracked gears in Life likes, but if you search this forum for cracked gears it is probably specific to certain locos only.

I look forward to more photos.

 

My first 2 Peco turnouts arrived today. I've glued them down and now am waiting for it to dry before adding some track to them. At least by this evening I'll be able to run my switcher around a bit. I might even take a pic or two. I'm still mulling over the idea of just having a run around track only in the switching yard. Does save the cost of 2 turnouts. As it is, I still will need a few more turnouts to finish up the yard and the industrial area. I still have to think about the cost of the structures for the town, the engine facility (coaling tower, water tank, sanding, and a diesel pump and storage tank). And then structures for the industrial area, not to mention a run down engine shed.

 

I didn't get all the track laid tonight that I could have. But I did take a quick pic just for grins. I did a quick back ground just to make it look better. The local switcher just set out a boxcar on a siding in the little moutain town of Piney Creek while the through freight from the west slows down a tad to go by the station. You'll have to excuse the pin in the track.

 

You can probably ebay most of the buildings you are looking for. AHM used to make a decent coaling tower kit. You might be able to find one used for pretty cheap.

Thanks for the pic. The buildings I see there look pretty nice.

 

I'll probably kit bash or scratch build most of the structures. The clunky molded plastic shingle roofs will have to go and be replaced with new roof with Campbell roll shingles. Also many of the windows in kits are pretty clunky looking too. The downtown area will be modeled roughly on the downtown of Truckee Calif where I lived at one time. It has a mixture of 2 story brick and wood buildings. Some of the DPM structures will work just fine, some I'll have to scratch build or find wood kits. The time frame of this practice layout with be about 1956. It will be the fictitious town of Piney Creek and the SP passes through there on it's way over the Sierra. Piney Creek flourished during the 1940's as timber and some mining contributed to the war effort. But buy the middle 1950 Piney Creek was in decline as many of the younger folks move away to the larger cities in California where there is more opportunity. So there will have a bit of a run down look to it.

 

I have this old MRC transformer, but I can find nothing about it on the net. Anyone know anything about it? Seems to work great.