So I went to the train store and they had no caboose stove pipe replacments at all ! I'd have bet this would be the thing they WOULD have in abundence..I was home and tired of looking at my Atlas caboose with the broken off pipe..Then I thought "toothpick scratch build it"..I got a toothpick, cut it for horizontal and vertical parts, laid them flat and dropped white glue on it..Next day solid as a rock..I cut off unwanted glue with the exacto..Then with a huge drill-driver, keeping 1/16" bit plumb I drilled out old plastic shaft R E A L S L O W..Done...slowly pushed new shaft in place with a little more glue on...next day colored it with.....a black marker pen...leaving the ends un covered( more sky-like)..Perfect results first time !! That was a week and a half ago.. Today I'm in Starbucks and a dad is carrying his little boy of 6-7 who's holding what ? The very same caboose with what ? A broken off stove pipe !! I got their attention by saying " Hey, that's an HO caboose, huh !? " Dad stopped and I told him this story about mine and that of all the different types of cabooses, his and mine were identical except that his was the high-end Walthers with great detail, hand grabs and trucks and mine is an old cheaper Atlas ! The little boy had a better caboose than me..!! We laughed and all and I gave dad a list of clubs to take his son to in L.A.... You might say with this hobby, " What goes around, comes around " and in many ways and forms !
