a pair of PRR f units moves a passenger train. meanwhile a BN GP9 rolls past me to switch a paper mill
I had a empty house this weekend - and sorted all my spare building parts in all my storage boxes (It's a Libra thing). I also fooled around with a Norscot front end loader. Just need to get that 'new car look' off with some weathering. Now the grain terminal doesn't need the local to move cars for unloading.
Working on a new car for donation to Z Scale layout at the WP Museum in Portola, a Maxon built Woodchip Gondola: Our club is invited to display Z Scale trains at the museum during Railroad Days in 3 weeks, so we are all getting our modules ready for the show.
SAMRA train show last weekend. I'm still trying to post the pictures. By popular request (of the Z scale guys, at least) here is some Z scale at the show. Layout in operation. Jim Hinds (Richmond Controls) and Z scale lighting.
I've managed to get some quickie diesel detailing projects done this summer but have been out of town on a lot of weekends so haven't gotten to post them. I saved up the pictures, though: Chessie GP-30 got correct horn placement courtesy of a couple of the standard Atlas 3-chime N scale horns that I had in the parts box. Chessie GP-7 got correct horn placement and nose bell - I think I'll be ordering more of the Atlas SD-24/26 high-hood bell, as I have a few more geeps from various roads that all seem to need a bell on either the long or short hood. Chessie NW-2 got longer exhaust stacks courtesy of a VO-1000 spare parts sprue. CR GP-15 got a homemade cab signal box. Jeff
Hey, there's Larry Donsbach and his TTrak Z modules! Hi Larry! Question on the C&O Chessie GP's... Is the lettering color black, or dark blue? I have to make some decals for a friend, and cannot tell from the photos I seen online. Thank. Robert
On a recent railfan trip along my Allegheny & Cumberland, I caught this eastbound coal exiting the east end portal of Sand Patch tunnel .....
Hi, Robert. The Chessie GP lettering is dark blue. I've been using Floquil 414260 C&O Enchantment Blue to paint my detail parts and find that it is a good match to the Atlas factory blue paint. Have you looked at http://www.trainweb.org/chessiephotos/ for reference photos? I've found a lot of useful material for modeling Chessie locos there. Jeff
With the Mullan Tunnel shutdown on MRL, there was a lot of re-routed MRL traffic on the BNSF Hi-Line. Here's a BNSF re-routed coal empty crossing the Sheep Creek Trestle at Goat Lick, MT: Another re-routed coal empty, this time at Tunnel 3.7, deep along the Flathead River canyon: A real find was this pair of sequentially-numbered SD40-2's at Coram hauling an empty ribbon rail train: And while this shot is not hard to get, how many railfans have removed shoes and socks, waded across part of the Flathead River to a gravel bar, and shot an EB manifest at this tunnel deep in Bad Rock Canyon? Dig the Warbonnet leader! Oh, BTW, this is only day 1 and 2 of a 4-day railfan blitz!
Nice shots, Hemi! Just how cold was that water................. Looks like it may be a decent place to fish for brook trout AND watch trains.
The water wasn't bad at all--the most treacherous part of the less-than-knee-deep excursion was the algae-covered rocks. It was really slick out there in bare feet. One had to go very slowly and carefully. The shame was that it clouded up about 30 min before SF 677 came thru--and rained a few minutes after the train cleared. We got back to the truck just about the time it came down heavy.
