Weekend Update - 1-04-2009

[John]

Welcome to 2009 . So what have you been working on. For me, I actually got the lower level main line back in operation and the track cleaned. I enjoyed a great morning of roundy roundy ..I also worked a bit on basic land forms ..

I completed a Walthers bridge and put it into benchwork



This next photo is the area where I am doing most of the work.

[up1950s]

[Puddington]

Been watching the World Junior Hockey Tourniment - got "into the spirit"...so to speak....



Puddington Valley Transport owner Rob Roberts is a hockey fan....!

(I had to do something easy after my three car plastic melt down !)

[central.vermont]

Well things are moving right along on the CV. Here's what I have so far.

Got this nice little CV reefer from my buddy John N.!!!!

Thanks John!!!!
01/03/09



With some help............let me rephrase that A LOT OF HELP!!!!!!! from Pete and John the CV got some preliminary wiring done. 1/03/09


The helix under the stairs got some attention too this week. The main line is now connected (track in foreground) , as well as the yard lead (middle track) are now connected. The passenger main lead (third track) has had the cork put down and some preliminary placing of switches for a couple of sidings to see how well they will fit. I have placed a couple of pieces of the Atlas C55 21.25" full section sectional track in place for the future release of their curved switch. 01/03/09


That's it til' next week.
Jon

[davefoxx]

This week, I completely overhauled and Beardenized five locomotives that had many hours of running time before being put into storage for the last few years, including a repowering of this Life Like GP18 with an Atlas GP9 frame and DCC decoder.  All five units are running like new, perhaps better.



Sorry about the quality of the picture.  I tried for several minutes of different exposures to get a shot where the numberboards were properly lit and not washed out by the LED headlight.  Without wanting to waste any more time trying to take pictures guessing at how long to power the headlight, I settled for this shot.  Oh well, better luck next time.

Dave Foxx

[diezmon]

I had in-laws here for what seems like forever... finally getting back to the SD9 chop.

more details...


filling in numberboards with my scotch tape trick...

[Ian MacMillan]

Not much for me, kept hanging drywall and my Conrail GP15-1's came in. Man are these locos sweet.

Maybe sometime in the next two weeks I'll get the numberboards painted white and the white sill stripe added.

[wm3798]

Dave,
When I take a shot like that, I do a time exposure, then simply flip the direction of the loco to reverse to douse the headlight and number boards after a fraction of a second.  Leaves enough illumination to light things up, but not so much to blow it out.



I built a simple decoder tester... basically a motor on a stand, two light boards, with everything wired to a line of terminal screws.  Power can be alternated between the program track feed for programming and read back, and track power for testing of directional lighting and motor function.  This is done with the toggle switch in front.



Lee

[Hyperion]

Started work on my BN Executive F45s.  Here the two are posed along with the SD60.

I ended up settling on a scheme more reminiscent of the actual one used on the F7s than the one used on the MACs.  I had to use the wider stripe to match up with the cars I've already gotten started on.  And, though I wanted to use the same "arc'd" paint on the front, I didn't have the decals to do it (the 90* pinstripe arcs on the MACs won't work because of the wider stripe).  I will also probably not put the unit number on the stripe, but rather use the same small gold-type unit number on the lower rear flank that the actual F-series had.

Still got a lot of overspray I've got to work on on the upper unit in particular.  I'm not sure what happened there to have so much of it.

[tom mann]

I will never be able to work on trains again, thanks to a discovery of a leaky window in the basement bathroom:

[up1950s]

I had that problem Tom . I solved it by tilting my gutter to drain towards the front of the house , the way the ground flows naturally , instead of the back , and from there created a drainage ditch to let that water drain to the front of the property line . The ditch is now covered with grass and against the fence so it really isn't noticeable . I also banked the area next to the house so the water doesn't flow down the cellar wall .

[central.vermont]

Tom,
Now's the time to put that hole through the wall for the outdoor railroad! ;D ;D

Jon

[daniel_leavitt2000]

Heh heh... wow, thats a new type of "toilet bowl stain" Tom, eh? So how did you weather that!  ;D I feel for ya, my basment takes on water every major rain storm. Before I start the layout or renovations, i'll need to trench around the house including part of the driveway, install a series of sump pumps, drill out approx 750 feet of floor cracks and re-cement... then i can START waterproofing! Needless to say the layout is i few years away.

Anyway, new for this week:
My SW1500 is almost finished.

Body work mostly done.







And a GP10 to go along.

Old photo.
This engine is actually done now, except for truck and fueltank weathering. I'll take additional photos this week.

Other projects: I just started work on the Bay Colony S2 that was stored in Newton untill being scrapped a few years ago. I am awaiting a few Bachmann 44 tonners to paint into some local roads. I have been placing some custom painted engines on eBay, but they were not going for as much as I had hoped. Maybe I just suck at painting/weathering.

[atsf_arizona]

SNFF 2009 01 04

Hi, all,

I'm working on updating my layout web site, which hasn't been updated since January 2006:

http://home.comcast.net/~j.sing/Peavine_Layout_Overview.html

I haven't actually done it yet, just started assembling pictures.
For this week, some shots from the 'raw material' pile:

















Perhaps will have the update done in a week or so.  Things to add
include: detailing in the past 2 years, experience with adding
DCC, how are the Unitrack Unijoiners and electrical conductivity
holding up.

Have a good week, all!

[sirenwerks]

Daniel,

The Geep 10 looks great (and so does the SW1500). Which later model cab face did you use for GP10's face? And did you lower the high nose, or use the short nose that came with the cab face you used? I have 4 GP9s I want to lower the nose on and am looking for an easy way out. (And no, Lee, I don't want the cyclops look.)