PRR/Conrail Juniata Division Engineering Report

[Dave V]

When I first built the layout about six years ago, I intentionally avoided modeling specific prototype PRR scenes, opting instead for a more generic Pennsy-like look.  Consequently, the town on the layout was named Lewisport; a combination of Lewistown and Newport, both towns on the PRR Middle Division in central PA.  I built a DPM Gripp's Luggage factory with very little modification and called it Juniata Machine Tool Company.  That sounded like something you might find in Pennsylvania's industrialized river valleys.  In this very early 2006 photo, you can see the factory peering over Lewisport's freight station:





Fast forward to 2010, and I'd renamed the towns on the layout to real Middle Division names. Lewisport became the more proper Lewistown, PA, which was not only a significant junction, yard, and source of traffic on the PRR, its depot (the oldest in Pennsylvania, by the way) now holds the archives of the Pennsylvania Railroad Technical and Historical Society.  The freelanced town I built resembles Lewistown in only a vague way, as for starters, there was no stand-alone freight station of the type I'd built at the real Lewistown Junction.  There's also no tunnel portal there, and the train station is very different than what's on my layout.  Nevertheless, behind the Lewistown depot was a real factory in approximately the same location relative to the station as the Juniata Machine Tool factory I'd built.  However, the factory is Lewistown was a huge, sprawling complex made up of many different buildings.  The American Viscose Corporation Lewistown plant was a major employer in Lewistown and finally went out of business after Hurricane Agnes flooded the Juniata valley, damaging the plant beyond profitable repair.

My little factory got redecorated as the American Viscose factory, but it lacked the prototype's huge industrial character.





Although I didn't leave myself anywhere close to enough room to model the American Viscose factory even in a compressed sense, I did have enough room to add just one additional building to at least suggest a larger structure.  I have a number of unfinished Walthers Cornerstone kits lying around for use as "parts," and so I reached for my Walthers Modulars and the smoke stack from a Walthers Northern Power & Light power plant.  I have to say, I struggled a bit with assembling the smoke stack.  The parts really didn't fit as well as I would have liked.  Nevertheless, I matched the colors, both of the brick and of the mortar, to the walls on the factory building I'd painted some six years before.  One emergency popped up...  I'd painted the original windows with Poly Scale Pullman Green six years ago, but I didn't have any on hand.  So, with a makeshift palate, I mixed Poly Scale's Reading Green, PRR Brunswick Green, and a drop of UP Dark Gray.  It isn't a perfect match, but it's close enough.  The result is a boiler house and smoke stack that makes the factory look at least a little more worthy of rail service.



All in a rainy day's work...

[Specter3]

Nothing like the sharpening of focus to give new impetus to model!

Looks good!

Ryan

[Ed Kapuscinski]

I like it. You know, you could also fake in a put under the rails there as a spot for a GLa...

[Dave V]

I like it. You know, you could also fake in a put under the rails there as a spot for a GLa...

There's an under-track coal grate with the power plant kit.  When I relay the sidings with c55, I'll use it.  Good call!

[vt_railroad_guy]

Dr. Vollmer sir, your work is outstanding as always.  If I can accomplish half of what you have on my own HCD, I'll be a very happy modeler.

BTW, I have lost count of the number of times I have watched your seminar.  I pick up on something new every time.  For anyone who hasn't watched, it's well worth your time.  Not a valid vimeo URL
JDB

[DKS]

Great to see this thread bubbling back to the top once again, Dr. Dave.

[Dave V]

Thanks for the comments, guys!

[Bsklarski]

Dave,

Have you started to convert the main layout to C55 yet??

[Dave V]

No...  I haven't had time.  Besides, I have a little over a year left and then I move again, so I may hold off until next assignment to do that.  We'll see.  I have to finish Air War College before I undertake such a large project.

[Leggy]

Dave,

May I suggest an addition that would improve the operations of the yard? It's something relatively simple that'd help hugely, a short (just a bit longer than your longest loco/steamer+tender) traverser off the end of the door. It'd just need a simple block with running rails (drawer sliders?) and you could possibly even mount that mystical turntable onto the top to further its useability. You'd simply be able to run a train into the yard, move the power onto the traverser to free it and allow the engines to be moved onto a clear track to run around the train.

[Ed Kapuscinski]

Dave, I keep forgetting to ask. Can you do a writeup on your brick technique?

[Dave V]

Dave,

May I suggest an addition that would improve the operations of the yard? It's something relatively simple that'd help hugely, a short (just a bit longer than your longest loco/steamer+tender) traverser off the end of the door. It'd just need a simple block with running rails (drawer sliders?) and you could possibly even mount that mystical turntable onto the top to further its useability. You'd simply be able to run a train into the yard, move the power onto the traverser to free it and allow the engines to be moved onto a clear track to run around the train.

Sounds great when I have more room.  For now the layout is shoehorned into the back bedroom with little room at all.

[Dave V]

Dave, I keep forgetting to ask. Can you do a writeup on your brick technique?

For this one all I did was paint the bricks with Poly Scale Boxcar Red, and then washed with Poly Scale Sand, wiped off to leave only the mortar lines.  It's actually not the best technique I've used, but it needed to match what I'd done 6 years ago on the original building.  Using Poly Scale Sand as the mortar color was something I read somewhere either in MR or in the MR forums.

[Bsklarski]

I have used thinned plastic model putty from Squadron in the past, use your finger to wipe off the excess and it works well.

[Dave V]

So not exactly a build update, but time for some fun.  Part of what keeps the layout dynamic is the ability to swap eras.  For now it's 1980 on the Juniata Division, which means Tuscan and Brunswick have fallen to Conrail Blue...