Pictures from Cherry Valley.

[Hiroe]

Various pics, from over at CV this week.

Kermit got a new brass RS23:


Buzzy's B1 (set up to run off the pans, for when the wire goes up):


Buzzy, testing out his newly-decodered Reading steamer:


John's PRR M1:


A few of the poles salvaged from the original Grant brothers' catenary installation on the old layout, soon to be reinstalled with my new catenary (which will all actually work as intended):



30'th Street-based Passenger station soon to go here on the left.







BICK Tower:




I believe this is one of the Atlas X29's:



I had been planning to continue taking pics this week, but right after this batch, we had a bit of a flood in the basement. 1890's church with dry-laid fieldstone foundation, bad gutters, poor drainage, and a heavy rainstorm. Probably more next week, if there's interest.

--Drew

[Dave V]

Oh, man...  Operating PRR PL dwarfs AND catenary...  Please, no more!  You'll drive me back to HO!

[Guilford Guy]

I really like the clean benchwork. It's nice to see a layout where the equipment and locomotives are weathered realistically compared to a lot of magazine layouts where brown chalks seem to be thrown on every surface they can find. The scenery looks terrific, and working cat to boot! ;D

[Hiroe]

Oh, man...  Operating PRR PL dwarfs AND catenary...  Please, no more!  You'll drive me back to HO!

Hey, if i'm doing the work of installing it, it's damn well going to operate. I managed to build working PRR compound cat in N, so O should be easy, right?

We're having a show/open house on the 12th of September. Feel free to stop by and drool.

[Hiroe]

I really like the clean benchwork. It's nice to see a layout where the equipment and locomotives are weathered realistically compared to a lot of magazine layouts where brown chalks seem to be thrown on every surface they can find. The scenery looks terrific, and working cat to boot! ;D

I really ought to take a few pictures of the framing itself, as it's almost a shame to bury all that custom laminate work under a layout.

The weathering has been a group effort, and we're all committed to realism. While the wire hasn't started going up yet, i've got the first 50' worth scheduled to be well underway by the end of the year. Before it happens tho, i need to finish installing the head-end/MU car tracks, and build the station platforms.

[ChrisNH]

Thats HO?? I thought it was a larger scale. I been doing N too long. Nice work!

Chris

[Ed Kapuscinski]

I think it's O Chris.

[Hiroe]

It's definitely O scale. Some of the stuff on the layout is actually Lionel that's been two-railed.

[Ian MacMillan]

Man thats some nice stuff...I'd like that layout even better if it was at eye level.

[Dave V]

Regardless of scale, that's an exceptionally well-rendered Pennsy.  It really reeks of PRR (in a good way), far more than I've been able to achieve.  Please, by all means, share as much of this with us as you can.

I've seen those Atlas O X29s in person, and it's enough to make me really jealous of O-scalers!  The detail is phenominal, but the mass of the car is what gets me.  I can only imagine how that M1 looks rumbling by in O.  Must really convey Pennsy might in a way N scale never can.

Thanks for sharing!

[Sokramiketes]

BICK Tower:

Yeah, O scale, you can tell because the rails look too far apart, 5' gauge instead of 4'8-1/2"...

Other than that Mrs. Lincoln, how was the play?   

(friendly ribbing of course, looks like a great layout.)

[Hiroe]

Yeah, O scale, you can tell because the rails look too far apart, 5' gauge instead of 4'8-1/2"...

Other than that Mrs. Lincoln, how was the play?   

(friendly ribbing of course, looks like a great layout.)

Heh heh. I asked about P48, and was emphatically told that it's just not going to happen.

[Hiroe]

Hey, more pictures!

Yes, the class lights do work.




I also have one in O.




Hey Lee!

[Hiroe]

Swiped from Weekend Update to repost here for topic continuity.

The wires are coming.

Spent about 12 hours sat and 8 hours sun working on four of these two-track span support towers:









Took me about an hour to figure out what i was doing, then the first two (towards the tunnel) took about 3 hours each. Today, i managed to shave that time down to about an hour and 15 each, and built the two closer towers, which are pictured above on my "jig". The "footings" are actually sections of 1/2" hardwood dowel, cut about 3" long and hammered into 1/2" holes drilled in the subroadbed, then drilled with a #8 bit to act as sockets for the poles. (I would have preferred using square footings, but square holes are a lot harder to drill.) More photographs of the first two, plus assembly of the 4th, are available here.

I was supposed to be reusing a lot of the cat off the old layout, but it's vastly complicated by the fact that they painted everything (poles, wires, and insulators), and used steel music wire; so now it's covered in grunky paint and loaded with rust. Anything i do want to reuse has to be thoroughly cleaned before it can even be disassembled; as even with my 400-watt grandpa iron i can't get good heat transfer to painted/rusty metal. If i'm going to try to salvage any of it, i might just coil it all at the bottom of a new 40-gallon rubbermaid trash can, and soak it in vinegar for a week or two to clean the rust off. (Will vinegar also remove the old paint?)

I'll probably build a few more span towers for around the curve (behind the camera) before hanging the actual running wire. Yes, the equipment *will* run off the pans.

--Drew

[Hiroe]

Five and Six.






Seven.



Also, if anyone wants to prep their electric locomotives to run under the wire when visiting the CV, here's the electrical schematic for how i've got the pantographs and toggle switch connected:

All the diodes are 1n4148 high-speed switching diodes. The relays are simple 12vdc SPST, although i typically use the Potter-Brumfield KH styles. This setup is designed to allow the locomotive to choose the proper return rail, regardless of which way it's oriented when placed on the track.

--Drew