The Western Maryland in Free-moN Modules

[NorthWestGN]

Your water pour came out great, nice work on the semaphores as well! The vertical numbering on the main shaft reminds me of doing Loco number boards or car end road number decaling...

Congrats on the Audition opportunity as well! Best of luck!

Brent

[PiperguyUMD]

Well, it’s been a crazy few weeks. I played one of the best auditions I’ve ever played last Thursday - literally note perfect! - and was dismissed after the semi final round. All I can say is I sold them the most unbelievable chocolate chip cookies you could ever want, but they were in the mood for ice cream. Oh well.

Worked on a few modeling odds and ends in the mean time. 4th canal crossing got its own tool shed, and the previous one was relocated to its original position on the Longs Run module.



Also overhauled the small house near the right of way. I had originally thought this was a railroad building, but now I’m starting to think it may have been a canal watchman’s house. At any rate, it got windows and a roof. Still need to scenic both buildings into the module, but all structures are done!



I think this module is going to photograph really well. Next time I setup the layout, I’ll put it on the opposite side, so Jack’s Mountain and the track in the foreground will both curve off to the left, that way I can get some of the canal in the shot. Wish I was a better photographer, but still got a few good ones!







After watching the TTRAK modules popping up around here, starting to think I might dive in. Emory Grove would work great on a triple!

[John]

Sorry to hear the Navy didn't want you ..

Looks like you left the building soak a little to long in the alcohol . .. I did that earlier this week on the PRR tower

[PiperguyUMD]

Sorry to hear the Navy didn't want you ..

Looks like you left the building soak a little to long in the alcohol . .. I did that earlier this week on the PRR tower

I may have left it on the build plate the entire time I was in DC….

[Tad_T]

I’m sorry that the selection process didn’t go your way.

Tad

[PiperguyUMD]

Was able to do a little bit of wood working and garage cleaning this week. As mentioned earlier in the thread, with the completion of the shed, this has freed up a nice slice of wall space for a permanent shelf layout. It will be at FreemoN hight and will serve as a staging yard for my modules.



There had previously been two taller cabinets in this location, but they would not have provided adequate clearance to work on the railroad. I relocated them to the other side of the garage and built two shorter cabinets to take their place. The new cabinets will have almost 19" of clearance from the rails. I'll build two more, and will have TTrak storage extending to the electrical panel. The yard will be the same length, giving me 16' of real estate from the corner. Over the workbench it can be 36" wide, but needs to be narrower towards the middle of the wall so that I can open the car door.



Looking into the corner, I can start to get an idea for how this space will work. The brown line along the wall is 50" and shows how the workbench will tuck under the layout when not in use. The miter saw is normally stored underneath, so no clearance issues there. Once the last two cabinets are complete, I'll add a valance and LED lighting. The exciting part about this is that my garage is finally starting to look neat and tidy, so the wife is happy, but there are more trains in it than ever before!! Really going to have to get the track plan for the yard figured out, I'm only an empty weekend or two away from benchwork!

[PiperguyUMD]

Came up with this yard design over coffee this morning. The loop is growing on me, I think I can stage the type of photos I envision and it keeps the benchwork narrow where I'll be opening the car door.

Not that I plan on doing a ton of heavy duty operations, but as best I can tell it also provides a lot of function should my modules ever evolve into serious ops. Arriving trains would take the inside loop, where the road power can cut off just short of the turnout at the bottom left and head for the Service Racks. The yard crew would leave the switcher pocket, stash the caboose, then sort the train by shoving into tracks 1-4, using the arrival track as the yard lead. Outbound trains could be assembled in tracks 1-4, the staged on the Outbound track via the crossover at bottom left. The only hitch would be tagging on the caboose, that would be a bit of a pita!

[mu26aeh]

What about making cab track double ended, and adding a crossover to the outbound.  Yard crew could stash the caboose, do their work, assemble train on the outbound, then grab a caboose off the other end, wait to road crew to pull pass the crossover, then they duck behind and tack cab onto the end.

[PiperguyUMD]

I managed to finish a project! This one has been sitting on the bench waiting for a decoder for a LONG time. A big thanks to whoever pointed out that Tony‘s Trains was blasting out the sound equipped RS-3s for $140. A quick shell swap and some N Possible couples and I can finally check this one off the list. Maybe I can keep the momentum going and start to tackle one of my Steam projects!

[Ed Kapuscinski]

Oh man, I'm really glad that post was helpful!

She looks great. Love me a hammerhead.

Did you do anything with the headlight in the long hood? I've found that the LED is poorly positioned for the stock light setup.

[PiperguyUMD]

@Ed Kapuscinski Other than guessing where to put it on the high hood, nothing 🤣. Maybe it’s closer to the LED than on the low hood.

BTW enjoyed your TTM interview. I need another project like a hole in the head, but I may bounce some ideas off of you at some point.

[Ed Kapuscinski]

@Ed Kapuscinski Other than guessing where to put it on the high hood, nothing 🤣. Maybe it’s closer to the LED than on the low hood.

BTW enjoyed your TTM interview. I need another project like a hole in the head, but I may bounce some ideas off of you at some point.

I'd be honored. And thanks!

Don't miss the two hour snoozefest here: https://conrail1285.com/modeling-the-northern-central-with-a-twist/

And interesting about that LED situation. I'll have to take another look at mine.

[Point353]

I managed to finish a project! This one has been sitting on the bench waiting for a decoder for a LONG time. A big thanks to whoever pointed out that Tony‘s Trains was blasting out the sound equipped RS-3s for $140. A quick shell swap and some N Possible couples and I can finally check this one off the list. Maybe I can keep the momentum going and start to tackle one of my Steam projects!

Do you have any passenger cars to go with this loco?

[PiperguyUMD]

Of course! Almost that identical consist 😁 I’ll post a pic soon.