Weekend Update 8/16/26

[up1950s]

https://thetracksidephotographer.com/category/trackside-structures/

https://www.lawforpeople.com/railroad-cancer-lawsuit/can-living-near-railroad-tracks-cause-cancer/

https://www.trains.com/mrr/how-to/expert-tips/model-railroads-with-multiple-eras/

https://www.american-rails.com/flat.html

https://www.railwayage.com/news/nokian-tyres-ns-tvrm-team-on-sustainable-service/

[nickelplate759]

Finally added a layer of pink foam to the layout structure.  This will be the east end of the East Wayne yard.

[davefoxx]

Using pooled power, Train No. 261, the Florida Perishable, is routed north along the Seaboard Coast Line, Durham & Southern, Virginian & Ohio, and Allegheny Midland.  This was made plausible for my layout, according to the operating plan designed by Allen McClelland on the original V&O layout.



More on The Carolina Sandhills Lines thread in the Layout Engineering forum.

DFF

[packers#1]

I’m pushing towards starting some scenery, so spent this week getting my last two planned structures for the hit of town on my layout started.

First up we have my fertilizer plant. It’s the Bar Mills kit and it was my first extensive wood structure build. Painted with spray paint and used wood glue to assemble, the structure came together quite well. I’m less than pleased with the elevators though, both in my paint selection but also the detail. Southern Grain Modelers has a railcar unloading bucket elevator that I eventually will purchase, but this will do for now. I did cut its base off from the building and didn’t glue the chute into the building to it, so I can pull it off when the time comes. However overall I’m quite proud of how this came out. I’ll eventually weather it. Mentally I’m calling this Tri-county Fertilizer after an industry on the real-life Pickens RR, but time will tell what it eventually becomes




Second up the as Import Motors from Walters Cornerstone. I’m not including the signs as of yet, as I plan for this to be an empty building in my town area across from the hardware store. It’ll get weathered up and have a different style sign installed missing the business name, just really rusty. Should help tell the story of a slower section of town that’s grown and shrunk.

[Dave V]

More work on my PRR Granville Bridge (Juniata River) module:

[Jesse6669]

More work on my PRR Granville Bridge (Juniata River) module:

I really like how this is coming along.  Back in the day I would railfan Conrail between Tyrone and Huntingdon on weekends when I was at PSU, so these look quite familiar.  Of course they're double tracked now so it'd be very prototypical if you ran some blue diesels on them... (or is that heresy to a Pennsy fan?) 

I made progress on the Z-scale SP S-10.. rear trucks wired and decals started: 





And McCullough Yard is primed, waiting for track paint and ballast.  I also got the backdrop sorted for this section.  Details in the Layout Engineering Report.

[garethashenden]

Spent some time this morning patching concrete in the basement. The original slab seems to have been a little thin in spots and over the past century has deteriorated. Dug out the broken concrete, some smaller stones, and a few big stones before adding 400 pounds of fresh concrete. There is another smaller area that still needs to be done. Then I can think about paint. This is the first step towards a potential basement layout, details TDB.

[jpwisc]

Wrapped up a fun one day project. I patched a FVM boxcar for WC. I dropped the height a little so the NP couplers would be at the right height and I weathered it up. The Ron Hawkins prototype photo was my inspiration.
[ Guests cannot view attachments ]
[ Guests cannot view attachments ]

[R L Smith]

Wrapping up a scracthbuilt freight house for the Lackawanna in Bath NY. The only photo I have is in a Morning Sun book (below) showing the south and west walls, so I "imagineered" the east and north walls and the interior. Because this will be front-and-center when visitors enter the layout room, I am detailing the interior.

This photo, dated 1970, is about 20 years after my modeling period:



On the exterior, the long walls have four types of siding and the end walls have five.




The interior walls consist of two types of siding. Some details are castings from an unknown kit, others are from scratch, such as tissue paper window shades.




I have some Woodland Scenics exterior lights to install over the doorways. (The green "room" in the office is the channel to feed the wires through the floor.) I will add a couple of figures, and do something about the staircase. It will get railings, but I'm not sure I'm keeping this item as it isn't very close to the prototype. It's a leftover from a Walthers kit.

[BCR 570]

Not much layout progress of late as I have been experimenting with ground cover and backdrop prior to proceeding further.

The next two coaches for my museum train project are progressing well.  These are printed kits from Interurban Models and represent two of the five cars purchased by the BC Government from the American Freedom Train Foundation in 1977.  They served as staff cars on the museum train for its final two seasons in 1978 and 1979.

End grab irons installed:




Side grab irons formed and installed:




Rear observation platform and railings assembled and installed:




These cars are now waiting on American Limited diaphragms so I can know exactly where to install the couplers.

These are the last cars for my museum train project.  I will have modelled all except one for which there is no viable starting point in N scale, so will have to leave it out.


With the final cars approaching completion, I am now starting on the primary locomotive for the train.  Ex-CPR Consolidation No. 3716 was purchased by the BC Government and restored for use on the train in 1975.

The only logical starting point is the Bachmann Consolidation which is a fairly good model, but a little too large.  I made a tentative start on this engine many years ago, starting with modifications to the tender:




The engine will receive a custom 3D printed kit for the boiler, cab and details, as well as the correct tender for my era.  The kit is proportionally correct but has been up-sized about 12% to fit the Bachmann mechanism.  I think that works out to roughly 1:148 or 1:150 which is UK and Japanese N Gauge:




My first task, and likely the most harrowing, will be to remove the driving wheels and re-gauge them as they all fall short of that specified on the NMRA gauge.  For that I will need to borrow a wheel puller.  I will also clean out the holes in the new cylinder block, paint and install it while into the drive train:




Hoping this doesn't end up becoming a pile of parts . . . . .


Tim

[jagged ben]

Test prints for the 10-pack fuel foiler end units.

[ Guests cannot view attachments ]

[peteski]

Pretty in pink!   

[delamaize]

Not much in the way of modeling this weekend, was on the road most of the day yesterday, returning from a trip to the Oregon dunes near Coos Bay for the last 4 days.

Did some small stuff on the short tender i1sa project, nothing to really take pictures of, mostly wiring stuff.

I did get a test print from a buddy who was printing a 3D model I had downloaded and resized for my ATSF FastMail I'm building. I could not find a b60b kit for my consist, but I did find pictures of a weird long Pennsylvania boxcar. Did some research and found out that it was a X42, and they were not as common as the b60b on the fastmail, but they still made an appearance pretty often.

I found a good 3D model online that was scaled for HO, downloaded it, and contacted the artist to get clearance to scale it and have it printed for my needs, which he did. I sent the files to a buddy who does a lot of 3D printing, he had to do some tweaks, but this is the first print, which turned out pretty good. I'm going to go ahead and try to finish it out. And I may have him print me another. I need to figure out decisively which trucks belong under this car, the few pictures I have found look like BX Express trucks, and I have some micro trains ones laying around, so that's probably what it will get initially, unless I could find something that says otherwise.

[ Guests cannot view attachments ]
[ Guests cannot view attachments ]

Prototype:
[ Guests cannot view attachments ]

Anyone that is intresred, this is a link to the orginial. The Artist, FO43, asked that I give him credit for the model, and to not sell the design. I would say out of respect, if any of you are going to try to print your own, I would contact him through thingiverse and get permission.

https://www.thingiverse.com/thing:7083891

[jagged ben]

Pretty in pink!   

That's just the poor lighting of course, but thanks. 

[Mark5]

but I did find pictures of a weird long Pennsylvania boxcar. Did some research and found out that it was a X42, and they were not as common as the b60b on the fastmail, but they still made an appearance pretty often.

Doug Nelson made a nice X42 model: https://www.therailwire.net/forum/index.php?topic=44633.msg574986#msg574986