Update on July 4th

Happy Independence Day to y'all in the USA!  

Life has been good lately, just not for trains!  I have picked up two new hobbies that have been consuming most of my time.  I expect them to continue to do so also…  

First is welding.  I grabbed a cheap little 70amp setup and have been abusing it.  Even made a frame for my dad for one of his projects!  My next goal is to make a pull up bar.  All I need is some metal pipe.

Second is my wife and I got motorcycles.  I don’t know how many of y’all have one or have driven one, but there are no words.  The best I can say is it is glorious.  I never cared to get or ride one, but my wife was interested so we took the class.  I sat on that little practice bike and suddenly I was hooked.  Now we spend most nights getting some wind therapy.  Below is a picture of Peggy, my Suzuki VL1500.  She weighs in at about 900 lbs with a 1500CC motor.  She has some awesome custom pipes that make her loud enough to be heard on the highway and she handles like a dream.  On a related note I have a new belief: you never see a motorcycle outside a therapist’s office for a reason.

 As far as trains and model railroading goes, there have been some good developments over the past several months.  

First is a Digitrax Zephyr Extra system.  It replaced my old MRC Prodigy express which quit programming locomotives randomly.  It is simple and direct and a great starter system that I will be expanding soon.  I am looking at JMRI with a phone app to control the trains through wifi.

Next, is the layout has buildings!  Unfortunately, the train club down in Galveston has been forced to close.  If you have never had the chance to see it in person (I have not seen it operating, only being disassembled) then I will only say it is incredible what was done. I saw bridges that were over 15 feet in length and 6 feet tall. It was well built and a beautiful example of a club layout. However, they are giving other modelers a chance to enhance their layout or find a memento. For around $250 I picked up all of these buildings and trees.  I will post on these in detail later.  If they have another sale, I will be getting more trees and maybe some of the train stuff.   I would love to pick up the 15 named passenger trains they had but let’s be honest: I ain’t got that kind of money.

Two new engines and the excursion train are on the layout and almost complete!

Anyways, I am going to get back to work on life!

For the random picture of the day:

This is an interesting generator load on a super flat car.  It was at the front end of a autorack train that the BNSF genset is setting out.  I was able to grab a quick shot of it while waiting at a red light.  I would love to build one of these one day.  It is a great subject since it would not require a special move but would add a twist to operations.

Going Full Circle

Alright so for this post I would like to give a quick overview of how I have gotten the layout to go full circle again.

 

After all of the uncertainty that has arisen over the past couple of months with moving, I decided to bring the rest of the layout back to life.  In my previous setup, the connectors that ran from one end of the modeled layout around the room to the other were supported by angled shelf brackets that were secured to the wall studs.  This time around, I cannot do this as we may or may not be moving.  So now I had to come up with new methods.

 

I had some constraints.  First, I hate floor supports.  They and my toes do not get along.  Plus, the connectors will not see much weight.  So I wanted to avoid those as much as possible.  Second, I wanted to follow the rules of simplicity.  As few curved sections as possible, easy alignments, simple entrance/exits, that sort of thing.  Third, I had budget constraints.  Consume as little funds as possible.

This greatly limited my options but part of the fun I have with this hobby is learning new things.  So I turned to my trusty friend the internet and set out to find new possibilities and solutions.  After a few days of searching, several options presented themselves and I worked with them as best as possible.

 

To keep curved sections to a minimum, I built extensions to the exiting layout.  They are the standard 1x4 with ½” plywood fare I have been using.  I have removed the floor supports and added bracing to keep them level with the rest of the layout.  Track on top, and boom, done.

Next I took care of the long straight runs.  This got me a lot done without much invested.  The book shelf is a simple big box store setup.  It is a bit tall but it was all that was available.  I built some adjustable landing brackets and screwed them into the sides.  The boards are ½” plywood strips I had left over from the previous setup.  This whole thing took a night, including cutting work.  Very simple, even if it isn’t subtle.

 

 

After that I came to a challenge: a lightweight corner section that doesn’t require a whole lot of support.  Enter these neat modules I read about here.  They cover how to build them so I will not elaborate much.  I only have two thoughts.  1) the hot glue does a great job of holding and 2) do not use the 1/8” MDF board that I did.  Find some thin, cheap plywood and it will have a lot less saw dust and weight (I also used some Liquid Nail).  All things aside they are really a clever solution that does work.

 

 

Lastly, there is the biggest obstacle.  The lift bridge.  I really wanted to have a simpler way to get into and out of the room.  Before, I had a whole section of wood to manually lift out of the way after disconnecting and removing track.  Now I have this beauty.  More on it and its construction at a later time.

 

And there you have it.  How I built the layout back up to running capacity.  The past several weeks have seen many a train go over it after a little tweaking but it will do the job well.  Which of course means I am far too busy to blog because I am playing with my trains!

 

Random pic of the day!

 

This was actually taken today, 5/7 at Englewood Yard.  I have seen the Penn Central engine before. but this is the best perspective I have been able to get.  Very fortunate to have caught it.

Back up and running!

Man life is crazy.  So much has been going on, but fortunately some of it has been the trains.  Most importantly, the trains are back up and running again!

1989 pulls the official first train around the layout.  It is all tank cars, the most common car hauled on the SRR, part of how we got our name!

I will have more posts coming soon.  Lots to talk about!

Random picture of the day:

This the Southern Railway heritage engine by Norfolk Southern.  I caught this one outside of the Port of Houston grain terminal.  It was hidden behind an arriving grain train that sat for about ten minutes and then finally moved to reveal the prize! 

Greater Houston Area Train Show: Loot!

I was fortunate to make it out to the local train show this year.  However, it was only for about an hour.  I had my parents in town and I needed to help them with some random business but I am very happy to have had that hour.

This year the show was so much better than in the past!  There were more tables, more stuff, many more model contest entries, and some outstanding layout setups.  Last year I had just been laid off, so most of what I did involved dreaming, but this year for one brief hour I scurried all over drooling and conniving for what to do, see, purchase, etc!

I ran into several old friends from Bryan/College Station as well.  It was fun to hang out and see everything.  If you are ever near Houston, go to this show!  Even at its worst, it has always been at least entertaining.

Anyways, I picked up some neat items.  First, is this steam engine!

 

She is a Bachmann Spectrum 4-8-2 Mountain lettered for the SP.  The best part is I got her for about $90.  She has some very nice detail and can probably pull teeth she is so heavy.  I broke her down, cleaned and lubed her, and put in a spare DCC chip and boom!  Now I have an excursion/special locomotive for the SRR.  However, the DCC install requires you snip some capacitors to make it run smoothly.  See this link to the TCS DCC Install page for instructions.  Soon, I will add their WOWSound decoder to finish it off with some replacement details!

 

Also, I found this DVD.  It is Part One of the Valley Eagle trip taken by UP 844 back in 2010.  This video is really cool because it covers the first time I ever really chased a train.  In fact, I show up in it a few times (actually my old Chevy Blazer shows up more than I do...).  I had a simple point and shoot camera, some storage boxes as a tripod, and little experience.  It turned into a 6 hour affair spanning nearly 100 miles.  The results?  Some really nice pictures, new friends, and tons of fun that I look forward to doing over and over.  Especially now that I have a better vehicle, camera, camera equipment, etc...

 

And now the random picture of the day!

 

That's a lotta hot sauce!



 I caught several tankers of Louisiana brand hot sauce in Englewood yard waiting to be humped.  From what I understand, they no longer carry the good stuff but it is fun to dream.  It would be awesome if one spilled near a crawfish farm!

Anyways, until next time!

Signals, Scenery, and Ballast

And here is the first post of the new year.  Hopefully everyone enjoyed the transition and is looking forward to the blessings of 2016!

With the new year, I am going to do something new: this whole post of being created from my phone!  I figure I should start working my way into current technology uses.  This could be the new thing.

Anyways, on to the subject of the post.  I finally finished the ground cover scenery and ballast on my first module!  

The scenery is the same stuff and technique as before.  I was really worried that the little corner left would not blend with the existing, but even I cannot tell where the new begins and the old ends.  I'll call that a win.

The ballast is real stone made by AZ Rock & Mineral company.  I followed the techniques that regularly show up in MR or MRH.  It took four good glue soakings though as I did not have a good base secured.  Lessons for next time!

Here are some closeups of the signals.  The electrical cabinets are from BLMA and a pain to build for a novice structure guy like myself but they are nice and accurate.  The switch machine is by Details West.  It was simple install and build, but is non-functioning.  The Blue Point below the decking handles the control.  I also added exposed electrical conduit for effect.

Here are the signals past the turnout.  One head is turned away from the tracks on purpose.  The set of these I purchased had a double head that is commonly used in ABS or block territory.  I decided that the SRR left the block signal when it added the siding to keep costs down.  This turnout is controlled by a Caboose Industries stand.  I cut off the lever normally on these and added a more modern looking handle.  Might not look so bad or obvious now.

And now for the random pic of the day!

I hope I haven't used this one before but anyways, this is one of the test units for the ES44AT locomotives.  It is the first of the Tier IV locomotives and is made by GE.  They are currently producing these engines for BNSF, UP, and CSX.  I have not yet seen a UP one.  I caught this bad boy heading East out of Englewood Yard one afternoon when I was heading home from work, and was lead by a Citirail ES44.  A train with no class one engines!