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.