Switcher Saturday - Mark II ! 5/16/2020

Boston & Maine GE 44 Ton #117 (model by MTH Premier) on my 10’-by-5’ layout. These small locomotives are very smooth runners with strong sounds.

MELGAR

Happy SWSAT!

Penn Central GP9 #7180 (Atlas O) works the branch line:

Stay safe, everyone.

Tom

Happy SWSat!

A couple of Chessies' working today.....8463 is a MPC GP-20 brought in a loaded string of box cars while 2314 a K-line S-2 works the team tracks getting ready to pull the empties and deliver the new loads.

The MPC locos run great with some simple maintenance. They still have mechanical e-units which I plan to change out to electronic one day.

Good morning fellow switcher fans!!  JHZ563 thanks for getting us rolling again on this fine Saturday!  Also great looking module   Love that 44 tonner Melgar!   Tom Densel ... very nice looking scene  Love those Chessie switchers RSJB

Here are more photos using natural light which I took last Sunday morning.    Of course I used as my main subject my B&O Dockside, the designated logging locomotive which runs on the FSJR's Mountain Division.  This is a most reliable engine.  I call it " the little engine that always does"   Have a most enjoyable and safe weekend everyone!!

With the sun just peeking over the mountain range, the first logging train of the morning trundles over a grade crossing as workers ready their truck for a hard day's work. 

Very early this morning the little Dockside is not yet ready to pull away from the yard. 

The engineer has a good view of wild life as the train rounds the bend. 

A farmer, all ready on his tractor as the sun is not completely up.  The sun's rays light up the red Ford pickup and the face of the Dockside.  A raccoon is king of the trash pile as the sun's rays begin to shed light on his kingdom. 

Good morning sunshine!  It's going to be another great day on the FSJR's Mountain Division!  

Patrick your modeling and photography are amazing as usual.   I hope one day to be capable of creating scenes comparable to yours.  I look at your photos and see hours of work in every shot!

@jhz563 posted:

Patrick your modeling and photography are amazing as usual.   I hope one day to be capable of creating scenes comparable to yours.  I look at your photos and see hours of work in every shot!

JHZ563,

Good observation. You are correct. It looks like Patrick stages every photograph before he takes it. Takes time and patience. Unlike myself - who just assembles the train and takes the photos...

MELGAR

Those MTH Docksiders are solid little engines and very smooth runners. The scored driver wheels make a strange noise on tubular rail though.

Right-of-Way makes a very nicely detailed model too.

TALES OF THE DOCKSIDER

Oh,oh.  NYC shop switcher X-8688’s crew isn’t going to be happy this Saturday.  The Yardmaster has assigned them again to move some foreign power!  This time it’s NH EP-5 “Jet” 379.  379 has stalled due to a short in one of it’s transformers.

The Docksider’s crew completes the move as directed.  When their shift is up, they march en masse to the yardmaster’s office to give him “piece of their mind”.

To the surprise of the crew, they’re the ones that get a “tongue lashing”!  The Yardmaster tells them how disappointed he is about their attitude toward foreign railroads.  He reminds them that other railroads have many competent and dedicated employees, just like their home road.  He tells them the foreign employees are entitled to NYC’s respect, regardless of where they come from or the color of their engines.  

Chastened, X-8688’s crew goes home to “ lick their wounds”.  You can bet they won’t complain about a foreign motive power move again!

jhz563 and Melgar - thank you both so very much for your wonderful compliments!!  Your words mean a great deal to me, I assure you!    The model railroad hobby spawned my photography hobby.   You both picked up on my tremendous enjoyment of staging scenes and waiting for the sun's cooperation to produce the  "rightly lit moment."   I consider the hobby as an art form and I so much enjoy when my mind is indulged in the creative process.   Switch engines, both prototype and model,  seem to have a great deal of character and make for ideal photo subject IMHO.   Again thank you both. 

Patrick,

For me, and apparently for you too, the hobby is as much about art as it is about model trains. We are fortunate to enjoy in that respect.

MELGAR

A PRR ES6 is moving a reefer from the icing track to the westbound local classification track.  The little engine is one of the yards more dependable switchers.

The E (EMD) S (switcher) 6 (600hp) is a MTH RailKing SW-1. The reefer is Atlas.

Steam Crazy,

A superb tale.

MELGAR

Yay! SWSat is on and off to a great start this week. Beautiful work @trumpettrain and @MELGAR. As usual you guys are setting the pace.

I am going to post some older 3 rail images I came across while going through my phone. This week I have been actually making some cars instead of directly working on the layout. 

Here we go.starting with a B&O NW2 shifting cars.

This engine is a Williams. In fact all of the engines I show this weekend are.

I am always looking for suitable looking “normal” common daily driver cars that fit in the era I want to model.Here comes a B&O in Chessie paint GP38 long hood forward sliding past an down E60 with a mangled pantagraph. On the undersized  Williams E60 I painted the black on the roof and windshield area. For some reason Williams never painted these areas. I think I makes them look much better painted.

It is pulling a lumber load bound to the lumber yard. 

Have a great week. I can’t wait to see what you guys post. 

Model railroading is basically a solitary hobby, Train clubs and layout tours not withstanding. Having this forum as a place to share the fruits of our labors makes all the difference. Much of the inspiration for scenery on my layout has come from the forum.
Count me in on enjoying Patrick's wonderful shots

Bob

ABB #1502 is switching cars for Sherwin Williams today.

@trumpettrain posted:

Very early this morning the little Dockside is not yet ready to pull away from the yard. 

Is that Hoghead... um... "draining his radiator" over there??

Andre

REMCO stays busy even in these times as it is very essential in supplying pumps to our Navy for carriers, submarines and other ships. The railroads and many of the industries they serve are also essential for our defense and economy.

VO1000 brings necessary parts and materials to keep production rolling 

B&A 0-8-0 pulls finished pumps

Together they keep this plant productive

GP's on switching duty this week

The Shark Bay R.R. company`s first steam locomotive. 0-6-0 ST #12 "EARL"

Great photos as always, crew!  Thanks for posting!  

Melgar, thank you for the compliment!

John

@abbrail posted:

Love this video!  A great silent short.  Well done!

Tom

Here's to a healthy happy SWSAT to all here!

There was a lot of switching action at the East End this AM. Four set-outs (paused here on the East End lead):

and three pickups (a load of scrap, an empty tank car and a loaded grain hopper):

This is a bit of an Inglenook so the first task was to make a little space. To that end the grain load was pulled:

and spotted at the scrapyard:

That made room to drill the loaded tank car and PS2 covered hopper:

Then the empty tank was pulled:     

and drilled out of the way:

So the PS2 and tank car could be spotted:

The empty tank car was assembled with the other two pick-ups:

The empty grain hopper and mill gondola were drilled:

And the mill gon was set-out:

With the three pick-ups dropped on the East End lead the crew can now get busy switching the West End:

If I counted correctly it took 26 moves to complete this switching.

I totally agree with Patrick and Melgar and their comments about model railroading being an art form. The movement of the trains makes it a dynamic art form. And, sunlight can make a beautiful contribution to the scene to be photographed. Here is one of my favorite photos that I have posted before, which is greatly enhanced by natural morning sunlight IMO:

Love the look of that Postwar 44 tonner center cab switcher boring through the hazy sunlight. Arnold

Happy SWSAT guys...well here is my contribution.  You all may know that on or about 27 May NASA and SpaceX a private company are about to conclude nearly 10 years of work, designing, building and testing a new space launch system to take US astronauts into space.  I worked on the human certification of this system for the Agency during most of this program and now we are about to see the FIRST launch of US Astronauts into space on a US System since 2011.  Big day!  So in honor of that day, I include pictures of a system from another time when the US was fully focused on launching our astronauts, the 1960's.  Here is the Marx  "Cape Canaveral Express" from 1959-1960. 

Here is the GE 70 Ton Switcher with the "Chemical Rocket Fuel" tank car

Side view of just the switcher alone. 

This view shows some of the cars in the "express" train.

Here is my attempt to show the whole train...it consists of the "Chemical Rocket Fuel" tank car, the "DANGER" gondola, a missile launching car, and the "Rocket Computing Center" caboose.

Have a great weekend fellows, and don't forget to tune in on TV on May 27 to see our astronauts go back to the International Space Station on a US system. 

Respectfully

Don

An Iowa Interstate Geep is switching the COOP at Winear Junction.

Don, thanks for sharing,  I can't wait for the next launch.   The Soyuz program is about to be out of business!

Patrick,  Melgar, Arnold, the photography and skills are awesome. 

Geyzergazer- you have the full spirit Switcher Saturday down for sure.  It's hard not to get the five fingered crane involved in all those moves!

JLM, wb47, BAR (nice saddle tanker), Abbrail (nice soundtrack), Tom D., RSJB, Steamcrazy, Ron, Andy, Ray, BillT,  Dave W, Stangtrain, and anyone I may have missed, thanks to everyone for contributing. I really tried to get everyone, posting from my mobile is a little tough some times.

As a prelude to next week,  here's a peek at coming attractions.