Weekend Photo Fun 2-2-24-??

Scott Smith

Thanks Scott for getting us started for this fine weekend!   Here are my photos of the fun kind ... all taken in natural light.  

Dawn's early light.  A Ma & PA SW 1 runs lite to Westerly Yard.

Just a few minutes later the sun is just a bit brighter

MOW workers Floyd and Wilbur arrive to work at 5 a.m.

Nice day for a drive.

I took these photographs of the former New Haven Railroad station in Waterbury, Connecticut on January 31, 2024. The building is presently in use by the Waterbury Republican and American newspaper.

The station is located at the north end of the 27-mile Waterbury Branch of Metro-North Railroad. It was built by the Seth Thomas Company in 1909 during the New Haven presidency of Charles S. Mellen. The tower is copied from the bell tower in the City of Siena, Italy and is 240 feet in height.

Waterbury was once the site of the largest brass manufacturing industry in the United States and was known as The Brass City. The New Haven Railroad had a large yard with 12 tracks to serve the brass industry during World War 2. After the war, brass was replaced by plastic for many common items.

Directly across the street from the station is a building with a curved front – once the headquarters of the American Brass Company – built in 1913.

MELGAR

Yes, I did some more wiring this week……..but, I took time to run some trains……and, what else? New Haven and New York Central, of course!

Have a great and safe weekend, folks!

Peter

A 2023 Christmas Layout memory

Evening settles in on Waltburg

- walt

Mel, when did the railroad take over the Seth Thomas building?

@coach joe posted:

Mel, when did the railroad take over the Seth Thomas building?

@coach joe,

Joe,

As I understand it, the Seth Thomas Company built the station for the New Haven Railroad, which occupied it in 1909. Seth Thomas Clocks were manufactured in Thomaston, Connecticut, about 8 miles north of Waterbury. The Waterbury Branch of Metro-North was originally built by the Naugatuck Railroad and ran north about 49 miles from Devon Junction (on the New Haven Railroad) to Waterbury, Thomaston, Torrington and Winsted, Connecticut on the Naugatuck River. The Thomaston Station still stands and is the home of the Railroad Museum of New England. The Seth Thomas Clock Company built the large clock in the center of Grand Central Terminal.

MELGAR

Here are some views of a scratchbuilt split entry home on my layout which I built. These are all over the place in the US, but you rarely if ever see them modeled. In my attempt to portray the world as it really is, I had to have one of these on the layout. Not done yet, but getting there! Last image is an overall view of the whole scene mbuilt on sculpted laminated pink insulation foam, A large barn (already built) will be set into the hole towards the bottom of the image.

@PRRMiddleDivision posted:

Here are some views of a scratchbuilt split entry home on my layout which I built. These are all over the place in the US, but you rarely if ever see them modeled. In my attempt to portray the world as it really is, I had to have one of these on the layout. Not done yet, but getting there! Last image is an overall view of the whole scene mbuilt on sculpted laminated pink insulation foam, A larges barn (already built) will be set into the hole towards the bottom of the image.

Beautifully done with superb and realistic detail!

Gene

Let's build a mountain !

This week I began to tackle the backside of the layout - from the tunnel to the new coal mine extension.   I added some cardboard strips, then plaster. Once that dried, I painted it gray and then needed something to make a rock wall with.  I had an idea to use a bag of pine bark mulch.  Taking the largest rock like looking nuggets, I used liquid nails to fasten the rocks to the plaster mountain wall.   Next step will be to  dry brush the rocks with a mix of tan & gray paint to make them look a little more realistic.

Needed something to fill in this front area, so I made a little hobo camp/railroad supply area

Picked up a NIB 8474 Rio Grande F3 B unit to match my SSS

Erie GP9 seen stopping at the station platform with an evening commuter train.

PRR RSD4 8446 trundles over Cowan's Creek with a transfer freight for the Lehigh Valley

Park progress.

A missile takes down a potential "weather balloon" from being launched. We had fun playing with this. I hope everyone has a great weekend.

@Putnam Division posted:

Yes, I did some more wiring this week……..but, I took time to run some trains……and, what else? New Haven and New York Central, of course!

Absolutely!  Always be faithful to your Home Road, Peter.

I really like your Boston & Albany 4-6-6T.  When I was a kid (starting in 1952, when I was in first grade) Uncle Roland, a Union Pacific Engineer, gave me his copy of the monthly Locomotive Engineers' Journal, the magazine of the Brotherhood of Locomotive Engineers.  In one of those early editions was a photo of a B&A 4-6-6T which gave me an appreciation for the clean and pleasing design of those engines.

Cracked out the GS-4 Bantam this week, it having sat on a siding at the back of the layout for a few years. I was expecting the worse, but it fired right up. Let it sit for 5-10 minutes recharging the battery, added a few drops of fluid to what had to be a dry smoke unit, then off we went. Here it sits at idle, recharging:

It might be a bit ghastly to look at for a scale modeler, but it fits my tinplate world rather nicely. The Bantams have a look that might suggest it's been dropped on its face, what with the compressed pilot and steamchest (not to mention the diminutive driver set).

Anyone else have one of the Bantams (SP GS-4, N&W J, or Pennsy S-2)?

PD

This is difficult to discern if it's a 'real' photograph or not Neal.

a few stains or a forgotten kid's toy on the concrete would certainly push it over the top!

@c.sam posted:

This is difficult to discern if it's a 'real' photograph or not Neal.

a few stains or a forgotten kid's toy on the concrete would certainly push it over the top!

Thanks, Sam! Indeed, the weathering is coming just haven’t gotten there yet. The kids toys is an excellent suggestion although I am probably going to use my set of teenage boys playing basketball. This comes with a hoop that I would install the edge of the driveway. My father loved basketball, and he had one installed at the end of our driveway when we were kids.  I will post more pictures as I finish up the scene  

That is a great model, Neal. Very similar to my current house (minus the basement garage). You've got me thinking....

Rob

@robmcc posted:

That is a great model, Neal. Very similar to my current house (minus the basement garage). You've got me thinking....

Rob

Thanks Rob. This is just an example of how I like to model what is out there in the real world, not the cutesy and cool.

Railking passenger set hitting the rails.

@PRRMiddleDivision posted:

Here are some views of a scratchbuilt split entry home on my layout which I built. These are all over the place in the US, but you rarely if ever see them modeled. In my attempt to portray the world as it really is, I had to have one of these on the layout. Not done yet, but getting there! Last image is an overall view of the whole scene mbuilt on sculpted laminated pink insulation foam, A large barn (already built) will be set into the hole towards the bottom of the image.

Neal showed me this scene awhile ago and I have been absolutely ga-ga over it since.  The garage scene above is so realistic that words fail me.

George

Just some more roster shots from my ever-growing passenger pool.

A GGD 12-1. A prior owner did some nice upgrades to this car including adding more people, markers on the end of the car, and enhanced detail at the couplers including airlines and chains.

Heavyweight cars to go behind my CBQ E5s.  I've got a set of coaches to go with this train too.

Special run cars from Berwyn's trains.

A Weaver Osgood-Bradley car.  This one will get converted to 2 rail to go with my other 2 rail New Haven trains.

@c.sam posted:

This is difficult to discern if it's a 'real' photograph or not Neal.

a few stains or a forgotten kid's toy on the concrete would certainly push it over the top!

Yeah, that's just spooky.

I have to search for the places it doesn't look real. I think that I found a total of 1.....

Even the lighting shows very little "multi shadow syndrome" that always give a model away.

In other words, superb; wish I could pull this off.

If you're in the Fort Pitt division of the TCA, then you'd probably know or attended the show we had today at Cheswick! As always, I was behind our little Hi-Rail display where we were running a heavy amount of MTH/Atlas-O stuff than we usually do...

And a nearly complete collection of the TCA Passenger set released sporadically from 1984-2001 brought in by Jim, a former president of our division (2000-2004) and the National one as well! Jim was insanely friendly and boy those engines were beauties!

The PA's weren't there, but the '93 Lionel F3s with Railsounds1 (Ironically the first time I heard the original diesel rail sounds in person too. The Steam sounds though I have because of a certain Kughn Era Scale Hudson ) and K-Line Gs-4 we're! The F3's as usual ran beautifully! They never broke a sweat and had zero faults. The Gs-4 was quite the experience...

It ran fine for the first few until the Jim asked on turning on the smoke unit, which we did. At first everything looked and worked okay! That was until PTSD of my encounters of a K-line smoke unit welting the body of a recently purchased N5c a few years ago kicked in after a buddy of mine who was co-running the Gs-4 with me said he can't turn it off from the remote and started to smell burnt up...

We swapped power back to the F3s a few seconds after that! Jim understood and we continued on our chatting's, learning on the K-Line Heinz reefer string I own was co-helped by him, until we had to pack up the stuff.

All in all, the meet was a blast for me and probably for others that are in this forum who were there too! Here's my album of decent shots and videos I took while at the show...

There will be several others releasing clips of their experiences and hauls later down the line this month so keep an eye out for us on Youtube. Stay warm gang!

Ran with the Trackers this past weekend at the Maryland State Fairgrounds Train Show…first modular club show of the year…

We had a trolley run on the layout, mine is on far right, it  ran all weekend. It’s the Bergen County, a gift from staying at the convention hotel at the 2017 TCA Convention in Pittsburgh.

@Craignor I like how the trollies are spaced out perfectly!

@MELGAR posted:

I took these photographs of the former New Haven Railroad station in Waterbury, Connecticut on January 31, 2024. The building is presently in use by the Waterbury Republican and American newspaper.

The station is located at the north end of the 27-mile Waterbury Branch of Metro-North Railroad. It was built by the Seth Thomas Company in 1909 during the New Haven presidency of Charles S. Mellen. The tower is copied from the bell tower in the City of Siena, Italy and is 240 feet in height.

Waterbury was once the site of the largest brass manufacturing industry in the United States and was known as The Brass City. The New Haven Railroad had a large yard with 12 tracks to serve the brass industry during World War 2. After the war, brass was replaced by plastic for many common items.

Directly across the street from the station is a building with a curved front – once the headquarters of the American Brass Company – built in 1913.

MELGAR

MELGAR

Thanks for sharing those pictures. Waterbury has a very beautiful train station. Worcester MA also has a very beautiful train station - it's made of white marble blocks (probably from the Proctor quarry in Vermont).

The train station in North Conway NH is a handsome building:

The little train station at Crawford Notch NH is also real pretty:

B&O F7’s making the rounds…

B&O FA’s doing there part…

Craig,

That's one beautiful set of diesels. Did MTH make those?

@jim sutter posted:

Craig,

That's one beautiful set of diesels. Did MTH make those?

Thanks. Those FAs above are Williams.