Well this morning was suppose to be a work session but instead it ended up a frustrating sessions to get a MTH engine to run. I am learning I have some issues to address with DCS. I have a CN C-liner that I had running on the lower mainline. So I decided to move it to the upper mainline. Should of left well enough alone. Finally got it to run after many engine not on track out of range and error. Hopefully now I can get back to fun stuff this afternoon............Paul
Doberman,
I like the paint job a lot. Is your painter available for hire! ;-)
I like the roof treatment as well.
he is and his twin brother is painting on the other side of the house
This afternoon I went to Home Depot to get a sheet of Masonite. I had them cut it for me. I needed a number of smaller pieces for backdrops on the lower level. Tomorrow I can start to prepare them for mounting ..............Paul
Last night I glued all the roofs on the pickle canning plant. The prototype photo in this old Wabash Valley kit shows a disheveled and deteriorated building. The thin, actual metal corrugated siding provided is good for that image. Also I have the loading dock attached, will put a canopy over that, and do some detailing, such as figuring out how to make the Peiffer's Pickles wording look faded painted on that siding.
Painted the back side of my cut piece of Masonite white because it will be sitting across the two windows And I am hoping the white will reflect the suns heat a bit and also look better from the street side. This afternoon I'll be cutting the two backdrops to fit the Masonite and gluing them in place once the paint dries...........Paul
I worked on adding a "cable restraint" system to another section of my upper main lines. The system is nothing more than3/8" oak dowels for the posts with 3 runs of braided Mason's line running thru pulled fairly taught.. The idea is to prevent any derailed rolling stock from taking the dreaded 4 1/4' free fall to the concrete fall.
Ed
Finished wiring my layout, not bad considering I just erected the benchwork 2 weeks ago.
Snow is in the forecast so we had to break out the plow.
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Christmas Open House, Ran trains for 5 hours. Had about 90 visitors to the layout today.
Karl
Just finished running my trains second time today, probably, a third before bedtime.
Attended a local show...did not find what I was looking for, although they are all over the internet auction, and not uncommon. I also missed out on an auction of an HO pickle car kit for a company from my home town, that was realistically priced, that I hoped to recreate in O. Later I finished the Wabash Valley cannery kit I have bashed slightly into Peiffer's Perfect Pickles Packing Plant (say that fast). Will photo tomorrow and post. Now have the Menard's, as a pickle salting station, shipping pickles to this plant on a Peiffer's vat car. Boxcars will take cases of jars of pickles out to the world. Look for them on your grocery's shelves
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Just finished lighting a Lionel bobber caboose using some bulbs and a 3v AAA holder I had on hand...
Package cellophane + light sanding = frosted windows!
Now that's one lit caboose!
Mitch
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Yesterday, I started the initial placement of "trestle support" pieces to provide means to connect the OUTER loop mainline to a planned second level which will be predominately Trolleys. (Sound good to you, Mitch ?) I started to use a Lionel set, of which I have plenty, but got turned off because the holes do NOT line up with the holes in the track ties. (Lionel--take note...)
So, I turned to my K-Line supply (of which I have plenty) and started out from where the "branch" line takes off from the straight portion of a Lionel # 6-5166 LH 072-switch. So far I am up to around 4 3/4--5 inches.
My goal is a minimum of six inches. And then I can run overhead track wherever I wish. Once I gain the six inch height, I can use the other K-Line set which contains ten pieces of the maximum-height type.
Pictures will be forthcoming--- until then, Merry Christmas to all my OGR friends.
KRK
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Trolleys are ALWAYS in order! ^.^
Mitch
I bought a really nice 2383 A-B-A set of engines. Probably the second best I have had in 40 years. Very low run time so I was surprised when I put it on the track and it did not run. After investigating I took apart the trucks to lube them and found the old grease had solidified . I cleaned the gears, relubricated, reassembled and tested. It still didn't run although now one truck was running great and the other did not move. Disassembled the bad truck and after much puzzlement found that the main gear would not turn in the nylon bearing. Pulled it all apart, did not see anything but cleaned it all, reassembled and tested and it all ran. I have had hundreds of old engines but never one where the old lubricant was such a problem especially where a nylon bushing was involved. Live and learn!
Today was a hit and miss day. I managed to get most of the strips of wood up around the shelf brackets before I headed out to a train show in Kirkland Ohio. When I got back I finished off the wood strips around the last bracket. As soon as the glue sets I can place my small mural in place. It's only 76" long by 7 6/8' tall. Once I do that I'll post the pics..........Paul
Good day. Got the backdrop in place. All I have to do now is tack it in the middle at the top so it won't fall forward onto the track. Once I do that I can add low foliage in front of it. Here are some pics...................Paul
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I brought home a nice Lionel ZW transformer that I don't need. Thought it checked out OK but a couple of issues that need squared away. The price was right so not sweating it.
clean,clean,,,,and more,,,for ,xmas company,,,so have to spiff up the place rails are shinny
Never being one to clean up after a work session, today's priority task wasn't very fulfilling. I managed to squeeze in something productive though. Using 14 gauge Romex solid core, I ran main track power feeds and attached existing drop feeds. All is now ready to continue table construction and track laying.
Bruce
Today I made a quick run to Home Depot to pick up a bunch of smaller drill bits. The rest of the time I just enjoyed running trains..................Paul
I haven't been downstairs yet today, but yesterday I got a couple of noteworthy things done.
I installed a Tortoise on the small helix. This one needed a little different style of linkage. From the top, it looks the same.
But down below, I used two clevises, and a 2-56 threaded rod to transfer the motion from the Tortoise to the crank. I need to do another one like it on the other side going into the Ford Plant.
I also started making the last two temporary control panels. The switch above is controlled by the second one from the left on the upper panel. The Ford Plant is the one on the far left. The far right is the west depot access, and is a routine install. Now that crossover in the middle, is a different story! Because of where they are, the Tortoises are going to have to be mounted more than 3' away. That means that I'll have to splice two of my red and yellow push rods together for each. These should be interesting, since one switch is on a bridge, and the other is on the bookshelf with little room to get tools and hands in to work.
I'll probably head down after the hockey game.
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Having finished a couple of projects and posted pictures I spent yesterday musing over several structure kits, and going through mags looking for interesting models to build. One on my future list is a Walther's gas electric kit, so I went through books looking for a western road that used a similar car, and possibly found several. Two Colorado and Southern gas electrics I found were not close matches. More research, for a photo, is needed, so I have not decided on whether or what to build. I am thinking about another pickle car, and a vinegar car, for the Menard's pickle plant and the pickle packing plant just finished. Just research today.
This past Friday I took possession of a brand new Williams scale brass camelback locomotive in Lackawana livery.
Although the Free State Junction Railway is comprised of Maryland's 4 class one railroads ( and Reading which had trackage rights over part of the Western Maryland ) and 3 short lines of the late 1940s - 1960.... the FSJR cannot keep up with current traffic demand. This great demand turned the top brass of the FSJR to the Lacawanna RR for lease of a 4-6-0 camelback. Once on the property, the camelback was immediately assigned to a special commodities trains ... IOW beer trains.
Here is a photo of the camelback posed at Patsburg Rd crossing.
Another photo of Boyds Billiards hall which I worked into the scenery along Patsburg Rd this past Sunday. I used a side walk by Bar Mills. The asphalt road is made out of roofing shingles. 
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Christmas open house. Ran trains for three hours. Had 61 visitors in to see the layout.
Karl
finally started painting my WBB FA-1 ABBA engines to Amtrak, did the black tonight when I got home from work. Silver will get on the shells friday, then the red strip, then the blue strip. They will be painted in a one of a kind phase II scheme, road # 616 AB and 617 AB. the lead A and both B's will be powered for a total of 6 motors with 2 speakers in each with the new WBB sound board for the alco 244.
Also finally finished the winter christmas side of the 8x8 layout in the basement.
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Not sure if this counts, but I used wire that I unwound from a burned out 627 magnet winding to stitch up my folding knife's leather case (after 20 years of service, the stitching on one side broke)...
Mitch
Finally got the tree up on the layout, still some work to be completed. Spent the last few weeks tracking down a DCS signal issue. Replaced some worn track, rebuilt the base under the layout in one corner. As for the DCS signal issue. I started replacing the wiring with 14 gage wire with drops 16 gage wire ( Bad timing). I have one section left to do, but results in signal strength have been good from 1 - 5 to 4 to 10. My oldest daughter who is Autistic decided to decorate the tree on her own. Family will finish decorating the tree later today. Then I will post pics in the other thread.
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trumptrain posted:This past Friday I took possession of a brand new Williams scale brass camelback locomotive in Lackawana livery.
Although the Free State Junction Railway is comprised of Maryland's 4 class one railroads ( and Reading which had trackage rights over part of the Western Maryland ) and 3 short lines of the late 1940s - 1960.... the FSJR cannot keep up with current traffic demand. This great demand turned the top brass of the FSJR to the Lacawanna RR for lease of a 4-6-0 camelback. Once on the property, the camelback was immediately assigned to a special commodities trains ... IOW beer trains.
Here is a photo of the camelback posed at Patsburg Rd crossing.
Another photo of Boyds Billiards hall which I worked into the scenery along Patsburg Rd this past Sunday. I used a side walk by Bar Mills. The asphalt road is made out of roofing shingles.
Pat: As always, GREAT scenery!!!! I love the camelback locomotive. Thank you for generously sharing your scenery tips and sources with us. Merry Christmas and Happy New Year.
Made a video short.
A 35 Second • Video Christmas Card from Train Room Gary & Crew
Used Ken Burn’s Effects, iMovie and Photoshop to put together this video short. Enjoy. Enjoy.
Gary and Pam,
Thank you for the great Christmas card! Looks like you have two young train enthusiasts there to help you along! Have a Merry Christmas!
Gary,
Nice Christmas card. Merry Christmas to you too.
Did some cleaning up of the layout wiring.
Today I read books, researching Burlington gas electrics, and found a lot of color pictures of them, to my surprise, but...they were all, every stinkin' one, EMC powered with Pullman bodies, and none were EMC powered with St. Louis Car Co. bodies. The Burlington Route historical society website must have been hacked, for all I could pull up there was some Italian marketing, in Italian. I was hoping they had a newsletter or book on the gas electrics, since the Burlington had a lot of them, and they operated longer than many, into color film days. But since there are so many color photos, and there were a lot of St. Louis versions, too, the photos must be out there, so will keep looking.
Got a new gopro for Xmas I figure they knew it was going to be used on the layout, boat and car
Put my three new engines on the layout and got ready for tomorrow's open house.
Karl
Ran all 5 loops twice today and, maybe, once more after I change some engines. Also scrounged some wheel and axle sets from an old Marx tanker to use on my recently acquired diecast Marx tender. Finished cleaning the rust off the tender frame, trucks and wheels. Why you don't throw things away. Tomorrow I plan to pick up some more cars from the lot the tender came from. They have rough finishes but will be fun to fix up. Two are dome cars and I have no Marx cars like that.
