What did you do on your layout today?

Kerrigan posted:

CL&W is starting to get toward it's "final form" with the upper grade (in the background) and it's roadbed is in the works.

Wonderful layout and collection.  Envy your space!  I look forward to following your progress.

Dave 

Some really nice engine storage and service facilities within the last few pages....always an exciting part of a layout.  I will soon need to make solid plans on what to do with the space allotted for steam, diesel and electric facilities of my own. 

Mean time, another set of PW F3 AA's recently joined the roster but not before the usual revival maintenance was performed.  On the left the freshly serviced and cleaned 2343 gets a shake down while passing trusty 2353.  The noise is deafening!

Bruce

Having completed my tree planting for most of the layout I turned my attention to an area, 10 ft., where I plan to paint a backdrop. Sketched the top elevation line and then watched numerous DIY videos after I removed 3 mountain components to reach the wall. I will practice some techniques in the next few days.

As usual a lot of great work and ideas. 

Went back and finally changed out the trucks on my CB&Q NE4 project. Took delivery of a Lionel CA4 and used the trucks to get as close as I can to the proper CB&Q waycar trucks. and installed kadees. Of course while taking pics some decals came off. go figure.

Did some measurements and  with modes to the windows and cupola look like I might be able to reconfigure the CA4 into an ACL M5 waycar. What do you think?

With Atlas Cab trucks installed

Both very nice.  One photo your commenting with seems missing or the embed won't show for me , so...I don't know what I think lol...?

But I like the Burlington. Nice when you can do that eh?

I keep wondering if the tiniest dab of Testors canopy cement would hold, and clear up the haze on decal edges that lift. I think it stands a good chance.

Fooled around yesterday with my collection of Standard gauge cars. Needed a coupler for a nice gondola I had so stole one from the rear of a caboose.  That old Lionel sheet metal is heavy duty stuff !!  The Standad motor I bought at the TCA show has a short that I can't find so will have a repair man give it a going over. That will give me a spare motor which will be nice to have.  Looking at my layout in the dining room that has 5 loops of O gauge and a big loop of Standard on the floor underneath. I think I could take up the second longest loop of O and get a loop of Standard in there. Would like to get the Standard off the floor.

Adriatic posted:

Both very nice.  One photo your commenting with seems missing or the embed won't show for me , so...I don't know what I think lol...?

But I like the Burlington. Nice when you can do that eh?

I keep wondering if the tiniest dab of Testors canopy cement would hold, and clear up the haze on decal edges that lift. I think it stands a good chance.

I might try that (Testors canopy cement ). Have to go through and find my CBQ Waycar decals. The problem they are the old Champ decals and need to be careful with them. Its to bad the dude on E bay who sold decals got arrested and the feds shut down his computer. Should of ordered when I had a chance.

Work Night Part Two for 11/1/16

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1CRmOFM289c

I took these test shots for a magazine article I'm working on.

For the actual article shots, I'm going to take a thin dowel, cover it in cotton in a conical shape, put some grey highlights, and during the long exposures I'll place it directly over the stack and rotate/bounce it for several seconds then remove it less than halfway. Then, I’ll do the same with a small cone of white cotton to show venting of the cylinders for just a few seconds.

If the effects I got with the wadded paper towel worked out as good as they did, cotton in the right shape should really look good (and it'll cast shadows like real smoke will).

The original shots were very yellow-tinted as I used the original room lighting and had no special bulbs. I corrected the color balance on the computer. That, and cropping, is all I did. I have some extra lighting I can use, these were just test photos to see how some ideas I had would turn out. They were 25-30 second exposures, which corrected the depth-of-field issue quite nicely.

Looks good. I see the ghosts have been resurrected and doing well. 

I like the detail you put into everything Lee! You always do a great job on everything you share here!

suzukovich posted:

Looks good. I see the ghosts have been resurrected and doing well. 

mike g. posted:

I like the detail you put into everything Lee! You always do a great job on everything you share here!

Thanks, gents!

Mike, once I get set up for the photos for the article I'm planning, the detail is going to be ratcheted up quite a bit from what you see here now. Mostly:

• More little detail parts, like mailboxes, smaller 'debris' along the right of way and little stuff like that. I have a huge shopping bag filled with castings, detail parts and all kinds of things just waiting their turn on the layout.
• Trees. Lots more trees. The back corners are gonna be covered in them.

My friend Charlie who made the viaduct saw that I needed bases for them.  picked them up last night and fit them on the layout tonight. 

p51 posted:

suzukovich posted:

Looks good. I see the ghosts have been resurrected and doing well. 

mike g. posted:

I like the detail you put into everything Lee! You always do a great job on everything you share here!

Thanks, gents!

Mike, once I get set up for the photos for the article I'm planning, the detail is going to be ratcheted up quite a bit from what you see here now. Mostly:

• More little detail parts, like mailboxes, smaller 'debris' along the right of way and little stuff like that. I have a huge shopping bag filled with castings, detail parts and all kinds of things just waiting their turn on the layout.
• Trees. Lots more trees. The back corners are gonna be covered in them.

Sounds great. When the time comes can you tell us where to find the article?

Looks Great Bryan!

mike g. posted:

p51 posted:

suzukovich posted:

Looks good. I see the ghosts have been resurrected and doing well. 

mike g. posted:

I like the detail you put into everything Lee! You always do a great job on everything you share here!

Thanks, gents!

Mike, once I get set up for the photos for the article I'm planning, the detail is going to be ratcheted up quite a bit from what you see here now. Mostly:

• More little detail parts, like mailboxes, smaller 'debris' along the right of way and little stuff like that. I have a huge shopping bag filled with castings, detail parts and all kinds of things just waiting their turn on the layout.
• Trees. Lots more trees. The back corners are gonna be covered in them.

Sounds great. When the time comes can you tell us where to find the article?

Lee you can count me in for the article too.

My friend from NJ international found me a double track o scale brass signal bridge so after painting it I am working on mount the signals and install 

fl9turbo2 posted:

My friend from NJ international found me a double track o scale brass signal bridge so after painting it I am working on mount the signals and install 

Now that looks like fun, I always like to clean up and restore stuff like that!

Started the preliminary work to take up the O gauge #2 track  and put down the Standard gauge track.  Used some older excess track to make sure it will fit with minimum cutting.  Picked up al the little vehicles that were in the road. Finally decided to use the ZW I have running the Standard gauge and take out the KW.  Hope to get the O torn up tomorrow, the Standard down so I can make test runs then look for carpet for under the track.  Will probably cut narrow strips to put between the rails of the standard gauge like on the O.

Be nice to see those NJ Signals in operation when their all wired up. 

Good Luck, John 

Bryan those really look good. The added height makes it look like I am looking at the Starrucca  viaduct. I knew  Tuesday night at Charlie's I should of taken them and held them for ransom. Just kidding. See you Saturday at Kirkland..........Paul

I had a chance to run some newly detailed Wabash 21" passenger cars.  I added Woodland Scenics baggage and Preiser 68209, 65306, 65327 and 65602 figures.  I need to replace a #5 Atlas switch on the other mainline tomorrow. The crossover rail from outside rail through the turnout curve, popped off the ties.  John

Ran trains.  Made up a new train for the Mountain Div. Had fun!!  

Here's a few pics of snow plow equipment being prepped for the oncoming winter season.

Started working on our electrical panel, soldered a few feeders, and tested it out.  So far so good and I was even able to run an engine back and forth a few time.  Maybe its a good thing, our next track shipment wont get her for another two weeks.  Its forcing me to do work that I do not prefer to do.  We also received our Legacy setup last week.  Really looking forward to setting that up soon.   

Trumptrain Pat,

I always like the active scenes on the Patsburg!

Thaddeus posted:

Started working on our electrical panel, soldered a few feeders, and tested it out.  So far so good and I was even able to run an engine back and forth a few time.  Maybe its a good thing, our next track shipment wont get her for another two weeks.  Its forcing me to do work that I do not prefer to do.  We also received our Legacy setup last week.  Really looking forward to setting that up soon.   

Thaddeus,

I agree I do not like wiring even though I have worked in electronics for over 40 years.  Looks to me like you are doing it right!  I agree the wait for track may entice you to spend quality time on the wiring and doing it right.  I well look forward to seeing trains running!

suzukovich posted:

Its to bad the dude on E bay who sold decals got arrested and the feds shut down his computer. Should of ordered when I had a chance.

I take it he didn't "copy right" and ran into issues with copywrites. That stuff is monitored way more than folks expect it to be.

 Might be just as well you didn't order. You never can tell, the feds might be after ALL the offending decals and I don't think you wrestling your train away from a fed while yelling "get gour own" would have gone over well, lol.

Adriatic posted:

suzukovich posted:

Its to bad the dude on E bay who sold decals got arrested and the feds shut down his computer. Should of ordered when I had a chance.

I take it he didn't "copy right" and ran into issues with copywrites. That stuff is monitored way more than folks expect it to be.

 Might be just as well you didn't order. You never can tell, the feds might be after ALL the offending decals and I don't think you wrestling your train away from a fed while yelling "get gour own" would have gone over well, lol.

Actually he had been arrested for Child Porn supposedly and other related issues.   It was discussed a while back on the forum.

Anyway found my CBQ decal stash.   And in the words of  late Jack Brickhouse  Hey, Hey The Cubs win the world series.  1969 has been avenged.

Rain day....Train day. Started once again organizing boxes to see what will go to the basement and when in the basement add some more shelves under the tables to get the things on the table off so I can lay out some track and switches out. While doing that I got out my Railking Alleghany to let her get her running legs back. A couple of pics............Paul

paul 2 posted:

Rain day....Train day. Started once again organizing boxes to see what will go to the basement and when in the basement add some more shelves under the tables to get the things on the table off so I can lay out some track and switches out. While doing that I got out my Railking Alleghany to let her get her running legs back. A couple of pics............Paul

Nice, Paul.. I really like your bridge!! Did you build it or purchase it?? Got a couple great ideas for my new layout too.. Thanks for sharing!!

As planned, I took out my #2  O gauge loop and replaced it with a loop of Standard gauge track that had been on the floor. Went rather smooth although there is more to do, such as some track side signals, and tacking it  down.  The new track went own right over the carpet ballast from the O gauge but will probably put new down.  Ran an engine around as a test.

jim pastorius posted:

As planned, I took out my #2  O gauge loop and replaced it with a loop of Standard gauge track that had been on the floor. Went rather smooth although there is more to do, such as some track side signals, and tacking it  down.  The new track went own right over the carpet ballast from the O gauge but will probably put new down.  Ran an engine around as a test.

It is so good when a plan comes together!  So how many standard gauge loops will this make?

WOODSON, thanks for the compliment. I got the bridge as a kit from  Miami Valley Bridges out of Ohio maybe almost 20 years ago. It was a wood kit cut out of red cedar. Once put together it measured 6' and it is a double mainline but back then it was not designed for the scale height cars of today. Also the center to center spacing on the bridge is 3 1/2 inches. In order to get the newer scale car carriers to go through it I had to take out the bottom cross braces inside the bridge. This afternoon I was in the basement and I managed to get another 8' shelf under a train table. And already got it full of stuff but the top of the table is now almost empty and I can start laying down track and switches down to see what I want to do...................Paul

Yesterday got a bar stool put together for the basement so now I have somewhere to sit to put my building kits together. And cleared most of the boxes off the tables so I can lay out some track and switches........Paul

Ran a few postwar trains.

Been adding some new motive power to the roster...

This Williams shell will wind up in Razorback Red, and will probably borrow the Pennsy unit's power chassis...

MPC 8010 Santa Fe switcher, running on a borrowed chassis while I get its motor sorted (the worm gear likes eating plastic gears...)

Bachmann Baltimore Peter Witt in Philadelphia Transportation Co. livery.  A what mighta been car, as PTC almost ordered these!  However, they opted for the PCC streamliners which came out a couple years later, and history was changed...  ;-)

Mitch

M. Mitchell Marmel posted:

Been adding some new motive power to the roster...

Bachmann Baltimore Peter Witt in Philadelphia Transportation Co. livery.  A what mighta been car, as PTC almost ordered these!  However, they opted for the PCC streamliners which came out a couple years later, and history was changed...  ;-)

Mitch

Mitch;

All you're missing on that Peter Witt PTC is a gi-raffe trolley pole   

Apples55 posted:

Mitch;

All you're missing on that Peter Witt PTC is a gi-raffe trolley pole   

He should know better than that, right, folks? 

Mitch

Most of the leaves are still on the trees here in KC, so between other chores and some college football I repainted an old trackside produce loading dock. I  have 5 more bldg flats to design and build this winter and need to practice back drop painting as well. Here's a pic of  the produce dock.

Nothing on the layout today. Went to the Kirkland O gauge today. Was looking for some weaver cars but didn't find ones I wanted. However I picked of a few trackside pieces made by steel city designs who took over the Keil line product line. Just got to paint them up and put them together............Paul