What Projects Remain Unfinished?

CO Hi:  Man have you hit a nerve!  I have so many started projects, plus a few that I'm going to do someday.  Tried to get a bit caught up this last week or so because I have a bunch of friends coming over next Tuesday for a get together and I really wanted to make some progress to impress everyone. 

 

Well, I've started to build and install 7 Miller lighted signs.  Have them now erected but not wired.  I have their little power supply but need to get under the layout to connect everything up.

 

I installed six of those Lionel lighted power poles with the two small yard lights.  The lights are in place but, again, not wired.  (At my age, getting under the layout and doing wiring is pure torture.)

 

I still have three switches on my passenger terminal throat that need to have the switch motors installed.  So what I do is enter the terminal from the other end, even though it would be handier to come in from the blind end.

 

I have an old Walthers CNS&M (North Shore) coach body that I want to complete and run as a four car train with my 3rd Rail NS coach set.  That's still in a box up on the "to do" shelf.

 

Probably two years ago I started on a custom factory building designed to fit into a wedge shaped area between a siding and the main line.  Using Ameritown building parts, I have fashioned a three story, trapezoidal shaped building about 24" by 10" overall.  Still haven't gotten around to finishing the interior and installing windows, but the building is proudly standing in it's ultimate location.

 

I purchased a combination of Custom Signals and Atlas signals to start an installation of block signals on the layout.  Well, the signals are all set and in place, but they're still dark at this point.

 

Wait!  There's more!  Not going to go into it but I kinda figure that the layout, plus all the miscellaneous projects are really supposed to be a form of relaxation, in other words; a hobby.  And, if I don't feel like doing something or other, it's not like the real world, no one is forcing me to do it.  I'll get "a round tuit" some day.

 

Paul Fischer

All of my projects are unfinished. Heck, most of them are unstarted...

 

Jeff C

Tearing down my layout so I can begin anew...Greg

I have a couple of unfinished projects.  One is a mild custom Army train.  Another is a Canadian Pacific Holiday Train (CPHT).  The CPHT was going well, but head problems got in the way and the flashing LEDS weren't helping that.  I'll get back to it eventually.

Geez, I don't even think in those terms, because nothing is done. I'm just trying to stay somewhat focused and work on one thing at a time. Right now it's laying track and getting it wired. I'm getting close to finishing the lower level. Scenery and structures are still low priority at this point, but I'm starting to think about them more and more.

actually not as many projects gathering dust as I'd like to have, but I haven't been to a show for quite a while to hunt for more, or parts for what I do have.

2402 Chatham

 

 

 

a 2026 needing a few parts,and this 4-8-4 project has been sitting for a couple years now.

 

Track Weathering...... Always details to be worked on..........

Can never find a process that I like.

Ballasting the track I've relocated 3-4 times

Adding more detail around my buildings

Painting/lettering a MTH Round Roof boxcar for B&O (need to add wire grabs/steps, etc)

Rewire my layout to a star pattern

 

These have been haunting me for 1+ years, but in that time I've started/finished maybe 6-7 other projects, plus have one started (Norfolk & Portsmouth Belt Line 2-8-0 and caboose).

My unfinished project is some apartment flats that will be mounted on the wall. I finished the building flats and now I am waiting to receive the fire escapes I had ordered. Then I will try to have lighting on some of the windows of the apartments. There are so many "little" details on what I thought would be a simple project. It seems that once I start something, something else either does not look quite right or I feel I need to add to the scene.

Waiting for the arrival of a replacement motor block for a prewar American Flyer 1218 which is a miracle I found one from the 1925 era....Rewiring another block from Marx after removal of the reverse for use in a scratch built articulated streamliner...I just have to get the motor bracket to attach it to the body shell from R Grossman. 

I have four Marx SF passenger cars waiting for a redo of paint, or I should say an application of foil tape as suggested by Steve Eastman..finally found the tape. Ill try one as a trial....otherwise I am caught up with repairs and projects..........for now. 

Unfinished projects drive me nuts. I try not to start what I can't finish within a reasonable time frame.

I have a few projects, building my hollow door layout, restoring a postwar Lionel engine a friend gave me. Restoring a Marx CV and Mercury however, can’t work on repainting them til spring. I also have a few custom builds I’m working on just have not had much time due to school, but spring break is in a week so I will work on some of the projects then along with homework.

The layout,  1st level track is all laid, about 2/3 of it is wired. Got 2 levels to go but had both left rotator cuff surgery and right knee meniscus scope done. Can't reach out to do anything on top and can't get down under the layout to do any wiring for awhile.

 

I have several projects in progress. On is a restaurant for the layout called Parker's Cut (steakhouse). I also have a project with a postwar 736 that I have a posted about on a different threat on the forum (link below if interested). Several plans: custom painted passenger cars to match Lionel Santa Fe Black Bonnet F3's from made in the last few years, Electric RR upgrade to postwar 736 and Lionel SF Black Bonnet, and getting the layout up of the floor and permanently installed.

Link to 736 topic: https://ogrforum.com/t...-pullmor-motor-screw

 

Way too many--its time for me to stop overthinking and just get things done.

Scotie

Given that a layout is supposed to "never be done" I don't focus on the negative of unfinished projects.  Instead I look at the accomplishments and gather inspiration from them.  Because I have decided to work on various areas of the layout which are in different stages of completion vs completing 100% of individual tasks for the entire layout, I can work on whatever floats my boat that day.

 

Bench Work

Wiring

Laying track

Scenery

Buildings

etc, etc, etc...

Too many to count. Attempting to describe them is depressing

I would have to agree with Rex. I do attempt to complete something at least every week. The key is to slow down. Yeah right..........

I don't dare list them.  It would be discouraging.  Just do one when you feel like it and then run some trains and then . . . . . you get the idea.

.....

Dennis

These   Unfinished NOS USTTC BART or Metro subway car shells are going to become

(A) a set of Talgo cars for running between my Checkerboard Williams F3 New Havens as a John Quincy Adams Train Set

(B) a Hudson and Manhattan, PATH train set

(C) standard finished as the BART or DC Metro. I have a single loose powered BART car that I could cast the end from.

If I do ever finish these I'll probably go for the John Quincy Adams.

I hqave two I can think of:

 

One I will not return to: I completed a running chassis for a model of the planned-but-never-built 2-8-8-8-8-8-2 "super triplex" that Baldwin proposed to make for Santa Fe.  The chassis ran well and was spectacular with forty drivers.  I used chassis out of Lionel RTR 0-8-0 locos and therein was my problem: the chassis was too lightweight to manhandle a big articulated body well.  So is assembled it for parts.  I may try again with heavy components.

 

And I was converted a die-cast '56 Pontiac to a '55 Olds 88 like my Dad's first new car.  Its sitting half done in a box on a shelf on the workbench, just because I sort of lost enthusiasm for the project and think I'll wait.  Some day someone will make a plain jane '55 Olds 88 sedan.  I can wait. 

I disassembled a csx ac6000 that I purchased used.  It had issues.  I picked up all of the necessary parts but it still sits on the shelf.  I am doing my best to make a meal out of this one.  

Four or five MPC era hoppers that I painted black to make some low budget N&W cars. They have decals on one side and are still blank on the other. The project got sidetracked when the prewar bug bit awhile back. Eventually the postwar trains will run again and the hoppers will get done.

In the dozens, if not hundreds! Some of the most likely actually to get done:

 

-- Finish installing the switch/accessory control panel on the layout. The panel is built, I just need to find time to mount all the controllers and then wire them to the switches and accessories. 

-- Put roadbed under the Standard Gauge loop running around the outside of my layout, to quiet it down and create a visual distinction between it and the rest of the layout, which is 0 gauge. 

-- Finish repainting an old Lionel Northern and upgrading it to TMCC.

-- Assorted rolling stock repairs.

-- Disassemble my Weaver Milwaukee Road F6a 4-6-4, install softer springs on the driving axles, and fix a wiring issue.

-- Finish repainting a Standard Gauge 124 station.

-- Put together a McCoy 2-motor Cascade. I bought the shell a couple of years ago, less motors, pantographs, and some detail parts. I've found the motors and the pans, but need to find time to get the motors working properly, repaint it, and put it together. 

-- Restore a Standard Gauge CMC/CMT 2-4-0T. 

-- Assemble a set of CMC/CMT passenger car kits.

-- Numerous other Standard Gauge restoration and repainting projects.

-- Redecorate several locomotives and freight cars for Milwaukee Road and Gadsden Pacific Lines (house railroad of the Gadsden Pacific Toy Train Museum).

-- Add scenery and buildings to my layout. 

-- Assemble, paint, and install modern electronics in an Atlas AEM-7 "toaster" electric.

-- Various electronic upgrades, TMCC and DCS.

-- Build some of the 0 gauge kits I've accumulated and never built.

-- Build some 1/43 die-cast automobile kits - a '59 DeSoto, a Duesenberg Mormon Meteor, and 1930's Opel and BMW. 

-- SELL a ton of excess trains!

That sounds absolutely amazing. How would the boiler have moved in relation to the drivers- massive overhang?!?!