Railroading in the winter

[Anonymous]

Hello,, I live in Northern PA where we can get up to 2 feet of snow in 1 day , How do I take care of my railroad in the winter?? Thanks. Alan www.MrTrain.com

[Anonymous]

ALAN
I LIVE IN LEBANON PA. , I HAVE A TRACK IN SIDE FOR THE WINTER,LET THE SNOW BLOW, STAY IN AND STAY WARM. IN THE SPRING I FILL AFTER THE BALAST UNDER THE TRACKS IF IT NEEDS IT . CLEAN THE TRACK , AND PUT MY BUILDINGS OUT, WHICH I PAINT AND REPAIR OVER THE WINTER. I ALSO HAVE A POND IN MY RR.

[Anonymous]

Alan;

This is not going to help you much but I have the perfect solution to this winter thing, I moved here to the Sunshine Coast in Queensland, where we do not have any real winter. min winter temp 15 deg C, no snow, no frost, no cold winds. The trees are all evergreens so they don't lose there leaves and the birds don't go anywhere for the winter, just sit around like they do for the rest of the year.

However we do have just the opposite problem from December to February, it gets just too hot to do much, so I guess you can't have it all. We can't even have a decent winter Christmas, last one was 39 deg C, so think of me when you have some turkey next Christmas day.


Rgs

ian Kawana etc.

[Anonymous]

I live in Minnesota and our weather is a lot like yours.
If you have provided a way for water to drain off your layout area your track should be fine. I bring the buildings and other small items inside for the winter. I bond my ballast in place but if yours is loose you may have to add more in the spring.
Don't forget to bring your power supply inside if your using track power.

Winter is a good time to do modeling projects for the garden line if you don't have an indoor layout.

OLD DAD

[Anonymous]

Hi Old Dad
In my neck of the woods winter is the time for those heavy engineering jobs like Extending the line.
Spring Autum play time.
Summer hide inside with the airconditioner and do the modeling projects that you would do in winter.
regards John

[Anonymous]

All of you poor, poor people with snow in the winter. I love sunny CA because we don't get snow, and to top that off, it's decent enough to work and run trains year round. The only thing I do differently in the winter with my trains is to wear a coat and I bring most of my rolling stock indoors and then only bring out a few cars at a time. The rains do mess up quite a few things however, but we have wonderfull weather most of the time.

[Anonymous]

QUOTE: Originally posted by Teran5

All of you poor, poor people with snow in the winter. I love sunny CA because we don't get snow, and to top that off, it's decent enough to work and run trains year round. The only thing I do differently in the winter with my trains is to wear a coat and I bring most of my rolling stock indoors and then only bring out a few cars at a time. The rains do mess up quite a few things however, but we have wonderfull weather most of the time.

Howdy,

You need to visit South Texas, we two feet of snow every...hum...50 years. We also have regular droughts and plenty of sun. I can't wait until I am ready to set up outside!

Good luck, y'all.

[vsmith]

Two words!

Rotary snowplow!

There are still a few of these for sale floating around the internet, USA made one that operated just like the real thing. There is another one out there, cant remember the maker, thats gas engine powered, weighs a ton for stability and works as good as any storebought sidewalk snowblower!

The video I've seen has this baby chewing its way thru snow as tall as itself! Hook up a few locos to pu***his puppy around your layout and you'll be rolling in no time!

[bman36]

Vic,
Marty Kozad brought along his rotary blower to the MWLSTS. What a hoot!!! Works awesome. He made his from a cordless drill. Added a housing to an Aristo B unit and fitted it with a fan from get this...a Kirby Vacuum! Really cool. Gonna' build one myself if I ever find the time. Later eh...Brian.

[Anonymous]

QUOTE: Originally posted by Teran5

All of you poor, poor people with snow in the winter. I love sunny CA because we don't get snow, and to top that off, it's decent enough to work and run trains year round. The only thing I do differently in the winter with my trains is to wear a coat and I bring most of my rolling stock indoors and then only bring out a few cars at a time. The rains do mess up quite a few things however, but we have wonderfull weather most of the time.

Teran, didn't you know, winter builds character, or was that; only characters love winter, I forget, my brain isn't completely thawed out yet.
OLD DAD

[Anonymous]

Proper winters? We used to have those in the UK not to many years ago, with the ground frozen solid December through March and temperatures down to minus god knows. In the days before central heating was standard in the UK the ice used to be on the inside of the windows and the only heat was from the coal fire in the lounge/sitting room. In those days garden railroads were few and far between in England and I can't recall any in the North of the country. The full size railways didn't even run, never mind garden ones. No wonder half the country emigrated to Oz.
But it's not like that anymore, we get a bit of frost that's neither here nor there and whilst the full size trains still don't run (can you believe 'the wrong type of snow') the garden ones do! There must be a moral there somewhere?
Cheers,
Kim
[tup]

[smcgill]

New England gets some snow.
I love to go out and plow snow with the Aristo snow plow.
This unit works well.
You should see the smoke coming out of the engines!!
Mant. is also done on all the stock.

[bman36]

Hi guys,
This just made me think. Is it possible to live steam a plow around a layout??? I wonder because it could take forever to get steam up in the cold weather. Anyone try this? I can just see the puffing in the cold air! Later eh...Brian.

[cacole]

Snow? What's that? Maybe you could find a military surplus flame thrower to mount on your locomotive and melt that stuff. Just be careful that you don't also melt the plastic crossties and set fire to trackside buildings and scenery.