Reactivating Lines after Winter

[Anonymous]

Does anyone have a special run starting the season after Winter ends. Our winter is very mild, in fact, I was out in tee shirt and jeans yesterday,,,but i am aware that some of you blokes deal with cold, snow or rain.

I've done little train work ourdoors, foolishly I might add, because I have been working. But I am aware that some of you have been snowed in.

What say you...

[tangerine-jack]

Winter? What is this thing of which you speak called "winter"?[swg]

Actually, I run year round for the most part, and we do get some nasty stuff in January and February.

I don't have any special event marking the "end of winter" on the railroad. Not enough people interested in that sort of thing. I just take the locos outside and tell them to get to work.

[Anonymous]

I would like to run out side --but can't , i have a bridge out over the pond , which i just rebuilt and must wait to put it back in. because of the weather here. BEN

[Anonymous]

Let us set a date to where we can all have some pics of the first day...those of you like myself that have...er...precarious winters at best, make a special run in honor of the FIRST DAY of the SEASON.

Rene...it would be nice if the magazine could reflect and push such a day.

[SandyR]

My first run is usually toward the end of April!! Too wet/snowy/shady before then. I usually don't clean the tracks, except to brush off any debris, and then I run the old starter set engine (LGB 2010 from 1984) until I can cut the power back to a crawl. Then I do a bit of sprucing up of the garden (bad pun, sorry!) and wait for another dry, sunny day. My 'season' begins in earnest about May 15.
SandyR

[tangerine-jack]

OK, shall we make the "official" opening day of the season May 15? That date works for me. This could be fun!

[Anonymous]

QUOTE: Originally posted by SandyR

My first run is usually toward the end of April!! Too wet/snowy/shady before then. I usually don't clean the tracks, except to brush off any debris, and then I run the old starter set engine (LGB 2010 from 1984) until I can cut the power back to a crawl. Then I do a bit of sprucing up of the garden (bad pun, sorry!) and wait for another dry, sunny day. My 'season' begins in earnest about May 15.
SandyR

That would be viable MofW, but then we excpet to see your signature train. May 15 sounds like an excelletn day. Should it rain? Well, leave us pray for sun.

[Curmudgeon]

We don't go climbing into our fur-lined sleeping bags in winter.
If it snows, we plow.
If it's monsooning, we run.
If the leaves are coming down, we clear the right of way.
We've run and kept the entire main line open except for the new Gorge Line Grade with 30" of the white stuff, plowing until 0300.

TOC

[Tom The Brat]

When I visited a garden railway in Northern Illinois one spring, I was the first to run on his stainless track since the fall before. He hadn't touched it. Just made sure there weren't any sticks in the way, set my track powered 0-4-0 on the rails and away it went. I was very impressed.

[Marty Cozad]

I guess I don't understand, ??? I thought everyone ran year round.
Its muddy right now because the frost is coming out of the ground.
But run we must. Unless your a,,,,,, "girly-mon" . DUDE!!!!!!

[Train 284]

I wish, it has been pouring rain for the past week, and it will continue! I need a clear day!

[ttrigg]

[8D][8D][8D]

Cappy:

I have a "Pre Season Special" run scheduled for New Years Day. That will be a break time from dismantling the Christmas lights and such. Just had an "End of Season Special" run on Christmas Day. Couple of new cars were under the tree and had to test them out, make sure they worked, you know.

In preparation for the "Pre Season Special" I have to put in new foundations for a few new items, a working Carousel, (YES I know, it is NOT UV proof, so it will be a "Put up, Play, and take down" item.) A new ceramic "Haunted House" (also in need of UV proofing). A new "Vegetable Stand with Delivery truck." To do this "work" I plan on using the "new residents" of Rosebud Falls, a 9 man construction team. Don't know how much "work" I'm going to be able to get out of some of the other new residents, Hofbrauhous Sam, and Madam Gertrude. Don't have a building for those two yet, so Sam will be working from an orange box in front of Gertrude's tent. Also need to put in the new RRXing lights. (Have not yet fathomed the mind of SWMBO, "New" flashing cross bucks {Oh Yes, battery powered and marked "For Indoor Use Only"} in a village from around 1930"s? Well like I've said before, she buys and I make it work.)

Hope everyone had as good a Christmas as could have!

[Capt Bob Johnson]

Hopefully, and with a bit of luck, May 15th will see work trains running on the "Round Tuit and Faraway" getting the construction going on the mountain loop!

Otherwise, TJ will shoot me with S--- and hang me for stinking! But he'd be 2nd in line as Dianne wants progress!

[SandyR]

Why I don't run trains outside in the winter: we usually get heavy, wet snow beginning in November. It covers the railroad about 12" deep or more until March. It also freezes solid, and with no sun reaching the railroad until March, it doesn't usually melt away. Even with the warmer days this week, most of the right-of-way is still buried.
SandyR

[Anonymous]

winter in the bay area is really cold at some points and rainny so i hafta deal with washouts a every so year frozen rails but we's be cool[:D]

[Anonymous]

First run 2005 was around April 1st. No snow left of the tracks, just some leaves.

Late March I start looking for the tracks.

During the winter branches of a tree falling across the tracks. Can't find the picture right now. No harm to tracks, lucky me.

[Anonymous]

We try to keep the CJ&M running year round . When it snows we bring out the plow . The railroad was shut down for a couple of weeks in December when we got about a foot of snow . Its been reopened since and was running my new S-4 in Canidian Pacific colors around today. I had it one day now and it looks like its been around for 50 years after the weathering job I did to it. Hopefully i'll have some pictures to share soon. I leave a train of 14 weathered gondola's on the track all the time so I don't have to set any cars out when I get the urge to go out and play . I like summer better but running trains when its 10 degrees outside is fun too .

[vsmith]

Winter is when I usually get most stuff done in the yard!

Mild Temps make it much easier to do major yardwork than during the summer, only caviet is rain! I wanted to add a dogleg to my outdoor layout this last weekend but the rain was so bad it was impossible to do anything away from my workbench!

[Train 284]

QUOTE: Originally posted by Capt Carrales

QUOTE: Originally posted by SandyR

My first run is usually toward the end of April!! Too wet/snowy/shady before then. I usually don't clean the tracks, except to brush off any debris, and then I run the old starter set engine (LGB 2010 from 1984) until I can cut the power back to a crawl. Then I do a bit of sprucing up of the garden (bad pun, sorry!) and wait for another dry, sunny day. My 'season' begins in earnest about May 15.
SandyR

That would be viable MofW, but then we excpet to see your signature train. May 15 sounds like an excelletn day. Should it rain? Well, leave us pray for sun.

May 15th, I will be ready! Serious ballast work to do first!

[Anonymous]

I must admit I do like to have a photography session on the First running day of the year!.
This was my First running of 2005
http://darreneckersley.fotopic.net/c461924.html

Lots of leaves, and the biggest Gradient on the Railway, but them good old Kato Models dont half give it some welly![:D]