Gidday All, Hope everyone has survived the week, at the very least, in good spirits.
Got the tops on the clubs exhibition corner modules this week.
"A Long Wait".
Have a Great One Folks.
Cheers, the Bear.
"One difference between pessimists and optimists is that while pessimists are more often right, optimists have far more fun."
Bear ..... I like the trackside building.
Here is a set of FT's hauling a freight train and an SD7 serving local industries.
GARRY
HEARTLAND DIVISION, CB&Q RR
EVERYWHERE LOST; WE HUSTLE OUR CABOOSE FOR YOU
Love the shack, bear. Another excellent shot, Garry.
An H10-44 works the yard. DJ.
A pic from open house last weekend.
I`ll be doing open house this weekend if anyone is nearby and wants to see the layout in person.
http://www.modelrailroadopenhouse.com/
Dennis Blank Jr.
CEO,COO,CFO,CMO,Bossman,Slavedriver,Engineer,Trackforeman,Grunt. Birdsboro & Reading Railroad
Here is photo from the club that I played around with an app on my phone.
Happy Friday all! I assembled one of those Jordan Model T pickups for the layout, and weathered the daylights out of it. I wanted it to look like it's seen 30 hard years or so:
Once again, some great photos from everyone. Great work guys!
-Stan
Awesome work everyone.
Curt Webb
The Late Great Pennsylvania Railroad
http://s1082.photobucket.com/albums/j372/curtwbb/
Good stuff!
The lead unit has a very cool mars light, the 2nd unit is from my first train set I got from my Dad:
Terry in NW Wisconsin
Queenbogey715 is my Youtube channel
Looks like we're all having fun doing great work and taking great pics.
This week on the Rio Grande's Four Corners Division it was time to build the mill complex in Durango. I put together two mills that essentially existed at different times on the same site in Durango Colorado, just the other side the the Las Animas River from the roundhouse.
The ASARCO mill processed the typical lead complex ores found in the San Juan Mtns to get lead, zinc, silver, and gold. After it was closed for good in the Great Depression, the US Gov't bought the site and its contractor, the Vanadium Corporation of America, built a mill to extract uranium in 1942. The rest, as they say, is history...they eventually got it cleaned up.
So the mills are together on my layout, like most squeezed into less than optimal space. Fortunately, the relatively few pics of the mills showed them with a similarly claustrophobic feel, so this compresses well. I had a few pics of the VCA mill last week, but worked on the rest this week. The major structures are all in. I still need to add an elevator/skip to takes the materials to the top of the furnace house, a chemical unloading rack, and a blower house, plus landscaping and details.The roofs come off, so lots of room for detail later.
Here's a couple of overall pics of the complex, front and back.
Ore is unloaded and stored in bins outside and inside the main mill building. The mill track passes through the building and extend to an unloading pit on the other side. Big sliding doors can make things more cozy in the winter, but it's a warm summer day. By the time the ore arrives here, it has been crushed and requires only sorting. Big "roasters" chemically process the ore and it is further processed as needed before going to the furnace house. After coal, flux, coke or other materials are dropped in the pit, the elevator and bin complex stores and dispenses materials as needed into handcars on the complex tramway. Sorry about the dark pic of the power house. It gets coal via an augur from the dump pit. Here's the front of the furnace house. Eventually, I'm gonna have some big honking red LEDs to provide a fiery glow from the furnaces. Rooftop view of the furnace house. You can see the draft tubes that go down to the blower and then the dust chamber before exiting through the stack to help suppress the worst of the pollution. In between the tubes will be the elevator skip to raise materials to the top of the furnace. A shot of the back of the furnace house. On the front of its roof are two cold air intakes, one for each furnace. These channel the air to feed the furnace. The draft tubes provide suction to capture the gases from the smelting furnace which pulls the cold air in. Lots more work before it looks finished, but I think I've achieved the look I was after of the mill's industrial canyons that match the mountainous gulches where the miners work up past Silverton.
Ore is unloaded and stored in bins outside and inside the main mill building.
The mill track passes through the building and extend to an unloading pit on the other side. Big sliding doors can make things more cozy in the winter, but it's a warm summer day. By the time the ore arrives here, it has been crushed and requires only sorting. Big "roasters" chemically process the ore and it is further processed as needed before going to the furnace house. After coal, flux, coke or other materials are dropped in the pit, the elevator and bin complex stores and dispenses materials as needed into handcars on the complex tramway. Sorry about the dark pic of the power house. It gets coal via an augur from the dump pit. Here's the front of the furnace house. Eventually, I'm gonna have some big honking red LEDs to provide a fiery glow from the furnaces. Rooftop view of the furnace house. You can see the draft tubes that go down to the blower and then the dust chamber before exiting through the stack to help suppress the worst of the pollution. In between the tubes will be the elevator skip to raise materials to the top of the furnace. A shot of the back of the furnace house. On the front of its roof are two cold air intakes, one for each furnace. These channel the air to feed the furnace. The draft tubes provide suction to capture the gases from the smelting furnace which pulls the cold air in. Lots more work before it looks finished, but I think I've achieved the look I was after of the mill's industrial canyons that match the mountainous gulches where the miners work up past Silverton.
The mill track passes through the building and extend to an unloading pit on the other side. Big sliding doors can make things more cozy in the winter, but it's a warm summer day. By the time the ore arrives here, it has been crushed and requires only sorting. Big "roasters" chemically process the ore and it is further processed as needed before going to the furnace house.
After coal, flux, coke or other materials are dropped in the pit, the elevator and bin complex stores and dispenses materials as needed into handcars on the complex tramway. Sorry about the dark pic of the power house. It gets coal via an augur from the dump pit. Here's the front of the furnace house. Eventually, I'm gonna have some big honking red LEDs to provide a fiery glow from the furnaces. Rooftop view of the furnace house. You can see the draft tubes that go down to the blower and then the dust chamber before exiting through the stack to help suppress the worst of the pollution. In between the tubes will be the elevator skip to raise materials to the top of the furnace. A shot of the back of the furnace house. On the front of its roof are two cold air intakes, one for each furnace. These channel the air to feed the furnace. The draft tubes provide suction to capture the gases from the smelting furnace which pulls the cold air in. Lots more work before it looks finished, but I think I've achieved the look I was after of the mill's industrial canyons that match the mountainous gulches where the miners work up past Silverton.
After coal, flux, coke or other materials are dropped in the pit, the elevator and bin complex stores and dispenses materials as needed into handcars on the complex tramway.
Sorry about the dark pic of the power house. It gets coal via an augur from the dump pit. Here's the front of the furnace house. Eventually, I'm gonna have some big honking red LEDs to provide a fiery glow from the furnaces. Rooftop view of the furnace house. You can see the draft tubes that go down to the blower and then the dust chamber before exiting through the stack to help suppress the worst of the pollution. In between the tubes will be the elevator skip to raise materials to the top of the furnace. A shot of the back of the furnace house. On the front of its roof are two cold air intakes, one for each furnace. These channel the air to feed the furnace. The draft tubes provide suction to capture the gases from the smelting furnace which pulls the cold air in. Lots more work before it looks finished, but I think I've achieved the look I was after of the mill's industrial canyons that match the mountainous gulches where the miners work up past Silverton.
Sorry about the dark pic of the power house. It gets coal via an augur from the dump pit.
Here's the front of the furnace house. Eventually, I'm gonna have some big honking red LEDs to provide a fiery glow from the furnaces. Rooftop view of the furnace house. You can see the draft tubes that go down to the blower and then the dust chamber before exiting through the stack to help suppress the worst of the pollution. In between the tubes will be the elevator skip to raise materials to the top of the furnace. A shot of the back of the furnace house. On the front of its roof are two cold air intakes, one for each furnace. These channel the air to feed the furnace. The draft tubes provide suction to capture the gases from the smelting furnace which pulls the cold air in. Lots more work before it looks finished, but I think I've achieved the look I was after of the mill's industrial canyons that match the mountainous gulches where the miners work up past Silverton.
Here's the front of the furnace house. Eventually, I'm gonna have some big honking red LEDs to provide a fiery glow from the furnaces.
Rooftop view of the furnace house. You can see the draft tubes that go down to the blower and then the dust chamber before exiting through the stack to help suppress the worst of the pollution. In between the tubes will be the elevator skip to raise materials to the top of the furnace. A shot of the back of the furnace house. On the front of its roof are two cold air intakes, one for each furnace. These channel the air to feed the furnace. The draft tubes provide suction to capture the gases from the smelting furnace which pulls the cold air in. Lots more work before it looks finished, but I think I've achieved the look I was after of the mill's industrial canyons that match the mountainous gulches where the miners work up past Silverton.
Rooftop view of the furnace house. You can see the draft tubes that go down to the blower and then the dust chamber before exiting through the stack to help suppress the worst of the pollution. In between the tubes will be the elevator skip to raise materials to the top of the furnace.
A shot of the back of the furnace house. On the front of its roof are two cold air intakes, one for each furnace. These channel the air to feed the furnace. The draft tubes provide suction to capture the gases from the smelting furnace which pulls the cold air in. Lots more work before it looks finished, but I think I've achieved the look I was after of the mill's industrial canyons that match the mountainous gulches where the miners work up past Silverton.
A shot of the back of the furnace house. On the front of its roof are two cold air intakes, one for each furnace. These channel the air to feed the furnace. The draft tubes provide suction to capture the gases from the smelting furnace which pulls the cold air in.
Lots more work before it looks finished, but I think I've achieved the look I was after of the mill's industrial canyons that match the mountainous gulches where the miners work up past Silverton.
Mike Lehman
Urbana, IL
Nothing new on the layout but I finally painted some aluminum replicas of Pennsy Whistle and Bell castings I have had forever.
Wow Curt! Too bad that R sign isn't original! I do have an original W sign. The paint looks good.
Great stuff,as usual,folks! Stan: The truck is terrific! What did you use to weather it?
'Needs more work,but it's a start.
Have a good weekend,
Mike
Gidday All again, Great stuff as usual.
The cabin in the photo in my opening post was scratch built by a former club member, Dave Allen, from a article in the January 1992 Model Railroader, "The House on the hill" by Sam Swanson. The article was actually a "project for that first scratch built wood structure", however Dave built his out of styrene. This is the third layout its been on. Building several as company houses is on my to-do some day list.
Like every one else I too love the Rail side shack Dave did some nice work Bear
Its time to dust off my lay out as my open house is next Saturday as part of the Houston
San Jac MR Layout tour
I've been tweaking my coal tipple loader seen in this video
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=FHTcJye5jTY
so i can run live loads to the coaling tower in Thurmond
as seen here
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=RdgZjJpfzZ4
this makes great use of the old Operating Tyco Coal Cars
TerryinTexas
See my Web Site Here
http://conewriversubdivision.yolasite.com/
middleman SNIP 'Needs more work,but it's a start. Have a good weekend, Mike
SNIP
Mike,
Ohhh, I like that. Nice work on the wye scenery!
"JaBear" tops on the clubs exhibition corner modules this week.
tops on the clubs exhibition corner modules this week.
They look great. Too bad you're gonna mess 'em up with scenery and track and trains and stuff.....
Bill
"Never try to teach a pig to sing. It wastes your time and annoys the pig"
Just takin a break at the car shop
Karl
NCE über alles!
It's time to point my new DSLR camera at the HO trains and see what happens.
Front Range ACF 2-bay covered hopper
A-Line Husky Stack
Walthers Thrall double stack car with A-Line 45' containers
Athearn SDP40
Southern Railways "Tennessean' crossing a bridge at night.
Jarrell
middleman Great stuff,as usual,folks! Stan: The truck is terrific! What did you use to weather it? 'Needs more work,but it's a start. Have a good weekend, Mike
Mike, I be pleases to bring my Big Boy over and run trains anytime!
Old shoot from my layout.
We feed the spiders very well at the mine!
Ken
I hate Rust
Great stuff, guys!
I filled in an empty block in Rice lake, Wi.
Middleman, Thanks for the reply! I use weathering powders that I bought through Scenic Express, and Testors Dullcote. I pour just a small amount of the weathering colors I want into the caps of the containers, and then I take the Dullcote and spray a little bit into its cap. Using a small brush, I dip into the Dullcote first, and then the powder. It makes the powder stick to the car better. You have to work with it a while to get it the way you like, so try it on something not too important, like some cheap car, and work on the balance of the mix. I use this for things like coupler parts. Here I'm painting the coupler knuckle with medium rust:
This also helps keep it out of the spring and joint so it still works freely. For a larger area like a car side, I dust it with the grimy black first, and then wipe much of it off so that it stays mainly in the nooks. A light dusting of light grime gives the effect I want. This picture shows the side of a Pennsy boxcar from Bowser with the dusting finished, and one truck done. I do the trucks the same as the coupler, getting the inner part of the wheels with a little deep rust or maybe grimy black :
The older versions of powders seemed to disappear when I gave the finished car with a layer of Dullcote, but the newer powders seem to hold up better. Here's the finished car:
The model T was weathered like the trucks and wheelset.
Great pics everyone!
DJ ... Thanks for commenting on my photo. I like yours very much, and I can almost hear your FM swicther chugging through the yard.
Everybody else .............. Great Work!
Here are two pics on the abandoned interurban line I`m working on for my layout.
Robert,
Beautiful bridge!
Only two pages and it's already Sunday?
Time for an update...
Here are a few more pics as I complete the major work on my Durango mill complex. First is the blower house, which supports the material conveyor to the VCA part of the mill; it also acts as a view block at the end of the River spur track. Then there are a few pics of the elevator/skip lift on the back of the furnace house. It all needs a heavy coat of grunge to get it looking more like an operating mill.
That and those glowing red furnace LEDs...
I like the way things came out all scrunched together and busy at the mill, a contrast to the wider open spaces in the background up in the mountains.
if your wondering what the stray white line is, it's where my jig broke. I rebuilt it and have cut a few more tanks. Just have to glue in the styrene bits to shape it out.
The "cut" tank compared to an "uncut" tank:
Figure later this week I clean up the rest of the noses of the other Fs and start cutting skirts on units who get them. Maybe get a few in base primer and add the DW stuff to them.
Vincent
Wants: 1. high-quality, sound equipped, SD40-2s, C636s, C30-7s, and F-units in BN. As for ones that don't cost an arm and a leg, that's out of the question....
2. An end to the limited-production and other crap that makes models harder to get and more expensive.
alfadawg01 They look great. Too bad you're gonna mess 'em up with scenery and track and trains and stuff.....
Rare earth magnets, perhaps a tad too strong?
errr, perhaps it's time to drill, tap and screw that "snap on" Tichey coupler box cover.
"The true sign of intelligence is not knowledge but imagination."-Albert Einstein
http://gearedsteam.blogspot.com/
LOL That's classic Geared Steam!
Alan Jones in Sunny Queensland (Oz)
I had to save that picture!