Teen Model Railroader Place - February 2009

Sounds fine with me.  Happy February. (TWO MONTHS 'TIL SPRING!!!!!!!!)

GO CARDINALS!!!!!!!!!

I'm going to watch the game while working on trains, since I need to multitask while watching TV.

Well, let me add my

Go Cardinals!!!!

 I'll be the third to say

GO CARDINALS!!!!!!!

The key is going to be how well the Cardinals passing game does against the Pittsburgh D.

Looking forward to the game, and just finished my homework, so now i can watch it w/o worrying about anything!!!

I won't be disappointed if the steelers win, b/c then Big ben will have proved the first ring wasn't a fluke. I got major respect for him, I think he might be the next Brett favre of the NFL.

 I'm not a football fan but I will say (in red, Cardinals color)

Go Red Sox!!!

My NJT cars derailed a lot at the club... It got so bad I had to pull them. I'll look into the IHP trucks.

 go mets, hehe

how about a link to the old thread:  http://cs.trains.com/trccs/forums/t/145579.aspx?PageIndex=1

 Growing up in NJ I was surrounded by Yankees and Mets fans... Moved up here when I was 11.

Bapou

My NJT cars derailed a lot at the club... It got so bad I had to pull them. I'll look into the IHP trucks.

Are your cars weighted right? If they are too light, that could explain alot of it.

Packer

Bapou

My NJT cars derailed a lot at the club... It got so bad I had to pull them. I'll look into the IHP trucks.

Are your cars weighted right? If they are too light, that could explain alot of it.

Check your couplers. My Horizon had a lot of play in the coupler boxes, a few washers solved the problem.

I got finished with my diorama. I can't remember if I told you that I started one, that might have been over at the Trainz forums but here are some pics.

A pair of Proto 1000 F-Units that my Aunt got me for Christmas

A Proto 2000 GP38-2

The bottom layer of ground cover is hand dyed sawdust, with materials from a Scenery Detail Kit from Woodland Scenics. Atlas Code 83 Flextrack. I need to ballast and add a backdrop, I appologize for the blur, I was to lazy to bring the tripod down to the basement. Go Steelers.

 Its walther's horrific trucks. When I shove cars, I find the trucks have too much friction. When pushing, the lead car(s) have so much resistance, that cars behind the locomotive are forced outwards due to the body mounted couplers. Get IHP trucks. The truck mounting on those cars are horrible as it is.

Very nice!  I don't remember you having a diorama, but what the hey, LOOKS GOOD!!!!

I'll hopefully get some pictures up tomorrow.

CARDS are catching up, looks like they have a chance.  1 TD ties it and they have 5:30, so it is still possible!

I didn't much like Springsteen at halftime, it seemed a little dry.  Normally like him, especially Thunder Road & Badlands, too bad they didn't play them.

Wouldn't using a truck tuner help if that's the case GG? I bought one the other day, but it isn't here yet.

Gathering what info I could from people in my area about standard hobbies shipping, my F45 should be here tommorow, along with the 120 P2K 33" inch metal wheelsets I go for 70 bucks shipped (and taxed, seller is from south florida). The truck tuner should be here by the weekend.

BTW, I got my schedule from work; and I finally got a saturday off. I told them I was taking my dogs to the vet when they asked. They don't know that the dog's appointment is Friday, so I'm going to have some fun MRRing.

Update on the superbowl: The cards just got a safety. So it's 20-16 steelers in the lead,but the cards have the ball. This might be a good few minutes.

Edit, the cards just got a TD. 23-20 Cards.

Have fun on your day off!  Nice trickery.  Watch though, your boss watches these forums.  Sounds about my luck. 

Go Cards! They're up late in the game!  A field goal will tie it though.

Packer

So it's 20-16 steelers in the lead,but the cards have the ball. This might be a good few minutes.

Well it was a good few minutes!

Packer

Wouldn't using a truck tuner help if that's the case GG? I bought one the other day, but it isn't here yet.

It would be hard to use a truck tuner on these cars!  Look at the trucks:

http://www.walthers.com/exec/productinfo/932-6072

The trucks are merely pieces of plastic, with slots for the wheels to go in. There is no real bearing or anything, the wheels just "roll." They are held in place by a metal plate which is held in by the truck mounting screw. There is NO detail, just plastic, and wrong diameter wheelsets. Luckily IHP makes correct trucks that actually roll...

I had one of those cars, ended up replacing the whole truck. The originals were horrible, barely running when pulling the car! I'd go for new trucks too.

Hmm... I have (well now HAD) one. It barely ran. I did everything to that car, and it still wouldn't cooperate. BUT it had different trucks and body mounted couplers on a double bar... Interesting.

Well, now, it's on its way to becoming a station, so here's an update picture:

Can't believe the Cardinals lost... Oh well, they beat the Eagles who beat the Giants.

Well lets see...

I need 4 more of those coaches, and one cabcar, then I'll have a complete train.

One day, some will show up on ebay again...

 Got a package form a guy in Virginia today. He got some N scale stuff from a friend's estate, and he sent some of it to me.Yes, I told him thank-you many times.

The contents:

14 CSX dbl. door boxcars w/ off-set doors (apparently Life-like he said, IDK, I'll have to check)

3 black unlettered hoppers

1 LVRC boxcar (yes, GG, I'll have pictures)

Pictures of everything either this weke or wekeend, but not today, going to a basketball game between our Middle school and the other middle shcool that feeds Aiken High (Aiken Middle).

I worked on the benchwork for my new trolley layout (in addition to my current layout; I'm not abandoning the WRS!) and then went railfanning last night...

Here's my trip report.

http://cs.trains.com/trccs/forums/p/147105/1631347.aspx#1631347

 I'm at a cross roads... Think of 3 switches.

There's a brakeman at the first switch who has been waiting to throw it for over a year... Continuing past that is a wye, one way leads to MBTA Bilevels, and the other to scratchbuilt B&M G scale equipment...

So... I'd really like to get the MBTA Bilevels and GP40MC, but this would mean having to use the money I set aside for building benchwork this month, to use to buy the 5 cars. 

Then there's also the scratchbuilding idea... I was reading through a freaking amazing thread on a different forum, by a Japanese Man who scratchbuilds lcoomotives and rolling stock almost completely. They are 95% paper, with wheelsets made of Plumbing Parts, and Paper, and Powered trucks employing Mabuchi 12 Volt Motors.

I have to give this some thought. If the MBTA K cars don't get enough people to invest in them prior to Feb 28th, I will probably put in cash for 1/3 of the numbers of orders he needs to produce them. If not, I'll wait it out until after the benchwork is up, and order from him down the road.

Oh well... Decisions Decisions.

 Well, I've got 4 cabs and 1 coach Weird consist!

My F45 came in the mail today!!!

The whole thing looks awesome.

The fans are frickin schweet!! The lift rings are too, but I don't know how to get a close-up of them with this camera. (Cannon PowerShot SX100 IS)

The backend.

The front.

The one Qualm I have with the model is that there aren't any indentions to drill holes for the Winterization hatch. I cut the mounting pegs off and glued it to the roof with CA, maiking sure the groove on it lines up with the grove along the body.

I have yet to run it in yet. When I do that I'll probably try get a video of it up. Then it gets MU'ed to my SD45s and U30C.

Vincent: Like that F45.

I LOVE faculty meeting days! Got out at 1:04 (usually 2:34) today, so I think I'll finally paint and add the railings, piping, etc. to the bakery.

Bottom of Page 4!

I worked a bit on fixing trackwork this morning, once it warms up a bit more, I'll do some more work. I've still got some new equipment (trailers for my impack set) to weather, as well as some recently-OOS service cars to write up waybills and car cards for to put them in service now that I've installed metal wheels on them.

 gonna go get some pics of my cars now

I went to the LHS on Thursday to pick up some Microsol, Dullcote, and the March MR (subscription ran out). But somehow, they didn't have ANY styrene that I need for the F40 and CII/station rebuilds

All the piping and handrails are attached to the bakery. I applied the decals and weathered to building also.

Went into the garage today to spray a coat of Dullcote. I didn't get everything sprayed because my hands got purple and I had to come inside, even though it was about 40*. Maybe I should explain:

Yesterday, I was at lunch, just talking, when my friend asks me why my hands are purple. I look at them and they are deep purple. So I go to the nurse and she has no clue what it is... Oh crap, I'm gunna lose my hands. So I leave early and go to the doctor. Apparently, since I'm really skinny, I get bad circulation in my hands and feet, causing them to change color, especially in cold weather. So it's no big deal. Well, all day today, my hands were still purple, even though the house was 70*. So if they are still acting weird the next couple days, I might have to go back.

Anyways, found a walthers CI on ebay, so I'll see if I can get my hands on it.

went to my MR club today and got my SD45s and F45 matched up (I set the SD45s speed to match up with my F45 since the club's decoder pro hasn't been updated enough to the decoder in this unit listed; turns out MRC decoders don't have readback). That consist is a real tonnage hog, so much so that I'm thinking of NOT getting another F45 or MUing my U30C to it.

The only time my hands turned purple was when I was outside in the below-zero (with wind chill) temperature railfanning wearing fingerless gloves...

In between track repair today I managed to work a bit on a couple other projects.

This is the White River Southern Railroad's humble maintenance yard for the White River Subdivision (there's also the Concord Subdivision). It consists of an old 53' container for storing smaller parts (tie plates, spikes, tools, etc) as well as some larger items such as track bumpers and relay boxes. The railroad equipment available includes a 40' flatcar, two ballast hoppers, a small gasoline speeder with trailer, and whatever empty home-road cars can be spared. Those are stored on the caboose track.The scenery is far from done in this area...

I also sceniced the gravel truck docks for Eyore's Kitty Chow. The ballasting isn't done, and the backdrop needs some work, but it's an improvement over pink foam!