Flintlock76 AHHHHHH! THE GREEN DIAMOND! What the locals called "The Tomato Worm!" Hands-down the UGLIEST diesel ever built! Yuck! It always shows up and jumps out at me when I least expect it! Actually, it's so damn ugly it's classic, I wish someone would come out with an affordable 0 gauge model. I'd buy one in a heartbeat and run it on Halloween. You should see the blood drain out of Lady Firestorm's face when she sees a picture of the "GD," it's amazing. She loves all things '30s but draws the line at that example of Art Deco on drugs!
AHHHHHH! THE GREEN DIAMOND! What the locals called "The Tomato Worm!"
Hands-down the UGLIEST diesel ever built! Yuck!
It always shows up and jumps out at me when I least expect it!
Actually, it's so damn ugly it's classic, I wish someone would come out with an affordable 0 gauge model. I'd buy one in a heartbeat and run it on Halloween.
You should see the blood drain out of Lady Firestorm's face when she sees a picture of the "GD," it's amazing. She loves all things '30s but draws the line at that example of Art Deco on drugs!
Except for the color - I don't see where the Green Diamond is any uglier than UP's M10000.
Never too old to have a happy childhood!
Jones1945 These pictures always looping in my mind:
These pictures always looping in my mind:
Jones 3D Modeling Club https://www.youtube.com/Jones3DModelingClub
Firelock76 Don't worry Mr. Jones, Becky knows better than to overload a circuit. Not like this guy... https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=JGnUexrYlwY
Don't worry Mr. Jones, Becky knows better than to overload a circuit.
Not like this guy...
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=JGnUexrYlwY
Johnny
Penny Trains That's the problem, there is no under. It's all flat on the carpet so I have to route wiring through as many places where I can hide it as possible. It's about a 50, 40, 10 ratio between what's on the 14v transformer powered grid, 110v extension cord grid and 6v LEDs. Looks something like this: It should NOT look like this:
That's the problem, there is no under. It's all flat on the carpet so I have to route wiring through as many places where I can hide it as possible. It's about a 50, 40, 10 ratio between what's on the 14v transformer powered grid, 110v extension cord grid and 6v LEDs. Looks something like this:
It should NOT look like this:
Cute cable cars looking at all those wires and electric wires and devices.
I would use some 3-4mm thick Acrylic sheet for the base and do the wiring at the base of it like a motherboard in the computer. The price should be around 10-12 USD per feet. In the place I live, I went to those shops making small advertisement billboards and Company logos for costume size acrylic sheet. I think you could buy them on the "Bay" as well if you like. Beware of fires, Becky!
Jones1945Imagine all the wiring under the layout!
Trains, trains, wonderful trains. The more you get, the more you toot!
That is really amazing! I didn't note there is monorail in the town! Stop motion animation needs a lot of time to create but it is fun and I think it worth the effort. you are really dedicated to this beautiful project, Becky! Imagine all the wiring under the layout! Looking forward to new projects in your town.
Well that settles it! Every time I have a frustrating day on the job I'm going to watch that video.
Just watched it and now I'm grinning wide enough to eat a banana sideways!
Thanks! Here's last year's vid with plenty of stop motion animation:
Thank you very much, Becky and Firelock76! The Christmas Disneyland Layout is really amazing! It is lively and cheerful! The Sleeping Beauty Castle and the train station is very cute and looks like the real one in California! There are some awesome Art Deco Skyscrapers models and The lovely town is connected by classic toy trains as well! I can't access Becky's photo album but I found more photos of your Christmas Town via Classic Trains page.
http://ctt.trains.com/videos/layout-visits/2013/10/becky-chestneys-christmas-layouts
I made a search of the "Classic Toy Trains" magazine "Layout Visits" video collection and there it was, I knew it was in there somewhere!
Hit the link, start the video, and prepare to be amazed as all the "CTT" readers were in 2013.
OK there's some Plasticville there, but as I said the rest is all "Penny-Trains Produced."
No pics yet of this year's set-up, but other than some improved landscaping it looks about the same as last year. (You'd be hard pressed to spot a new roof let alone a new tree, which is about all I changed over the summer! ) All I have pics of so far is the ones I started taking today (before my AA batteries quit) of my prewar layout in the "media room" or the spare bedroom as mom calls it!
I call it a "media room" because that's where all my train books, magazines, DVD's and VHS tapes are!
Firelock76Becky, I know you're not one for blowing your own horn, but for everyone's enjoyment could you link your "Disneyland" photo spread?
Here's the best option, my Shutterfly folder: https://photos.shutterfly.com/album/60149208964 With that you can see the evolution since 2011.
Firelock76 For those of you who don't know, the "Penny Trains" Christmas layouts were the subject of a "Classic Toy Trains" magazine feature article in the December 2013 issue. I've kept it, it never made it to the recycle bin or the magazine table at the gym I go to. It was that good! Plus, everything on the layout with the exception of the obvious things like trains, track, wire, and light bulbs is hand made by herself. Becky, I know you're not one for blowing your own horn, but for everyone's enjoyment could you link your "Disneyland" photo spread?
For those of you who don't know, the "Penny Trains" Christmas layouts were the subject of a "Classic Toy Trains" magazine feature article in the December 2013 issue. I've kept it, it never made it to the recycle bin or the magazine table at the gym I go to. It was that good!
Plus, everything on the layout with the exception of the obvious things like trains, track, wire, and light bulbs is hand made by herself.
Becky, I know you're not one for blowing your own horn, but for everyone's enjoyment could you link your "Disneyland" photo spread?
This is amazing! I wish I have a chance to see Becky's Disneyland in Christmas layouts!
Penny Trains Just one small piece: Big Thunder Mountain, just to the left of the tree.
Just one small piece:
Big Thunder Mountain, just to the left of the tree.
This is an amazing layout Penny Trains! Such a lovely Christmas town in your living room.
Jones1945 a mini roller coaster in the living room?
Penny Trains Jones1945 Hey! I have one of those in my living room!
Jones1945
Hey! I have one of those in my living room!
Wow, a mini roller coaster in the living room? that's interesting. If I living in a huge mansion like Kasteel van Mesen, Lede in Belgium, I would build a real one in the garden and open it to the public.
Overmod Meanwhile for you lovers of fast experimental steam even sexier than the PRR Q1, I suggest (from the glorious Self site, of course)
Meanwhile for you lovers of fast experimental steam even sexier than the PRR Q1, I suggest (from the glorious Self site, of course)
Yes, the glorious self site and a website which is still working but I forgot its name, had a full list of all streamlined locomotives from all over the world, were railfans online heaven in the mid-2000s. I remember I can find only one single tiny decent pic of LMS Coronation Class from that page, without any detail information about the engine in 2006. Another one was the America steam locomotive .com, but I am not very interested in US's steam engine at the time. During the demise of Geocities webpage hosting service, a lot of html pages disappeared and gone for good. Including my first website.
By the way, I still prefer Q1 to every thing but S1
M636CI updated the link to this: http://railwaywondersoftheworld.com/british-railplane.html
http://railwaywondersoftheworld.com/british-railplane.html
All kinds of interesting things can be accessed quickly by using the links on that site's pages!
I had not read before about the interesting way the Railplane cars were MUed into trains. I was also delighted to see pictures of the 1926 LMS turbine and some other locomotives from angles I hadn't seen before. Including this for our Canadian steam-locomotive aficionados:
(I do confess that I looked for the description of Schmidt high-pressure experiments with some , and sure enough the British patriots quietly mention Fury as 'withdrawn from testing' without the juicy details...)
Thank you for fixing the link, Peter. If I remember correctly, the online version of the "Railway wonder of the world" was one of my favorite railroad sites a few years ago. Glad to know the site is still up. If the magazine put more streamlined trains of America in the page "Speed Trains of North America", I would have started study the RR history of the States in-depth 10 years earlier.
We can see the exquisite craftsmanship of the prototype railplane; the very smooth body of it and colorful glass doors. I regret to know that George Bennie passed away one year after the project is sold for scrap.
Jones1945 M636C It's been done... http://www.gearwheelsmag.co.uk/archive/the_bennie_railplane_feature_13.htm Peter Peter, your link is broken. (404 - File or directory not found. The resource you are looking for might have been removed, had its name changed, or is temporarily unavailable.)
M636C It's been done... http://www.gearwheelsmag.co.uk/archive/the_bennie_railplane_feature_13.htm Peter
It's been done...
http://www.gearwheelsmag.co.uk/archive/the_bennie_railplane_feature_13.htm
Peter
Peter, your link is broken.
(404 - File or directory not found.
The resource you are looking for might have been removed, had its name changed, or is temporarily unavailable.)
I updated the link to this:
which worked when I tried it.
Overmod Even in a fantasy we have to do effective world-building. Alternate history is a craft, not a game.
Even in a fantasy we have to do effective world-building. Alternate history is a craft, not a game.
No Please. No need to spend your precious time writing a 1400-word essay to analyze how my fantasy is divorced from reality, how historically inaccurate it is etc. Especially when I told you clearly in the message I sent you that I firmly believe that my "900 miles fantasy HSR between NYC and Chi-town" is mechanically and economically impractical just a few days before I post it on the forum. Any person with a basic knowledge about HSR knows its limits.
If you really think I want to run the PRR, a dead company, like a monarch, I suggest you take a longer vacation or "sit back, relax and have a glass of something fine ..."
I am going to ride a train which is pulled by Bee birds to the moon with one compass and two oranges in my pocket. Yes right now.
Thanks to everyone who contributed to the theme.
Jones1945(It is a very rough draft plan, please don't take it seriously, but I can't resist...
Let's see now ... your Plan A would almost presume a resumption of 'federal control' in WWII. How that embodied "lessons learned" from the experience in WW1, the Esch Act, and the various consolidation plans of the 1920s (including the Plumb Plan and the CN aggregation) is in itself a topic for a whole thread and an interesting story. My own approach would be that railroads were jointly agreed that very fast passenger service was not a profit center "in competition" going forward, and were perfectly happy to have passenger mandates lifted from them in exchange for operating new government-built (or government-acquired) passenger service at cost or reasonable cost-plus (this was, after all, the age of six-percent return)
There is no question that ABS would be wholly obsolete for such a line, and you would need some analogue of the French TVM system involving intelligent cab signals and proportional speed control -- this having the advantage of being inherently CBTC decades early.
On the other hand, it's lunacy to operate such a high-speed line with two-cylinder simple anything, or for that matter with steam turbines with quartered rods. It would be only a matter of time to the first awful accident, and then the second, and then here come the diesel-electrics. The future for steam would be with direct-drive geared turbines, but with some variant of Cardan-shaft drive and viscous/magnetorheological clutches to individual wheelsets, and perhaps with Bowes drive at each turbine. I would also think about incorporating effective independent-brake slip control by wheelset. There's at least a possibility that a free-piston turbine could have been developed that would have enough gas-turbine exhaust heat to make a bottoming steam cycle practicable (as with the bus in the same 1941 Van Roemer article as the double-deck Boynton train in the other thread).
You must not forget that you can't just ramp up steam locomotive power without consequences -- PRR found this out fairly dramatically with their mechanical turbines, apparently not once but twice (and possibly more, if the 9000hp water-vaporware design had engineering behind it). That is so because of two paired items: effective water rate and the need for careful feedwater treatment in high-pressure boilers. The one severely affects the actual distance a locomotive can cover even if provided with long and heavy A-tank support; the other rules out most forms of track-pan operation, particularly unattended pans. Fixing this, especially for a high-speed mainline that will not age well in areas of pan spray with treated water, is nontrivial.
I would be sorely tempted to adapt the Roosen motor locomotive taken as 'war booty' to true high-speed service, perhaps with a slippable clutch in place of the rudimentary version of quill drive. That would give you a chassis that would easily 'scale' from two up to sixteen powered axles using the same powerplants, a kind of steam approximation to the electrification extension to Pittsburgh on the old PRR main line.
Ofr course, with the war over, it seems fairly obvious to me that a federal-control new-construction version of the New Main Line routed through south Pennsylvania (which is almost where you'd need to put it to get to Washington in the 'middle' of a Chicago-to-New York routing!) would have so many tunnels as to make electrification de rigueur ... even without the French showing how high-speed electrification could be done by the middle Fifties. Then you have all the opportunity in the world to build high-efficiency supercritical steam engines ... on the ground, with adequate room for efficient auxiliaries, not subjected to vibration and dirt and expediency. And not much later, practical atomic power... on the Shippingport model, the CANDU model, or Cisler's fast breeder, depending on your priorities (and whether you can keep shoe salesmen out of running the show).
A key point here is that you are NOT likely to be running long heavy trains on those headways for all those hours. So to me it makes sense to have different sizes of power for different effective 'dayparts' -- or even run some of the high-speed service with motor trains or even cars, or connecting shorter services (some of which would be partly underwritten by state, not federal, government). I also suspect some form of Pullman service (still "private", I presume) would be provided as part of many trains, not 'whole trains every hour'; even prewar, PRR recognized that all-coach trains would be where the postwar excitement would be, and enhancing coach is a less expensive 'draw' than more and better Pullmans especially where the short trip times facilitated by high-speed operations are concerned. Where, for example, is Conrad Hilton's famous outsourcing of train "experience" as a subsidized franchise -- with those distinctive decorative schemes for individual consists done with private money? Where is the system of Delmonico's revival as a kind of Fred Harvey of the East where the fast trains run and where the fast trains stop? Where is Balt's father as the head of the commissary for 'proprietary' dining service?
Alas! I suspect multiple-channel telephone service would not be practical even with post-1949 technology. Even if limited to half-duplex voice (which consumers would probably not bother with at the necessary price). Something you are NOT likely to get is nationalization of functions of the Bell System (or its competitors like ITT) no matter how the fifth Roosevelt administration might have liked the idea...
What's that? Telegraph on a 125mph train? I hate to break it to you, but there's this thing called 'teletype' that would have substituted for skilled operators in that era, and it would likely have substituted for most non-voice communications, and provided cable/Telex.
Likely a better way to do the crews, except for the select 'name trains', would be to establish cadres for individual parts of the route, with 'old hands' who know the potential clientele training new people as necessary, and then coaching the ones who stay on that particular run. This information would be known to clients ordering tickets, who could specify having a particular crew in deciding which train to take...
Yes, you want a route map showing the train's location (probably with lights along a reasonably accurate topographical map). Along with a number of clocks showing arrival times at important stations, a big prominent speedometer, and some way to have actual expected arrival time at any given stop indicated with a couple of button pushes.
I think you're missing one of the most important incentives (and reasons for 'large' locomotives on frequent LD passenger service): the high-speed transportation of automobiles to 'match' the trips taken by customers. Two forms of service: one with carriers in the train, the other in dedicated M&E trains arriving within a reasonable 'window' before and after the passenger arrival time. This goes with a concentration of regional roads and feeder services leading to the high-speed express stops, and a reasonable two-seat service on regional trains in longer corridors (perhaps again with 'check-through' automobile service) which keeps regional interest in larger forms of transit active and well enough patronized to survive and perhaps even thrive (with government assistance of appropriate kinds).
I'm tempted to say that, while there is a place for 'deep discounts' in private amenities, there is an equal or greater one for enhanced experience and service levels, at appropriate price or surcharge, for many of the kinds of special service you mentioned. "Hospitality" experience and quality assurance already knows what many of these can and should be. (And we haven't even gotten into "B&B" services on what are likely to be fairly many private cars... run in some cases entirely for 'subsidizing' profit or timeshare, and in some cases to pay for a high travel lifestyle) Personally I'd run specific trains for the 'money-saving' clientele, and provide active yield pricing right up to train time on those trains to maximize their 'contribution to profitability'. That keeps your various higher tier service levels intact from the temptation to price the amenities down to LCD.
The discussion so far reminds me of Mark Helprin, who hasn't yet quite investigated the wonderful European and Asian societies that coexist with his New York in "Winter's Tale." Where are the through connections to the superexpresses out to Western points ... including the new developed communities in the West that go with the water projects like TVA that the Government is building there? How are the Hollywood arrivals staged and promoted on the LA end of that combined trip? What's the touted equivalent of the Red Carpet in the various Left Coast cities, or destinations outside the continental United States? Let's have some fun and run with this!
Many references to the Bennie Railplane, which is a rough contemporary of the Schienenzeppelin, on the Web. Here is a good introduction (1929):
A premise of the 'grade separation' that Bennie stressed was that the elevated track could have nearly 'zero footprint' by being located above existing permanent way, much as the Wuppertal Schwebebahn was built above the river.
I never look at this without being reminded of the "interurban" in the movie version of Fahrenheit 451...
Trinity River Bottoms Boomer Had America invested in HSR after WWII people would have used it to make trips between the Big Apple and the Windy City especially when Old Man Winter has closed all the highways as well as shut down airspace. It's called insurance and is there when needed the most. Sure beats wasting billions of $$$, thus helping increase the national debt to finance senseless wars, not to mention counting the loss of fellow Americans on foreign soil, does it not?
Had America invested in HSR after WWII people would have used it to make trips between the Big Apple and the Windy City especially when Old Man Winter has closed all the highways as well as shut down airspace. It's called insurance and is there when needed the most.
Sure beats wasting billions of $$$, thus helping increase the national debt to finance senseless wars, not to mention counting the loss of fellow Americans on foreign soil, does it not?
Well said, Trinity. I wish I can make your dream come true 70 years ago, but I can only suggest you keep your dream alive at the moment. You post-war HSR idea makes me want to write a brief proposal...
Ladies and gentleman, its fantasy time! (It is a very rough draft plan, please don't take it seriously, but I can't resist...)
.............
Planned and coordinated by the US government in 1946, constructed by a consortium of PRR, NYC, N&W, CNR, GE, Pullman, Baldwin and Westinghouse, a 900-1000 miles high-speed railway (average speed =98.5mph, allowed top speed = 128mph) connecting three most important cities in the world!
(Plan A) Chicago, Fort Wayne, Lima, Columbus, Pittsburgh, Washington D.C, Baltimore, Philidelphia, New York City
(Plan B) Chicago, Toledo, Detroit, Hamilton (Canada), Buffalo, New York City
(Plan C) Your plans, your dream, your choices!
Featured Steam Engines:
Ten PRR S2a 6-8-6 8000hp direct-geared steam turbine / turbine-electric "hybrid" engine *#6200-6209 (*S2 retired), design top speed 130mph
Ten PRR S1a 6-8-6 Super Pennsylvania Class 8000hp express steam locomotive #6300-6309, design top speed 130mph
Fifteen NYCentral S-2b 4-8-4 Super Niagara Class 7500hp express steam locomotive #5501-5510, design top speed 125mph
Spare power: 4 second hand EMD E6 ABA set and 5 PRR T1s 24/7 standby along the route.
Overmod Jones1945 Was wird uns die Zukunft Neues bringen? (Aber morgen wird es vielleicht schon NICHT Wirklichkeit...) The Boynton Bicycle Railway meets the Weems 150mph telpher in Durrenmatt's tunnel! With 2 decks just like the world-record-holding HSR train!
Was wird uns die Zukunft Neues bringen? (Aber morgen wird es vielleicht schon NICHT Wirklichkeit...)
The Boynton Bicycle Railway meets the Weems 150mph telpher in Durrenmatt's tunnel! With 2 decks just like the world-record-holding HSR train!
It's been done....
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