Just a quick note on the Rapido 'Totally Wired' telephone poles & wires - if you know a store that has them, then go get them, as Rapido is sold out & is having trouble getting new stock in (at last report). The full explanation is on the product page:http://www.rapidotrains.com/poles.html
Just FYI, Woodland Scenics makes a set of city maintenance figures that includes a line man climbing a pole with a belt and spikes:
http://woodlandscenics.woodlandscenics.com/show/Item/A1826/page/1
Dave
I'm just a dude with a bad back having a lot of fun with model trains, and finally building a layout!
hon30critter Just FYI, Woodland Scenics makes a set of city maintenance figures that includes a line man climbing a pole with a belt and spikes: http://woodlandscenics.woodlandscenics.com/show/Item/A1826/page/1 Dave
I like those Dave, thanks for the link!
Jarrell
I have them on some places of the layout but not others. They are the last thing to go into a scene for obvious reasons. Eventually all my poles will be wired. I strongly suggest E-Z-line because it can stretch without breaking in case you do get a little clumsy around it. (I have, many times). My basement is fairly dusty but I don't need to clean dust off the lines very often. Once or twice a year at most. Not a big deal.
While a scene might look acceptable without stringing lines, it looks amazing with the lines strung. It really adds a lot. One exception are some background N scale poles I used for forced perspective. No need to string lines "in the distance".
jecorbett I have them on some places of the layout but not others. They are the last thing to go into a scene for obvious reasons. Eventually all my poles will be wired. I strongly suggest E-Z-line because it can stretch without breaking in case you do get a little clumsy around it. (I have, many times). My basement is fairly dusty but I don't need to clean dust off the lines very often. Once or twice a year at most. Not a big deal. While a scene might look acceptable without stringing lines, it looks amazing with the lines strung. It really adds a lot. One exception are some background N scale poles I used for forced perspective. No need to string lines "in the distance".
Thank you, I appreciate the input! :)
BroadwayLion There is a lot more to prototypical power lines than what meets the eye. Go around photographing every interesting pole and arrangement that you can find. see how the cross members are attached, where the guy wires go, how the transformers are wired. Then get a book perhaps from the '40s about utility poles, our power house has such a book, and it is very instructful. See if you can find it on line. There is a hiherarchy of how wires are installed on such poles. High Tension at the top, then the local transformers and the local 110-220 distribution. Below this telegraph and then telephone, then street lighting, and at the bottom, the wires for your trolleys. More modern installation would not have trolley power, but would replace that with cable TV. Telephone service is by far the most complicated to recreate, and you had better photograph that stuff sooner rather than later. Not only had all telco been underground before I arrived in North Daota 35 years ago, but even that has been abandoned and replaced with underground optic fiber. ROAR
There is a lot more to prototypical power lines than what meets the eye. Go around photographing every interesting pole and arrangement that you can find. see how the cross members are attached, where the guy wires go, how the transformers are wired.
Then get a book perhaps from the '40s about utility poles, our power house has such a book, and it is very instructful. See if you can find it on line. There is a hiherarchy of how wires are installed on such poles. High Tension at the top, then the local transformers and the local 110-220 distribution. Below this telegraph and then telephone, then street lighting, and at the bottom, the wires for your trolleys. More modern installation would not have trolley power, but would replace that with cable TV.
Telephone service is by far the most complicated to recreate, and you had better photograph that stuff sooner rather than later. Not only had all telco been underground before I arrived in North Daota 35 years ago, but even that has been abandoned and replaced with underground optic fiber.
ROAR
Modern telephone cables have far more capacity than those from eariler eras. If you look at the untility poles from the 1940s and 1950s you will see many more crossarms and wires than you see on today's overhead lines.
My plan is to use actual lines on the telegraph/telephone poles that lined the tracks, but only where the elevated ROW put the lines at slightly below track level. Where the lines would interfere with access to the equipment they will simply stop, hopefully in an unobtrusive way.
I have a supply of the Rix crossbars that were molded in clear plastic and green tinted translucent plastic. You paint only the wood parts and the insulators look very real.
Power lines were on the far side of the track and the lines would be modeled with less danger of snagging them when accessing the layout and equipment. if done right I think lines add a lot to realism.
Dave Nelson