If you MUST build that laser-cut craftsman Caboose kit at the kitchen table, do NOT get up to answer the phone, especially if you happen to own an 18-pound Maine Coon cat.
Tom
Tom View my layout photos! http://s299.photobucket.com/albums/mm310/TWhite-014/Rio%20Grande%20Yuba%20River%20Sub One can NEVER have too many Articulateds!
twhite wrote: If you MUST build that laser-cut craftsman Caboose kit at the kitchen table, do NOT get up to answer the phone, especially if you happen to own an 18-pound Maine Coon cat. Tom
And especially with a 35 pound Maine Coon cat! You'd be amazed how quickly he can abscond with something and make it through the cat-door.
Marlon
See pictures of the Clinton-Golden Valley RR
Medina1128 wrote: twhite wrote: And especially with a 35 pound Maine Coon cat! You'd be amazed how quickly he can abscond with something and make it through the cat-door.
twhite wrote:
Whoa! THIRTY FIVE? I must have gotten the 'runt' of the litter, LOL!
My dog and I are really enjoying the way cat stories keep showing up in this thread.
My own no-no is this: Never watch the game, movie, etc. on your shop TV while running the table saw (band saw, scroll saw, etc.). I caught myself doing this so I relocated the TV out of sight of the "heavy equipment" in the interest of keeping my digits.
Here's to counting to ten on your fingers.
-Phil
Phil, I'm not a rocket scientist; they are my students.
SteamFreak wrote: Never spray out a motor with contact cleaner next to your gas stove. Vapor trail + pilot light = flash fire and flaming towel, motor, and hands, and a crash course in fire dancing.
Never spray out a motor with contact cleaner next to your gas stove. Vapor trail + pilot light = flash fire and flaming towel, motor, and hands, and a crash course in fire dancing.
So...Do you do the Safety Dance instead now?
Modeling the N&W freelanced at the height of their steam era in HO.
Daniel G.
Kudos to whomever started this post: it's funny!
Here's another one-
Don't have your powerpack/throttle on full speed with a loco on the track then plug said powerpack in just to see your loco go full speed into a bunch of cars and projects so you have to do the projects again...
Do not use a motor tool without safety glasses on.
Thankfully I don't know of this problem the hard way.
Buy belt sanders with dead man switches only,that way it won't sand all your scenery flat,in its rush to the end of the cord.
When you are vacuuming up your work area after a ballasting session, do not, under any circumstances, succumb to the temptation to see if you can use the suction of the vacuum cleaner to move those detailed and weathered freight cars along the track.
reklein wrote:Buy belt sanders with dead man switches only,that way it won't sand all your scenery flat, in its rush to the end of the cord.
Is that a good method for turning code 100 rail into 70?
Nelson
Ex-Southern 385 Being Hoisted
Don't invite a bunch of crazy friends over for a party and leave black N scale ballast sitting out in a bowl with a spoon in it.
They think it's some kind of special pepper.
Cleaned their teeth pretty well, OTOH!
Don't wonder just how hot the hot glue is, and don't get mad and throw it across the room when you discover the answer.
Don't use 2 pair of channel locks to grip and open that Floquil Safety Yellow that you bought back in the late '70's. Amazing how well that paint covers things when applied in spewing blobs.
And don't store all of your N Scale engines and rolling stock on top of the refrigerator in the workshop, turn the heat on very high, as in salamander high, and forget that it's supposed to get up in the high 60's in an "unseasonable warming trend".
Oh no, don't do that.
They all bend up on the ends.
Speaking of teeth, don't apply CA glue to a part and then hold it in your teeth while you find the other pieces of the assembly. I assure you, CA sticks to tooth enamel, very well!
And yet, if you break your false teeth the morning of starting your vacation, super glue will do you absolutely no good at all! Even if you glue them over and over and....well, you get the idea.
And the wife's hysterical laughter does nothing for helping the exact alighnment needed to not fix them right!
Just the memory still leaves a bad taste in my mouth!
This is a great thread, here's mine
Never clean the tip of the CA bottle with an Xacto knife.
5 stiches later and a newly shaped finger!
Never use Gorilla Glue on anything model railroad related. (I'm still trying to chisel off those big foaming blobs of rock hard glue between the flatcar floor and the load.)
Never lay across the rails reaching for something on the other side of the layout when you're hot ,sweaty, and shirtless. (I guarantee you'll beam brightly like an SP SD9 running mars lights.)
Never grab hold of a hot glue gun by the wrong end. (Ever smell burning flesh? Indeed it's not a pleasant smell after you are able to gather your other 4 senses from the excrusiating pain.)
Never try and hold tiny parts in one hand and drill a hole in them with a 3/8" electric drill with the other. (I still have a scar where the bit went through my finger.)
And finally, Never give up on the hobby. (Eventually you'll get it right if enough time and money is spent on model railroading.).... chuck
For heavens' sake, Chuck, be careful. This hobby is not supposed to be painful.
I've got to be serious for a second. A lot of you tell about x-acto knife injuries; I urge you to consider the number 16 blade instead of the number 11.
Click here to see the number 16: http://www.ares-server.com/Ares/Ares.asp?MerchantID=RET01229&Action=Catalog&Type=Product&ID=50279
It has a shorter sharp edge so your mistakes may require a band-aid instead of stitches. I use both 11s and 16s and I find that the #16 stays sharp longer because the tip is less fragile and I cut myself less frequently and less seriously.
OK, back to the fun!
Happy model railroading,
Phil
SpaceMouse wrote: Never build a craftsman kit naked at the kitchen table during a tupperware party.
Never build a craftsman kit naked at the kitchen table during a tupperware party.
Would Athearn Blue Box be okay?
Never drill any hole up through a baseboard without having drilled a pilot hole down first... thus establishing that the upward hole will emerge clear of things you do not want holes in. (Boring but practical).
at your first attendance of a large model railroads operating session with 13 other regular operators, try not to scream over the radio to the dispatcher (when everyone else can hear you)....."DISPATCH THIS IS FPWX I JUST WENT THROUGH A SIGNAL THAT WAS GREEN AND IT JUST TURNED RED AFTER MY ENGINE WENT THROUGH IT....IM STOPPING AND BACKING UP"....everyone found that quite humerous...i was embarrassed to say the least!!! but i now know how block signals work!!!!
Joe
Modeling:
Providence & Worcester Railroad
"East Providence Secondary"
HO scale
Artur wrote:Don't let the cat walk on your unfinished layout, ever. Even if he is gingerly and innocently investigating and smelling everything especially the powered track with his wet nose, now thats not a problem the problem is him rampaging from one end of the layout to the other after getting a shock of his life.
Never let your not-even 1 year od puppy investigate the Lionel Warbonnet and it's track. A yellow stain on the floor and a derailed excpress train.
OK, I'll fess up....
When I was about 9 or so I bought a model kit of a Huey helocopter. Being the "mature" modeler I was I decided to paint everything before assembly. So I set up 3 or 4 of those little tables you use to eat while watching tv, covered them with newspaper and went to town with 3 or 4 shades of green (i was looking for the full camo look). I just finished the last tray full and stood up a bit to quickly, bump one of the trays...............ever see the movie scene where the library bookcases fall like dominoes????? Trade the bookcases for 3 or 4 trays with about 80 plastic parts LOADED with wet paint scattered to the 4 points of the compass.........in the living room...........on the carpet which just celebrated its 2 month birthday................and the carpet WAS NOT remotely green beforehand.
I vaguely recall my dad saying something like ........."we leave you alone for an hour........."
I DISTINCTLY recall running for my life....
The good news is that most of the sharp contrast lines between the different shades of green ended up getting blended pretty well........
"There's got ... to ... be ... one ... more ... joke ... in there. ...!"
Modeling the Rio Grande Southern First District circa 1938-1946 in HOn3.
ALways put away your parts sprues, the unconsumed ones that is. Back into the box they go. Why?
That bottle of glue or paint you just kicked over with the elbow will go straight to that pile on the side then to something else that has any significance to you or spouse.
once i super glued my hands together. the result......
it was our maine coon that brought the power lines down, so the town switched to undergroud.
a cat knocked over micro set(decal stuff), ruining a good engine.
never leave a dremel tool on that fan being ground off, or else you will have a new exhaust stack (ex-Sou unit being turned into slug, it had that fate because it refused to run, so I rearanged it, by.... ripping the motor and ALL the gears out.
I am going to turn it soon from this....OO_____OO... to this....0-=0..::>xc]]^///(junk)
so far I've scrapped two engines, one an F7 and a BN GP38. Soon the slug will suffer the same fate.