We want another shrubbery!

Added some additional trees to the layout. Assorted trees both deciduous and Aspens from Grand Central Gems. These were a great deal acquired at the National Train Show in Indianapolis. The savings made attending the show worth it for me.

Added a couple of the Aspen as accent trees behind the ranch houses. 

Used several more to fill in the river bank fronting the apartment building. A little low growth along the bank and this area will be done! 

Different angle looking across the river towards the waterworks. 

Might need to add a few additional trees.

40' and 45' shipping containers

In a prior post I showed my progress painting the shipping containers. Progress on several is moving along. There was a set back with one model.

Decals on on of the 45' containers is almost done. Once applied, it will need a gloss top coat to seal the decals, then a flat coat to dull the shine.

In profile showing all the defects...

The decal went on fine, but this photo really shows off the grainy surface. I guess we'll call this one 'used'.

The ink ran while the decal was drying. I can fix most of it with over painting. But again...used.

Thought the door latches got cleaned up. But some of that gray paint remains.

The profile shot. What most people will see as it travels around the railroad.

Des Plaines Hobbies Container kits - status update

At the 2015 S Spree, I purchased several kits of intermodal containers - two 40 footers and two 45 footers to bring some diversity to my S Gauge intermodal train of Gunderson well-stack cars. While not quite done, I've gotten the kits assembled and at least a base coat applied to all four models.

The 45 footer on top is to be a Mediterranean Shipping Company (MSC) container. The 40 footer on the bottom is clearly from Hapag-Lloyd.

Decals were printed on clear decal paper using an HP inkjet printer and then sprayed with several light coats of gloss coat to seal the ink to the decal. It works okay.  This is one large decal from logo on the left to name on the right.

Painting the door latches and hinges was relatively easy. A coat of Vallejo light grey and silver grey to highlight the detail. The end text was built using Microsoft Excel and printed on clear decal paper. The labels were cut into several small pieces and added to the end of the model using Micro Set / Micro Sol to ensure the decal adhered to the model. 

One goal was to get a contrast in container colors to bring some diversity to the container load on the train.

Two shades of yellow paint were used to simulate a new container versus a container that had made several trips across the seas. Weathering will be done after the decals are applied.

DC in an AC world...

Back in January, I purchased an American Models SD-60 locomotive from a vendor at the World's Greatest Hobby On Tour show. It was the CSX road name which is increasingly difficult to find. I took the train out of the box this weekend at the Muncie and Western train show for it's inaugural run.

The end of the box. Some wag has marked the unit as "AC". It's a high rail model, and the DC box is bot checked.

It would not work.

It just sat there and vibrated. A couple of folks looked at it. One theory is that it was a DC model (everything I have is AC).  So I set it aside and got on with the show.

Today, I had a chance to look at it. Rich B. lent me a DC rectifier that I could hook up to my AC transformers. First up, I removed the body to inspect the chassis, the motor and the gearing assemblies.

I went to disconnect the headlight and the whole circuit board came loose! Talk about a tight connection!

I also pulled the body off another SD-60 in the collection for comparison.

The CSX engine and circuit board

The AC High rail circuit board. 

As the pictures show, the two circuit boards are clearly different. I placed the chassis on the track  and hooked up the rectifier. A little bit of movement! It would move and bit then halt.I'd throw the switch and it would go the other direction.

While I had it open, I checked the rotation of the motor shaft. It was experiencing some binding, but there was nothing obviously wrong. From past experience, I know that if you overtighten the plates that secure the drive shaft mounts for the large flywheel, the shaft can bind, so I backed off the screws until the two plates were snug but not tight.

I tried it again. Success! The engine would move back and forth. But only at very low power levels. If I raise the power of the AC transformer, the engine would slow and then stop. But at low speed, the engine moved and pulled the large intermodal freight string around the layout.

The CSX engine moving freight on it's demo run.

Verdict: This is a DC powered engine.

Well...poop. All my other engines are AC. So guess, I've got a DC engine in the collection. 

In other news, added a new box car to the collection. A nice Showcase line car for the DT&I.

Tunnel Portal, take 2

Here's the back story, in 2015 I had finished the landscaping for the tunnel. It was done. Materials put away and I'd moved on to finished the yard. In the fall, I ran a double stack container train onto the track and routed it into the tunnel.

BAM!

I was not expecting that to say the least. The top container and clipped the top of the portal entrance and would not fit. It derailed five cars, spilled containers all over the track and caused a coupler pocket to explode.  I should have taken a picture - it was an accident worthy of an FRA report.  I was in shock - how could this happen. I knew I had run the train over this track before and never had a problem.

Yeah...before you installed the final tunnel portal. Idiot!

Yep, it's true I'd not tested the track after installing the last portal. It was a converted MTH portal and had been cut down to be closer to S gauge. When it was cut down, it was clearly cut down to an older clearance standard and not the modern standard.

This weekend I finally fixed the portal. Ripped out the old portal and installed a new one from Pre-size model specialties.  It was not hard work, just something I did not relish having to do.

The old portal, all nicely landscaped into the layout.

Overview showing the framework that comprises the tunnel.

Close up of the same space. I was able to leave most of the landscape in place.

The Plasticville church normally in the space beyond the trees was moved for this repair.

The new portal was much thinner than the old MTH version. This required inserting a styrofoam spacer to the portal,. It did not have to be pretty as it would not be visible once the potal was installed.

The spacer plugs in place.

Yes, I would forget which one belonged on which side.

The angle of the portal needed to be tweaked, so some spacers and cutting took place to support the desired placement.

The double stack car fits into the tunnel!

Checking the portal clearance for the double stasck cars.

Sliding into the installed tunnel portal. Still have to finish the painting and landscaping..

Here's a video showing the clearance test of the double stack car.

 

World's Greatest Hobby On Tour show in Indianapolis January 8-9, 2016

I'm back from a weekend in Indianapolis at the World's Greatest Hobby On Tour (WGHOT) train show.

Held in the South Pavilion of the Indiana State Fairgrounds, the show featured a vertibale who's who in the model train hobby. Exhibitors included Lionel (maker of American Flyer), MTH, Athearn, NASG, NMRA and Z-Stuff for Trains signals (owned by a fellow Miami University graduate!) to name just a few. There was a great cross section of model railroads on display in all gauges from "T" up to the mighty G. I might have missed it, by 7 1/2" gauge seemed to missing. Several railroad historical societies and hobby shops rounded up the mix.

Friday saw me driving up mid-day to join the crew setting up the layout. We had fantastic turnout for this with 15 people participating. This was really great as it made set up a much quicker and physically less demanding than I feared it would be.

Late Friday afternoon - set up is almost complete. The floor of the building is not level, but through generous use of shims, the layout worked well. For this show, the staging yard was truly a 'hump yard'. once past the mid-point, everything rolled to the back.

This is a big show. Each night and morning, you could find multiple instances of the television ad running for the show. It must have worked, or else the rain which lasted all day drove everyone to find an indoor activity. Saturday's crowds were huge, with the people packed in 'stroller to stroller'. I took a tour of the exhibit hall and after about 45 minutes I retreated to the relative sanity of the far corner of the layout display room.

Vintage dimestore dreams toy car

The Lionel S table - a simple oval plugging the Polar Express set.

The prototype F3 rolls on the MTH display layout. The only thing not available in that train was the F3 which has not yet been relelased.

Sunday started on a very different note. Late overnight the weather broke. The rain switched to snow. The wind picked up to 23 mph. On top of that temperatures plummeted through the twenties down into the teens throughout the day. I walked out of the hotel to find everything covered in a layer of ice and snow. Undaunted, I scraped off the ice and snow and headed to the show.

Unlike me, many people stayed home until at least noon. Sunday's show was lightly attended. We had a good crew turn out to aid in operating the layout. It gave a good opportunity to take some pictures.

The detail inside this one room of one building on the layout is amazing. I'd never noticed it before.

This figure is well lit from the overhead light.

American Models 4-8-4 Northern waits for the signal to pull out.

The train extends back into the station platform in the distance.

A few early departures were offset by a few diehards that braved the weather and drove over from Dayton. At the end of the day, we had the trailer loaded and were on the road by 6:00pm.

The drive home was slow, but otherwise uneventful. The weather was the most challenging element, but otherwise, we had a good time and really capitalized on this opportunity to showcase S Gauge trains to the general public.