A Conrail GP15-1 heads up a caboose hop to Camden

Bruce

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Hi folks,

We are actually looking for a new switcher locomotive for our Donohue Paper Mill. We actually use a Bachmann GE 44-Ton. The engine is nice but most of you know the questionable running qualities of this model. I could upgrade it but don't feel like putting more time and money on it. Adding sound to it is out of question too.

Thus, knowing Donohue swapped its 44-tonner for an ex-CP Alco S2, this is the locomotive I'm looking for. Main modification include rebuilding the cab roof which was shopped back then. No other big customization is needed excepting a good paint job.

Actually, one can find sound equipped S2 at very good prices. Bachmann and Atlas both released neat looking engine. I've have a sound-equipped Bachmann RS2 and was more than surprised by the quality of this entry-level model. According to reviews, it should be the same. I own several old Atlas S2 from the previous tooling. Hard working engines weighting a ton.

Actually, I'm leaning toward the Atlas engine because of its details and because I feel it should run very nicely like older ones. However, I'd like to know if any of you had the chance to compare both models first hand. Particularly the sound. The Bachmann engine had limited functions, that's a given. Alco sound is a particular thing and makes switching move interesting.

By the way, I'm not on a tight budget for this next acquisition, so the cost isn't a selling point this time.

Thanks in advance.

Matt

Long story short... my family and I are moving... Phoenix to Bloomington, IN. As part of the chaos, we took a trip up there to scout for a house. Found one, made an offer, offer was accepted.
The really cool part!!!....
The Indiana RR,
<!-- m --><a class="postlink" href="http://www.inrd.com/">http://www.inrd.com/</a><!-- m -->
has a mainline that runs within sight of our new house. Just six miles down the road is the Tulip viaduct.
"a 2,295-foot long railroad bridge (also known as the Greene County Viaduct or Tulip Trestle) in Greene County, Indiana, that spans Richland Creek between Solsberry and Tulip. According to Richard Simmons and Francis Haywood Parker, authors of Railroads of Indiana, it is "easily the state's most spectacular railroad bridge".[2] The bridge was built in 1905 and 1906 by the Indianapolis Southern Railway and successor Indianapolis Southern Railroad, which became part of the Illinois Central Railroad in 1911. It is now part of the Indianapolis–Newton, Illinois, line of the Indiana Rail Road.
Work on the bridge started on May 22, 1905, when a groundbreaking ceremony was led by Joe Moss. It was finished in December of 1906 and is the longest rail trestle in the United States and the third longest bridge of its kind in the world. It has 18 towers for support.
<!-- m --><a class="postlink" href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tulip_Viaduct">http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tulip_Viaduct</a><!-- m -->

Just a heads-up, but we are experiencing a few problems with our Gallery right now. We are not sure what the problem is, so we are in a quandary about how to solve it. In the meantime, we are recommending that you do not add any new images to the Gallery until we tell you otherwise. Like our old chat room, the gallery is an add-on to our forum software and therefore is subject to being abandoned and unsupported. When that happens, it is possible that it is no longer compatible with newer versions of our forum software.

What you should do, rather than linking to images in the Gallery, just attach them directly to your post, or link them to a photo server website like Photobuckets.

We are working on it and will keep you posted on our progress. We appreciate your understanding and patience.

Hi folks!

Just wanted to share some recent experiment.

I'm actually in the process of adding weight to my freight cars. Many use lead to add weight. I was particularly interested by auto adhesive wheel weights as described by Mike Confalone. However, lead weights are getting hard to find. Every auto parts shop I went turned me down, telling me to ask a repair man in a garage changing tires. I also found them on the Internet, but shipping dead weight is prohibitive, almost as costly as the item itself.

Thus, last Friday, I went with Louis-Marie to the local home improvement center to find the cheapest way to add weight to a car.

First, nuts and bolts. Costly, very costly, and most are from a cheap alloy that doesn't weight that much: chromed zinc.

Second, we checked steel rod. Less costly but not very fun to work with. Cutting the rod is labor intensive and leaves very little place to customization.

Third, steel pipes and accessories. Cheaper, but still costly, not very practical.



At this point, we were a little bit disappointed. Each car would cost at least 2 to 3$ to add sufficient weight. Then, Louis suggested we take a detour and check up tiles and grout...

BIG DEAL! Cheap glass mosaics were selling for $4.95 each. It weighted a lot and was customizable: you just cut the number of tiles you need with an X-Acto. Better, they stay together because of the supporting mesh. Let's do some maths!



A 12 inches x 12 inches mosaic tile cost 4.95$ and weight 52 onces. A tile is made of 144 small 1" square tiles. Each little tile weight 0.36 oz and cost 3.4 cents.

Just for fun, I tried to weight up a Walthers FGE 50ft boxcar to reach about 11.1 oz just like Mike Confalone does (yep, that's a lot of weight, maybe too much, anyway I tried it on a few cars and it makes switching more realistic and less prone to derailment, not sure if I'll upgrade all the fleet though, probably not very good on axles). It took me 3 rows of 6 tiles and thus cost me 60 cents! Most people will strike to get the NMRA recommended weight. You only need one row of 6 tiles in most cases, costing you 20 cents. Now, try to beat this! And I guess you can find them at cheaper price if you find a dealer discounting discontinued tiles lots.

I recommend gluing the weight with hot glue. Strong enough but removeable if needed and glue instantly.

Glass mosaic tiles are cheap, readily available to most people, easy to work with, quite heavy and non toxic. They may not suit every type of cars, but for boxcars, reefers and many other enclosed cars, they should do the job. I had good result filling some cars with Plasteline or sand. Plasteline is particularly useful for hoppers as you can fill discharge bays.

Still, I need lead for my locomotives!

Matt

Hey guys,

I recently acquired an Walthers American Crane. Its a neat model, with one troubling issue, the hook tends to "stick" to the thread. Unlike the Athearn 200 ton wreck crane, which uses meta pulleys, the hook on the walthers crane is compose of two solid plastic castings, with a "U" shaped channel cut into one. Ideally, the thread would wind through this channel as the hook is raised or lowered. I have included a part of the Walthers diagram to show the parts, which are in the lower right corner.

However, the problem on my model is that the hook like to "cling" to the thread. Initially, the piece were so tightly pressed together that I had to use a lot of force to pull the hook down to the bottom of the loop where it should hang. I split the hook halves apart and put them together again, but while I can easily tug the hook down, it requires lots of weight to actually keep it down while raising and lowering the hook.

I suspect I can spread the two halves a little further (and maybe reduce the friction a little), but do you have any suggestions for making this hook function more prototypically? Perhaps a thinner thread?

Otherwise, its a neat little crane, and I was really looking forward to putting DCC in it.

The Banning TrainFest and Cajon Division Meet in Southern California will take place this coming weekend, October 11 and 12. The Cajon Division will get a head start for early attendees with a Welcome Mixer and “Bingo for Trains” on Friday evening starting at 6:00 pm in the Banning Community Center.

One low $5.00 fee covers admission to all events both days and you do NOT have to be an NMRA member to attend Cajon Division activities. Parking is free.

Festival activities will include over 11,000 square feet of operating modular railroads, a railroad swap meet, hobby clinics, a model contest with displays, a hobo train auction and food vendors.

The bulk of these activities will take place at the Banning Community Center, 789 N. San Gorgonio Avenue. This is six blocks north of the downtown and Interstate 10. This is the venue for the exhibitors and vendors, model clinics, model contest, hobo train auction, bingo for trains and some of the modular railroads.

Map Link: <!-- m --><a class="postlink" href="http://tinyurl.com/osca3o5">http://tinyurl.com/osca3o5</a><!-- m -->

The swap meet runs from 8:00 to 2:00 (Saturday only) adjacent to the Banning School Gym, approximately 560 N. San Gorgonio Avenue. This is one block down the street from the Community Center and is the site of additional modular layout displays.

The line-up of model railroad clinics:

Ron Banco: Weathering Freight Cars (2 clinics back-to-back)
Bob Chaparro: Right Of Way & Trackside Details
Ed Hall: Basic Airbrushing
Carl Heimberger: Scenery
Joe Villaryo: TBA

TrainFest website: <!-- m --><a class="postlink" href="http://banningtrainfest.com/">http://banningtrainfest.com/</a><!-- m -->

If you have questions, please contact Ed Ball at 951-237-9818.

Bob Chaparro
Moderator
Model Railroads of Southern California
<!-- m --><a class="postlink" href="https://groups.yahoo.com/neo/groups/Model_Railroads_Of_Southern_California/">https://groups.yahoo.com/neo/groups/Mod ... alifornia/</a><!-- m -->

"Paul Revere" passed away Saturday.

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I always loved that Cherokee People song................

There havent been a lot of posts here in a while, so I thought I'd post my operations planning.



this is my layout that I've been running for several years, In just 30" x 54" (2.5 ft vs 4.5 ft). It has yard switching, a continuous running loop with two pathways, and industrial switching in that space without looking at all crowded!

the yard is the quintessential British puzzle: inglenook sidings. the 3 sidings each can hold 3, 3, and 5 40-foot cars. The yard lead holds 3 cars and a short engine (an 0-6-0, SW600/900/1200/1500, RS-1/RS-3, or similar sized switcher. inside the peanut shaped mainline, there are 4 industries, plus an additional industry outside the runaround track, and an interchange.


13 cars and one switcher engine handle this urban layout. The yard has 8 cars, plus one at each of the 5 industries. I generally suggest 2 Reefers, 3 Covered Hoppers, 4 Tankers, and 5 Boxcars, but any combination will do. All 5 industries are generic enough to take each kind of car (though admittedly a tanker at ACME might be Rocket Fuel, while at the Food Plant it might be Milk, and Gasoline at the town track, just as an example).

Operations proceed this way: of the 8 cars at the yard, 5 are chosen by rolling an 8-sided die, rerolling any repeats, in addition, a 6-sided die is rolled for location (rerolling 6s). with the consist to be in the order rolled - eg the first car chosen must be the first after the engine, then the 2nd car, etc.

After the 5 car train is assembled, at least one full circuit is made. Then the cars currently spotted at the industries are reassembled into train that is parked on the interchange while the original train's cars are spotted at each industry. Once all cars are spotted, the train at the interchange is picked up. Again one full circuit is made and the 5 cars are parked at the yard, the engine is moved to the end of the yard lead/engine service area, and the game is setup for another run.


thoughts? hve I discovered a perfect railroad?