The body is a bronz streamlined economy hudson loco body. I first tried a old brass mountain frame. I tried it as a mountain and it didn't work out. I removed a driver and tried it as a pacific or hudson. The brass frame just didn't work out. I went to the Mantua Pacific frame and drive and had some sucess here. I have a frame in the body and I tried different tenders with it. The two that seam the best was the Riverrossi NYC Henrey Driffus streamlined tender and a old A.C. Gilbert diecast hudson tender. I am going with the gilbert. On the mantuas drive I replaced the mantua lead and trailing trucks with brass ones. The gilbert is just as wide and the height is good. They are both from the same time period. This is where I am now.


   

Alright, here's one...

Sculpture Supply Canada: <!-- m --><a class="postlink" href="http://www.sculpturesupply.com/">http://www.sculpturesupply.com/</a><!-- m -->

Hydracal and casting plaster are sold in 50lb bags. Way cheaper than the little boxes you get from WS in the hobby shops.

They've also got RTV Rubber for making molds and gallons of resin for casting your own parts.

Not to mention plaster bandages by the case!

This is the place not only for your favourites, but also your key "go-to" places who have the hard to find stuff - 2" extruded foam in California, or Homasote. Let's try to include some "secrets" too, like where to get styrene or plaster at a good rate.

So if you've got info to share, start a new thread - make sure you use a descriptive title and include all the relevant details.

Andrew

We have created a new forum where you can list your favorite hobby shops and other places to find equipment and supplies. Remember, these recommendations are very subjective and should be considered when using any of them. Also note, we do not want to see negative reports here, just the places that you would go to to find products you need.

Do not limit your recommendations to just hobby shops. Maybe someone needs to know where to find blue foam in a particular area or even a web site where they can buy a hard-to-find product they need. Try to list as much info as you can such as address, phone number or a link to where this info can be found.

The forum is here: http://www.the-gauge.net/forum/viewforum.php?f=51 The "hobby shop" thread has already been moved there.

A few days ago I got my new Athearn RTR SW1500. It is a very nice little engine with an incredible level of detail, almost as good as an Athearn Genesis.



Especially the grill on top of the radiator is absolutely amazing.



Being the first Athearn RTR with a can motor, it even runs smoothly and quietly ... well, too quietly for my liking. So I decided to put a LokSound decoder in this little beauty. I thought it would be quite difficult, but it proved to be very easy instead. The engine is DCC ready with a 9-pin and and an 8-pin plug on board. I don’t use 9-pin decoders, so I cut off the 9-pin plug to give way for the LokSound decoder.



I wanted to put a small .640" x 1" mm speaker above the front truck, but found out that it was just .040" too long to fit in between the front of the frame and the pc board. After some contemplation (I am not that quick ... ) I had the idea to remove the little black clips that are used to attach the wires to the board. I soldered the wires to the board instead and now the speaker would fit in perfectly.



At the front I placed the speaker on the frame (after cutting off .040" of the frame to make the speaker fit under the shell), for the rear end of the speaker I made a little support from .060" styrene.



I fixed it by tucking it between the pc board and the frame. Now I only had to glue the speaker with a tiny drop of super glue to the frame.



Well, that really did not hurt, did it?

Hi all. Has anyone got any feed back as to if its a good place to buy from. They have some awesome beer cars and wondering if some one has bought from them before. Thanks in advance Roger

I thought that I had moved this here earlier, but I can't seem to locate it.

Rather than buying cast brass lagged pipe, you can make you own easily and at low cost, too. I made my pipe to represent a steam supply line for a Barber-Green Snow Loader.
First, fabricate the pipe from suitably-sized brass wire: use wire about two scale inches or so smaller in diameter than what you require for a finished size. The one shown below is .052", which is about 4 1/2" in HO. Make all of the necessary bends and determine the method that you'll be using to fasten it in place before starting the actual lagging procedure.
For lagging, stick a length of ordinary masking tape to a sheet of glass, then, using a new blade, trim off the factory edges and discard them. Next, measure and mark for the width of lagging that you want to use: for my large pipe, I made it 1'(HO) wide, and for the 4" (actual) length of the pipe, I used about 16" (actual) of tape.
Start at an end, or, as I did, at one of the mounting fixtures. You can cut 1/4" or so of the end to a taper or start with a square end - it doesn't seem to make much difference in the appearance. Hold the end against the pipe, with tweezers if necessary, until you can get the tape wrapped at least partway around, and keep some tension on the tape as you wind. I overlapped each preceding wrap by about 1/3 or 1/2. When you come to the end, cut it off with your X-Acto blade.

   

I ended the first wrap at a point where the pipe goes through a mounting clamp on the smokebox front. The lower end will get lagging after the pipe is installed on the loco.
All of the other mounting clamps are installed on the pipe, along with stand-offs to keep the pipe in the proper position. The small wires protruding through the stand-offs will be inserted into holes in the boiler, then bent over to hold things in place.

   

When all of the lagging is in place, apply ca to all of it - all sides and especially the ends. Soak up any excess with tissue. The glue on the masking tape will eventually fail, but the ca will keep it in place. I have pipe that was lagged this way over 30 years ago that is still solid.

   

If you have areas to be lagged after installation, as I did, do so, then apply the ca as before.

   

Here's a look at the installed pipe:

   

The front end has a simple plug, made from a large nbw casting. I drilled out the end of the wire, then ca'd the casting in place.

   

On the prototype, when the snow-loader was to be used, a hose would be attached to the end of this pipe, with the other end connected to the snow loader.
After you've installed the pipe, paint it using your usual paint and techniques. I brush-painted mine, using Floquil paint, as it was installed on an already painted loco.


And, on a different loco, some steam delivery pipes for an Elesco feedwater heater:

   

I hope that you'll find this simple technique useful.

Wayne

Has anyone tried installing the MRC decoder w/sound #1644 in a Kato SD70-MAC loco?
It is supposed to be a drop in decoder much like the Digitrax decoders for the Kato SD-70 but it includes sound.
Any comments on ease of installation, locomotive control quality, and sound quality would be appreciated.
dwight77

Anybody here belong to Train Orders.com? They look a bit interesting-- what little they will show you before you pay them 32 bucks a year to participate. Now i'm not against helping a site to prosper , but most give you some exposure before making you register, not this one. Is it worth what they are asking?

Well...it's almost Nscale. You can find these tanks at Target or will find them soon. This is a newly stocked item and is almost exactly NScale. I measured the tank at 31 scale feet, and the M1A1 is about 32 feet long. Close enough! They also had a Striker vehicle as well, and both are $3.99.