Big Steel! Update Feb 15/09

[Spitfire]

Thank you Ralph and Tyson!!!

Gus, thank you as well. I hardly know what to say, except that this is high praise indeed and I'm not sure I really deserve it.

Val, I'm puzzled with that starting thread ( dated january 2009 )
In Canada tax refund check comes in the mailbox around june or july.
How can you wait for 8 months before using that money ?
Obviously, that money took a long time to burn a hole in your pocket lol.
I was born in the Belgian "Pittsburgh" ( Liège ) with plenty of coal mines and steel mills ( 100 meters down the road )
So I appreciate the titanic work of modeling a steel mill and your attention to its details
Right now I'm checking the Model Railroader special issue " Model Railroad Planning 2008" page 16 . There is a very interesting article about modeling a HO 4" X 8" steel mill.
And if my memory is correct I remember you posted a reply on the N scale subforum about a steel mill started by Josh.
I prefer to model another part of my Belgian heritage ( breweries ) . It takes less space on my 23" X 11" switching layout.

Jacques

Ah well you see Jacques, I submitted my tax return a little (cough) late.... So no, I didn't wait 8 months to spend it... more like 5 minutes!!!!

Anyway, right now I am stuck waiting for parts, so to keep things moving along I've started to weather some of the rolling stock. I have 1 each of the bottle cars and slag cars done, with 2 more of each to go. It would be nice to have 6 of each in total, but they are RTR and too expensive to have more at this point.

Here are a couple of shots of my weathering progress to date.





I changed the number on the bottle car from 3 digits to 2, but now I notice both cars have the same number 27. :oops:
I think I'll paint out the 2 on the slag car making it no. 7.

cheers
Val