Man can not live by passenger cars alone; to this end, I like to take a varnish break now and then and work on the "other end of the spectrum" - MOW equipment. The Puddington Valley Division has an eclectic assortment of MOW equipment and currently I am working on an "ice breaker" box car...... Here's a selection of our MOW - let's see what we have.. A Jordan spreader is a 12 month a year tool in British Columbia; snow removal for 8 months and road bed grading for the rest. This is a "Train Collection 2000" resin model kit I built and detailed. These, and many other MOW models from the same supplier are available from Hobby Junction in Dorval, PQ Another view of the spreader and "the boys"..... Another resin kit from "Train Collection 2000", this Canadian Pacific style plow is being dead headed by a MLW FA unit. The windows are filled with krystal kleer and the smoke jack is a Miniatures by Eric product. A Micro Trains tank car is used for diesel fuel transfers to the Samuel Ridge facility. Next: a few more "golden oldies" of the MOW department....
The crews need some place to eat their beans and lay their heads after a hard day on the track gangs... An old heavyweight 12-1 sleeper that has been converted to MOW service. The Riverossi car had the sides snaded and an enlarged sill built for it; the end doors were removed and the car was painted for MOW service and heavily weathered. A track speeder sits stuck in the snow in front of the sleeper. An old wood side box car is used for a tool car by the local track gang. The mechanical department uses another old woody for their rolling shops. Both cars are old Dimi kits modified and lettered for the CPR. The need to "repair in place" cars is handled by a 'sawed off" old mini boxcar that was converted into a wheel replacement car. This car was scratch built from a model power mini box; strip wood and styrene. The compressor and winch are metal parts and the wheels are MT lo-pro's.... I am in the process of adding a ice breaking boxcar; a tool boxcar and an aux water tender built from an old steam tender. Building MOW equipment is as far away from the "neat and tidy" world of modeling varish as you can get - and it's just as much fun ! Let's see your MOW equipment ! Thanks for visiting.
Someday I will get my act together and take pictures of my equipment. I have a Walthers snowplow, a Railway Express speeder, A Dimi Trains wrecker, and a small work train with a MT troop kitchen car, various flats and wood boxcars. Not a bad start for a 100+ mile shortline. Frank
Wow. Nice stuff! One of the reasons that I model Winslow, AZ is because it was a division point, and maintenance crews and 'stuff' were always there. Winslow has seemed to attract more than its fair share of big-time maintenance equipment for a physically small location. Even the Google Earth photo (2003) shows the 'big hook' still parked there - one of the last places I've EVER seen a 250-ton wrecking crane in serviceable condition. So as an N modeler, I've pushed that to the limit. I've got way more stuff than I really should! The infamous 199361 rotary plow that was 'really' based in Albuquerque is now mysteriously relocated to Winslow. And my latest 'complete nutbag' tiny critter project has been to make an operating Burro crane from a Railway Express Miniatures kit and a Modemo drive unit. That's just a sampler. My operating schedule includes regular movements of material cars into and out of the yard from divisional freights, that are picked up and set out to the MOW train - ties, rail, ballast gondolas. And the local cinder pit at Winona (long a supplier to ATSF) is also in the car exchange to ballast extras. Operationally, that's solved the problem of no real industries to switch in Winslow except one lumberyard - the MOW stuff and shop activity more than makes up for it, switching rail, ties, fuel tanks, ballast, sand, etc. More to come...
This is the Puddington Valley Division's "Ice man".... a 40 ft boxcar, now religated to MOW service with home made (in the Calgary shops) "ice breakers"... The CPR used these to break the large icicles that would hang from the mnay tunnels on the route of the "Canadian" and endanger the dome cars windows (and patrons no doubt) A small fleet of these ugly ducklings were created, no two completely alike to clear the tunnels. I used an MT 40's CPR boxcar - applied scalecoat stripper to a microbrush to "age and damage" the lettering to look like a photogrpah I had of the prototype. I weathered the car; applied the new roadnumber and service designations and then sealed it with dullcoat. The breakers were made of .010 styrene sheet with .010 x .030 strip. The support rods are wire, drilled into the roof. The breakers were painted with CP's Action yellow and gunmetal. The entire car was then lightly weathered and rusted, and then re-sealed. Very close to the prototype; this will be a neat conversation piece either in the yard ot on the Divison's rails as part of a work train.
Great MOW modeling, All !! This equipment is usually kept out of sight of the public, which means you have all done some digging. Gotta ask, randgust - I know "impossibly small" is your forte' - but did you "DCC" that Burro, with the decoder/speaker in the FLATCAR ??? Great stuff gents - Thanks ! Bob C.
So randgust where might someone be able to find the drive unit that you used for this crane or where did you get yours from. Thanks, Cody
Plazajapan on 'bay has them. Right at the moment only the ones with body shells are out there. Check out item 360127574806 for example. See this thread for details on this: Powered Burro Crane project - TrainBoard.com Lets put it this way. I bought the mech and sat on it for months because every other idea I had for it wasn't worth doing - it doesn't have enough pull to be a locomotive.
First set for tonight...three different fire cars, one slightly modified P2K tank and two kitbashed cars, and a side dump hopper bashed from a MDC log car.
Last set...three scratchbuilt bucker/flanger plows and a Walthers Jordan spreader. Most of this equipment is built based on McCloud River prototypes. Jeff Moore Elko, NV
