Hello, all, Sharing some of my in-progress additions to my Community Webshot home pages. The continuing experiments to do a layout with realistic appearing Kato Unitrack continue. http://community.webshots.com/user/atsf_arizona I am getting ready to integrate the painted Kato Unitrack into the scenery (the photos keep pointing out to me it's time!) ================== In January 1961, the Santa Fe's 'Peavine Line' branch to Phoenix, Arizona, still left the transcontinental Santa Fe main at Ash Fork. Phoenix (denoted on ATSF timetable as the Salt River Valley) was a large vegetable farming area, and Santa Fe during season ran lots of of reefer trains to carry the goods to Eastern markets. The power on these trains at that time was varied; F7s, GP9s, and occasionally even the new SD24s. Here we see three Santa Fe Geeps in the brand new blue and yellow Santa Fe paint scheme introduced in 1960, bringing a load of empty reefers through the rugged mountains above Prescott, down towards Glendale and Phoenix: The Peavine Line south of Prescott and north of Skull Valley was a twisting, turning, 3% grade - which made for great train watching as the Santa Fe reefer trains snaked over bridges and through the desert mountains. The Santa Fe's GP9s were actually numbered 700-751; this painted and lettered 1996 Atlas GP7 is acting as one of those engines. The MicroScale decal sheet had '779' as one block and so I took modeling license to save myself time and to use that number, even though ATSF never actually had a GP9 number 779. (I wanted to make sure the numbers all lined up neatly!) The Prieta 3% grade line depicted here (freelance scene) between Prescott and Skull Valley had a very short time left; in March 1961, Santa Fe started building the Abra cutoff, which bypassed Prieta grade and the city of Prescott with a much easier 1.5% grade. However, I model that magical window of time in which charming little Prescott was still on the Peavine mainline, so here, it's January 1961. ========================= John Sing singj@us.ibm.com San Mateo CA 'puppybig' on the Kato Unitrack Forum 'atsf_arizona' on the Atlas N Scale Forum Modeling the Santa Fe's 'Peavine Line' from Ash Fork AZ to Phoenix AZ in the 50's/60's (that's where I grew up) Visit my Community Webshots home page: http://community.webshots.com/user/atsf_arizona 'Best of' my photos: http://www.railimages.com/gallery/johnsing
John, Fantastic scenery it looks very realistic. I'm suprised to see such use of unitrack before, I guess you will just paint the track to blend it in as you dont need to re-ballast the track. Ho extensive is the layout do you have a plan you can post? Great to see you post for the first time here on Trainboard, look forward to seeing more posts.
Great looking scenery, John! I really like the dry river bed. Where did the stones come from? Did you dye any of them to make the varied colors? Also, isn't it going to be a problem to weather the Kato track after it is already in place? Looks like you would have to do some additional ballasting.
Very nice John. The Unitrack looks right at home! I am starting a similar project this fall, hanging up the N scale for a while and experimenting with some HO scale EZ Track. I want to try and make a little shelf style switching layout using only the basic track associated with EZ Track to show what can be done for a minimal amount of effort. I look forward to seeing more pics of your layout! Welcome to Trainboard! Russ
Hi, John, First, welome to trainboard. I encourage you to browse the other areas of this board, as you have time. You'll find lots of good stuff and great people. It looks like the scenic work on your layout is progressing very well. The unitrack seems to fit in nicely.
I love John's work. This is the same area of interest as mine, different time and story, but the same place. The southwest offers some of the most beautiful vistas to be seen, and John has captured the feeling well. Having spent a lot of time in Prescott (pronounced locally= Pres'kit) I would want to include it also, even with the grade. Great work John!
Wooooooooooooooooow!!!! Good Jop!!!! John I am also a big Santa Fe freak!!!!! I like that Railroad!!! [ 14. October 2003, 21:03: Message edited by: Eugen Haenseler ]
