Yesterday's trip to Ottawa for the model train flea market went well, since the snowpocalypse was demoted to a minor annoyance. And I did come back with some more booty! Matching Atlas RS-3 pair (paint fodder): Both run like a charm. I figure I'd do either a matching Central Vermont pair with steam generators, or a CV and the second GT (not GTW) unit. I have enough steam generator detail parts for both CV units. All in 1950's CN colors! These two bring my count to seven RS3 units... confirming that one can never have too many trains... A Proto FB2 dummy (more paint fodder): This thing weighs a ton but it is a dummy! To be painted as a 1950's CN freight engine. A GP7 already in CN colors: Needs some work. Change the road number for that of a GP7 in the 4800 series (4151 was a GP9), install a better horn (this one looks like it was swiped from an F-unit), remove the steam generator detail and repaint the top of the short hood, and replace the loose-wired incandescent bulb headlights with LEDs. At first it didn't run, but it did once I pressed down on the motor and the frame contact was re-established. Runs like a new one, and doesn't sound like a coffee grinder like a lot of Athearns... And a one-of-a-kind box car: The man who did this custom job did it as a sort of "demonstrator" for a club in Nova Scotia. It generated no orders, so it remains a unique specimen, the only one in the world. And it's mine! All mine! Muahahahahahahaaaa!!! I also scored a 2024 edition of the Canadian Trackside Guide, and a pen/pencil/small tool holder repurposed from an old plastic tobacco container. As usual, not disappointed nor empty-handed.
I'm from Canada, so I get the majority of my stuff from Otter Valley Railroad in Ontario. From the US I have ordered from Walthers, Tony's Train Exchange, and The Yankee Dabler with great results. For the DCC system itself, you can get started fairly reasonably as far as cost. I started with an MRC Prodigy Express unit. These are currently $155.95 from Tony's. They are a full featured DCC system, very user friendly and not expensive. Great for a smaller layout. I now run a Digitrax DCC system on my layout. A Digitrax non-sound decoder will not cost you much, the DN136PS is $20.30 from Tony's. Sound decoders are more money. TheTSU-1100 is $111.96, and the speaker you would need is another $7.95. If you are going with sound, I recommend SoundTraxx or ESU Loksound. These are top of the line units and will give you great sound and great running performance. The nice thing about sound is you can mute it and run silent when the old bag next door is at home and run with sound on when she is not. You can also adjust the volume. Even though I live in my own house, I don't run my locos at full volume.
Thanks Jeff, I have found the decoders. Both of them as you suggested. When I bought the two DCC steamers I already got a NCE Power CAB and had about 3 feet of sectional Bachmann track to try them on. That was back in '07 when I moved up here close to where I grew up. She is not an "Old Bag". She is younger than me but also a loner who may have had a RINO husband.
That's what I thought when I saw it! It's already been renumbered 4803, joining 4801, 4809, 4816, 4817, and 4823. I think the next step is to create a LED lighting circuit with front and rear lights. For the others, I found decals in my treasure chest to paint and letter the FB2, and for the two RS-3s too.
70-tonner wasn't the only HO loco I bought at last weekend's train show. $25 for this classic RS-11 in need of minor repairs, which turned out to be putting the handrails back on and grabbing some Kadee couplers out of my spares box? I'll switch scales for a deal like that! But hey, it looks like a Kato and by gosh it runs like a Kato. And it'll become a proper SP unit once I feel like tackling the nigh-un-strippable Kato paint
Now that I got the HO Heisler I'm wondering about what I should use for tracks. I'd start with just DC, but everyone says all I would have to do is hook up my DCC controller for the other two. Even though Bachmann claims they both work on DC and DCC. I do have a Kato oval with a siding for the N gauge DC. Just needs more track for a little switcher layout in the dinning room. If I stay with the Kato for both what would be a good place to go? How about alternate for the HO? There are no dealer around here.
Those Atlas RS-11 units do run beautifully. I have a pair I've painted, lettered and detailed for DW&P, numbers 3603 and 3609. It's fun to run them together. They also run quite nicely with any one or more of my now seven Atlas RS-3s in my fleet. All have Kato mechanisms.
Not sure, but somewhere in the mists of time, I think I remember seeing a DWP RS11 in a GTW consist. Should be good looking locos.
Came to me via the Kanawha Youngstown and Northern thanks buddy great engine Now to decide if it's going to become an Indian Rock unit high hood possibly or an Ohio Southern Unit
Used to see these LSRC MP15's working the paper spur in Port Huron prior to the closure of Dunn Paper. I caught the 1502 in January of 2020: I've been looking for the Athearn model for quite a while now. Found the 1501 online at a hobby shop in Pennsylvania for a good price I think. DCC and sound, $260+shipping, so I pulled the trigger on it. Looks as if the best place to look for rare Michigan stuff is out of state where nobody's heard of it. I don't know where these two units have gone for sure. Lake State originally bought these to switch the Durand yard, so they may have gone back there. One thing I am sure of is that this one will stay cleaner than the prototype. I can't quite bring myself to dirty up such an attractive paint scheme.
Laval Hobby Show booty! A light takeaway but with some interesting freight cars and more. First off, a Roundhouse Old Timer kit for building snow-clearing MOW equipment: A really neat Pennsy coal hopper with some incitement to buy War Bonds: NMRA 50th anniversary boxcar: NMRA 1974 Silver Gate Convention reefer: A very interesting boxcar for the 25th anniversary of the Wreck Pond & Northern: the other side: Clamdigger's Cannonball? There is a Wreck Pond in Spring Lake, New Jersey, on the coast (so clam digging makes sense), and there's a railroad going through there! And a pair of billboards: I'll make some signs to fit. Red Indian Gasoline comes to mind. Maybe one to advertise Hokum's Burlesque House? I also found a pristine copy of a 1950s road map of the province of Quebec. I already have a copy that I found in the glove compartment of my '69 Newport some 34 years ago after I bought it, but it was in a delicate condition and has worsened. I love old maps and atlases. I have one atlas that dates back to 1919, 105 years ago! It was great to get out and hang around with other like-minded people. A get my train fix!
It's not directly model RR but close. I got two DVD but had buy a player today to hook to the TV. The "Installing a DCC System" from Model Railroader is much more informative and I could see the items. The discriptions are clearer than most postings. And I do own the NCE Power Cab they used. The only negative side is I think I will have to really start building a real layout instead of what I was thinking about. Oh well!!
Yes, building a layout in an apartment has many restrictions. Along with having my career, house, truck and license removed doesn't help.
And layout building has many benefits. Mostly for the soul. It took me two years of meticulous work to get to 99.9% of the 6'x8' layout, on and off, in my free time, vacation time, whenever I wasn't busy with domestic tasks. Or sleeping. I still work on improvements, upgrades, replacements, additions and other ideas that pop up in my brain. The best part is just taking one's time, enjoying the present, staying in the impervious bubble with just one's self and the layout. Then stepping back a bit and feeling that pride that comes with making something with one's own hands, something that comes out of our own creativity. Out of the soul. Even learning new things. Best hobby ever.
