That looks pretty good! Even gives an impression like one might see of the D&RGW narrow gauge lines, sixty years ago.
Thought the same thing! Durango/Silverton. Only thing, my trains don't fall 400' straight down to the river below!!
Finished ballasting newly rebuilt section of track. Still a tad wet, but workable. Now complete from Sidewalk switch down to South switch. May need touch up yet. Going to let it sit for a bit and see how it settles. Same spot, slightly different view. Finished up this section shortly after getting home from TCA train show at Forney Museum in Denver. Hurting too much. Will NOT be going back tomorrow. Wouldn't mind, as I'd like to grab more car and train shots!!
Please hop over to our O Scale and post some pictures! Would love to see anything Lionel 1945-1969, or post-War American Flyer S gauge.....
A bit of work tonight. Pulled some rocks out of the way, pulled old drain pipe out. Dropped half cinder blocks in, with minimal leveling required!! Just need to do some minor leveling of second , I can start moving rocks back, making minor changes as I continue rebuilding. Might be all I end up doing for a bit. Rain slated for the weekend. If not too bad until Friday, I'll try to get things finished up a bit more. No photos at this time since it was too dark by the time I finished. Wasn't gonna be a mobile dinner for the mosquitoes either!!
Progress up to now. Finished installing blocks and placing track in place temporarily. Doing this, I've discovered that I now have to MOVE the bricks about an inch back, to sit better under the track. Shouldn't be that hard of a project. May depend on the weather. Rain expected over the next 2-3 days. As seen from opposite direction. Track at switch not yet clamped in permanently yet. Just placed so I could get an idea of where the bricks needed to be placed. Gotta move them about an inch or so. Also need to move/adjust the rocks that were there. Need to be re positioned a little bit. Shouldn't be too long of a project. Tomorrow maybe, IF I'm up at a decent time, and it doesn't rain!
The post I've been waiting for!! Trackwork is DONE!!! Everything is connected. Ballasting and final adjustments tomorrow. Then general maintenance, as needed should be all I have to do. Should have a train running, and not just for testing purposes tomorrow!! Then, I think I might be able to start working on where I want my eventual tunnel to go! In no hurry for that though! Just want to get things running again, first!
An even better post! Trains ran most of the afternoon!! Started ballasting Noon-ish. Finished up about 3:30. From that point, until about 8:30, train ran. One uncoupling, and a small handful of minor derails. Might be car and/or track related. Was a flat car that derailed. BUT, I need 2 steel wheels added yet! Think that's my problem. One boxcar with unexpected uncouple. Problems seemed less, as it got later. Track, before ballasting started. Test train running, after track ballasting was done. Crossing a 48" bridge. This section is probably next! Entering bridge. This section of track still needs ballast and adjustment. Need to redo bridge first. Putting larger bricks under bridge ends. Should look better, when done. No, there is NO grade at this point! Track is level, or less than 1/8" off perfect. Slightly different view of bridge. Only this section, between switches, remains to be ballasted. After bricks under bridge are replaced with something larger, and better looking! Cinder blocks seen, are going to be my tunnel walls before too long. If I can't placed this year, they'll be placed next year for sure. By then, loose dirt should have settled nicely! Inner loop still needs ballast also. Need to work on grade, off to right. Slight grade adjustment required. Although, train handled it pretty good! Wasn't too hot, so it made for an almost perfect day to work! Was 79* when I began, around Noon. Quite happy with progress so far. Maybe some minor work tomorrow. Will see how bad I hurt first! Can barely move now!! Might look into new, updated video of railroad also. Give me a better view of what I may have to do! Overall, after tearing out, and coming close to throwing in trash...........I'm quite happy with how it's come back together.
Looking forward to the pictures. Edited: Looks like our posts arrived at TB one before the other. Love those pictures of the railroad. Nothing like a Garden Railroad.
Did some minimal work today, so far. Leveled blocks under a couPle of switches, again. Placed another block under another switch and leveled. Touched up one leg of wye, and started the other leg of wye. Found a broken rail joint, where clamp popped off. Get that fixed and I can start ballasting the rest of the wye. Maybe a bit more later, after it cools down a bit. Not real bad, but hot enough to be a bit uncomfortable when working.
Maintenance crew decided NOT to do any additional work tonight. By the time dinner was done, maintenance crew was too darn sore to work!! I had a doozy of a time, just trying to get up and move!! So, the minimal work done early in the day, was all that was accomplished! Not much, but it was maybe an hour at best. Crew is thinking of taking a couple of days off, to TRY and sort of recover from the aches and pains!! Gonna be fairly hot, so a short break is a good thing! May consider doing something though, IF it isn't too hot early on. Still have a couple of 90* or better, days coming up. Started today, it was a perfect 79*. And under the shade of the tree, it was just about perfect!! Then it got warm! I'm trying. Slowly, but I'm trying.
Thank you! In process of rebuilding, in some fashion, for the Nth time! Have made design changes early on. Now, it's kind of like fine tuning the final design. Now that I've managed a layout design I'm satisfied with! Although, I do wish I had more room to build. I'd have tried to go with a large curve yet! But, not too bad for the space I'm working with.
Maintenance said I was NOT gonna work today!! Well, I gwas able to get out and get a bucket of ballast down. Something coming in now. Wind has picked up quite a bit. More than I care for at the moment. Have about 4 foot of track to ballast yet. And probably get some rocks placed so I can finish ballasting one side of the track, between switches along fence. A few photos of the work section done to date. A general overview of the area. Looking between turnouts along the fence. Can see the unfinished areas. Along with a bit of a wiggle between switches! Looking at the West switch of wye. Grade appears to be rather stiff yet!! Something I had hoped to get rid of!! That's what wasa causing me SOME of the grief I had! I'll have to check it at a later time. I'm noticing a couple of wobbles in ballasted curve as well. Interesting though, trains will run through this area with no problems! Guess I'd better see IF I can smooth it out just a bit!! Gonna have to water everything in right quick, clean rails and test run a train. Adjusting things as necessary. Was pleased with initial test run most of the day Saturday, so.......
Finished ballasting track yesterday. Watered everything in, cleaned rails and ran a 5-7 car train for the rest of the day. Worked fair, at first. Had 2 gondolas that decided they had to start derailing on me!! When I reversed the cars, the derail problem got even worse! An observation, as cars passed by spot, indicated the trucks were the problem, along with my track! Backed off mounting screws on both cars and tried again, with success!! Had no more trouble with cars derailing. Still need to fix that small section of track. Should be fairly simple as long as rail itself is NOT bent! Looks as if it could be, but not sure until I get a closer view! Definitely seems to run a bit better than before the tear out and rebuild!
After watching R/C racing all day today, there will be NO railroad work for an unknown time!! Maintenance crew, on my right side, is a very bright, painful PINK!! A cool, quick shower, a quick rubdown with 71% alcohol and rag, and greasing up with lotion to help ease the pain, in a couple of days maybe.... Not the first time, not the last time, just the most recent!! Have done this in a LONG time! Last time, it was lower legs, after sitting and running trains all day. Maybe a good 6 months or so, or maybe last summer! Let the train go, and lost interest!! Took a brief snooze while running, in direct sun! In bed now, wondering how the rest of my night is gonna go!
After several problems, I actually pulled out a short train and ran for a couple of hours! Most recent, was the severe sunburn blistering of the right foot. That's healed up and looking good. In process of dealing with left foot problems. Some problems with couplers drooping too far today, I had a few early problems with trip pin catching turnout rails and derailing. Moving stuff went pretty good as well, this despite finding out that I successfully managed to break a small piece of my right hand middle finger!! Decent weather for a it, I might look at pulling something out and running another train again in the next couple of days. Maybe after spending time getting a 1/8 scale nitro RC truck running again! Gotta get some photos next time. Hurting enough to NOT want to go downstairs to grab camera! Weather was absolutely perfect for running . Spend a couple of hours running. All I really had to do, was sweep the track of downed tree leaves!
Well, I did a quick sweep. Mom took the leaf blower to the entire front yard TWICE, about a week apart, because of the amount of leaves. And she swept the track area once as well. Our tree is about done. Many of the leaves we've had, have been from down the street! Still a mess though!!
