Good morning from sunny and warm Northeast Ohio! Down to the 80's for the next week after a bunch of 90 degree days. Got some stuff done this week. Finished another Southern Railway converted 50' boxcar into a TOFC flat, but this time I finished it in the Norfollk Southern paint scheme. Built car from McKeen kit, substituting wire grabs and A-Line sill steps for the plastic ones provided. Painted the car with Scalecoat II Boxcar Red paint and lettered with Oddballs decals. Trailer is also an old Front Range/McKeen 45' Trailer, painted with Scalecoat II Silver paint and lettered with Microscale Decals. Proto 2000 4427 Hi-Side PS Covered Hopper Kit, substituted a Plano etched metal roofwalk for the plastic one in the kit, you have to drill 64 #80 holes for all the roofwalk supports. Car was painted with Scalecoat II UP Covered Hopper Gray Paint and lettered with Oddballs Decals. Car was one of 1,000 acquired by the Rock Island, and this is the 4th and final car of this type as I am now out of these decals. Wabash motive power again this week on the Strongsville Club Layout; when the Ann Arbor was sold to the DT&I the DT&I took 10 of the 14 Ann Arbor FA-2's for trade-ins on new GP35's using the FA-2's for trade-in fodder and the GP35's were delivered with AAR Type B trucks from the FA-2's. The Wabash kept 4 of the FA-2's and just changed the ANN ARBOR on the car sides to WABASH. Later the FA-2's were painted in the solid blue paint scheme. Thanks for looking! Rick Jesionowski
Another shot from the old Blue Water modular club. This week's photo is an overview of my "Michigan's right coast" module. The peeled paint was created by the old rubber cement method. And ,of course, I couldn't get by without a Pere Marquette Berkshire or two. Somewhat grainy, but the camera we had back then wasn't the best in low light. Photo by Grace Decker.
Nick, Cynthia and I test fit background panels for modules 01 thru 08. Will purchase LED lights and another sheet of Masonite tomorrow morning for the Boston Mountains Sub Division layout. Joe
Blue water? Looks like blue ice! Brrr! Stuff looks great! (Is that Kilroy in the back of the second shot?)
Really have a soft spot for those Southern conversion cars Rick. That looks great. While not anywhere close to as nice as your car, I did some in N scale. They still need the front ladder and break wheel. No kits for these so started with one of those Atlas flats that had the two short trailers. Here is where they are at now.
My newest HO scale loco came in the mail this week. I picked up the last Broadway Limited Imports Southern Pacific Gray and Scarlet SD9 the shop had. It is beautiful. Someday, when things get back to normal, I'll the famous SP light package and renumber it to 4340, an SD9 that I found a photo of in Tracy, Ca,:
Wrong time of year for ice, but- Blue water area- Free tour here: https://www.michigan.org/hot-spots/blue-water-area As far as "Kilroy" is concerned, he'll have a more important role in a future post.
On the road with a BIG BOY in Z-scale - (sounds like a contradiction in itself) Do you like it? Thank you! ....and now something for dreaming; Rolling into a fantastic late summer night........... Enjoy your WE! Sven
Great modeling as usual Rick. I have a question. Where do you get your scalecoat paint from? I have an order in for going on a month with the outfit that makes or mixes Scalecoat.
That is a great looking engine. There was something special about those old SD,s. There was 2 on a telecom train that pulled a short train that included a couple flats with trackhoes chained down with the boom turned to the side that had big knife looking things buried in the ground laying cable.Those old SD9's pulled that work train burying those cables, tool cars, cable reel gondolas and even an old caboose, like it wasn't even back there. Very impressive the power they had. The only times they got out 1-3 notch was quittin time, then the old hoghead would turn'em loose to the siding or house track for tying up for the night.
I have started purchasing from the manufacturer lately and I had to send an email inquiry about my order finally got it about 3 weeks later. His state was shut down due to the Covid-19 pandemic he may still be behind in production. I would send an email and check. I used to use Walthers through my LHS but Walthers stopped carrying the 2 oz bottles probably to increase their profitability as the 2 oz was only a couple of dollars more than the 1oz bottle. And I wanted the 2 oz bottle for colors I use a lot of like boxcar red, black, UP hopper car gray etc. Rick Jesionowski
Here is this weekend's run by lead by my Mantua New York Ontario & Western 2-8-2 Camelback. I finally got the couplers changed over. I used a Kadee #148 on the tender. On the loco the screw holding the hook and horn coupler was stripped and there was no hope of removing it. I had to cut the coupler off. Since I do not plan to use the coupler I took an Bachmann EZ-mate coupler and trimmed it to fit and glued in place. Next is an Accurail Lehigh & New England wood box car Then an Athearn undecorated wood boxcar I painted and decaled for Rutland An Athearn NYC hopper with a custom made coal load
Following is an MDC/Roundhouse Erie gondol A Mantua Pure Oil tank car An Accurail New York Central wood boxcar And bringing up the rear an Atlas NYO&W caboose. And now some video footage
