We are back and so is the heat here in East Central Illinois. Don't worry though, there is plenty of iced tea of both varieties along with donuts here at the station. Settle in and be prepared to tell us what you got done this past weekend. Saturday: Well effective August 1st, my job here went back to part time status, the RC hobby is in dire straits, so I now have Friday's off again. I spent the day masking and painting the DRG&W GP30 I had originally done two years ago and the U.S. Post office was nice enough to destroy it for my customer. Over the last year, I have slowly repaired, re-detailed and now re-painted the poor GP30. Decals started at the end of the day and I hope to have it completed next week. When Saturday came, I had a brand new soft top and some other parts for Jess my Jeep. I was actually thankful for the heat as anyone who has had to put a top on will tell you, there is a lot of stretching that first time. The rest of my time was spent on cleaning up and out the garage, washing Angela's car and enjoying some good BBQ in downtown Champaign in the old Illinois Central RR Station. Eating ribs while watching both Passenger and freight is not a bad thing at all! Sunday: I drew up plans for my transport box for the B&M modules. Currently, the layout uses two "triple wide" (36.5 X 14-inch) and one double wide (24.5 X 14-inch) T-Trak modules to form a small, rural switching layout set in New Hampshire. The box will hold all three modules, the NCE controller and power plus a box for the local switcher, buggy (Caboose), and freight cars. I was able to frame this box up with some available 1/4-inch plywood and was able to get a majority of it done. Hopefully I can have it somewhat finished and ready to transport modules by next weekend. So how about you? How did you do? Let us know what you did, where you went and what you got or got done. We'll assemble once again on Friday the 10th to start the process all over again. Until then, have a great week, stay safe and as always... High Greens!
I am getting closer to having Pacific Electric Express Motor 1445 in revenue. Just like 1124, she needs windows, lights and poles. Unfortunately, there are no accurately spaced freight motor decals, so I used passenger car lettering.
Saturday: Rode the Pacific Surfliner down to San Diego. Our Granddaughter had a ball. This was her first "real" Choo Choo ride. We did have a little hick up on the way down. Metrolink's PTCS system took a crap - we were stopped for about an hour- just before San Juan Capistrano. And - about half hour late leaving San Diego for the trip north. Sunday: I did manage to get the trucks and body mounted couplers installed on my Lark's 22 roomette Pullman.... that's it for modeling this weekend. Oh - yeah -- I found and purchased the remaining stripes that I need for the Lark - the first batch showed up this past weekend -- all is good to go for the Lark project. Hope Y'all had a great weekend, Wolf
Back from three weeks vacation - worked a lot on the layout, made plenty of trees, finished the roads, so now layout is about 99% done, just some rearranging and a pond to create. It was great to zone out for a while and just work and play with trains. Was over at the Seaway Train Show on the 21st, came back with some freight cars, details, Kadees and other odds and ends. My bag was full!
It was a great time at the N Scale weekend in Altoona. Mike & staff did a great job. The railfanning was great too. My thanks to the good guys at CMR for helping me to get my grade crossing signals working properly this weekend. Their signal driving system works flawlessly thus far. They customized it to my particular situation too. I will be ordering more for my home layout. I recommend their system to you all. Come see a demonstration on our Galesburg City Job layout at Trainfest.
Hope they don't hold up that crossing too long-looks like the local PD is timing them! Most towns have time limits on crossings being tied up.
Right, but not so much so in the 60s. Thats part of the beauty of CMR's system. After 15 seconds, the signals will shut off unless a sensor is tripped. I can now just slowly cruise around, performing switching chores, not having to worry about what the signals are doing.
W, Which CMR circuit are you using? I got a few more bits for a TTrak module I have in the works, and edited the video I shot a couple of weeks ago in Green Bay on the E&LS while i was visiting my in-laws. Took ten years, but I managed to get live E&LS trains on film, so to speak.
There are a couple places called CMR on the web. Contact these guys: https://www.cmrproducts.com They may not have anything posted yet on their site. They are just refining and developing it. But I am sure that if you ask them, they will provide you more information. Again, I am happy to give you a live demonstration at Trainfest. I am told that I'll have at least a flyer there to handout that will tell you more about it as well.
