A hold over from the "Train Set" era. Growing up, for me a train set was something you dragged out periodically and "Set up". A layout was a more permanent affair that was always ready to go, well, after the track was cleaned a bit. To most of my friends, they all were train sets. My first train set was a Lone Star 000 set that came with a crane car. When I moved on to a permanent layout with state of the art N scale trains, I still had to have a crane so one was provided by Bachmann. Kind of clunky and over sized but still cool at the time. It would not go through the tunnels on my layout so was a yard queen. Speaking of tunnels, I always found it amusing that a train set had to have a tunnel. A small hill that was placed on a curve and just big enough for a train to go through it. Like the survey crew went out of their way to find a hill just right for a small tunnel.
In my parent's basement in 1978, the end of the branchline on my N Scale pike. It was a sort of steam tourist line with some freight, and under (rubber thread) wire. Go figure. That Fleischmann boxcab in the foreground was a fine little engine actually. Selection of N Scale decals was pretty thin back then, so I bought B&O and swapped the letters around and named the line the Oscada & Barcliffe.
Completed and on club layout for picture............................ Not a train but layout related. Thanks for looking and stay well, Carl
Good afternoon from Northeast Ohio! Late checkin as I took my wife to have an Endoscopy early this morning and just got home, also Photobucket was having its usual troubles. Got a lot of stuff done this week! Athearn bay window caboose kit, as the Rock Island purchased some close to SP design bay window cabooses, I used this one for one of them. Painted with Scalecoat II ATSF Red, Reefer Yellow, Black and Silver Paint and lettered with Microscale Decals. Atlas FMC 5077CF Boxcar Kit, painted with Floquil MEC Harvest Yellow, Scalecoat II Black and Silver Paints, then lettered with Highball Graphics Decals. One of the infamous IPD boxcars of the late 70's era. Since I had a Rock Island caboose, I needed a Rock Island engine to pull it. Stewart U25B, with Utah Pacific GE Lift Rings, DW Snow Plow, Cal-Scale late model exhaust stack and various grab irons. Painted with Floquil Rock Island Maroon and Scalecoat UP Covered Hopper Gray paints then lettered with Mask Island Decals. Another shot of of Wabash U25B and GP35 on the Strongsville Club Layout. Thanks for looking! Rick Jesionowski
I like your photo but have a question. The windows seem to have a green tint and the lighting seems subdued . Is this a camera result or did you do this a certain way?
Yep, the Lionel set up I had used a gray tunnel with a red house with black windows painted/printed on both sides with a brown road/path from one to the other on the opposite side. The size of the house looked like a number would fit in a boxcar. Strange that. But when you are young...
They are LED's; 2 or 3 per car. I bought a large quantity on the cheap many moons ago, and use them in all my passenger cars on my analog DC layout which also give the impression the windows are tinted, while they're not. They also have a homebrew flicker-free circuit (Jim Betz's design). I use a point-and-shoot camera with manual settings and self-timer, set down on the layout for an "eye-level" view. Constructive criticism is always welcome! John
"Yep. It looks like everything is on the rails OK". In another Blue Water club shot, "Kilroy" AKA Tom Grambau Jr. carefully examines his model of Pere Marquette 1218 and Malcolm Kramp's Pennsylvania K4s. Both are Bachmann models.
John, The lighting on your layout is excellent- Rolling stock, structures and street lights. Your attention to the lighting (as well as nicely detailed passenger car interiors) sets the scene for the really excellent night shots we're all used to seeing here. Thanks for the details.