Weekend Update - 7-6-2008

[John]

Another is almost over. What have you accomplished this week ..

For me, I put up backdrops on the new layout section ..

[img width= height=]http://lh4.ggpht.com/acsxfan1/SG4xexjyyjI/AAAAAAAAD1k/VOcn2gvZ0rw/s800/IMG_4666.jpg[/img]

[img width= height=]http://lh3.ggpht.com/acsxfan1/SG4xfYcXWJI/AAAAAAAAD1s/pzd5KCZSpKw/s800/IMG_4667.jpg[/img]

[img width= height=]http://lh4.ggpht.com/acsxfan1/SG4xh0ZSQ1I/AAAAAAAAD2M/MdNe8zRAmCk/s800/IMG_4671.jpg[/img]

[mmyers]

John,
It's amazing how much more finished the layout looks with backdrops.
Martin

[absnut]

I built JL Innovations Ice House this week.  Though not a beginners kit and certainly not a one evening project, the final product is very pleasing.

[atsf_arizona]

Great photos.  John, that layout looks great.

I'm back now from the Derby City Express 2008 National N Scale Convention.
It was a great show.  Many great memories, which are online at:

 http://www.pbase.com/atsf_arizona

One of the memories was carrying around and showing Randy Gustafson's
SP GE 70-tonner, built by the Randgust himself from one of his resin kits:





Here's a YouTube video, showing the pulling power of this little critter
(it walks away with a 12-car Kato Daylight):

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(if you're interesting in Randgust's kit, you can find more info at:  http://www.randgust.com )

Have a Good Week, and Happy 4th of July, all.




 

[up1950s]

Geez Randy's GE can pull the paints off of most anything a big time manufacturer feeds us , and look great doing it .

[Hyperion]

Downside is that it looks like it starts at about 20smph.

[up1950s]

Downside is that it looks like it starts at about 20smph.

Diodes can fix that easily .

[3rdrail]

Got back home Monday night from the DCE convention. I swear I walked more in five days than I'd walked in the ficve months before it.
The convention center was connected to the hotel alright, but it was not mentioned that it was several blocks away via an overhead "pedway", some of which was not air conditioned. 

Spent two fruitless evenings trying to figure out how to put the battery in the digital vernier caliper I bought from "the Toolman". Finally figured it out last night. Did find that PECO axles are .590" long and the wheels are a scale 36.4". Will email Matt at FVM to see if he thinks the .563" axle length is long enough. PECO wheels do not play well with Micro-Engineering turnouts.

Wanted to put the placard boards on the new MTL three dome tank car, but only found two holes, on the ends. Emailed Joe D'amato at MTL, who said there should be four holes. Well, there are not, so drilled two No. 72 holes for the side placard boards and glued them on last night. Of course, managed to send one off into orbit - those things are as bad as the MTL coupler springs! Have spares, though.

[ryourstone]

Finally finished up the VO1000 from the paint remover thread:



This turned out to be a much bigger project than I expected! I modified the frame and moved the contact strips up to fit a cut up and reassembled LL fuel tank. Added brass grabs and a scratchbuilt brass exhaust stack, front number plate, and glued the cab and walkways togethor for a better looking fit. Lettering is CDS dry transfers converted to decals.

[Chris333]

Gregg, I just checked again and both of my 3-domers have a hole on the first cross brace to the left of the ladder. It is molded into the frame.

Rich, You suck!    Is that part of the new layout???

[James Costello]

I worked Saturday, but managed to find a couple of hours Sunday to get started on some loco projects - all EMD at the moment. Some Rio Grande SD50's, EMD Demonstrator SD70M's and a couple of California Northern SD9's. Got the fans drilled out on the 50's/70's, now there's a lot of sanding to get them cleaned up. Good to get them off the drawing board and into production though!

[ryourstone]

Rich, You suck!    Is that part of the new layout???

I was going to just use the stock Atlas stack and I thought "Chris would never do this". So yeah I was cursing you as I tried to shape and glue a perfect .006" wire ring to the end of a 1/16" brass rod! In the end it came out pretty good though...

Not the new layout yet, I just finalized the trackplan this weekend too. Probably going to make that first Home Depot trip for building supplies next week, this is going to be my first urban-scenery layout so I can't wait to get started.

[Chris333]

Working on this right now, glue is still wet. I wanted to lay track over this bridge, but couldn't till the scenery under it was finished. So I had to lay the road down and paint it. Then added some dirt along the sides. Anything else could be touched up later.


Now I'm thinking I need to center stripe the road first...

[John]

Plaster for the road?

[Chris333]

It is cut from a sheet of .060" styrene, same stuff I use for backdrops. 4x8 sheets are sold to put up around the shower stall. I glued it down and painted it with a 50/50 mix of "rain grey" and "storm grey" Ceramcoat. I dry brushed a dirt color on the edges and graphite down the lanes. My pics sux, no tripod.