HOn3 Rio Grande Southern First District 1938-1945

[Dave V]

Current state of the RGS:



Unfortunately from that angle, bridge 45-A (my favorite scene) is hidden behind the peninsula ridge:

[CRL]

So you’re saying is your view block is working as designed? 

[wm3798]

You're doing it wrong.  I don't see boxes of sh!t under the benchwork, and there's neither a coffee cup or a beer bottle to be seen.

I'm not sure I can consider you a model railroader anymore.

Dr. Fun

[CRL]

Don’t forget the freshly vacuumed carpeting. 

[Dave V]

You can’t see it from this angle but over at Rico, I have one of those pop out beer can holders from New Rail Models mounted to the fascia.

[CRL]

Just one? Are you antisocial or something?   

[DKS]

[Dave V]

Submitted for @wm3798 's approval:







And yes, your very own RGS First District and Foothills Farm Studios is available now!

Also, new acquisition!  These are getting almost impossible to find…. A ConCor HOn3 Pearce-Arrow style Galloping Goose.  I'll be lettering it as Goose 3.

[wm3798]

Duly noted and roundly approved!

And you gotta love those boys at ConCor.  When they really put their minds to it, some really good things happen.  But then they import Mehano SD45s

One day, I'm going to have buy @ncbqguy a beer so he can explain to me how all that worked...

Lee

[Dave V]

Replacing the modified plastic AHM sand house (rear) at Ridgway on my RGS with the proper Banta models kit (foreground).  The plastic version was something I scored at my LHS, already assembled but unpainted, for $6.  I had shortened the bin, added grout sand, and painted it to look as much like the RGS sand house as I could.  The Banta kit is far more accurate, designed from Mike Blazek's plans.  I love that Banta made it so that the bin walls lean in under tension from the tie rods per prototype.  The tree is also added per prototype in the early 40s.

[Dave V]

Whoa, it's been a while!

Let's see...  To start, I've built a few cars.

RGS 01714 was built from a Narrow Gauge Colorado kit.  I added Blackstone trucks And Tichy grab-irons.



Then I tackled a two-pack of San Juan Details (former Grandt Line) C&S/RGS Type III boxcar kits.





I had this excellent HO scale kit from Main Street Heritage models in my stash, and I came across it while cleaning up my workshop. I couldn’t help but build it! While it looks nothing like the real business after which it’s named, it resembles another structure still extant on Glasgow Avenue in Rico.  It’s headed for my erroneously-placed Rico town scene on the north end of my Rico yard.  This structure will be right up against the edge of the layout, which is why the sidewalk is so short on one side.







The choice of Coors signs is based on prototype research...very little else beer-wise was available in Colorado in the late 30s and 40s.  Most bars had at least one Coors sign in photographs.

[Missaberoad]

Nice job on the stonework, looks very convincing!

[Dave V]

Early on in 2017 when I wanted to make as much progress as possible in a short period of time on the HOn3 Rio Grande Southern First District, I chose to use the inexpensive plastic HO AHM kit for the Rico depot.  I upgraded it by adding shingles to the second-story, extra trim, and Grandt Line details as well as modifying it to appear as it did after it was semi-repaired following the disastrous fire that destroyed the iconic tower and killed the station agent’s wife.  I also made the choice at the time to hide the model’s hideous molded roof shingles under Wild West Scale Models shake shingles.  Well…as great as they were, they were all wrong for the Rico depot.  They were the wrong color, the wrong size, and represented rough-cut shakes rather than shingles.  After four-plus years I decided I needed to change it, and after having had so much fun building the Ridgway depot from Ragg’s to Riches [sic] with its amazing scale-sized adhesive shingle strips, I bought a bunch more and gave them the proper reddish-brown hue.  In the photos, the top is the after shot and the bottom is the before shot.

[Erik W]

Nice Dave!  It's neat to see that now that your layout is at a near finished state that you're revisiting stuff and tweaking things you think you can improve.  I also like the stonework on your building above.  You've got a real talent for the artistic side of model railroading.

Erik

[Dave V]

Nice Dave!  It's neat to see that now that your layout is at a near finished state that you're revisiting stuff and tweaking things you think you can improve.  I also like the stonework on your building above.  You've got a real talent for the artistic side of model railroading.

Erik

Thanks!  Since the First District will be on the 2023 National Narrow Gauge Convention (Denver) tour, I'm really trying to bring it up to a higher standard.  I know the folks who'll be viewing it in person will--in many cases--be far more knowledgable even than me about the RGS, so I've been re-doing a whole bunch of "used to be good enough but now isn't" scenes.  So far I've replaced the house at the end of Bridge 45-A, the Ridgway sand house, the shingles on both the Rico depot and the Rico section house, added switch stands, the Ridgway depot, and a host of other lineside details.  I now have the Ragg's to Riches Placerville depot kit which will replace the Narrow gauge Colorado kit with which I've never really been satisfied.  And eventually I want to replace the vintage Classic Miniatures Ophir depot I got for 10 bucks at the 2017 NNGC with the better, more detailed Banta kit.

I still have my freelanced "dislocated Rico" scene north of the north yard throat, but I'm also planning to add N scale flats to the bluff above the depot to look more prototypical.  I'll allow myself the one indulgence so I can have a relatively large town scene with recognizable Rico businesses, but that's about it.  I also want to re-work the cattle pen spur at Rico so I can add the Crystal River kit for the Rico Burnett and Clifton coal pockets.