Weekend Update 10/8/23

[craigolio1]

Wow there tons of great stuff here this weekend! Happy thanksgiving to this north of 49.

This week I started work in the modern variant of the Rocky Mountaineer



The most exciting/difficult pet of this project will be masking and painting so many cars with the complicated paint job. I’ll be using either templates to cut the mask or have the masks cut in a cutter. Not sure. Here’s my drawings of the masks that could be cut on a cutter.



More in the build thread.

https://www.therailwire.net/forum/index.php?topic=56623.0

Craig

[Cajonpassfan]

@bcr570 Tim, nice to see you can have full blown op sessions without a completed layout, and I love the DS setup; looks very functional. I plan something similar in my DS "office" but for now it's just a storage room (we can never have enough storage when under construction).
Out of curiosity, how long is a full ops and how many trains do you run across the railroad?
Fun stuff, Otto

[SirTainly]

Just sharing a couple of shots from modular meets a few weeks back.

[BCR 570]

Is that my friend Simon?  Hope you are doing well!

Tim

[BCR 570]

@bcr570 Tim, nice to see you can have full blown op sessions without a completed layout, and I love the DS setup; looks very functional. I plan something similar in my DS "office" but for now it's just a storage room (we can never have enough storage when under construction).
Out of curiosity, how long is a full ops and how many trains do you run across the railroad?
Fun stuff, Otto

Hi Otto:

A full session goes about 3 1/4 hours; this was an abbreviated session at 2 1/2 hours as some of us had an early start the next morning.

A full session comprises the three Chetwynd yard shifts, the Dawson Creek Switcher out and back, and the Septimus Turn out and back.  We also usually run a work train which can be engaged in rail relay, tie setout or reclaim, or a ballast train.  There is also a Northern Alberta Railways run into Dawson Creek to exchange cars.

Once the staging yards are added I will be able to run the VP and PV Freights in and out of Chetwynd; curently they are staged at the start and end of the sessions.

More details here: 

Cheers

Tim

[Cajonpassfan]

Thanks for the video, Tim, answers my questions but one: why does Gary look like he's not having a good time?
Nicely done, Otto

[btrain]

Went to the Berea, Ohio train show today and found two great items that are (at least to my limited knowledge) new to the market. First is Yelton Models who did an excellent 3D printed kit of BE tower. I'm not sure if this will be part of a future free-moN or T-Track module, but being a NYC superfan, I couldn't pass it up! The detail is very well done, you can even make out the relief in the block spelling out the tower's name. The only thing that will need to be corrected is the roof warp, but dipping that section in warm water with some gentle prying should fix it.

I know Custom Signal Systems has been around for a while, but I was pleasantly pleased to see a good set of crossbuck flashers made by them. Other than NJ International, I haven't seen any decent flashers that didn't look cartoonish due to an out-of-scale size. I picked up a pair of one-sided ones for my Lake Shore Central switching layout, but they also had the much more common two-sided flashers available.

[bbussey]

Artitec makes a Cat D7 bulldozer payload in HO scale that I've been bugging them for years to replicate in N.  Thanks to the Thingiverse links that @haasmarc posted, I no longer need to.  With the two Cat models available in assembled and exploded STLs, it was easy enough to extract the bulldozer blade details from the scraper, assemble them on wood bracing and include the assembled crawler and a crate to have a suitable payload in N.  My preference is a pair of 42' flatcars as opposed to a pair mounted on a 52' or longer flatcar.

[up1950s]

Last July when I went to PA and visited my dad, he had some freight cars that needed repair.  I brought them home and fixed them (thanks MTLJoe!).  I had showed him one of the bulldozers I printed and he really liked it so I decided, while I had one of his flat cars, I would add a load.

Outstanding !How do you do the deck without crappy lines where the wood meets the metal on both ends . Can I purchase a printed pair dozers  ?

[up1950s]

Finished preliminary construction on the center buffer section for the Shaw's Cove swing bridge.

Wow , what's next Noahs Ark ?

[up1950s]

From Wikipedia:
"Known as the Panama Railroad Company when founded in the 19th century, today it is operated as Panama Canal Railway Company (reporting mark: PCRC). Since 1998 it has been jointly owned by then Kansas City Southern, now Canadian Pacific Kansas City, and Mi-Jack Products and leased to the government of Panama.[9] The Panama Canal Railway is primarily dedicated to freight transport, but it has also operated a passenger service between Panama City and Colón. "

Wow , so KCS didn't have tracks to it but had trackage rights there . Don't know of any other RR with a unconnected route .

[lock4244]

Wow , so KCS didn't have tracks to it but had trackage rights there . Don't know of any other RR with a unconnected route .

I believe it functions almost exclusively as a container conveyor along the canal for ships that are too large for the locks (so called Panamax ships).

[John]

I believe it functions almost exclusively as a container conveyor along the canal for ships that are too large for the locks (so called Panamax ships).

I cruised through the canal a few years ago (2017), and was part of the Just Cause operation that removed Noriega -- the port area in Colon (Carribean Side) is a significant container terminal now since that time -  we saw both container and passenger trains during the transit ..

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Panama_Canal_Railway

[haasmarc]

Outstanding !How do you do the deck without crappy lines where the wood meets the metal on both ends . Can I purchase a printed pair dozers  ?

I laser cut the decks out of laser board.  The "wood" and "metal" sections are just brush painted.

Can't sell the dozers because they aren't my models.

[up1950s]

I laser cut the decks out of laser board.  The "wood" and "metal" sections are just brush painted.

Can't sell the dozers because they aren't my models.

Thank you Sir . It " wood " swell if MTL made the metal deck parts separate and to be applied by the modeler . This way we could paint the decks , weather them , then apply the matching painted metal plates with near as good results as your kick a$$ models .