Running Bear’s July 2021 Coffee Shop


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CNJ 1508 at Jersey City.jpg

CNJ H16-44 # 1500 on the pit at Jersey City. #1506 (Atlas with factory installed decoder), resides on my layout during the Summer, hauling a CNJ Shore train. The CNJ used these beasts in road freight, local freight and yard service, as well as commuter and intercity passenger services. They were equipped with cab signals and train control.
 
Good Morning all! Thundering at the moment and my little fuzzy buddy doesn't like it. So he has climbed in my lap, guess I'm to protect him.
Pancakes and sausage please

TomO - love the new digs. I would like one with a water feature, you know a fountain.
Willie - Thanks for letting me be a keeper.
Troy - I got to go with Boris, you need to prioritize. Looks to me if you eliminate the pink side you will need to pretty much have to start over as your incline won't work as it currently sets. TomO's suggestion to raise the table and store other interests underneath seems to be a doable option.

STAY SAFE

LATER
 
Willie: 100% agree about TV being a waste.

Mine is connected - not to cable - but to the internet via an AppleTv box. It's 99% on the Pandora Music subscription service. TV has to be on, to get the music to come out of the fancy surround system.

Otherwise, it's the odd news show during breaking events, or the CuriosityStream documentary service. Those rarely happen.

The recliner is good for napping away from where the wife is watching her Korean Dramas, or talking to her mother with the every other nightly call. Me and the cat can curl up and snore away without bothering the wife.

Right now, the TV area is the gaming area, but I can't leave a table set up. So all games must be finished or called at the end of the evening. That's the bonus for adding a dedicated game table. If we want to fight Waterloo or Gettyburg, or land in Normandy, we can do so over several gaming nights.
 
Greetings all!

July 05 here. The 4th was fairly uneventful. Greyhound was okay with the firewrorks in the neighborhood, which relieved me. Sometimes they can get the panic-run reflex.

Thanks Jaz, for the awesome tips on painting. I'm a big fan of your work!!

Got the RH service tracks temporarily wired yesterday and ran a loco on and off the TT and in/out of the RH bays. Great fun and I am rather pleased with myself!! Today to shim up the TT with sheet foam roadbed so the approach tracks match up or maybe even a bit of an upgrade, the maybe install some fascia and start premanent wiring.

Cheers all.

Oh - - - crazy hot here today, so we are hiding indoors. -------Steve J
 
Hey Guys. I wondering if you can help me with something. Have any of you here tried to get anything from Smokey Valley Train products? I used to have them bookmarked,but when I clicked on my bookmark for them, I got a message saying that my computer can't find their server . I wonder if they went out of business? Any thoughts?
William.
 
L&N Castle said:
Hey Guys. I wondering if you can help me with something. Have any of you here tried to get anything from Smokey Valley Train products? I used to have them bookmarked,but when I clicked on my bookmark for them, I got a message saying that my computer can't find their server . I wonder if they went out of business? Any thoughts?
William.
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William, I haven't heard from them in over three years. My last couple of emails to Larry went unanswered.
 
chadbag said:
Happy Independence Day to our US contingent

We've had very little rain and everything is very hot and dry so private fireworks are banned in most areas around here (thank goodness -- no need for a fire burning down the neighborhood). Most people are complying. We were out walking last night and it was relatively quiet, with only a few scattered people firing off stuff, and then the various cities displays professionally done in the valley. Seeing as this is Utah, and the 4th is a Sunday, most of the official displays were last night.

Usually you hear it all night for a few days before and after, but like I said, it was pretty quiet with most people complying with the bans in place due to the extremely dry weather.
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Last night, on the actual 4th, there were more people out launching stuff. Not as much as last year, with the bans, but enough people who were flouting the bans, including in our own neighborhood, where it is always banned (we are just west of the line where they usually allow it, as we are more in the dry wilderness around our development).

We ate at my parents' house and played some games. On the way home we saw a bunch of stuff being lit off -- as most of the cities had done their official displays on Saturday night, these were all private. It is possible that not all the various cities are different parts of the cities were under the same bans.
 
troyphoto said:
Suggestions above being considered, but I need my writing desk to be comfortable. I spend a LOT of time there. The hobby desk is a natural extension of that space, but it may be movable. Some spacial reference. A standard game table is 4 ft x 6 ft

Here's a shot from above. For reference:View attachment 129681
The green arrow measures from front of that bump out to the outer edge of the layout... Exactly 6 feet.
The blue arrow between the two loop sides is exactly 4 feet.

That's the same as the gaming table size. Now add 2.5 feet on either side of the blue axis. We're at 9 feet needed where the blue arrow is. Benchwork to the right (pink foam) is 5 feet out from the wall. And there's almost four feet from pink foam to fridge door off camera.

It's doable if the pink side goes away, and the loop on that side moves into the back right corner. Game table can be slid against the wall when not in use. The bump out where the green arrow points toward the back would probably move down to be a part of the end loop.

But, this is why I'm thinking out loud now. Get it figured out before I get a wild hare and start tearing stuff apart.
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One word:

N-Scale
 
As Troy says: Howdy there internet RR people! I am sort of handicapped at the moment. When the Spousal Unit, daughters, and kids went to Disneyland ... was that last Wednesday, or Thursday - I can't remember; anyhoo, I happened to get bit by the miniature Dachshund (he is going to the VET dentist in a couple weeks to have several teeth pulled that are bad and infected.)
I did not think much about it as I have been bitten by dogs and cats several times throughout life ... I was not paying attention, reached down to pick him up, and he chomped down right behind where the fingers are joined to the hand and he broke the skin in two spots. I rinsed off the few drops of blood and held a paper towel to the spots which stopped the bleeding PDQ.
Then Friday, with the help of my neighbor, we fought getting the new disposer to line up for connection even though it was the same model and exact connect points. About 3-4 hours later, my hand started swelling up and with pretty good pain to boot! Things went downhill pretty fast after that and by Saturday morning I pretty much had a useless club of a hand with fingers that did not want to move. Everyone was telling me to go to the hospital, urgent care, and any other place they could think of, but would I listen- hell-no - it will go away in a day or two! OK, Today I made up my mind that it should have been better by now, and I drove up the road to Kaiser's Urgent Care center where my primary is located - I decided that I would try and slip in to see him as I want a couple of my meds changed anyway. Guess What? There was not a vehicle on the premises.
Closed for the Holiday!
Today is the first day that I have been able to hold a coffee cup with my right hand. It is still swollen and reddish looking and I cannot make a fist, but at least I am getting some use from it? I really had not thought about losing the use of my right hand before, but I tell you, I have found out that I am pretty much useless without it.
Wounded Warriors just blasted up my charity pole to the #3 spot for sure.

The Spousal Unit's MOM's 100th BD party was a great success yesterday. Counting kids, grandkids, and great grandkids there were about 40 of us there. The pool temp was 89 degrees.

I hope that everyone here had a great 4th as well - take care - and God Bless!
 
Howdy ....

Thanks for comments and likes for my parade photos.

I hope each of you had a 3-day weekend as a break from work enjoyed it. We watched a lot of home fireworks from houses here at the lake while sitting on our dock.

Our nephew spent the last couple of weeks managing a temporary fireworks outlet in Tennessee. He was paid 25% of the total sales amount which was substantial. That is a big boost to his funds to pay for college.

troyphoto said:
Thoughts? What am i not considering that I should be thinking about?
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Troy ...... My 2 cents ..... Prioritize your recreational activities. If model railroading is top of the list, do not cut back on your layout. There is never enough space to do all we want with model railroad layouts.

TLOC said:
Garry, in real life I hate parades. Maybe because my sister, 4 years older then me, was in so many when we were kids. She was in a baton twirling group and I think they hit every parade in Chicago, Northern Indiana and Northern Illinois. But, I got a great smile when I saw your modeled parade. Well done!
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Tom in Wisconsin ...... I was in the high school band, and I marched in parade playing a heavy bras sousaphone. Wearing a heavy uniform in the 4th of July parade was a bit too much. However, I lived through it, and I had many good times in the band. That said, I have seen enough parades so they do not thrill me.

Hughie ... Majestic Hardware looks good on your layout.

Joe .... Nice photo of a CNJ FM locomotive.

Sherrel ...... That is fabulous about your MIL having a 100th BD celebration.

Everybody ..... have a good evening.
 
Good evening Shop Dwellers! Currently it's 77*F and clear with a 4mph South breeze at my property.

As always, thank you everybody for the likes and comments on my Sunday morning post.

Sherrell - WTF!? o_O I could see exactly where your story was heading as soon as you mentioned about your dog having infected teeth! Hopefully you'll get on some antibiotics ASAP, before the infection has a chance to possibly spread to other parts of your body.

Jaz avalley said:
Good rusting colours - as you lay the paint down you may consider looking ag adding a very fine granular substance to infer the rust as rust usually gives texture, although at our gauges it is fair to say modelling said fine texture is nigh on impossible that said I have played with this
View attachment 129661
I also add white to the nearby paint to add a faded look
View attachment 129662
this is layered paint
1. The base colour
2. The base colour plus white to fade
3 the brown
4 the orange brown
5 using small brushed usually warns out ones especially with just. Few bristled left I dot and dab, thin black is good for oil and powdered black good for smoke if running wood burners,
but I would say yours are well thought out and much improved over the basic model, I certainly would use them on my own layout without hesitation.
Deluxe Rust an American product….booo hisss….lol…..is one of my favourite modelling products, and the stuff goes a long way, just make sure you seal the clips so no evaporation.
View attachment 129663
you can easily argue that the rust is oversize but you cannot knock the impact, a somewhat over done VW Beetle.
View attachment 129664
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Jaz - Excellent rust effects! Did you ever happen to see a 1973 Woody Allen futuristic comedy called The Sleeper? Your last photo reminds me of the abandoned 300-year-old Volkswagen that he and Dianne Keaton discovered.

* * *
We had a relatively quiet Independence Day here, since all of our kids are either living out-of-state or had other plans. Like Garry, we were able to watch a pretty good show of fireworks from our own back yard - even though we do not live on a lake! Many of our neighbors had pro-quality fireworks of their own that they were shooting off, so we were able to see them above the treetops in three different directions from our deck.

Layout update: I finished running the CMX car with mineral spirits over all of my steel mill tracks yesterday. That took just as much time as all the other sections I did on Saturday, due to the complexity of the mill track plan and the fact that there are so many dead-end tracks. Today I manually cleaned the remaining lineside industry spurs, then test-ran a loco over those to make sure they still had power (they did). So that's another significant milestone in my quest to get this layout ready for MER 2021 (*whew!*)

Good Night - and have a Pleasant Tomorrow!
 
Good morning. It’s 75f degrees on the deck this morning. The birds are chirping and the humidity is thick. Mid 90’s again today is the prediction and the possible overnight rains missed us entirely.

The day is young for me having been up only about 30 minutes. No plans and I am declaring today a exercise day off. Yesterday was miserable exercising and I believe the g/kids should come over this morning and frolic in the pool with me. Text sent to the SIL already. Maybe this evening the train bug will hit! Have a great day.
TomO
C0FC64E3-E687-4471-A39E-413ABAB75498.jpeg
 
Greetings and Good morning!


Sherrel -----> get your arse to the urgent care, now! Nothing worse than mouth buggies. My daughter, who worked as a vet tech for three years had four, count 'em FOUR bouts of dangerous infections due to bites. Cats are worse, but get on antibiotics, or you might lose that hand.

Got the TT shimmed up with sheet roadbed. Couldn't get any foam under where the RH service tracks come in, but I think it will be alright. Considering next step. Painted the TT pit with some Driftwood wash, which fives an impression of concrete IMHO. That'll take a 2d coat, but better than the plastic out-of-the-box sheen.

Now considering my next steps. I might post some pics later to see if y'all might offer any suggestions. I must build up the other ten Microengineering turnouts. Not a lot there, but multiply by 10 and it's a few hours. I'm torn regarding turnout controls.

Ideally, I was leaning toward Tam Valley Depot servo based with both DCC and pushbutton control. However with the recent kitchen project, plus supporting youngest daughter through a job change and a move - - - - money's a bit tight for the month or three.

So, beloved RR forum, do I:


1) Wait to install the TO's and yard track until I can afford the electronic controls?

2) Build everything up with 0-5-0 control and add the whiz-bangs down-the-road when money is surplus again?

I guess I am not sure how difficult it will be to add the TO controls later. I ***could*** drill for actuators, etc. while installing for manual control? Two of the TOs are a fairly awkward reach, one other is not too bad, Maybe if I get the blasted thing built, I will decide that electronic TO control is for whussies er, not necessary.

Chew upon that, friends all, and render your opinions.

Oh, prospective Son-In-Law has knee surgery tomorrow. One benny of having mom run the surgery center is that she has assembled "The Dream Team" for him in terms of surgeon, anesthesia, nurses, Pre and Post op care, etc. To top it all, she will drive them home after recovery tomorrow and help daughter get him settled in for the night and be on 24 hour telephone support. I am confident that he will be fine. But he is from Greece, having been in this country for only a few years. Brothers and Sisters, let us rejoice that we live in this fair land. Sure we USA-ians have our issues, but even Western countries like Greece have far more significant ones. For example? Pre-SIL literally asked wifeykins this question: "How many surgeries will I need? Won't the doctor screw up the first one so he can get more money by doing the next ones?" Apparently that happens in Greece regularly.

Blessing of the F, S, & HS to all --------Steve J
 
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