It's been one hell of a journey since October.. I've sold off all but one of my BNSF locos and exchanged them for BN SD40-2's in keeping with my 1970's theme. Thanks to help from friends in North Metro I've also acquired some more Milwaukee power, including a legendary Little Joe! I'm also electing to sell off my Northstar commuter set in exchange for a 1976 Amtrak Arrowhead consist.
BN #6806 and #6822 are presently the backbone of my 1970's BN roster. I also have the bicentennial SD40-2, #1876, to accompany them. As a native Minnesotan I was a BN guy before I found Milwaukee so I had to give into some Cascade Green. These, along with #1876, are Athearn RTRs I was able to get cheaply.
And of course my Little Joe! This is an MTH model that I found buried in the bargain section of my nearest store. The garbage MTH operating couplers are long gone and replaced with Kadee's. The pantographs are supposed to raise and lower on their own but one seems to be broken. No matter to me, honestly. I'm really waiting to use this as a helper on the Hennepin Overland layout where we have modeled catenary on the mountain line. Based on my test run with this loco, I may need to weigh down the pilot trucks a bit.
One of my North Metro friends has been liquidating a lot of his collection. He offered me two Walthers SW1 models, along with a BLI 2-8-2 and caboose for a price that I just couldn't turn down.
These SW1's will soon be joined by a third, and so begins my models of the Smoky Mountain Donkeys from south-east Minnesota. MILW's line out there had some weight restrictions, and so MILW opted to lashup five SW1's for the area rather than upgrade the line.
J. Bjorklund, 1977. Isinours, MN.
And last, but not least, the BLI Mikado. Someone in the North Metro club had bought this as a dead loco. The blown-out Paragon decoder was replaced with an ESU Loksound unit equipped with superior speakers and a very nice keep-alive. The loco is a very smooth runner, although noisy, but has excellent sound quality. This particular loco is MILW's L3 USRA-type Heavy Mikado, and the model is pretty close to accurate. I have a few steam-era freight cars to hitch up behind both 8690 and my two DM&IR 2-10-2's so I can run some highly demanded steam power for open houses.
I hope my next photos will show some of my first attempts at weathering. I've begun spraying my freight cars with dullcote in preparation for powder weathering.