WPH 13 May to 19 May


V&AL

Fred's Loco Shop Foreman
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UP 3985 Simmers quietly in the afternoon sun, on display out front of Union Station.

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Meanwhile, across town, BB&G #8 rumbles into town with a short freight.

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Preparing to meet friends and family visiting the 3985, The BB&G crew has the grill going full swing on their unique office on wheels...

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Engineer Bob JUST HAD to try out his new camera and wish he could drive a locomotive longer than a lot of the trains he pulls...




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The big surprise? Here's the town! AND all pics were shot with my Sony HTC Evo smart phone... (yes, my phone is smarter than I am... it's sad I know...)
 
Disclaimer: I claim no credit for the scenery... yet. This is a corner topper for the local modular group that has been given into my care for up keeping and improvements. They expected it to be a street car line.. but I just happen to have a GE-44 tonner that's perfect for it!
 
Here are a couple projects I've been working on for the past couple months. I bought a couple of Dole reefer containers on the cheap a while back, and found two container chassis kit for $3 shortly thereafter. And then I picked up one of the new Athearn Genesis 89' flatcars for $32 from Tacoma Trains. We are adding a intermodal ramp to the club layout, and I've always wanted to build the Walthers MiJack kit. So for the past couple days I've worked to put everything together. I built the container chassis and scratchbuilt the reefer units and added A-line tanks. While I did the initial build on the Mi-Jack crane a while back, I recently did some super detailing and painted the past two days. I also weathered everything including the Athearn flatcar this morning. So with a little sunny weather I setup this scene. But the sun went away by the time I "loaded" the trailer. I'm not sure if containers on chassis are top loaded with pins or bottom loaded with the arms, but the crane will be setup to load a trailer at the club. I left the crane so that it has moving parts and can be positioned.

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Was down at the club last night and brought out the SP trailer train again. Not only did I give the new Athearn car with the two Dole trailers a work out, I put most of my trailer equipment into a single train and tried to run it up the helix. The train consist of two sets of the Walthers 48' spine cars (really need to rework the hitches on them), a dozen 89' flatcars of various makes, and a single NS 50' intermodal car. While surprisingly the train didn't stringline, it did prove to exceed the pulling capacity of the consist, as the train slipped all way the up and stalled just short of the summit on the last loop. Guess I needed some six axle power ;^D

The GP50 in the last image is a old Blue Box Athearn I rebuilt into a "club engine". I detailed it enough to look and run decent, but it's fairly indestructible so the junior members in the club can run it all they want without ripping off most of the parts. Unfortunately the unit has one of the nosiest drives I've every heard out of a Athearn! Oh well, it fulfills it's purpose. That is one of three "Club Engines" I've rebuilt so far, the other two being Athearn BN SD40-2 and a BN F45. I've still got two more BN SD40-2's to go yet. There is also a UP SD40-2 that also get the same treatment when I find the time.

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Funnelfan, jealous of all those layout photos. Its in Oregon correct? Do you have a link to your club?
 
We're located at the Thurston County Fairgrounds in Lacey, WA. The club website is a bit dated, but we still meet on Thursday nights and most Saturdays (but we'll be in Tacoma this coming Saturday May 14th). Only the mainline of the track plan shown on the website is close to accurate, and everything else has changed.

http://www.omrs-wa.org/index.html
 
Nice trackplan. Kinda dumb question, but do you guys have any of those grain car/club cars for sale?
 
Thanks. There's more there than meets the eye. One of the questions I get is 'Where did you get that house? Can I get one?'. Sorry to say, not. Ezra's Exxon and home is a kitbash of a Heljan service station/garage that's no longer offered, a Model Power Cape Cod cottage and bits and pieces from a couple of other kits. Unless somebody has made a copy it's one of a kind.
 
Ted, are visitors from other local clubs allowed to run? I just bought a set of BN C30-7s that is like to roll on a layout big enough to justify all that power...
 
Ted, are visitors from other local clubs allowed to run? I just bought a set of BN C30-7s that is like to roll on a layout big enough to justify all that power...

Sure, we allow people to try out their locos on the layout all the time. Next Thursday night would be a great time for that as it's our regular run night.
 
I'll try to score some decoders before then, I just popped one apart, and found it's an 8-pin drop in candidate... Did y'all enjoy the show or did I steal all the good stuff while setting up? :)
 



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