Tabla de contenidos para August 2023 en Model Railroader

Built by Others: Dave Foxx’s HO scale Carolina Sandhills Lines layout The first installment of the Built by Others article series showcases reader-built layouts inspired by trackplans and projects that originally appeared in the pages of Model Railroader. If you’ve built something inspired by a track-plan from MR, we’d love to hear from you, and possibly feature your layout on Trains.com! E-mail dpopp@kalm-bach.com for more information. Olympia & Sand Creek, Episode 12 Work continues on the new section of the Olympia project railroad! Host David Popp tackles a variety of tasks in this episode of the Olympia & Sand Creek project series, including paint stripping a passenger car, building a retaining wall with flexible rock sheet, and widening the tunnel on the layout to accommodate wider cars, such as cabooses…

Electro-Motive Division GP20 diesel locomotive. This new four-axle road switcher is available decorated for Wisconsin & Southern; Amtrak (fantasy scheme); Arizona & California; Atchison, Topeka & Santa Fe; Burlington Northern Santa Fe (fantasy scheme); Chicago, Burlington & Quincy (fantasy scheme); Commonwealth Ry.; New York Central (fantasy scheme); Penn Central; Toledo, Peoria & Western; Southern Pacific; St. Louis Southwestern; Union Pacific; and United States Army. The model is also available undecorated. Road-specific details include horn type and location, truck sideframes, turbocharger type, dynamic brakes, and more. The model features BLI’s Paragon4 sound decoder and sells for $369.99. Broadway Limited Imports, 386-673-8900, broadway-limited.com HO scale locomotives • Electro-Motive Division E8 and E9 diesel locomotives. Southern Ry.; Baltimore & Ohio; Chesapeake & Ohio; Chicago, Burlington & Quincy; and Union Pacific. Road- and era-specific details…

A General Electric U28CG diesel locomotive has joined the Master Line from Atlas Model Railroad Co. The newly tooled HO scale six-axle locomotive features railroad-specific details, etched-metal grills, and factory-installed and painted crew figures. Atchison, Topeka & Santa Fe was the only road to order the steam generator-equipped U28CG. A mere 10 units were built between July and August 1966. The 2,800 hp dual-service units, numbered 350-359, were equipped with an FDL16 diesel engine and a split fuel tank for boiler water and diesel fuel. In April and May 1970, the U28CGs were renumbered 7900 through 7909. After Amtrak began operations in May 1971, Santa Fe removed the steam generator equipment from the locomotives and reassigned the six-axle units to freight service. The U28CGs were repainted into Santa Fe’s pre-…

This is the story of an old model railroader and a broke and broken-down railroad, The Narragansett RR. The 18 x 24-foot On30 layout is set in Rhode Island between 1929 and 1935. This is my seventh and final model railroad. I started off with N scale, then built two HO scale layouts. After that I moved onto On3, indoor G scale, a Gn15 diorama, and finally, On30. Finding the fun First, understand that I’ve never been much into operating layouts. I’m more interested in scenery. Without towns and such, there would be no need for a railroad to service empty space. As construction progressed, my friend Dave and I started out wiring with all-new, easy-to-install switch machines and such. At first I thought that would be exciting. I was…

I have been a model railroader for 54 years, but like most of us, I enjoy some things about the hobby more than others. For me, I have always loved locomotives and electronics. My HO scale layout fills a loft area above my garage. It is 13 x 24 feet and has no room to expand further. My growing fleet of locomotives was either taking up valuable yard and spur space or just sitting in display cabinets. I would have to move a locomotive out of the way to operate another one. Since I use Java Model Railroad Interface (JMRI) for operations [See page 52. – Ed.], I like being able to cycle the use of the engines, which the program does automatically. Keeping locomotives in a display cabinet would…

• Chesapeake & Ohio camp car set. Four-pack of N scale camp cars produced by Micro-Trains Line Co. for the C&O Historical Society. Includes three 50-foot ex-WWII troop sleeper cars and one ex-WWII troop kitchen car. Decorated in standard gray with black lettering. Equipped with Allied Full Cushion trucks, wheels, and standard Micro-Trains Line N scale couplers. Four-car set, $123.95. Chesapeake & Ohio Historical Society, 540-862-2210, chessieshop.com • Railroad Museum Friends 40th anniversary boxcar. Lionel HO scale boxcar produced for the Friends of the Railroad Museum of Pennsylvania. Decorated with a painting and photo of the John Bull steam locomotive. Features metal wheels and couplers, positionable doors, and added weights. $40. Friends of the Railroad Museum of Pennsylvania, 717-687-8628, rrmuseumpa.org…

The secret life of switch heaters Q How do switch heaters work? And how can I model one? Bob Kolankoski A Over the years, railroads have tried many different methods to keep switch points from getting clogged with ice and compacted snow. One of the earliest was placing burning smudge pots between the rails. Later, more permanent switch heaters were invented. One simple type was gas pipes routed to the outside of the rails and ignited, creating the spectacular sight of flames licking up alongside the track. You could model a switch heater like this fairly easily by bending and soldering together brass wire to represent the branching gas pipes. This method is still used in areas like yard throats, where tracks are too close together for the trackside hot-air…

The first thing to know is that I don’t paint in the traditional sense of the word. However, I do spray any non-wood items with either a dull black or dull white. Then I apply multiple washes. I start by dipping the tip of a brush in paint, then in water. Next, I dab the diluted paint on whatever I’m working on and let it flow. I repeat the process here and there. Then I go over the surface once more with a slightly less diluted paint. Once satisfied with the appearance and the paint is dry, I apply a mild mix of black ink and alcohol. This simultaneously adds highlights and shadows. If I don’t like the look, I use a toothbrush to remove the wash and try again. It…

During my years in the hobby, I’ve often encountered 45-degree corners when scratchbuilding, kitbashing, and kit building. Examples include corner joints on structures and where the sides meet the ends on a freight car. Lacking power saws, routers, or laser cutters, I’ve long resorted to eyeballing a sanding block or using a hobby knife to create bevel joints, usually with less-than-satisfactory results. I needed to find a better way. Inspired by the NorthWest Short Line (NWSL) True Sander and the Micro-Mark Sand-It, I built a bevel tool to make consistent 45-degree corners. The base is functionally similar to the commercial sanders, but I substituted an extruded aluminum angle for the sliding sandpaper holder. The extrusion slides on the two legs to make the 45-degree angle. Getting started I made the…

Walking around my layout, considering improvements inspired by a recent operations event, brought me to a surprising revelation. I realized that I saw loads, not freight cars, when I eyeballed a cut set out on a side track! Hominy feed headed to GLF in Sussex, gasoline to Decker & Simmons, and coal to the creamery in Slate Hill. I thought about the way veterans described the moves they made working these towns and my own crews placing their cars. I saw laborers shoveling coal out of the gondola. I could almost hear an agent’s tires crunch on the gravel as he turned into the station’s driveway. Railroads carry on commerce and the profit motive demands income. How did they turn waybills into dollar bills during the pencil-and-paper age? Eric Hiser writes…

Whether you’re a prototype modeler or freelancer, I suspect you’re actually building a railroad between two destinations: the one you started with called Perfection, and the one you end up with, called Compromise. None of us end up at Perfection. The key to a successful model railroad is what sort of shape we wind up in as we approach Compromise.  “Bright-eyed-and-bushy-tailed” might be a good description of us as we embark on our next model railroad planning and building project. That’s as it should be, as we’ll need some of that innate enthusiasm to carry us through the doldrums. I remember a good friend telling me and another veteran modeler about his plans for his next model railroad in a spare bedroom. A small spare bedroom. A very small spare bedroom.…

Technique makes diamonds easy, too Larry Puckett’s article on “Quick and easy crossovers” [Step By Step, May 2023] provided a nice tracklaying tip. I can confirm the technique works on Atlas N scale Code 55 track, as I have done the same thing with a pair of No. 7 turnouts (although I omitted the wiring step). After doing that successfully, I also tried it with a pair of Atlas diamond crossings. I have a junction where a single-track branch line crosses a double-track main using two 60-degree crossings. This was a little fussier than the turnouts, but the technique Larry described worked very well for this situation. Ron Smith, DuBois, Pa. Passing down love for the hobby Thanks for publishing the article “A tribute to Tony Koester” in the June…

Last month I reviewed the new TCS LT-50 Digital Command Control/Layout Command Control system. This month we’ll look at its more advanced CS-105 DCC/LCC system. To my knowledge the LT-50 and CS-105 are the first DCC systems to actively support both LCC and RailCom. Let’s start by exploring the attributes of the TCS CS-105. The CS-105 is an advanced command station. It supports 9,999 locomotive addresses; 2,044 accessory addresses; and decoder functions 0-28. The integrated booster is powered by either a 12 or 15VDC power supply rated at 6 amps, provided with the unit. This allows the CS-105 to supply track power at either 12 or 15V and a full 5A. Unlike most boosters, TCS says the unit can operate at the full 5A continuously. Other DCC boosters only claim a…

Many years ago, when I was 13 years old, my cousin’s husband, Steve, introduced me to the world of model railroading. When I would visit him in Charleston, S.C., we would sit at the kitchen table long into the evening hours, he with his coffee and me with whatever a teenager drinks, constructing buildings from cardstock and toothpicks. This was when I caught the model railroading bug that has stuck with me for some 50-plus years. While riding the bus to school, I told one my friends about the trains and the hobby. As it turned out, his neighbor, Mr. Mooney, was also a model railroader. I spent many hours in Mr. Mooney’s basement looking over his layout and dreaming about the model railroad I would someday build. Mr. Mooney…

While putting together a military train for my O scale layout, I found myself in need of many flatcars. During World War II, most new flatcars being built were 53-foot cars. Some railroads were even extending 42-foot cars into 53-footers by splicing a section in the center. In researching my military train, I also found many pictures of 40-foot cars. Railroads were refurbishing every car they could for use in transporting war materiel. The 40-foot cars are the subject of my modeling project. There aren’t many off-the-shelf options for O scale 40-foot flatcars. The only cars produced were the Red Caboose model with fish-belly side sills and the Berkshire Valley kit with straight side sills and fish-belly center sills. Both are out of production. After building several kits I found…

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