Come on back to the caboose and get a cup of coffee [or sweet ice tea] Part III

[ezdays]

Got a bit of a chill in the air today. It rained last weekend and a good part of yesterday as well. What a relief from the hot and cruel summer of 32 days at 110 or more, and the 90 degree days we had as recently as a month ago. The rainfall for the year is only around 4" so far, about half of what we normally get, so anything we get now is more than welcome. They say there's more on it's way for tomorrow.:thumb:

 

[Chief Eagles]

So warm you can go in short sleaves. Unbelievable!!! No wonder everyone is sick with colds. Great meal. Now outside to fix layout board. Perfect weather for it.

 

[mitchelr]

Good evening. Well, I finally got garage straightened out (then I had little snooze). I had to move a bunch of my son's crud out of the way to allow the cable TV guy access to the crawl space. Now I can get my car back inside. Did not like going outside scraping snow and ice before leaving for work. That's the trouble with no basement, no where to pile stuff or build a huge train empire. If I ever win the lottery, I will hire a contractor to dig down 7 or 8 more courses of block and create a real basement. Of course it would help if I played the lottery on occasion.

Mrs. won't be home for a few more hours. Think I will head out to Wally World to pick up a few things.

See ya later.

Mitch

 

[Chief Eagles]

Evening. One 4X6 layout delivered to the little kid. Realtrax screwed down and lighted lockon. Took him a spare CW80. Gave him a Pensy Flier engine and tender. Also gave him an operating N&W hopper and a caboose. Big bottle of smoke fluid. When I left, it was in his Granddad's shop running and smoking. He was pressing the whistle button and smiling. He had to show me the tublar 027 track I gave him. It is in living room running around his Granddad's recliner and the little cheap Lionel and tender fly around it. So now he is really into the trains.

 

[Brutus]

Is this you nephew, Chief? Sounds like he's in train heaven!

Got to Michaels and then had to go to Walmart, big mistake as it was packed. Then we went out to dinner at Longhorn Steakhouse with a $40 gift card - yummy! Now I'm sort of paralyzed with steak! Watching The Wild Wild West on dvd (3rd season), great old show!

 

[Chief Eagles]

No kin to me. Steak, uuummmm. I always love steak.

 

[60103]

Floyd: there are a number of common setups for engine mechanisms; very few are actually specific to one manufacturer.
Do they run if you touch wires directly to the wheels? Are you using the DC terminals on the power pack? Do you get lights or any hum from the motor?
What I suggest is that you take a string of old Christmas tree lights (the miniatures that are in series) and cut out one tenth of them -- e.g. a 30 string cut 3 lights or 4 for safety. Bare the ends and touch them across the tracks to see if you have current; if not try again at the power pack terminals.
Another test is wire an automobile bulb (tail light/turn signal) in series with between the pack and track; if it lights up you have some sort of short.

 

[steamhead]

Chief...Thanks from me, and all of us here, I'm sure... for making that boy's Christmas one he'll remember for the rest of his life...

 

[TomPM]

Good evening folks

I am finally getting around to the computer. Once the rain stopped and the sun came it was a nice day in the 40’s. We had a fun day in Philadelphia. We took the train in just before lunch. We went to Macy’s (used to be Lord & Taylor’s; used to be John Wanamaker’s) and visit the Christmas Carol display. The display uses dolls and animatronics to tell the story. The display has been around for a while. It started in Lits Brothers Department Store. When Lits closed Strawbridge & Clothier got. It stayed at Strawbridges through the various ownership changes until Macy’s. Macy’s closed the old Strawbridge store and moved the display to their new store; the old John Wanamaker’s. we had lunch in the café and watched the Holiday Light Show from our table. We also did some shopping and got home around 6 PM.

Here are a couple of shots from the Light Show.

I did some modeling and determined that I am no longer adding grab irons to cars when I have to drill the holes. I broke two 0-80 drill bits tonight. Also the process is too tedious and my hands hurt after a while. After I gave up on drilling the family and I watched the Polar Express.

I hope everyone has a good evening/night.

 

[Chief Eagles]

Tom, I break them too. Msot of the time drilling out 1/16 or 1/8 crappie jigs. I drill out the heads at an angle so 55 lb test mono line will go in. Then I use waterprooof epoxy and glue in a section that angles back toward the hook. Clip it off at the lenght so it will become weed guard.
Can thn fish right down in tree tops and not get snagged. Have broken them on trains too. I find it so slow as have to use little hand drill.

Goooooood night all.

 

[John Baker]

Beans on Toast in a cool, damp Stockport 3deg C, no gritters.
Funny, I was going to say so much having not done a post for some time, looks like I've got a severe attack of writers block.

 

[Frank53]

Good morning - here are a few shots of a birds eye view as the track plan continues to be refined:

Picked up a supply of black poster board today to cut to width for streets and sidewalks to lay out the scenery before finalizing the track plan:

Still undecided as to how to handle this corner. I may yet duck this curve under the overhang of the top level, or cut it at a sharp angle to build a complex of industries in the corner.

This area is pretty well set. I am most likely going to place the electromagnetic crane in the spot within the bridge, and it looks like I have no room for the coaling tower, as I do not foresee having two parallel sidings:

Unfortunately, I may also not have room for a switch to run a track down behind the door.

This has been a bear, as I have had to dodge the supports for the reversing loop on the upper level. Lots of finagling to get this to work, and of course the area under that loop to the left is about the toughest spot to reach:

This siding is not working well, and I may have to re-think this, as well:

also need to cut a piece for where that track runs over the spot where there is no table in the lower right.

 

[N Gauger]

g'Morning all...

Tom - Man - that rings back memories Remember the monorail?? That "just happened" to go through the toy department???

Yeah - I break those tiny drills in G scale too I need another pin vice - I'll probably pick it up at Greenberg's...

 

[BlueberryhillRR]

Good Morning.............
It's a cloudy 34 degrees. Snow is almost all melted. Going up to 46 today with a little rain. No sunshine.
Today I am working in the train room again. Have a few things to fix and lub. Easy day.
Everyone have a nice day.
Chuck

 

[BlueberryhillRR]

Frank53......We must have posted about the same time. Pictures look great. I like the lower level. I can see where you have to do some adjusting to get it to work. But it will turn out nice. Good job.
Chuck

 

[spankybird]

Good Morning All from NE Ohio
where the temp is 32 deg with overcast skies!

Frank53 - layout is looking great!

Chief - nice of you to make a layout for your little friend. Be sure to test that CW80. You know how many of the have gone bad.

Today is our open house at the museum so off we go for the day!

 

[Chief Eagles]

Morning all. Tom P, tested the whole thing before I took it over. Had the Pensy flier running and whistle blowing on sawbenches in the back. Guess the neighbors thout a steam engine was coming through. This is the one Lionel sent me to replace the bad one. I had already given him a 1044 which he is using in the house. Did not want to give him my 1033 as it is my original from the Santa Clause brought me set.

Frank53, looking good old man.

John B., about time you posted. [sent him an email asking if his figures were broken ]

Warm here but not quite as warm as yesterday. Suppose to go to the mid 80's tomorrow. Later.

 

[Brutus]

Another cold and yucky day. Meeting friends John and Leah for lunch at 1 and then back to their house for cake I guess for a birthday party. Was going to work on the basement, but probably won't now. Oh well, plenty of time for that I guess.

Chief, that's a double-great thing you've done :thumb:

Frank53, looks like you have made some incredible progress, looking great

John Baker, I wonder if Chief will visit you one day, since you keep saying the roads in England are paved with GRITS

 

[jefelectric]

Last night I unpacked and ran the 2007 Convention item that came the other day. Runs great and sounds like a John Deere (Chief would really like it). The horn sounds like an auto horn of the era, guess that is what it sounded like, I will take MTH's word for it as I never heard one. Here is a pic.

This morning after early church and breakfast we delivered a bag of Christmas goodies from the church to one of the shut-ins. A lady we have known for 50+ years. She sure has a positive attitude, one of those that makes you feel better after you visit her. We have two more to deliver this afternoon. One to the mother of my wife's best friend and the other to my HS Chemistry teacher, yes he still remembers me. Don't know if that is good or bad.

We were supposed to get some freezing rain this morning but the temps did not drop that low and it was just rain, which did not disappoint me at all.

 

[Jonadel]

Sure fun to read of everyone's activities, Doug--sorry about the bad weather we are sending you, it's going to get worse. It's been lousy here since Thursday, we've seen it all, I finally got new wipers on Friday and that is helping a little. Last night when I came home we had freezing rain and 13 degrees...... absolutely miserable

Radio City Spectacular (Rockette's) opened Thursday night, 46 shows between now and Dec. 30, ugg. They did 4 shows yesterday and I was in charge of two of them, I've had to deal with two situations where guests became lost because of dementia, their friends are doing a poor job of caring for them. Thursday night we spent a frantic 20 minutes after the show trying to find a gentlemen, he was 1/2 block away just wandering aimlessly. I couldn't believe his wife let him get away. Luckily for all of us it ended well. If any of you have the chance to see this show, GO, it's wonderful and spectacular and very family orientated.

Trains tomorrow:mrgreen:

Jon