Model Railroader
January 2015
104 pages
Editor: Neil Besougloff
Managing Editor: Hal Miller
Editor Neil Besougloff starts off with some inside information on how MR staff decide what to do for the annual project layout. He states that “the goal of Model Railroader’s project layouts has always been to inspire new and intermediate hobbyists to start or continue building a layout, and to show off new techniques and approaches.” Mr. Besougloff goes on to explain that they do not repurpose rolling stock or structures, the layout size is limited by the size of the doorway into the workshop, how they choose the theme, and the design has to be something that can accomplished within a certain timeframe.
Information Desk jumped to the front of the magazine as compared to 10 years prior whereby it was in the back. In this column, Jim Hediger takes a look at the second floor interior details in a mechanical interlocking tower. There’s some good information here if you need to detail the interior of your tower.
Jim Kelly provides a couple of ideas in his N Scale Insights column. The first is that he discovered that a sword shape drink stir stick makes a great N scale uncoupler. He then goes on to discuss how he provides stools for his operators to sit on while switching the layout. Everyone may not need a stool, but for those who do, they are a welcome relief.
Jim Hediger gives his suggestions for good layout lighting in the Workshop Tips column. This one, even though only 10 years old, did not age. A big portion of the article discusses incandescent and fluorescent lighting. The overall concepts of planning the lighting early and installing valences are relevant, but the lighting materials did not age well.
In the Step by Step column, Lou Sassi builds wood retaining walls. It is a basics type of article, but I will read almost anything that Mr. Sassi writes. If you need the ground goop recipe, it is re-published here. To make it even more convenient for you, the recipe is: 1 part Celluclay, 1 part Vermiculite, ¾ part brown paint (his choice is Pittsburgh Paints Tobacco Leaf Brown), 1 part Elmer’s white glue. And approximately 1 ½ ounces of concentrated Lysol.
The first layout feature article is the 12 x 24 On30 Fernwood Lumber Co. layout set in 1910 in Southern Mississippi. It’s a nice layout with a more unique era and locale. In the article, there are additional bump outs that describe how he models Southern yellow pines with Joe-Pye weed and how he makes cowpies with dried burnt sienna artist colors squeezed onto wax paper and peeled off. If you need smaller scale cowpies, I am assuming that a smaller dab will do ya.
Harold Russell provides text, photos, and plans for the W. Case Benham Elevator in Canandaigua, NY. This checks a lot of boxes for me. Structure. Check. Agricultural related. Check. Photos. Check. Drawings. Check. It would take some tweaking to give it a more midwestern look for me, but the basis is there. I also appreciate all that Harold Russell has published over the years.
Need to model a desert? Then Kim Nipkow’s article will be right up your alley. The author goes through step by step creating a 24” x 30” desert diorama with carved plaster rocks colored as Utah red sandstone. The track is weathered with an airbrushing of beige and a wash of leather brown and gray. Add the sand, dirt, and vegetation, and voila, a desert scene. The author doesn’t actually say voila, that was all me.
The 2015 project layout debuts this issue. It is an N scale layout built on a door and christened the Red Oak layout. It is a CB&Q layout set in Iowa in the early 1960s. It has a staging yard “hidden” behind a backdrop divider and has a rural agricultural feel. Some people are weary of project layouts, but I like to see what they come up with each year.
Paired with the interlocking details provided in the Information Desk column, this next article is how to build a working interlocking plant for your layout, complete with working levers for signals and turnouts. It’s not my cup of tea, but I’m sure there are some that will enjoy sipping on that one.
Moving on is a track plan for a mountain short line designed by John Armstrong. Mr. Armstrong had his first track plan published in 1952. He passed away in 2004. Fast forward to 2015 and he is still making the pages of MR. This article has a unique twist. In his career, Mr. Armstrong also offered track planning services commercially to model railroaders. In this case, a hobbyist who commissioned Mr. Armstrong to design an O scale layout set in the southern Rockies shared not only the track plan, but also the edited transcript of the recording Mr. Armstrong provided to him to verbally walk him through the paper plans. It’s a unique article that brings back a voice, and plan, from the past.
Need to weather a freight car, or more specifically a 2-bay covered hopper? M.R. Snell shows you how to weather the car in 5 steps one layer at a time. What really intrigued me is that his base layer is black theatrical makeup. The following steps include using paintbrushes, a rattle can, an airbrush, decals, graffiti, and reflective strips. There’s only so many ways you can talk about weathering, but this one hits a new technique, at least for me, with the theatrical makeup. Like the old quote says: “Movies will make you famous; Television will make you rich; But theatre will make you good; And theatrical makeup will weather your trains.” I may or may not have added that last part.
In the DCC Corner column, Eric White covers installing a decoder in a PCC car. A friend of Mr. White wanted to control the car to simulate a stop complete with brake lights. Traction uses a couple of options that us diesel, coal, oil, or wood fueled modelers don’t need, such as wiring a decoder for both overhead wire and track current. The other trick is to illuminate the brake lights. It’s good to know for those who need it. Me? I have 4,300 horsepower of fire breathing locomotive dragons. I don’t need no stinking brake lights. All kidding aside, for this moment anyway, I never considered any of this and it is good to know in the event that I change my mind for the 732nd time and model some urban scenery with trolleys or PCCs slugging their way through the streets. Ok, back to kidding.
Tony Koester talks family in this edition of Trains of Thought. While none of Mr. Koester’s children were bitten by the model railroading bug, he does have a grandson that suffers from this modeling malady. He goes on to describe that his teenage grandson wanted to spend his Spring Break working on Grandpa Tony’s layout. Mr. Koester concludes that “we do know that the reports about youngsters no longer being interested in working with their hands beyond keying text messages is overly pessimistic. Maybe the key to it is to personally engaging them in what our hobby has to offer.” And, yes, engagement is the key. The hard part is that the key is no longer a key, it’s a fob. And because it is a fob, we old-timers think the hobby is dying because the kids don’t want our key. You know what? The hobby is fine. Just let the youngsters use the fob and keep the key for yourself. OK, that metaphor may have not been the greatest, but my moral of the story is for us to engage younger folk in the hobby, not dictate how the hobby has to be done. The hobby changes from generation to generation. I’m sure the manufactures of those early wooden kits heard from the hobbyists who cut down the trees in the woods with their axes and milled the lumber for the models themselves that the hobby was dying when precut wood kits hit the shelves. Change does not mean death. Change means that the hobby is in good hands as the young-un’s are making it their own. The upside is that we get to keep our hobby in our way of doing it while the newbys are blazing their own trail. As much as we want them to appreciate our hobby, we have to let them make their hobby their own. Both ways can peacefully co-exist side by side. Get them interested in the hobby and set them free. If they want help, they know where we are. We’re either in the basement or down at Hardee’s drinking coffee.
Finally, Andy Sperandeo wraps up the issue with his column, The Operators. As it is the January issue, he went back to the basics and produced a glossary of operating terms. It’s always good to see his name attached to a column or article. He is missed.
Jeff