Random photographs from the branch

[Patrick_Flory]

If anyone is new to all of this branch line business, and is interested at all, I did two very long threads about the layout a while back. Lots of narrative and explanation about how and why things got done. An awful lot of talk about such a little layout.

[pennytrains]

It’s not the size that matters, it’s the quality.

[Patrick_Flory]

Missouri Pacific branch line

have been building this present layout, my third, since 2007. It’s a point to point operation on a 15 inch wide shelf that’s about 40 feet long. On the second layout in 1963 I left continuous running operation on a loop behind to create point to point operation that would replicate actual train operation from point A to point B as much as I could. The only prototype railroad I’ve ever been interested in modeling is a Missouri Pacific branch line on the Gulf Coast that replicates parts of the ol…

Missouri Pacific branch line - 2

This thread will be mostly about cabooses and various equipment items, but I left room for a few random photographs that might turn up worth showing. I think I need to clarify that there’s always been an identity crisis about this layout, probably very detectable. I call it a Missouri Pacific branch but it retains the name Midland Western from my days of youth, which I’m not really willing to give up. Plus, I run Frisco equipment on it regularly and sometimes engines from other Regional roads…

[Patrick_Flory]

I apologize in advance for duplicate photographs that might appear from time to time between this current post and the earlier ones listed above. My memory isn’t what it used to be and they say your short-term memory goes first. However, my long-term memory is very intact. Like all the times I saw steam engines when I was extremely young, I can review those memories every day and they are just as clear as photographs.

[Patrick_Flory]

The 180 is my very first Bachmann steam engine. I bought it in 2007 and it is still running with the original decoder. It is very close to Missouri Pacific prototype but different enough that I invented the 180 class, which never actually existed in reality, to accommodate these slightly different locomotives.

[Patrick_Flory]

[Patrick_Flory]

This is on the Gulf Coast Extension layout in Mississippi. I have a Pacific that I’ll never run on my main layoutthat I brought over here to try out.. it actually makes it around the 18 inch radius curve and doesn’t look that bad on eye level. A number of folks are not aware of that pacifics were used in freight service more often than one would think, notably on the KCS.