Weekend Photo Fun - February 26th through February 28th 2021

Model Railroader General Discussion (Model Railroader)
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Welcome to Weekend Photo Fun## February 26, 2021 through February 28, 2021### All Are Welcome!

This is the last edition of Weekend Photo Fun for February. This month sure did seem to go by very quickly. I will do my best to be a good host this week.

I have been very busy working on the house again, so no new train shares for me this week.

I do have a photograph of one of my favorite boxcars from my Fleet Of Nonsense posed on my layout experimental segment.

For those that did not see my build-thread on the layout benchwork test segment, just click HERE.

Please share anything model railroad related with us this weekend. I am hoping for all kinds of good projects, works in progress, layout photos, or anything else.

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WPF by Bear, on Flickr

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Thanks for starting WPF Kevin.

Bear at his best. [:D]

Classic error!!! 1914/1919 era layout with a 1990s style postbox. [#oops]

Must remember. Do not add things that came out after timeframe.

David

David

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Kevin, thanks for starting us out with another inspiring photograph, really like that car.

Bear, you really need to get back to modeling again!

David, I wouldn’t have known about the mailbox if you hadn’t told us, sometimes it is hard to find parts that fit your era no matter when that era is.

Got a couple of more cars done this week!

Completed another Kadee PS 2003CF Covered Hopper, painted with Scalecoat II MOW Gray paint and lettered with Decals from the Ann Arbor Historical Society. These were among the first cars acquired after the DT&I acquired the Annie from the Wabash and used the now familiar DT&I style lettering. Cars were used in moving cement from the Dundee MI cement plant and sand from the Yuma, MI sand pit to the Ford Casting Plant in Brookpark, OH.

Exactrail late Evans 5277CF Boxcar Kit, painted with Scalecoat II ATSF Red and Silver Paints, then lettered with Highball Graphics decals. The D&H acquired these 1974 built cars from one of the NRUC railroads in 1979 and painrted them in the new simplified D&H scheme, most were in boxcar red, but I found a picture of one of them in bright red paint.

Last week I took my DT&SL GP7’s to the club with a mixed freight, they ran well especially after I changed out all the broken gears and replaced them with Athearn replacements.

Thanks for looking!

Rick Jesionowski

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Good weekend morning, everyone.

Kevin, thanks for another opening. Your cars are always fun to see, and if you didn’t tell us, they look so authentic that we would wonder what railroad they belong to. I had to look at your link to the layout you tore apart. Hopefully one day soon you’ll be posting some of the new layout.

Bear, that kid waiting by the railroad might be waiting a long time. It doesn’t look like that rail line gets a lot of traffic.

David, you’ve posted another wonderful scene from your railroad. The ‘messy’ scene is just what old railroads look like here. Very seldom do we see a railroad that looks like it’s brand new in the best parts of town.

Rick, another week, another hopper car that looks great. I’ve said before that you inspire me to start buying some hopper cars. I live in the middle of grain country, you would think my railroad would be covered with hopper cars hauling corn.

I’ve been spending the last weeks trying to learn Arduino computer code. I guess it’s C++. I tried copying some code that I found online, but nothing seemed to work the way I wanted. Finally, I decided to just learn enough to write the code myself.

Next, I needed some crossing lights. I found that very few are available for N Scale, and the ones that are available are a little pricey. I decided to try to build some.

The light holders I made from the smallest washers Ace Hardware had. The pole is a 3/32 aluminum tube. The crossing sign is a decal, and the lights are 1mm LEDs. This was not easy, and I really don’t want you to zoom in on the picture – it’s not pretty.

I have one still picture, and I have a link to a short 30 second video showing how the photo resisters turn on the blinking lights. Today I will start another couple of signals.

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Nice scene David.

My layout is full of anachronisms! IMHO this hobby would not be as fun if we did not make these compromises…

Simon (no posting this week - as Bear would say, I don’t have really good stuff to show. Maybe next week.)

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Kevin … Thanks for starting the thread. I like the looks of the fictional B&M boxcar.

David (UK)… I do not know UK postbox styles, and you close up photo is very good. I like the windows on the industrial building.

John York 1. … Looks like high tech is comeing to your railroad.

Bear … LOL.

Rick … I very much like the AA covered hopper and the D&H 1970’s era boxcar. I recalll seeing the D&TSL GP7’s many times when I lived in the Detroit area, and yours look fantastic.

Simon … I think your photos are always “good stuff”, and I looke foreard to your next contribution.

Here is an SD7 switching some tank cars.

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Nice examples this week, folks. Here is a Proto UP 2-8-8-2 pulling a string of coal cars. Have a great weekend!

20210226_103309 by Paul Ahrens, on Flickr

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Here is a TMI 40’ boxcar created with a custom decal set from Don Manlick. We had these decals at our club in Rapid City. The Rapid City, Black Hills and Western ran from Rapid City through Dark Canyon and up into the Black Hills. The only evidence of it in Rapid City is the old engine house which is a private business today.[C):-)]

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Good morning from California.

Many thanks for jump-starting the thread, Kevin.

I see that another great Beartoon is hanging around!

David, the mailbox fits right into the scene, with a nice contrast against the brick.

Rick, always amazed at the speed and quality of your work! The Ann Arbor covered hopper looks swell.

John, great work on wiring the crossing signal, especially in the scale!

Garry, excellent weathering on the engine, the backdrop blends right in with the foreground.

Paul, nice consist, I especially like the look that the long string of hoppers appear in the shot.

Here’s my contribution, HO scale China Railway P70 boxcar arrived yesterday through the mail, and I am planning on converting it to better trucks and Kadees.

Fenfa used old Bachmann China tooling for the shell and cut down on costs with junk out of scale and gauge trucks and couplers. For the price it was a great deal.

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We are off to a great start with this edition of Weekend Photo Fun. Thank you to everyone that has contributed so far.

Bear: You were sure super-quick with the Bear Toon this week! I don’t think many people have actually seen the “Under Construction” graphic before. It only exists for a few minutes.

David: I like your picture. Anachronisms are something I try to avoid, but I have them, and they do not bother me. After all, my railroad exists in the SGAU (Stratton and Gillette Alternative Universe), so no one can know for sure.

Rick: Thank you for the kind words on my boxcar. That ANN ARBOR covered hopper is a beauty. I love the Kadee PS covered hopper, but I currently only have one of them.

John: Thank you for looking at the layout segment thread. That was an expensive and time-consuming experiment, but I got a lot out of it. I learned quite a bit about layout building and photography. I never had a layout section like that where I could set up full studio lighting and take pictures. Hopefully more of my efforts from it will be seen soon.

I’ll bet learning to write code for the Arduino is a bit of a challenge. My middle daughter write code for a living, and it amazes me how she can look at a screen full of incomprehensable gibberish and just read it like it was a book.

Simon: Thanks for popping in. I look forward to your next share.

Garry: Thank you for the comment on my picture. What a great scene you shared. That little industry looks like it provides alot of fun switching.

Paul: Big steam and coal hoppers! Perfect combination. I love it.

Toad: That is a great custom raodname. The decals look great. I still have quite a few Donald Manlick decals that are 20+ years old that still are perfect.

L Zhou: Your boxcar looks like great project

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Excellent contributions by everyone (again). I love this thread.

There is a few comments over my photograph.

That postbox has been there nearly two years now and probably stay there for some more time. I am only niggled about it because I used to w++k for our Postal Service and know ‘it is wrong’. I need to find a Victorian style hexagonel one. [:)]

As for the brick building behind (on the backscene) it is typical of warehouses in Leeds. Leeds being the area the layout is modeled on.

David

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Thanks for getting WPF off and running Kevin! A good looking non SGRR car.

Glad to see your looking over our shoulder Bear.

David, slick mail box no mater what era, all mine are on post out by the road.

Rick, very nice looking cars, sharp!

John, glad to see an Arduino newbie getting after it.

Garry, really like the scene with the backdrop.

Paul, I just love articulateds.

Toad, another fine looking freight car.

LZ, I buy a lot of stuff from China but nothing like that car.

I’m still plunking around at the workbench on my kitbash. Not much accomplished. I got the Ed parlor chairs in yesterday and decided to go with the Athearn floor to keep the head room.

I mounted the chairs on track nails and drilled holes in the Athearn floor so they would swivel. After spending about an hour trying to glue a nail to the bottom of a chair I made a jig to position the nail and 26 chairs all had nails in a bit over an hour.

Keep the pictures coming guys!

Mel

My Model Railroad
http://melvineperry.blogspot.com/

Bakersfield, California

I’m beginning to realize that aging is not for wimps.

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Hi all,

Always loving what people are posting. I agree that kiddo on bear’s post will be waiting a long time lol.

Here are my Bowser F30a flatcars after adding wire grab irons, new stirrups, touch up paint, plus Lasekit wood decks. I also added a lot of lead to the underbellies as they were about 2oz shy of the NMRA standard.

And now, except for weathering my Sunset N5b cabin car is painted, decaled, had a clear coat applied, and put together, it is now ready to run on a layout.

Alvie

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Kevin, Thanks for getting the WPF up and running, I like your tuscan color boxcars.

Always nice to have a constant, and WPF is constantly full of goodness.

Thanks to all the contributors and viewers, have a safe and joyful weekend, regards, Peter

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Some nice stuff from everyone.

Here is my project for the day - Decals on a A-line trailer. (Getting used to doing decals again that way. A set of rail cars and a couple of locomotives will follow.)

Let’s keep the better than my pics coming!

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Excellent pics.

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Started work on some loads for some autoracks I have.

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Hello, Folks!

Late to the party this last weekend of February.

Thanks for the kickoff, Kevin! As always, some fine and inspirational photos and projects going on here.

I added to my roster of Pennsylvania P70 coaches which arrived this week. BLI did an admirable job with this latest run. I bought the early paint version with the “orange” window sash, olive underbody and brown roof.

PRR_P70_3-4 by Edmund, on Flickr

Broadway did a fantastic job on the black-outlined, gold leaf lettering.

PRR_P70_letterboard by Edmund, on Flickr

I’ve had this “couplet” which is PRR-speak for a twin-unit diner, awaiting paint and lettering for quite some time now (something like four years! [:$]) and I finally got around to wrapping things up:

Amtrak_Diner_Budd by Edmund, on Flickr

For now I opted for the green-tint windows that was a popular option in the late '60s, early '70s, to hide the fact that there’s no interior in there.

Amtrak_Kitchen-Budd_edited-1 by Edmund, on Flickr

For the kitchen/dormitory half there was a corridor in place and the windows on the other side were frosted so

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This is a picture on my HO scale layout that I call the Seaboard Central 3.0, because I’ve three versions of the MR project layout over the years. The era is (usually) 1983-86, although I have a few anachronisms, like this pair of ACL F-units. The lower line is the Seaboard System; the upper line is the Seaboard Central, which share an interchange (in my world) in Aberdeen, North Carolina.

Dave Foxx