Yesterday's Post

I have picked up four incorrectly painted Penn Central coach bodes from Rapido.  The factory painted the window band in the freight color Jade Green vs. the correct darker Deep Water Green used on PC's passenger cars.  The shells are complete and include the windows, diaphragms, grab irons etc..  They posted that they had the shells, on the on the Penn Central Yahoo group and they were giving them away, you just needed to cover the cost of shipping.  Now the question is what to do with them.  I am thinking of repainting the band on one or two of them and using some of the old E&B Valley underframe components and having some very nice coaches.  I may have some other ideas as well.  Stay tuned.

Wordless Wednesday

Wordless Wednesday Review

Yesterday I posted two photos of Amtrak Coach Baggage cars.  I took the photos in the fall of 1984 in Pittsford, NY, a town outside of Rochester, NY.  These are both former NH baggage/parlor lounge cars that survived to make it into Amtrak service.  In 1976 these cars were rebuilt by Amtrak into coach/baggage cars.  This rebuild included blanking out three windows on the baggage end of the coach portion of the cars.   I assume this increased the baggage section of the cars as I am unsure of what the interior looked. The baggage doors were also replaced as some point. The cars lasted in Amtrak service until 1981 and then were retired.  I have no idea why the cars were in Pittsford, NY nor what has happened to them since then.  If anybody knows, I would be very interested in knowing there final disposition.  The Amtrak information came from the book Amtrak by the Numbers.  I have posted a couple of photos from the web that show the appearance of the car towards the end of the New Haven Railroad.

 

Wordless Wednesday

Fixer Upper Part 3

I have finished it up.  I have added the chimney and the exterior staircase.  The stares and railings are Central Valley products.  The rest is just sheet and strip styrene.  It really helps New Havenize the scene.  I am also working on the Thermos building as well as figuring out what to use as ballast.  I discovered my cheap source of material has magnetic bits, and that is bad as it can get into motors and such.

One Year Anniversary

It has been just over 1 year since I started my blog and I have enjoyed doing it.  It helps keep me motivated to keep working on projects and to actually finish them up.  I have had over 1700 hits to the site and am pretty impressed with that number.  I will continue to post more projects and keep working on the layout. Thanks for looking!

The Springfield Show - 2018

I had the opportunity to go to the 2018 Amherst model railroad show at the Eastern States Fair ground in West Springfield MA.  I have been going for a number of years it was the opportunity to find stuff and look for deals, but now it has become much more of a social event to meet up with friends, many of which travel a great distances to go to the show (or work at it).  There are many layouts on display as well as many, many venders.  Many manufactures are also their showing of their newest products.  I have a number of photos from the day.

Rapido Had samples of the New Haven Parlor cars, RDC-2, RDC-4 and a pre-production sample of their EP-5.

 

Scaletrains had samples of their Conrail SD-40-2’s and C-39-8 (think that’s what it is).

 

Bethlehem Car Works had the almost ready kits of the NH 15’ apt RPO’s.  These should be rady by the end of February. They also have prepainted Two Tone gray NH 14 sec Pullmans. They are not lettered but include decals.

 

Model Railroad Hobbyist had there TOMA layout on display.

 

A number of lovely layouts were at the show as well.

 

I went to the Steaming Tender in Palmer for the annual dinner that is held there.  It is on the CSX’s old B&A line and the New England Central line.

 

This is the East bound Lake Shore Limited.

 

 

 

That’s it for now.

 

 

Fixer Upper Part 2

I was able to get a new cast resin roof from the Hobby Gallery and I painted it using craft paint and then weathered it with pan pastels.  I repainted the brick on the tower box car red, the wood trim, widows and doors Pullman green and the cement weathered concrete.  I painted the interior a dark gray to town it down from the white.  For mortar I uses DAP fast and final spackle.  I heard about using this on the Mike and Scotty Pod cast.  I have a bit of touch up to do, add a some details and build the exterior stair case.  New kits are still available from the Hobby Gallery.