Folks: As I justified waiting to waxing the car until it cools off, I was admiring the variety of projects-in-progress at the workbench (I have been taking more time to model lately and it is great for the soul). What have Frisco Folks been up to in the warmer months? I'll compile a list of mine and get some pictures soon. We've seen an outstanding variety of layouts, models and diamonds in the last few weeks. I look forward to reading and seeing other's endeavors as well! Best Regards,
"During the warmer months" You ask. My awnser go to weights every morning. Though Last night I did start on some new projects. You remember the Big cardboard meat plant I made? I made a replacement for that. And I am also working on a oil storgae deal. I post pics when I get it done. Also I made a vid of my layout and put it on youtube. This is the first vid I ever put on youtube so that's why the camera angles wern't the best and I kept rambling on about. Watch if you want to. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=N_Aq_fsurOI
Here's what's sitting on the workbench... 4-6-2 #1057 Lots of progress thus far. I've built a new cab, added a new pilot with front end air/signal hoses, Kemtron washout plugs. This week I've started the air tanks out of brass tube; left do be done are the air pipes down the engineer's side, add the headlight, walkways, and a smokebox mounted bell. A bit of touch-up on the tender, and she'll be ready for the paint shop! Standard Depot (Based on Winona Mo.) This is simply waiting for exterior paint, at which point it will be ready for doors, eaves brackets and a roof. USRA Double Sheathed XM Rebuild This is another 10-year project; it's an old Sunshine kid I bought from Jerry Glow. I misplaced the walkway planking at some point, so I've used a spare one from a Tichy kit. It, too, is waiting for the paint shop. Outside Braced SS Boxcar-150--- series I'm using a Tichy USRA SS kit as the starting point for this series. The carbody shell is done but I'm stuck as I realized yesterday that I've snapped the last of my remaining #78 and #79 drill bits. KCT Tower 5 I've started a "good enough" kit bash of this structure on the west end of KC Union Station. There is an old Faller signal tower kit from my father-in-laws old layout that I had tried to "Americanize." I have saved the top portion and will use the slough of .040 styrene sheets I have, along with some Plastruct brick sheets for the bottom (see prototype photo at http://www.rr-fallenflags.org/kct/kct-twr5-m.jpg) I have a couple of threads on some of these projects; I will update those with more details with pictures. If I can manage to finish any of these before the next printing deadline, I'll try to get something written up for The Meteor. Best Regards,
I tore the top level of my layout down. Then started adding more track to the newly available space. No track plan just started laying track and switches then connecting the dots. I still don't like this layout but I'm much happier with its current state. There is a bit more operating potential. I have a passenger train that has to go from the inside to the far outside so all traffic has to stop in a place where the passenger train can get out of the station without stopping. After it makes a few loops all traffic must stop again while it tail hoses back into the station. Fun stuff! I'm also working on the Tulsa Sapulpa Union Railway SW1200. The decals are being made as I type. I just got back from a two week stay in Tulsa and got reinspired with this project. Last but not least is the assembly of the Tropicana reefers I scored on ebay a few months ago. It was a lot of twelve which now brings my total up to 48! I needed couplers and now I need metal wheels. I run this train at the Club. Speaking of the Club the Mobile paper ran a front page article last Sunday about it and some of my Frisco power were in the photo's! You had to look hard but they were there! I'll post a scanned image when I get one
well here in texas its to hot (100+) to go out into the garage where the layout is to work on it so i have a portable table set up inside the house to work on the steam and diesel engines that are not working also can do some work on frieght cars such as weathering and repair hope it cools down soon so i can get back to the layout forgot to say i might get around to building some hand made rock and brick walls for the east side of the rail yard out of plaster will post photos when im done
Newburg and catching up on building some resin car kits. Basement nice and cool now that the temp/humidity is in the 90s.
My basement is also comfortable this summer. In addition to some music arrangements I'm adding to my band's book - it's a septet (trumpet/alto/tenor/bari/bone/tuba/drums), I have the laserkit of Ellington Mercantile and a 50+ year-old Walthers paired-window coach I'm bashing to represent ACF 1926 chair car from the Will Rogers on the bench. The Ellington Mercantile building is huge for a small-town store. It almost seems S scale rather than HO. I also have my notebook for layout trackplan sketches. Posts from you fellow Frisco Freeks are inspirational. Don Wirth may even finish the styrene and H&R model of the Newburg Lyric Theater building I started 30 years ago. The layout photos are AWESOME. Doug, Ann Arbor
My job involves travel every two weeks, so I have to take some work on the road for motel rooms in the evening. 1) I have been working on installing decoders in my entire fleet of locomotives. I have two more to go, a brand new Stewart SLSF VO-1000 and a Spectrum 4-8-2 (slowly working at becoming 1522). 2) I have been putting together car cards, loco cards and caboose cards for all of my inventory. 3) I remotored an IHC Mikado SLSF 4006 (it did not run well in DC as it was), and converted it to DCC. It runs very nicely now. In a couple of weeks I will be traveling back home to Cape Girardeau for a week to do some more research for my layout and to collect some more images of businesses, buildings and signs.
Wow, My list is very long. Since it has and will continue to be well over 100F this summer, my hobby room will be just right for keeping cool and having fun. 1. GE45 ton, repaint, letter, build new handrails, add details, make new decal, add DCC and sound - then write article about the process for the Meteor. 2. Finish adding DCC sound, then detail and weather FA ABA for TWRA 3. Add DCC sound and weather F3 ABBA set for TWRA 4. Add DCC sound, detail, and weather F3 ABBA set for me 5. Paint 2-8-0, add DCC sound 6. Decal and add DCC sound to 4-4-0 7. Begin work on heavyweight Texas Special cars 8. Begin work on lightweight Texas Special cars 9. Paint, detail, decal, and weather second E-8A for Texas Special 10. Complete M3A1 tank train on 10 Frisco flat cars. Paint and decal flat cars. 11. Add marker lights to AMB wooden caboose (steel cupola) 12. Mow lawn Have fun and stay cool, mike
Hate to admit it, but I'm not doing any Frisco modeling right now - instead I'm working now on a model of a Luftwaffe Junkers Ju87 "Stuka" in 1/72 scale. This is a neat kit (Heller) I've had sitting around since 1973, before we moved to Cincinnati! Also getting ready to address decal work on a yellow Frisco GSC flat, GE44t SLSF 8, a Stewart Frisco F3B in the austerity scheme, and a Central Valley NP stock car. The decal shop is backed up! Ken
Well, so far I did get new legs installed on my layout- the track level is only 34" off the floor, but later I'll put extensions on the legs (which are, BTW, foldable and originally meant for larger tables. I installed them by first gluing and screwing 1x4 pieces on the bottom of the layout, tneh attaching the legs to the 1x4s.) Came back from Sherman last week and found the last of the stuff that came off the layout prior to moving it, so I can now start on trackwork. I picked up a battery-powered Dremel at KMart recently, and I'm anxious to try it out. BTW, temps are hitting the "dollar mark" here too, and added to that is the humidity (three rivers and several big lakes will do that). I plan on waxiing the truck when it cools off, too- say, around October
I backdated a Bachmann 4-4-0 into a straight boiler loco ( could be a very early Frisco loco) and the Union gunboat Carondelet scratchbuilt from wood and some styrene. Sorry for the low resolution of my iphone camera. I'll use my real camera from now on.
Very Very nice gunboat model! Looks like some ill fate has befallen two of the crew. The 4-4-0 looks great, too! I am impressed!
Summer projects: I have started a massive undertaking: Selling off my non-S model trains and dumping other non-model RR hobby stuff. All in the hope of being in a position to resume work on my KC Lines layout when the weather starts getting cooler and the nights are longer. Along the way, I hope to complete a couple of modeling projects, such as decaling an S scale SW-9 model into Frisco #314, and am looking at kitbashing an S scale Baldwin S-12 into a Frisco DS4-4-1000. Gotta' love the Frisco!! Andre Ming
Some summer projects are in the attached picture, but here is the short list: 1. Boxcar (same as posted before) 2. Tankcar 3. Paint & Install water tank built by my friend Joe 4. Ongoing, Never-ending Maintenance 5. Painfully slow progress on restoring the Ottaway 4-4-0 steamer 6. Intermittent progress on the Redbud Depot. - James
Looks like those two came upon a jug of corn squeezing floating in the harbor - probably planted by a "Johnny Reb".
Shore leave must have been hard on those two. I'll post a pic when I finish the diorama of it tied up to the Mississsippi riverbank. By then the crew should have recovered. The 4-4-0 may become an 1876 Frisco ancestor. I have some scratchbuilt frieght cars to go with it. Anyone model the first years of the Saint Louis and San Fransico?........(Do I hear crickets chirpping?)
