Towards swappable loads

It is a strange fact that I have never scratchbuilt a flat car before. I clearly remember the Kalmbach book, Easy to Build Model Railroad Freight Cars, recommending that you should start out with a flat and work your way up to house cars; of course, I also clearly remember ignoring that advice and leaping […]

Three flats is enough

Ellen Hood played flute in high school band across from me and my clarinet. Apparently, I was poorer than most kids at hiding my hobby as she found out about it, and introduced me to her dad, Tom. For several years afterward, I joined Tom’s work sessions on Tuesday evenings, I guess until I moved […]

Organizing the flat cars

It’s funny how jobs stack up. I needed to design the bolsters for the flat cars, which meant I needed to measure the truck bolsters, which meant that I had to find some trucks. These, along with most of my detail castings, live in one of the cabinets above the layout, and they’re a bit […]

Flatcar weight plan

The thing that makes flatcars challenging is surely how to make them heavy enough to stay on the track when they are empty. If it makes you feel any better, it looks like real railroads had the same problem back in the wood car era. They appear to have blocked empty flats near the back […]

The story of Canada Atlantic flat cars

I have been thainking that I need a side project while completing the heavy shop. Most nights, I’m not able to make progress on the woodworking as it’s too late to run the table saw. Casting about for a little diversion, I thought about making some flat cars. The first step is to get the […]

Racing to finish the roundhouse

After three evenings of concentrated effort, the roundhouse is nearing completion. I didn’t quite finish everything on the list, but I still should have one more day before I have to go to Toronto. Also, there is always the prospect of working into the wee hours on Saturday before the meet. It wouldn’t be the […]

Four days left

It turns out that due to my mum’s visit and an impending business trip to Hogtown next week, I only have four evenings left until the Railway Modellers’ Meet! There is definitely more than four days’ worth of work left in the roundhouse at my usual rate, and so, I need to get hyper-efficient. I took […]

A lathe joins the workshop

I’ve wanted a lathe for about as long as I’ve been able to spell the word. Even before I got into Proto:87, I knew one would be a part of my workshop someday. Since getting into the finer scale, it’s been inevitable. My friend, Andrew Hutchinson, has more machine tools than a single person should […]

Roundhouse mullions

The window pattern for this roundhouse came from a drawing for the roundhouse at Barry’s Bay. Each of the three windows has six large sections, each of nine panes, making 172 panes in all. That’s a lot of careful cutting, but trivial for the Cricut! I don’t know why I’d been putting it off, but […]

Roundhouse retrospective

Are models ever really finished? Maybe some are, but mine seem to get just finished enough. That’s the roundhouse now: I could continue to fuss with it, but I think it’s time to move on. To tell the truth, I didn’t really intend to build a roundhouse! I’m supposed to be building 622, but I promised […]