Pembroke Hay Field No Good for Tea

The area inside the corner at the south end of the layout was originally conceived as “the place to put your tea.” The idea was unpopular with the real model railroaders out there who universally proclaimed food and beverages should not be on the layout. Nobody would listen to my protests that “the place to […]

Locating Pembroke’s Boundary Fence

The next piece of scenery on Pembroke will fill in around the water tower, and will include the boundary fence that will keep the hay field from wandering onto the tracks. But where should the fence be relative to the structures on the layout? The Internet is no help at all, stating a broad range […]

Coal Car Test Print

From 3D file to the first print always makes me feel like a ten-year-old on Christmas morning. A ten-year-old with a ventilator, gloves and safety glasses in a basement workshop that smells more of chemicals than of pine. With this being the first whole car I’ve attempted to print, I hardly expected it to work […]

Coal Car Brakes

The brake systems on hopper cars are often tight for space. So, it’s useful to be able to check clearances before construction. In the case of the coal cars, I found the train line was a little too close to truck bolster for my liking, and so, I raised it a scale inch or two. […]

Flat Cars Finished?

With the loads painted, the flat cars are substantially finished. I sprayed the underframes with a dusting of Vallejo “Smoke” so they’d look like they’ve done work if they should ever flip over. The trucks, body and the steel and iron parts received a muddy wash of raw umber and white so they’d look look […]

Painting Wood Loads

I had three flat car loads to experiment upon, and with time running short before the Railway Modellers’ Meet, I got right to work. I had picked up a Vallejo paint pack for wood and leather when I went to Burnaby Hobbies for some primer. The “Dark Sand” in the pack seemed a good starting […]

Lumber Loads

The 3D printer has been busy cranking out loads of lumber for the flat cars as I get ready for this year’s Railway Modellers’ Meet. I’d already printed quite a few loads, some of which are “factory seconds” and good only for experimenting, when I went back and looked at some photos of Canada Atlantic […]

Finishing the Cattle Chutes

The Railway Modellers Meet is approaching, and it’s time to finish some of these projects so I can bring them to the display. There was almost nothing left to do to the cattle chute module except decide what to do about the end of track. After perusing my collection of Canada Atlantic photos, I concluded […]

Lumber Load Trials

The flat cars, despite being scratch built the old-fashioned way, were jig-built so that the loads can be swapped. The trick is to confidently locate the stake pockets in a 3D model to locate the stakes themselves. I started by measuring, and then printed a couple of test loads on the FDM printer. Its resolution […]

Replacing a Quadrant

Throwing the engine lead switch, there was an unusual “thunk” and then the lever moved a little too easily. Reaching underneath, I felt a new sharp edge rotating behind the fascia. A couple of the levers have needed replacement, but this was the first quadrant that broke. Fortunately I still have the drawing. The new […]