Down to the wire.

Tour day this Saturday! (updated April 6)

Only a few more days until the annual Doubleheaders Layout tour and like every year I am scrambling to get everything ready.

I am happy with what was accomplished this year, the trains are running on the lower deck, and the upper deck has one of the larger towns completely active. Last week I was able (finally, after 12 years) to run a train into the original Port Kelsey module, that has been waiting for a train for a very long time. I now can have some limited operation on the layout while I work on getting the remainder of it going. Only a few more years….

In the meantime I thought I would post a new picture, this is one of a Proto 2000 0-6-0 that I repainted and weathered on Sunday. This one has sound and runs great! To date I have bought 4 of these, and 3 of the 0-8-0’s. They are the perfect sized engine for my layout, and double head together very nicely.

At a flea market on Sunday I managed to pick up another 0-8-0 from a store that was there, they had an inconspicuous box marked “0-8-0 with DCC $150” I bought it and when I got it home I was pleasantly surprised to find it had a Soundtraxx decoded in it! Well worth what I paid….

I have a local engine guru, Dan Kirlin, of Kirlin Scale models, installing a sound decoder in a Pacific for me as well, and I am expecting it from him this week, so in total I now have 3 steamers with sound, which is starting to sound good….

If you happen to drop by be sure to introduce yourself as a blog reader, its always great to meet the people on the other side of my screen.

click on image for larger view

Image copyright 2005, Tim Warris

April 6 Update

While I should be cleaning up for the tour, I always get a dose of energy just before, and this year is no exception. I decided to add a ship to the front of the layout.

Image copyright 2005 Tim Warris

No, I didn’t build it last night, this was built 15 years ago when I was just a little model railroader (ok, littler). This model took me 3 years of working on it on and off to complete, I would be afraid to count how many hours went into it. I remember buying it at a hobby show in Toronto in November and telling the salesman it was going to be a Christmas present for my dad. He asked “your dad likes to build model ships?”, I said “no, I am going to build it for him”. He then asked “for this Christmas”, “Of course!” was my answer, while, he had a bit of a laugh over that idea. Little did I know it would be 4 Christmases later before he got it!

Recently my dad moved to a much smaller house and had no room for the ship (it was in a large display case), so I inherited it! Fortunately it is HO scale and coincidentally I had just the spot for it. I will be adding a large wood dock in front of the ship, shown in the picture by the white paper. Tracks will be on the dock, along with a busy scene of a ship being unloaded. I may need to raise the level of the water up 2″ or so to get everything at the right level.

Here are a couple of “before” shots of what the layout usually looks like a few days before the layout tour, after a few months of intense activity. You will have to drop by on Saturday to see the “after” pictures…

Posted by: | 04-05-2005 | 09:04 AM
Posted in: Uncategorized