June Roster Details

Greetings ~

Last Thursday I ran the bare Rock Island 5100 forward and reverse without problems. I reattached the shell and hooked it up to its tender and a 4-car train. It ran fine in reverse, but spun on the curves  when going forward. I removed the shell and tightened the motor mount screws one half-turn. I ran it without the shell in both directions with a load. So, I reattached the shell and tested it again with
success! The track power has to be pretty high for it to run, but it makes it around Track 3 now.

I used a water/dish soap mix to clean off the tops of the four original Rocky Mountain Rocket cars successfully. They had gotten dirtied when resting on a display shelf back in Illinois.

On Father's Day the Gamsbys and Seemans came to visit the new train roster. During the run, I found that one of the couplers on the caboose train will open occasionally, and the Rocky Mountain Rocket is having some trouble sounding the horn.

For the remainder of the week I continued to seek assistance with selling Cal's Post War collection, and did some planning of future train-related plans for our backyard.

So, for blog content this week, I will elaborate on the June roster lineup.

The doodlebugs on Track 1 will receive some more attention in coming weeks with the next Future Passenger Train entry. For now I'll say that they are reliable runners, but look odd on the curve-intensive Track 1. I wouldn't suggest walking between the cars during most of their curvy course!

The caboose train is simple fun. At the head is a Williams Illinois Central GP9 diesel locomotive, painted in the "black with white details" freight scheme. The thing I like the most about this paint scheme is that it includes the signature green diamond logo. The engine is a very good runner, and requires little track power to move smoothly. The first caboose is a scale Lionel Northern Pacific woodsided model, followed by a Lionel Chicago & Northwestern red bay window caboose, followed by a scale Lionel Montana Rail Link caboose, followed by another MTH C&NW red bay window caboose, followed by a scale Lionel Missouri, Kansas and Texas green caboose, trailed by a Lionel C&NW green and yellow bay window caboose. The Lionel C&NW red bay window seems to have a troublesome coupler that opens on its own. This train makes a unique sound when running, since all of the cabeese are roughly the same length as the track pieces, so they all seem to pass over a track joint at the same time. This results in a very pronounced repeating "CLACK" as the train runs on Track 2.

June's entry on Track 3 has received a lot of publicity already: the Fast Reefer Freight led by the Lionel Rock Island 4-8-4 steam locomotive. Behind the reliably smoking engine are a line of all-Lionel scale freight cars. The first is a red Swift reefer, carrying bacon. The second is a gray Canadian National reefer, transporting a mixture of cold foods. The third reefer is an orange Pacific Fruit Express car, carrying apples. The caboose is a handsome wood-sided Rock Island model.

And June's flagship on Track 4 is the Rocky Mountain Rocket, which was detailed in last week's entry. The car tops have been cleaned, and I will address the E8's horn issues this week. The mars light on the lead locomotive is a nice touch! The locomotives are from Williams, and the aluminum cars are from K-Line. The cars were originally part of a K-Line Club membership set, and I picked up a second diner later. The "newer" diner is populated with passengers, but the rest of the cars are people-less.

Till next time, keep those rails shiny ~

The shell-less 5100 pulling a freight

The June roster

Rock Island car before cleaning

Rock Island car after cleaning

A track signal near my office, with Sacrifice Cliff in the background