March Trains for Sale!

Here are pics of the items my friend is selling. Most of these are brand new HO items, along with some great G scale items and railroadania. Please contact me to make offers! Thanks - Mark

Through-lines coming Through

Here's an update from the train room for March 2017. I'm very happy to report that my son, now 3 months old, really enjoys model trains. When he's upset, I run the trains for him, and he calms down every time. The combination of the train's motion and sounds have a lulling affect, and he's even fallen asleep a couple of times as the trains circle about in front of him.

Since my last post, I celebrated another birthday, and my parents and my parents-in-law all gifted me some nice railroad-related items. I received two nice posters of steam locomotive paintings, for the Northern Pacific and Great Northern railroads. I was also given several model railroad scenery supplies, including a bag of real coal. I also received an authentic chain for my railroad pocket watch. And, my wife gave me an evening with just the two of us, which meant a lot more to me than a thousand trains. Thank you to everybody for your generosity!

I've been running NP 0-6-0 for my son (well, for me too) and haven't had any problems until recently. I warmed it up one day, and there were no audible sounds from the speaker. This is the same issue I encountered last year, and took it to Caboose Hobbies in Denver to have it repaired. I've contacted The Caboose (new owner and location) to see if they have detailed records of what was specifically repaired last year, in hopes that I can duplicate it.

Over the past week, with help from my father and son, the train layout roster has been changed. We also performed a bit of inventory on the previous and new roster items. As of now, there are 97 items remaining to inventory. The theme of the roster is "through-lines", meaning that these trains are not run by local/regional railroads - they are "passing through". The locomotives in use are the only ones in the collection from their respective railroads. So, here's the new March-April 2017 roster for your review and entertainment:

On Track 1, the Blue Train makes its first-ever run this month. With the majority of its members hailing from the mostly-blue livery of Montana Rail Link, I developed this train simply because my bride likes the color. With last year's acquisition of the Union 76 tank car, this mixed freight now includes three scale-and-time-displaced cars with a locomotive and caboose. As more primarily-blue rolling stock is collected, they will be added to this special freight. This version of the Blue Train consists of the MRL SD9 (Lionel), a Needham Packing reefer (MTH), a Union 76 oil tank (K-Line), an MRL double-door boxcar (Lionel) and an MRL extended vision caboose (Lionel).

Track 2 hosts an all-dairy-related train. The Dairy Express is led by the MPC-era MKT NW2 (Lionel), a GN stock car (Petersen) a Borden milk tank car (Lionel), a Carnation reefer (K-Line), a Dairy Men reefer (Lionel) and an MKT extended vision caboose (Lionel). The NW2 is a single-motor unit and runs very well - it growls like a Postwar locomotive and was the first diesel model I had as a youngster.

On Track 3, reliable and mighty Mikado #4100 pulls mixed freight #408. A variety of goods and materials are in tow behind the Frisco 2-8-2 steam locomotive, built by Lionel in 1993. First, a CP log car (Lionel), followed by two recently acquired Lionel tankers with Philadelphia Quartz and Army liveries, a Midnight-Chief-inspired boxcar (#97191, K-Line), a Peacock reefer (K-Line), an Old Dutch reefer (K-Line), a GN hopper laden with coal (MTH), a CNW flatcar with semi trailer (called a "piggyback") (MTH), a late-80's MRR tank car (Lionel), an IC hopper (Williams) and a Frisco wood-sided caboose.

The ATSF boxcar has a brake-side coupler issue. It's opening at certain spots on the loop, but I haven't determined the cause yet. I thought the magnet was activating, but I've proved that isn't the issue. It only opens when it is coupled to another car, so weight and force, combined with certain sections of track are somehow causing it to malfunction. I'll keep troubleshooting, but for now I've placed the boxcar at the end of the train to prevent uncoupling problems.

Also, as I learned while holding my son, one should not shift the Frisco Mikado into forward from neutral at 25% power. I had gotten used to running the NP Switcher, which has a very gentle shift and can run smoothly at low speeds, but the 2-8-2 experienced extreme acceleration. The log car uncoupled from the tank car and both derailed. Of course, this happened at the inaccessible corner of the layout, so it took some ingenuity, while holding a baby, to pull the cars closer and re-rail them. No harm done, and everything is running again, but it was a small adventure to fix it.

And on Track 4, I've assembled the longest-yet version of the Northern Range heavyweight coach train. This time, its being pulled over Pennsylvania Railroad ROW, so the train is called the "Philly Phoenix" and is pulled by a big GG1 electric locomotive (Williams). The real-life prototype for this locomotive is nicknamed "Blackjack", and can be viewed at the Pennsylvania Railroad Museum. Behind my O-scale version of Blackjack is a troop car converted into an REA head-end car (Weaver), the Van Twiller combine (Lionel, first time on rails ever), the Willow River coach (Lionel), the Willow Valley coach (Lionel), the Willow Range coach (Lionel), the second Willow River coach (Lionel), the Highland Falls sleeper (Lionel), and the Granite Canyon coach (K-Line) takes up the rear.

The GG1 horn sputters frequently while pulling the Philly Phoenix. This can be prevented by holding down the Bell button on the controller. I think this is just a symptom of something fishy going on electronically with Track 4, as I’ve had problems with Whistle/Horn-Bell functionality in the past.

With my son around, the trains are all getting a lot more run time, which means more fun for everybody!

Have a blessed day, and keep those rails shiny!

Bday steam locomotive artwork

The Blue Train

Dairy Express

Frisco 2-8-2

"Chicaqo" piggyback

Santa Fe Blackbonnet paint scheme

Mike and Blackjack

Part of the Philly Phoenix

Geepers!

Happy New Year and welcome back to my occasionally-updated blog. For the next month or so, a gang of General Purpose ("GP" or Geep") diesels have control of the layout, so let’s go check them out!

First, on Track 1, Williams-made Illinois Central GP9 #8959 leads a short freight consisting of a CNW hopper, NP reefer and a Texaco tanker, trailed by a wood sided Illinois Central caboose.

Next up, the snappy looking Rock Island GP9 (also manufactured by Williams) pulls a mixed freight on Track 2. Here's the roadnames, car types, and builders: NP hopper (MTH), D&H hopper (Lionel), MRR gondola (MTH), CGW tanker (K-Line), NP log car (Lionel), CSS boxcar (Weaver), Baker's Chocolate tanker (K-Line), and a Rock Island caboose (Lionel).

Track 3 hosts an abbreviated Bozeman Zephyr with a Lionel Postwar Celebration Series Burlington GP7 at the point. Behind the locomotive is the newest addition to the roster, a boxcar celebrating and commemorating the birth of my son Wesley Hudson last November. This short Zephyr includes a baggage car, coach and observation car.

And, Track 4 finds a double-headed snowy reefer freight! Lionel Chicago & Northwestern GP7s numbers 1518 and 8375 haul an 11-car train while pushing the CNW rotary snow plow through the drifts. The colorful reefer cars are filled with dog food (Doggie Diner), ham (Dubuque), baked beans (Heinz), assorted groceries (IGA), butter (Land-O-Lakes), biscuits (Merchant), mustard (Nash), bananas (Northern Refrigerator), fruit (Pacific Fruit Express), and cheese (Phenix). The whole deal is followed by a red CNW caboose.

Hope you enjoy these views of the new GP roster! Keep those rails shiny ~

The double-headed snowy reefer freight

Burlington Geep and Special Addition Bozeman Zephyr

Spiffy CRI&P Geep

Logs and South Shore

Geep Season

Mid-layout view

IC Geep

Wesley Hudson

There hasn't been much activity or blogging on trains lately, as we've been busy with other things!

This is my son, Wesley Hudson Poynter, born 11/23/2016:

Wesley Hudson and CNW Hudson

Banana cheese logs

Happy November ~

Please enjoy some views and video of the all-electric roster below. Visitors since the last blog posting included my uncle and aunt from the Chicago-area. Also, some new rolling stock just came in: a K-Line reefer full of bananas, a MTH reefer carrying Phenix cheese, and three heavy-duty log cars carrying some massive sections of tree trunks. The banana car really has bananas inside. The cheese car is a scale version of a 36' reefer, and thus it is shorter than the other reefers in the fleet, but is still prototypical. The log cars are referred to as "skeleton cars" since they are "bare-bones" only - just a rolling platform for transporting big logs.

Until next time, keep your rails shiny ~

Trolley, L Train, Interurbans and Electroliner

South Shore and North Shore

3rd rail and overhead electrics

Loops of electric trains

The banana car has lots of accessories

New rolling stock

Three new log cars

New cheese reefer

Banana car with bananas inside

Bananas, cheese and logs

Electrified

The autumn winds have blown up a flurry of activity in the train room over the past two weeks.

I started by putting away the semi-scale roster. Based on operation, I did some troubleshooting with the whistle on the NP 0-6-0. I confirmed that, once again, there needs to be other power draws on the track for the sound to work properly. For example, a passenger car with consistent lighting, or a street lamp that is tied to the track power. Modern trains controlled by modern transformers require this.
Next I tested the Electroliner successfully. I opened up the front car to re-affix the internal window frames. In doing so, the new wires I installed last month were disconnected. I used Gorilla Glue to affix two long frames and one short frame, and left them to adhere overnight.

I also tested the CSS Interurban set and confirmed that the cowcatcher on the lead unit contacts the track occasionally when running forward. This results in lots of sparks and sometimes a derailment. So I manually bent the cowcatcher about 1/8" and tested it again. The train now runs properly.
Continuing on the Electroliner, I installed longer lead wires on the front motor connection. I noted that two other wires were disconnected, and through additional testing I came to believe that these had been disconnected for years. I reattached another window frame to the front unit.

Taking a break from repair work, I researched existing and potential "long" locomotives that will run on the future train layout to determine minimum operational track radii. I adjusted the master layout planning diagrams to support a minimum radius track of O-54 (for the Electronliner, shays, hudsons, and northerns). Two locomotives yet to be purchased (the Little Joe and Z-6) have a minimum radius of O-72, so they will be unable to run on some of the loops. The three longest loops will be able to support very large radius track, and I'm experimenting with O-81, O-90, O-99 and O-108 radii to see what will fit into the plan. As of now, the plan is to have two O-54 loops, three O-63 loops, three O-72 loops, and three to-be-determined large-radius loops.

I re-soldered the connections on the Electroliner, but after several attempts found that this was causing a short.

I inventoried several cabeese while pondering the electrical issues on the Electroliner.

I reversed the wires coming from the power pickups on the lead car of the Electroliner. This resolved the electrical shorts, and provided extra power for the train. It appears that both sets of wires in this car were wired backwards from the factory. This car, numbered 802, is the lead unit on the train, and is identical to the trailing car, number 801, in all but two ways: 801 has red marker lights, signifying it is at the rear of the train, and 801 has a male electrical connection to the next car. Car 802 is the only car in the 4-unit train that has a female electrical connection, and it seems this was originally installed backwards, although this is not apparent by looking at the wire colors, which are in line with the appropriate wires in the next car. I reattached additional window frames on 3 cars of the Electroliner after resolving the electrical issues.

I disassembled and lubricated PW Lionel locomotive #2037, which has not run on my layout before. There was a rusty staple stuck in one of the gears under the shell, which I removed. The roller pickups were retracted, so I placed them in active position, and tested the locomotive successfully. It is fully functional - forward-neutral-reverse, whistle, and smoke. 2037's were produced for a number of years throughout the Post-War period. A pink version of this locomotive came with the 1957-1958 Girl's Set, and is quite rare. My engine is unique in that it is missing the decorative bell, but I don't think this makes it more valuable :)

I proceeded to clean up all the tools used for repair work, and set up the new all-electric roster. I opened up the powered CSS Interurban car in order to replace the 9V battery (to provide continuous sound effects), but could not find a battery or battery clip inside. Upon further research, I found that there is no clip for a battery, even though one is mentioned in the instructions. (Oh well.)

Anyway, the roster now consists of:
Track 1 - Trolley
Track 2 - CTA L Cars
Track 3 - CSS Interurbans
Track 4 - Electroliner

Everything runs very smoothly except for the trolley, which has problems running over the 45-degree cross track on Track 1. The Bowser trolleys only have one power pickup, which explains why it has difficulties with cross tracks. To resolve this, I could perform some electrical modifications to the track, but I'm not going to. I'll just have to run the trolley at a consistent 40-scale-mph, which is generally fast enough for it to jump over the dead spot in the cross track without shutting off or cycling into neutral. The layout of the future will have zero cross tracks and only a few switch tracks on main loops, because I just don't want to deal with them. In the meantime, commuters on Track 1 will be quite dizzy, but they'll get to their destinations really fast!

All in all it's been a great two weeks of progress in the train room, from repairs to roster changes and more! Keep those rails shiny~

Lionel PW NYC 6464-125 boxcar

K-Line Kingan's reefer car

Electroliner window frames

First window frame in place on Electroliner

Cowcatcher repaired on CSS Interurban

2037 prior to repair

MRL locomotives in Laurel, MT

All-electric roster