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Interstate Railroad - Appalachian coal hauling in 1952.


DanielB
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Dan, you'll have seen this, but there was a pike a while ago and on one of the otherwise wasted curves was a pair of tracks underneath a scenic divide.  On one side was a mine, on the other was the coal processing plant.  Two hopper trains, one empties, one loads were operated, you can guess the rest.  And the loads were fixed of course.

 

One of the YT shortline vids had a lot of those big woodchip cars, clearly acquired at different times, but now mixed up; same prototype, some of them still in reasonable nick - black paint, cleanish - the others flaking light grey/creamish dirty paint.

 

So relieved I took up O-scale early on, at least it's too big to stack the boxes in the toilet, unlike HO!!

Jason

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On 16/02/2021 at 14:12, DanielB said:

Structures

If you've made it this far through my wall of text, I have some pictures to show you all. :D

 

Seeing as there's not much I can do on the layout build at the moment, I have started to build structures to place on the layout once it is built.

 

The plan is to make at least three sets of structures for the layout - one set per era I can model. The idea is to make each structure as a diorama where possible, allowing them to be swapped out easily depending on what era stock I fancy running during an operating session.

 

The layout will be modelled in winter, with most of the trees without leaves and the entire layout covered in snow. As such, the structures will also have a layer of snow added. I'm hoping to use cling film or something similar, and to apply a layer of my own snow paste (a mix of matt modge podge, water and woodland scenics snow flock) to the film to create a "hat" for each building, allowing me to re-use the buildings in future by making the snow removable should either the winter idea not work out as I hope, or if I ever decide to change my mind and redo the scenery for a difference season.

 

So far, I've put together and started painting/weather an old Walthers Cornerstone kit I've had sitting in a box for a couple of years - Midstate Marble Products. This will form one of the small industries on the layout, and will represent a stone cutters to allow for gondolas of uncut stone to form some of the non-coal traffic.

 

Here's how far I've gotten with it. I still need to paint the static crane that comes with the kit, though the winding house for it has been painted and suitably rusted up. :)

 

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My building became the Ironworks on CHIRM 

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Quick update from this morning's progress, and both shacks have now had their tar paper applied.

 

Once the glue dries completely I'll get cracking on painting the walls, and then will come overall weathering. :)

 

I've noticed that the sugar paper looks  lot redder in the sunlight than it does to the naked eye.20210225_122054.jpg.41958b22267ed55df0109794e745c6ae.jpg20210225_122100.jpg.d5857173756ae9c67cd7d0a9c11834f8.jpg

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Thanks John.

 

My comfort zone has always been cardstock kits and using photo papers like Scalescenes or Clevermodels make, so for this project I'm deliberately focusing on scratchbuilding, plastic kits and craftsmen kits to really force myself to learn new skills.

 

I have to say, I am greatly enjoying the process (and progress) so far. :)

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My next project is going to have to be finding some suitable staircases for the front of the huts, stringer style.

 

I know Micro Mark make them, but finding them is going to be tough as I'm not paying daft money to import them from the US.

 

Anyone else know of any other manufacturers that might prove easier to find in the UK? I'd rather not have to fall back on plastruct if I can help it as the design isn't quite right.

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This morning I placed an order with Rails of Sheffield for one each of Bowser's three Interstate Railroad lettered GLa hoppers, as well as a big order of Interstate decals from K4_Pacific on eBay.

 

When they turn up I will be able to start on my freight car fleet. :)

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Dan, if it's any help Sykes (BBC TV Comedy) Season 1 Episdode 8 (1972) features a factory production line.  They're decalling hoppe... no, that's not Sykes ... they're stamping washers by hand and they are doing it in time with some music playing on the old record player.  Then the Production Line mgr, wanting to raise the production rate, fiddles with the old record player and makes it play faster.

 

Any help?  

Jason

 

 

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28 minutes ago, DanielB said:

And as if by magic, they have arrived.

It shouldn't feel like a miracle or witchcraft when stuff gets delivered, but it often does.

 

Today I had a parcel delivered by Hermes, I suppose I could stop there, but this gets better - it had someone's name on it who I've never heard of, our number, street & postcode, but 'Staffordshire' rather than 'West Midlands' as the County. :scratchhead: I've checked on Royal Mail postcode finder and our street name is not duplicated in Staffordshire.

I opened it to see if there was any further info inside or a returns address - no such luck.

As for the contents of the parcel.....

 

Anyone want a small but colourful bikini bra??? :rolleyes:  :jester:  

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2 hours ago, F-UnitMad said:

Anyone want a small but colourful bikini bra?

I think you would look very fetching in it, and Jordan does appear to be a "unisex" name... ;)

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14 minutes ago, Regularity said:

I think you would look very fetching in it, and Jordan does appear to be a "unisex" name... ;)

You'll just have to take my word for it that I would not, nor have I tried it for size. 

 

'Jordan' was not a unisex name until a certain "I wanna be a Moddle" woman got more plastic in herself than there is in an Airfix kit. :mad_mini:  I was once asked on a.n.other Forum if my real name was actually Katy; my reply was along the lines of 'don't be silly, it's Kadee of course' which did raise a smile.

As for why this parcel contained only a bikini bra, and not pants as well - that is as much a mystery to me as the whereabouts of her parcel is to the woman named on it, who by now will have received an email from Hermes proclaiming another successful delivery, yet she has not got her parcel and has possibly endured a frantic & futile search of her wheelie bin, as the well-known Last Resting Place of many a Hermes parcel, until the bin men turn up....

 

Back to Dan & his hoppers.... ;)

Edited by F-UnitMad
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  • 4 weeks later...

Rails of Sheffield very kindly ordered in one of each of Bowser's 3 currently offered road numbers of Interstate hoppers, and they arrived last week, along with some Wills brick sheets - which will help with more scratchbuilt structures. :)

 

Not much more of an update beyond that, for now, as March was spent painting wargaming miniatures - 32, in total. One for every day of the month and an extra for good measure. :)

 

The K4 decals arrived a couple of weeks ago too, so I can begin working on the hopper fleet during April.

Edited by DanielB
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DanielB.

 

Just wondering if, but no, a bit far away for any Pennsy lines to run the odd one or two Interstate GLa's. They do look rather tempting, I would like to support and encourage Rails to order-in more Bowser stock!

 

James.

NMRABR Registrar & Renewals Officer.

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Hi James

 

It's your layout, run whatever you like. :)

 

I've got that Pennsy K4 that I plan on running on the layout despite it not being prototypical.

 

Besides, I'm not sure how far those hoppers got from home rails, but the Interstate did seem happier when they weren't at home! :D

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