PUNTA BRAVA - RENFE HO - Adventures in Spanish Modelling

[Geep7]

7 hours ago, Nick_Burman said:

 

Alcoy, before it was rationalized to near-death? San Juan de las Abadessas? Ayamonte? Muskiz? Vigo? There are a few choices...

 

Cheers NB

Thanks. I made my comment when my knowledge of the RENFE system wasn't as good as it is now. Lesson learnt, never base your assumptions on a Google search. I've been frequenting the Forotrenes forum rather a lot over the past 12 months, and the amount of information on there is quite overwhelming, but definitely informative. I'm still learning though.

 

7 hours ago, Nick_Burman said:

 

Unsurprising, RENFE pulled the plug off the wagonload network about 20 years ago or so. If you want wagonload freight activity you'll have to turn  the clock back to the 1980's or earlier, when there was still such activity.

 

Cheers NB

I suspected as much. The layout will be nominally set during the mid-80's (1985, when I first visited Spain) and the early to mid-90's (my second holiday in Spain, 1994), so hopefully this will just catch the end of the wagonload freight era. I do have a small amount of stock covering Era V/VI, but some of this will be repainted into earlier liveries to match the Era IV, early Era V period.

[Nick_Burman]

 

This might be of help, even if it's dated 1948. Notice the thin lines denoting projected lines (which were never built) and the white lines which denoted lines under construction (some of which were never finished).

 

 

Cheers NB

[Dr Gerbil-Fritters]

Almeria is very interesting... even has an elevated ore dock, the Cable Inglés, like the ones you can see on the American Great Lakes.  

 

Granada also has a nice little terminus.  

 

I had a most excellent holiday in that part of Spain - much more interesting than the coast, although the trudge up the hill to The Alhambra in 45c has gone down in family legend!

[Geep7]

20 minutes ago, Dr Gerbil-Fritters said:

Almeria is very interesting... even has an elevated ore dock, the Cable Inglés, like the ones you can see on the American Great Lakes.  

 

Granada also has a nice little terminus. 

I found Almeria almost by accident on Google Maps, and noticed the ore Dock is still standing, if no longer connected. Having modelled the Great Lakes area before, it certainly caught my eye.

 

I've managed to find quite a few photo's of both Almeria and Granada thanks to our friends on Forotrenes. There's quite a few videos on YouTube as well....

 

4 hours ago, Nick_Burman said:

That map is very useful.... I was at one point thinking of a line out onto the Ebro delta, and to find not 1 but 2 lines there from Tortosa. One going to El Cava and one to Sant Carles de la Rapita....

 

There is obviously Sant Feliu and Palamós up the coast the other side of Barcelona which I could also use as names too....

 

[Dr Gerbil-Fritters]

Highly recommended...

 

http://www.gssr.es/index.php

 

the 2-6-0s look like the ones that ran on the MSWJR, available from Roxy Mouldings, and the 'Yanqui' hoppers similar to the ones from Westerfield for the YVRR

 

Edited September 7, 2021 by Dr Gerbil-Fritters

[Nick_Burman]

18 hours ago, Geep7 said:

That map is very useful.... I was at one point thinking of a line out onto the Ebro delta, and to find not 1 but 2 lines there from Tortosa. One going to El Cava and one to Sant Carles de la Rapita....

 

Tortosa - La Cava was one of the last meter-gauge railways to be built in Spain. The line to San Carles was graded but rails were never laid on it... something which could come handy for freelancing. http://www.docutren.com/HistoriaFerroviaria/Gijon2003/pdf/td7.pdf

 

Cheers NB

Edited September 8, 2021 by Nick_Burman

[Nick_Burman]

18 hours ago, Dr Gerbil-Fritters said:

the 'Yanqui' hoppers similar to the ones from Westerfield for the YVRR

 

The similarity is no coincidence, they were built by Pressed Steel Car Co. in Pittsburgh - the same builder as the YVRR cars.

 

Cheers NB

[Geep7]

So back to the subject of layout names.... i've been pondering over this for the last couple of weeks, and i'd almost settled on calling it Sant Carles de la Rapita, with a made up history, etc. But then I thought about plausability of a station being built there with the level of traffic I was proposing, and it made me think that perhaps they would have routed the main line to Valencia  through Sant Carles and along the coast if it was that busy, so wouldn't be a terminus.

 

So I started looking back up the coast on the Northern side of Barcelona. Both Lloret de Mar and Tossa de Mar (both I have visited) have never had stations, relying on a bus service from Blanes, and Sant Feliu de Guixols had a (proposed?) narrow gauge line from Gerona, but no National network line. So I thought perhaps I could create a made up history of a line deviating just north of Blanes, turning east to serve Lloret, Tossa and then Sant Feliu, with Sant Feliu being the station i'm modelling. However, with the way round my station is facing, this wouldn't make much sense as the fictional line would be coming from the West, and my layout (the way it's supposed to be) has the line entering from the East. Now you could argue that this doesn't really matter as i'm making this up, but I like to get details like the local topography reasonably accurate.

 

Whilst looking at the area between Tossa de Mar and Sant Feliu, I noticed an area that was just a few villas, named Punta Brava, Good Tip in Catalan, or so Google Translate says. I'm assuming it refers to a point or spit of land extending out into the sea. And it got me thinking, it's generic enough that it could apply to anywhere along the coast, not be a specific town that is well known, and vague enough that I can explain away the scenery and run pretty much any sort of Spanish stock I want.

 

So with that in mind, I thought i'd mock up a couple of nameboards, one in the early 90s RENFE style, and one in Cercanias style, just to see how it looks.

 

 

 

 

 

Would be interested to know what people think. Choosing a layout name isn't easy, but for this layout I want something that is memorable, definitely looks Spanish (yes I know it's Catalan, but most people will think it's just Spanish) and it's fairly easy to pronounce for those non-Spanish/Catalan speakers among us.

Edited March 31, 2022 by Geep7

[ellocoloco]

I have occasionally thought about layout /station names but unlike yourself, have not got round to laying any track so I have still got plenty of time.

 

Thoughts so far include Teruel Norte and Cullera Sud. Mine will be based on an imaginary line in La Communidad de Valencia. 

 

I like the signs.

 

 (Edit: My Valencian wife thinks Punta Brava sounds suitably Catalan.)

Edited September 21, 2021 by ellocoloco
Additional info

[ianmianmianm]

It has to and can only be this beauty for my Portuguese layout: 

 

[Geep7]

It's been quite a while since my last update. Whilst I have been making some progress with the layout, the past couple of months have seen work and domestic duties take time away from Punta Brava. Recently I have also been helping my father build a small 'n' gauge layout for my nephew to be ready in time for Christmas. It's been a long time since i've modelled in N, and the eyes aren't what they used to be.

 

The progress I have made has been focusing on completing the backscene and rear retaining wall. Once these are done, I can get back to finishing off the catenary masts. It looks like ballasting of the track will now have to wait until the weather gets a bit warmer, as i'll be doing this outside (glue on the carpet is frowned upon by the domestic authorities).

 

The backscene is the Peco Photographic series plain sky. Usually I just use lining paper and paint it with a sky blue emulsion, but I wanted to try something different, and thought a photographic backscene might look better. It's been attached using the Deluxe Materials View Glue, which is essentially a wallpaper adhesive, but it dries totally flat leaving no wrinkles. It all looks good, apart from where i've had to remove any excess adhesive, as the print on the backscene paper doesn't appear to be colourfast, and so started to come off when using a damp cloth to wipe up the adhesive. Fortunately, the areas where it has started to come off will be covered with buildings, but something to be aware of for future projects.

 

For the rear retaining wall and raised roadway / bridges, i've first made the structures out of foamcore board. As i've previously mentioned, initially at the station end, the wall is faced with random stone, these being Will's Crazy Paving sheets, cut down and placed in a slight random order to try and avoid the stones repeating. I think i've done a reasonable job so far.

 

 

The random stone gives way to rendered concrete for the retaining walls, bridges and tunnel entrance, taking inspiration from the line approaching Estacio de Franca in Barcelona.

 

 

In the above photo the furthest track is the main line, and disappears beneath the road. It is imagined that the main line curves away from the front of the layout, whereas in reality it continues under-cover in a straight line to the fiddle yard.

 

I have some worries about having such a long stretch of track being in a tunnel and not accessible. It will be inevitable that a train will derail where it can't be reached, so I needed to devise a way of accessing the track. I thought about cutting holes in the backscene, but I wanted to retain the strength of the backscene, and also keep the tunnel dark, as this helps with the illusion of the line going elsewhere. So i've come up with the below.

 

 

Whilst the photo shows the piece of MDF flipped up, as if it is hinged, it will just be a lift out section.

 

 

Here it is shown in the closed position, with the retaining wall in place.

 

The idea for this end of the layout, is for a small park area which starts at the left-hand bridge with a path running across the lift-out section to a road on the right-hand bridge, and then the entrance to a gated and fenced municipal gardens area. Obviously space is tight, so it will just be an impression of the park, but i'm hoping it will look OK. I'm thinking of some kind of monument or statue in the centre of the lift-out section, which will be a nice focal point, and also double up as the handle to lift it out. I'm thinking of something like the below photo I took of the Monumento a los Castellers in Tarragona, but not quite as large.

 

 

 

That's all for now folks. The layout's been put away for the Christmas period, so i'll only be able to work on one board at a time at most, or anything that can be done away from the layout, if I get any spare time.

Edited March 31, 2022 by Geep7

[Geep7]

For this post, I thought I would make a start with discussing the stock I intend to run on the layout.

 

When I first started out, I was intending on just modelling the mid-80's from when I first visited Spain, so late Epoch IV. However it soon became apparent through quite a bit of research (watching lots of old Spanish railway videos on YouTube), that a lot of the liveries I had seen on my first visit survived until the early to mid-90's, which has allowed me to embrace early Epoch V as well, covering my second visit to Spain. Since then, I seem to have stretched it a bit, and have had a bit of Epoch VI creeping in, but more of that later.

 

Locomotives

Let's start with the electric locomotives. I seem to have a thing for Serie 269 locomotives, no surprise as I have quite a few photos of them. I now have 3 Electrotren models, in Mazinger, Estrella and Taxi schemes. The Estrella 269 is factory sound fitted. I'm a bit disappointed with the sound on this, as the volume of the traction motor blowers when moving drowns out any of the other sounds, no matter how much I try and change the sound volumes. I think i'm going to have to get it onto Decoder Pro to properly sort out the settings, however, I have a feeling it's a LokSound select decoder, rather than a full fat V5, so might be difficult.

 

Above is my latest 269, in the early version of the Grey and Yellow 'Taxi' livery. The later version of this livery had the full locomotive number (apart from the check digit) in the large sized numerals. This livery reminds me very much of BR Large Logo. Seeing as the 269's started to be repainted in this livery from the early 1990's, I presume someone in the RENFE art department was a British Rail fan. I had some trouble getting hold of one of these in this livery, as this model hasn't been produced for a number of years, but I managed to purchase this from a Spanish seller on eBay (thank goodness for Google Translate!). After worrying about whether it would get stuck in customs, it arrived quicker than some deliveries i've had from within the UK.

 

As featured in some photos a couple of pages back, I also have a Serie 276, a multiple fitted example in it's original green livery. These lasted in this condition up until the early 90's, when the survivors were reformed and repainted into 'Taxi' livery, so very much another loco which can belong to Epoch IV or V.

 

I was rather pleased when I managed to pick this Serie 252 up at the Farnham MRC exhibition back in October for a rather reasonable price. My first (and only) trip on a Talgo from Monzon to Zaragoza and back, was behind a 'Taxi' liveried 252 back in 2002. It's the Mehano model, which is actually accurate to the prototype in length, whereas the Electrotren model is too short. When I got it home and took it apart, I was rather happy to discover it had already been fitted with a DCC chip. The livery is really out of my era, and so I am thinking of repainting it back into the 'Taxi' livery. However, this Altaria scheme really looks nice, and I do remember seeing a couple in this livery (albeit lettered for the ARCO service) in Salou and Tarragona.

 

Onto the diesel locomotives. Whereas the electric locos are dominated by Electrotren models, the diesels are more of a mixed bunch. I'll go in series order for these.

First up is a Mabar Serie 308 B-B shunting locomotive in RENFE green livery. I purchased it as part of a bargain lot of locomotives on eBay, and when it arrived, whilst it was still boxed, it was missing some handrails (I was aware before I bought it), plus it lacked a DCC decoder.

Seeing as it was already fitted with a speaker, I ordered a loksound v5 loaded with 308 sounds. As the 308's have Caterpillar engines fitted, it certainly sounds different. I managed to fabricate a replacement handrail (the one on the far right in this photo). It's a lovely little loco and runs like a dream, plus some were based in Tarragona during my modelling period for shunting around the docks.

 

Next up is an Electrotren Serie 311, again another shunting loco type to be found in and around the docks in Tarragona and Barcelona. I received mine as a Christmas gift last year, and it's in the later RENFE Mercancias livery of Grey and White. I plan to get around to painting this into the earlier Red and Silver Grey livery.

 

An Electrotren 316 and a Mabar 319, both in RENFE Green with Yellow stripe were also in the same lot of loco's that came with the 308. I don't really have much use for the 316, as I don't think they visited the Catalonia region much at all, but it's a nice model. The 316 was already DCC fitted, but I had to fit a DCC Decoder to the 319. I am debating about fitting this with sound as it's such a great runner, and a lovely locomotive.

 

Lastly there are an Electrotren 321 and a Roco 333, both fitted with DCC sound. The 321 is in Yellow and Grey 'Taxi' livery, and whilst the 321's were mostly found in the more northern parts of Spain, I have seen photographs of them getting to Barcelona.

The 333 is in green with yellow stripe, and was pretty much a must have when I found out Roco were doing a new run of them. I was initially a bit disappointed in how it ran, stopping on points (even though they are all electrofrog and have the frog switched and blades always powered) and being very sensitive to dirty track. I took the loco apart, and found the issue was with the way the pick-up strips are held in place. On each bogie, there is a plastic clip which holds the brass wipers in place, but when the bogie turned, the clip would lift, and therefore allow the wipers to lift as well. I took the brave step and superglued the plastic clip down, and now the pick-up wipers no longer lift and I have all wheel pickup. A shame to have to do this to a brand new model.

 

I think i've rambled on enough for one post, so i'll leave it here. Hopefully this is of interest to people, so next time, i'll come to the Multiple Units and rolling stock.

Edited November 18, 2022 by Geep7

[doctor quinn]

Thanks for sharing the tip about the 333, my Roco DSB MZs had a tendency to stall. I fitted new wheel sets without traction tyres which helped but I’ll check the pick up mounting too.

[ellocoloco]

On 09/12/2021 at 10:58, Geep7 said:

This livery reminds me very much of BR Large Logo

Very much so.

 

I think I first saw the Taxi livery in the 95 Lima catalogue when the 252 was launched and it had the same effect on me. Large Logo is about the only BR livery that showed any imagination. Taxi is definitely my favourite RENFE livery (except maybe AVLO....) And the one on most of my models.

 

I must try and find out why some locos have the class and unit number in yellow and others white!

[Geep7]

14 hours ago, ellocoloco said:

I must try and find out why some locos have the class and unit number in yellow and others white!

Something in the back of my mind is telling me I read something about sub-classes...... with the 252's, initially weren't some built as standard gauge, and the rest as Iberian Gauge, so might have been a way to distinguish them?

[Dr Gerbil-Fritters]

15 were built for the Madrid-Seville AVE (standard gauge) so would have been in AVE grey and blue.

 

The other 60 were Iberian gauge, and whatever livery was standard at the time.

[Neils WRX]

One of the AVE 252’s back in 2004

 

 

Thanks,

 

Neil

[Geep7]

Felices fiestas a todos!

I hope everyone is enjoying the festive break, and is able to spend it with family and friends.

 

After a few days of celebrating with my family, I thought i'd do a small update today to show a couple of new arrivals on Punta Brava.

 

 

Both loco's were received as gifts from my wonderful parents, the 0-6-0 steam loco a couple of weeks before Christmas as a birthday present, and the Serie 303 Shunter arrived Christmas day morning. Both loco's require 6-pin decoders before they can run on DCC, but I thought i'd show them on the layout.

 

I'm not sure where the prototype steam loco would have run, but i'm sure i've seen a similar loco 'plinthed' in a park in Barcelona. I shall have to do a bit of research into this. For now, i'll assume for my purposes that an enthusiast group have restored one to working order for a heritage train service, which I can run into Punta Brava.

 

The 303 on the other hand, is a model of a preserved example, which I think is still at the railway museum in Madrid. According to the Listadotren site, it was repainted into the colours in 1999, slightly late for my normal modelling period, but I like the livery and the prototype locomotive.

 

Following on from the previous post by @Neils WRX, it prompted me to have a rummage through my photos, and I found I had managed to take a photo of the Talgo service I had taken from Zaragoza to Monzon, with an (unidentified) 252 in Taxi livery. This would have been 2002 I think. Quite why I took the photo at this angle I don't know, but it's possible that the train had started to move out of the station, and my old 35mm compact wasn't quick enough to get the loco in the frame.

 

Edited March 31, 2022 by Geep7

[ellocoloco]

The 303 is a lovely little model. I don't have any Spanish steamers but have eyed up the Mikado a few times...

 

Christmas brought me a 321 which will be getting an IPA bath in the near future for an identity change into one of the contractors locos.

[long island jack]

There was only one 308 working when i was there in the late 90's, mainly 311 doing dock jobs, still plenty of "taxi" liveries knocking about.

[Geep7]

Hi all,

 

Firstly, Happy New Year 2022 / Feliz año nuevo 2022.

 

Secondly, I must thank @long island jack for sharing those fantastic photos of Tarragona. When I have visited myself it was always when on holiday with friends who have no interest in railways, or with family, so i'd never thought to go south of the station towards the docks, and it seems i've missed out on so much, but thankfully others had a lot more forethought.

 

The closest I got to taking a photo of Spanish train in the landscape is this shot of a 269 heading towards Reus (or the freight yard in Tarragona) on a steel coil train.

 

The 308 does look nice in the Red / Grey livery. I'd love to get hold of one, but perhaps will have to wait until Mabar possibly produce a new batch, as my 308 in the green livery is too nice to repaint. As an aside, does anyone know what the Red / Grey livery was referred to as? Is it just a variant of the 'Taxi' livery?

 

The 303 is a lovely model, and a lovely little prototype loco as well. I'm sure I remember when first visiting Barcelona in the mid-80's, a green loco trundling down the middle of the road where the marina is now. I can't remember what type of loco it was, it could have been a 303, 304 or perhaps a larger loco. My memory is a bit fuzzy (I was only about 8 at the time) and I wish my dad had managed to take a photo of it.

 

But i'd love to have a 303 in green as well. So, i've been a bit of a naughty boy and bought another of the 303's in Red / Grey (Amazon had one reduced to under £100, so I couldn't say no, especially considering they are now nearly £200 direct from Hornby) which will be repainted into the green with yellow stripe. No doubt Hornby will now announce a new run of this model in that livery......

 

Hopefully this year I can progress on with a layout a bit more. I'm thinking that i'm going to have to replace the sector-plate fiddle yard with cassettes, as I really hate handling stock when operating. I have plenty of Aluminium angle section already cut from the previous cassettes I had for my Southern Region layout, but will want something thicker as the base than the 5mm ply I previously used.

Edited March 31, 2022 by Geep7

[long island jack]

think the red/silver livery, was used on shunting locos

[Geep7]

How can we already be almost a month into 2022? Fortunately I do have some progress to update on.

 

So firstly, i'll turn to the station building. I managed to finally get the stonework masked and painted during the Christmas holidays, but i've only just got around to taking some decent photos of it.

 

 

I've fitted the windows and doors, although the glazing still needs finishing, along with interior detail.

 

 

The roof has been finished with tiles. The area to the right of the main section will have a clothes line, and some other outdoor furniture. The other areas of the roof need some other details, but i'm unsure what to put on here, as there are very few close up aerial views of Spanish stations. I think maybe, a couple of lean-to buildings on the left-hand side, and perhaps another level for the stairs to come out onto the main roof section?

 

Moving on to the retaining wall section, and I wanted a reasonably large building to fill the gap between the existing apartments and the station building. My first thought was to do a Moorish style castle, but I didn't think the area was large enough to do one, so I started thinking about a church. However, I could find a church that matched what I wanted, until I was watching a cab-view video on YouTube of the line from Barcelona to Ribes de Freser, and noticed a church beside the line near to Granollers. I don't think i've yet found that exact church, but when searching on Google maps, I found the Sant Esteve church in Granollers.

 

 

So to start with, I thought I should have a flattened area to give me a footprint to work with, and whilst I wouldn't be able to create a faithful copy, I thought I would be able to make something which gives a favour of the original.

 

Whilst I actually want to model the back of the church, without the entrance door, I thought it would be nice to include the rose window. I thought I would be able to find something either 3D printed or laser-cut, but not anything that was the right size or style. I was about to make the church with a plain wall when my father suggested I should give it a go making one myself. So I thought, well why not give it a go, and if it doesn't work, I can go back to the plain wall idea.

 

And here is the result

 

Not totally 100% perfect, and at this point needed a bit of a clean-up. Sadly the small points coming from the centre didn't last once i'd noticed one was missing.

 

Once I was happy with this, I continued on with the rest of the church structure. This is made, as with my other buildings, artists mountboard, which will be clad with plasticard.

 

Here it is, with the rose window temporarily added.

As you can see, i've added some raised relief around the rose, and a brick surround, made from a strip of slaters brick plasticard, nicked with a knife at each brick and shaped into the curve. I'm actually rather pleased with my first attempt at one of these type windows.

 

The rest of the building is fairly simple in comparison, alternating stone and brickwork for the first 2/3rd's of the structure, with the top 1/3rd plain brick.

 

Below is the church at it's current state of progress, in place on the layout to see how it all fits in. I envisage, to the left of the church, some gently sloping ground down to station level with an olive grove. In a mirror to the actual church in Granollers, the tower will be on the right-hand side of the building on the layout.

 

 

That's all for now folks. Happy modelling.

Edited March 31, 2022 by Geep7

[Geep7]

So it's time for the (rather late) March update. We've had some people round doing house valuations over the past few weeks, so i've had to pretty much pack all my modelling stuff away, however, i've managed to make some progress on the church.

 

The first picture shows I have added the side walls, roofs and internal structures. I'd also made a start on the tower, the dome being a modified Faller item from a TT kit.

 

The second picture shows the central window glued in place, and filler applied around the outer circle of bricks. The smudges of black on the central window are where i've painted the rear in matt black to block any light when I light it up with the stained glass behind it. I've also added some extra edging to the roof, to give a bit more 3D style.....

 

Here I have given the whole building a base coating of Vallejo Pale Sand. I've made a start dry brushing in the brick with some Vallejo Cavalry Brown, and stone work with some very watered down German Grey, also Vallejo. I haven't taken a photo of it, with the colours like this, as it looks very messy. I'll take a pic if anyone is interested, but otherwise i'll post some more once I have tidied it up.

Edited March 31, 2022 by Geep7

[Geep7]

So there's been a few ups and downs since my last update, and i've hardly had any time to work on Punta Brava. A health scare over the summer, plus having builders in doing some home improvement works meant I focused on creating a small shunting layout I could put out on the dining table (and more importantly put away quickly) for my British Outline stock, and also act as a test track. However, i've been wanting to get on a do some work on Punta Brava, and I was fortunate enough to take a week off work last week where I could just focus on doing some modelling.

 

As it happens, I spent quite a lot of time thinking about what I wanted to do scenic wise, with not a huge amount to show for it (waiting for plasticard to arrive didn't help either, as i'd run out), however, I managed to make a start on the ballasting (probably my least favourite layout job) and the roadway across the main bridge. 

 

 

I've decided that the lift out area will have a small memorial with a cross, and some grassland surrounding it, leading through to an entrance to a larger park area in the top-right corner.

The road across the bridge has a single one-way street joining onto a 2-way road, becoming a 3-lane highway. No road markings as yet, but I might have a bus stop in the left-hand lane on the bridge. Is a bus on a bridge a cliche, or is not having one on a bridge the new cliche?

 

I have an interesting idea for a building that will fill the odd shaped area between the main road and the one-way street. Hopefully, if I manage to do it correctly, it'll look great (in my opinion of course).

 

I have also recently had a couple of new arrivals to the locomotive fleet.

Both are examples of locomotives i've seen in Tarragona, and both are from Roco.

 

At the rear is a Class 250 locomotive, 250.001, the first of a series of 40 electric locomotives built by Krauss-Maffei / CAF between 1982 and 1988. From what I understand, they mostly spent their time on the lines between Port-Bou - Barcelona - Valencia hauling passenger and merchandise trains. During the late 90's and 2000's a few could usually be found stabled in the sidings at Tarragona. All were withdrawn by the mid-2010's and most, if not all, have been scrapped.

 

At the front is a Class 319 locomotive, 319.257, one of a fleet of Co-Co diesel locomotives built by Macosa with a GM/EMD power plant. Most were extensive rebuilds of the original Class 319 locomotives, however 319.257 was a new build example, released into traffic in 1995. My example has the Cargas logo on it, but will most likely loose them, as these put it in the later Epoch VI.

 

Since the above photos have been taken i've made further progress with the bridge to the right. Hopefully can give some more updates soon.