A few months ago, Smoken’ Joe and I were talking about starting a weathering contest at Trainboard.com. After a few emails back and forth, Joe and Ben at Micro-Trains agreed that it was a good idea. They sent me a box full of Micro-Trains weathered cars, and each month, trainboard.com is […]

So I organized a contest on Trainboad.com…

I swapped out about three inches of track, and my almost 2 year old is addicted to watching a pair of SD40-T2’s pull a string of cars through the pink foam valley of Santa Ynez, CA….I really have to start ballasting and building the hills….

The Work Train is Done!

I did some troubleshooting, and one of the joints had a little bit of solder on top of the rail, and the other end has a kink in the rail. The 2-8-0 now is able to run through it fine going forward northbound, but derails any other way. I pulled […]

Time to call in the work train

So today I wired up the layout today and I ran the 2-8-0 around the layout today. Most of it is fine, one small electrical dead spot and a pair of rail joints to smooth out….but it works

Worked on the PCRR today

A few weeks ago, the rail wire announced a prototype weathering contest. I happened to have a prototype picture of my MTL Union Pacific hopper. I decided to also weather a Southern Pacific ACF hopper at the same time using washes of acrylic paints, first fade coats of ivory white […]

Adventures in weathering hoppers

Smoken’ Joe D’Amato has figured out how to make a wood laser cut kit that is really a one  night project. I have built many kits over the last 30 years, and I can not remember an easier kit to assemble. This was a very easy kit, and it looks […]

Just finished building another Micro-trains.com kit