Running Bear's November 2018 Coffee Shop


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GarryCBQ said:
So, I have recently thought of buying the Bachmann’s smooth side observation to use as a close enough model. Bachmann sells them painted silver but unlettered. .
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Great idea, Garry. All that's left is to find the appropriate decals.

Back in 1998, when I was requalifying on the Philly - DC portion of the NEC, I noticed a NP Dome car, most likely purchased from Amtrak and restored to NP colors, sitting on an industrial siding off the NEC in Delaware. I really like the NCL color scheme. Ex NP Dome coaches were assigned to the single level Capitol Limited running between DC & Chicago until Superliners were assigned to the Capitol Limited in the late 90s.

Boris
 
Afternoon All,

Today I cut the grass and blew off the driveway. After lunch I did some measuring and the Ice House that I have is the same height/width as the others I have been looking at and about 2 inches longer. Based on this I decided to change the roof from the standing seam (weathered plastic) and change it to corrugated roofing. It's a big visual change and not a lot of money. If I decide later to scratch build something like Chet did then I will.

Toot- Great motive power shot.

Willie- That looks very time consuming but nice. I'm a member of the PRRT&HS. I joined for 2 reasons, access to records helping me model and to support the keeping of historical records and equipment. I like the look of being accurate but I'm definitely not a rivet counter.

I hope everyone has a good night.
 
GREG- Knew the "Aces & Eights" dead mans hand. Maybe most folks don't remember 'Canasta' or "Double Deck Pinochle' where 5 or more aces in a hand was darn good. Yeah, not in poker tho'.
Phil
 
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bnsf971 said:
That's known as a "dead man's hand".
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Terry, depending on who you are playing poker with holding 5 aces can certainly be a dead man's hand.

According to legend "the" dead man's hand was two pair, black aces, black eights and an unknown hole card. The hand held by Wild Bill Hickock when he was murdered.

I was taught to play poker by my mother using her pennies and I got to keep any winnings. I enjoy the game, but I don't like playing with people who gamble with money they can't afford to lose.
 
bnsf971 said:
Chet and I belong to a forum that considers anything less than 100% completely prototypically accurate to be complete garbage tinplate.
A current example is, after continuous calls for "made in USA" models, a company has released a boxcar model, made completely here in the US, that is not a completely accurate representation of a boxcar, at what is probably the cheapest amount they can offer it for. I made the mistake, after many, many posts bashing this attempt, of suggesting this lower-detail-level, not accurate model may be the best we will see at its price point, while remaining "made in America".
Let's just say that responses to my opinion have not been favorable. in the extreme.
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Sounds all to familiar; people being offended by the truth.

Rivet Counters, I got your prototypical right here ;)

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This is the one and only forum for me, it's got the best people.
 
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Good morning Everybody!

Sorry I was absent yesterday, "my dog ate my computer?" I never was good at making excuses.

I had a busy day planned, but I wasn't feeling up to doing all I had planned. Finally I am getting smart, rest when needed to avoid prolonged stays on the bench. I got a few things done and watched a movie with my wife "Meet the Millers". It was fun to watch, but most defiantly not for the kids! Seeing Jennifer Anniston as a stripper would have been worth the admission, but I had it recorded on the DVR.

I don't go to the movies any more. Last 2 movies I went to I ended up falling asleep, in the IMAX theater no less! Why pay $11 when I can fall asleep at home for free? Besides, popcorn and soda are much cheaper at home.
 
I had something else I wanted to say, but I got side tracked by my oldest beagle, Tucker. He finally got out of bed and was so happy to see me he wanted a hug.

Now I remember; friday morning I worked for Amazon. Well I showed up for work and got paid at least. The Amazon App sent me to pick up at 5501 Holabird Ave, the location that was damaged by the tornado on Nov. 2nd. When I arrived I see nothing but security people sitting in their cars surrounding the still damaged building. I asked one of them "where do I go to pickup my route?" he said "I don't know but this building is closed" I called Amazon support and told them what was going on. They said "thanks for showing up, but you can go home and you will be paid" Ok. I can do that. It's a good thing I only live 5 minutes from that location. I only had a 2 hour block, but that still works out to about $500 per hour, not bad work, if you can get it.

Speaking of Tucker and work, I had not worked for a few weeks. Tucker was sad to see me put on my Amazon Polo shirt Friday morning. When I returned home so quickly he was ecstatic! He was howling at me non-stop for what seemed like 5 minutes. I said hello to him, but that was not enough. I had to sit down and let him jump up on my lap for a hug. As he continued to howl, now directly into my ear. So we howled together. :) I think, he thinks I am a very big strange looking beagle.

Tucker is a rescue beagle that almost never makes a sound. Some low-life scum bag beat him to shut him up, at least that is what the vet thinks. Quiet beagles? I've never seen another one. I love to hear my Tucker howl, even if it is directly into my ear. Good thing I am hard of hearing.
 
Good morning gang
31 and sunny here in central Absurdistan. Got to put the trailer wiring right today before I park it. I'll wait a bit till the sun gets around to that side of the driveway.
There's a little train show in Westminster today. Might slide up there for a little bit.
L8ter
 
Good Morning All. 38° and cloudy today. Cold today and tonight, and then back to near 60° or above for at least a week. The rain in the forecast for last night didn't materialize so it's still dry outside, in most places. For today's remodeling, since it's cold outside, I am removing the old vanity and maybe the toilet depending on how energetic I get. I pre-cut a few more boards yesterday to apply to the wall today. Discovered that I have a wall stud that's not exactly plumb inside the wall, so I will have to make allowances for nailing the remaining rows. Yesterday afternoon I finally finished cutting my last dead tree into log-sized pieces for the heater, looks to be about a weeks worth of fuel. Still have some branches in the "firewood-marshaling yard" that were cut last winter and spring that need to be cut up, but most likely won't be burned until next winter. I'm am a little ahead on the supply chain this year. I'm already eyeballing which trees I will thin out this winter.
Another abbreviated day in the train shed yesterday but I was able to return to the fence project area. I added more trees, field grass, foam clumps and other scenery materials to the area. Looking at my stockpile of scenic details to see what else might fit in backyards and along the ROW. I do wonder why there are so many old tires along railroad tracks? Today I may finally get around to finish the ballasting that I started last week. Ballasting is a task that I like to do. It signifies a finality to well-laid trackwork. Planning a trip to Discount Model Railroad near Dallas next Tuesday for Thanksgiving shopping. I'm completely out of metal wheelsets and some minor supplies. I'll re-stock the Kadee #148 couplers even though I'm not yet out; there are still random cars on the layout with McHenry couplers and at least a dozen Athearn and Roundhouse kits left on the shelf.

Sherrel - Finding someone to sell a full cord of wood (4' x 8' x 4') is like looking for a three dollar bill. Mostly around here what they are really selling a "face cord", (4' x 8' x 16"). Save the wood from your tree and you'll have firewood for next year.
Greg - I mark uncoupling magnets by putting a wooden post next to them. Make them look like sawed-off utility poles or something. For eye-level turnout positions, I am going to put a small faded red dot of paint on the side of the rail that corresponds to the adjacent ground throw being in the diverging position. I have already painted the face of the throws red or green, but that cannot be seen at eye-level! Another thing that I learned from real-life conductors, is painting white marks on the side of rails to mark door locations on those places where there is no room for a man to fit between the freight car and adjacent wall. I do this where I have low-relief warehouses against the backdrop to assist in spotting cars.
Curt - Yes that style of wall covering is time consuming. Most time consuming is that there is a space about the thickness of a nickel between each row. I have spacers left over from doing flooring over the years, but think of holding the board, spacer, nail and hammer with just two hands!
Louis - Good to read your posts and to know that all is well. $500 per hour! Pretty lucrative work or just a typo???

Today is Mickey Mouse's 90th birthday. Happy Birthday Mickey!
Everybody have a great day.
 
Morning Guys -- supposed to get up to 75 from the current 39 degrees - oh yeah, a few high scattered clouds around which is a strange sight?

Foxie's drain was removed yesterday and the wound looks much better. After about another 8-10 days they will remove the staples that were inserted - two on the inside of the leg and two on the outside. I took the lampshade off for her to eat last evening and she promptly went outside to potty and started to lick at the leg immediately where-up-on I scolded her somewhat and put her "party hat" back on. Sure don't want her to pull out those staples!

Got most of the "beans" and assorted trash raked, sweapped, and vacuumed up. I'll post a pic of the "beans" in their tub later on - remember that this is the 4th time of cleaning up - and this is only from the patio and does not include the yard.
WILLIE - yeah, man - I will be looking forward to burning that tree next winter for sure - and it should be all the wood I will need next winter. I had not heard of the term "face cord", but that is exactly what they try to do.
So, Mickey is 90! What was his first - was it Steamboat Willy?
Still not sure about your carpenter work? If you are doing Shiplap, aren't the pieces supposed to overlap? What are the spacers for? And second -- don't they make a shiplap siding 4x8 that you could use? I'll look up some pic on the net and see if I better understand Arleane's wishes. Tell her hello for me!

LOUIS - when I was in High School - girlfriend's father had a pack of 8 beagels that we deer hunted with. Such sweet music them hot on the trail of a deer. Arr-roule - Arr-roule! .. all howling at the same time!

That's all for the moment
 
Good morning ...

Louis .... The Rivet Counters be damned. That B&O locomotive is absolutely gorgeous !

WIllie ..... Mickey Mouse is 90 ! ..... Remarkable.

Hard to believe Thanksgiving is almost here already..... We have family visitors coming from out of town on Wednesday.

I worked on my coal mine project a while yesterday. There is still much more to do.
 
Boris said:
Great idea, Garry. All that's left is to find the appropriate decals.

Back in 1998, when I was requalifying on the Philly - DC portion of the NEC, I noticed a NP Dome car, most likely purchased from Amtrak and restored to NP colors, sitting on an industrial siding off the NEC in Delaware. I really like the NCL color scheme. Ex NP Dome coaches were assigned to the single level Capitol Limited running between DC & Chicago until Superliners were assigned to the Capitol Limited in the late 90s.

Boris
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There's an NP dome car that has been seen a lot. It is owned by Paxall. Inc.
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I loved riding in the dome cars. My favorite place to enjoy the ride with the possible exception of the dining car. The food was outstanding. We got a hold of a cook book with recipes from the Northern Pacific. We have used it on a fairly regular basic over the years. I really enjoyed watching the train wind through the country ide and the signals change when the locomotives passed them.
 
montanan said:
I loved riding in the dome cars. My favorite place to enjoy the ride with the possible exception of the dining car. The food was outstanding. We got a hold of a cook book with recipes from the Northern Pacific. We have used it on a fairly regular basic over the years. I really enjoyed watching the train wind through the country ide and the signals change when the locomotives passed them.
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Garry: That looks like the one I observed. 1998 was a long time ago.
Chet: I only had the opportunity to ride in the dome twice, once on the B&O's Capitol Limited in the Stratadome Coach Eastward approaching Harpers Ferry, and once in an ex ATSF full dome on Conrail's Office car Special on the Northeast Corridor, from 30th Street Station to points East of Philadelphia, returning on the former CNJ/Reading route.


Boris
 
Good Morning everyone....sunny in Wisconsin.

Finished a four hour job this morning that should of been a 5 minute project. We have speakers in the living room/dining room and since last Christmas one speaker didn't work. I purchased new speakers and yesterday I connected the new speakers and the same area speaker didn't work. It had to be a wiring problem, but the wiring is run in the basement above a finished ceiling. I remembered a spice or two and ran new wire, with no results. Then I checked the business end of the Amplifier which it is a commercial grade 365 watt per channel unit and one lead was loose and I tighten it and the speaker worked. I checked these connections last year so I didn't think that I needed to rechecked.

Turns out the old speakers sound better than the new Polk speakers we purchased. This project ended this morning with the old speakers being re-hooked up.

Last night I figured out that I need turnout indicator lights on the mine to see what the turnouts positions were since the area is at eye level. I'll need three, two light fixtures of some type and mini wire and connectors to connect to the Tortoise switch machines. This should also add some interest to a another wise dull scene. The mine has three spurs leading in the hopper area. I like new projects.

Then, I need to install uncoupler magnets, ballast and scenic the area. Everything is accessible via a pop up which is largely concealed due to the elevation at eye level.

I have eight Milwaukee Road coal hoppers with coal loads, metal wheels and KD couplers with the cars being weathered with black power and Grimy Black over spray. Its easy to weather coal hoppers since the cars are covered with dust from the coal. No one ever remarked that the eight cars all have the same reporting number since the numbers are hard to read.

I have eight Western Maryland hoppers (purchased at Walthers on their Bargain Table) and some odd hoppers from a Minnesota road that need to be finished like the Milwaukee Road hoppers.

Dusting and vacuuming project later after lunch.

Chet: Riding in the dome car(s) sounds like a great railroad experience. Nice photograph of the car.

Sherrel: I would like a Beagle, but I hear they like to run off following a scent of an animal. At the cabin the poor dog would be a supper for a larger critter if the dog ran off and got lost. I hear of a lot missing dogs. Too many wolves and coyotes roaming the woods near the cabin.

Opened my Klein order yesterday and I'll like the KD Whisker couplers. This is my first experience with then and without the old spring plates, they should be a easy install in my ore cars.

That's all for now.

Greg

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santafewillie said:
Louis - Good to read your posts and to know that all is well. $500 per hour! Pretty lucrative work or just a typo???
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Willie, thank you.

Actually it worked out to be $492 per hour when I put the calculator to it. $500 was a ball park figure off the top of my head. The only problem was I only worked for just under 10 minutes. Total pay was only $82. 6x82=492
 
Good morning. 11 degrees to start off the day with clear skies and an expected high in the upper 30's. We didn't have much snow, but I did crank up the tractor to see how it would plow with the new belt on for the hydrostatic drive. Like a brand new tractor. I plower the snow back around 4 feet from the driveway and a lot more around the circle in the drive. My cousin has my skid steer now as he has some excavation work to do building his new pole barn. Don't know if I will get it back for a while so I wanted to have plenty of space to pike snow if it comes.

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Sherrel - Glad to hear that Foxie is doing well. A few more days and the party hat can come off.

Louis - That is a nice looking locomotive. Sweet.

Garry - It is hard to believe that Thanksgiving is almost here. Time sure flies. My wife got a nice Hutterite turkey for Thanksgiving. Those are some fine eating. We'll have quite a crew ofer for turkey day. It's going to be a busy weekend for us. Turkey day on Thursday, bowling league on Friday and then we have a tournament in Laurel, Mt to attend on Saturday.

Joe - Harpers Ferry is quite the place for scenery. I have driven through the area, but unfortunately never had the chance to ride the rails in the eastern US except for one triip I made from Chicago to New York to catch a plane to Europe to meet my ship. The Pennsy didn't have dome cars, but I did enjoy the trip.

Wilie - Fire wood is firewood. Any wood you can get is good. A weeks worth, not bad.

Greg - It did sound like you had a lot of fun with the speakers. We have surround sound in our living room with speakers all over the room. When we put the nerw flooring down we were able to hide the speaker wires going to the other side of the room. I did lose one speaker not too long ago, and like you, it was a connection to the back of the amp. What a birds nest I have behind the amp. Two towers in the front with 4 speakers in the towers, smaller speakers at the back wall, a center speaker box with 2 speakers and a powered sub woofer in the middle of the room. The wife won't let me crank it up. Easy to rattle pictures on the wall.

Last night we met a few couples from out bowling league for a birthday bash. It's a fine dining place in Manhattan ( Montana, not New York). I had forgotten that one of out drivers had given me a gift certificate for the place and the wife enjoyed prawns (huge) and I chowed down of a nice juicy rib eye. Cost us only $4.45 with the gife certificate. Here's Dave, the birthday boy and his wife Tanya.

20181117_192410.jpg Whenever Tanya and I get paired up in mixed doubes in tournaments, we always seem to get our poop in a group and come out winning some pretty good bucks.

Today is the final NASCAR race for the season. After this I should have more time on Sundays for trains.

Here's a rail picture for today.


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Later
 
Sirfoldalot said:
LOUIS - when I was in High School - girlfriend's father had a pack of 8 beagels that we deer hunted with. Such sweet music them hot on the trail of a deer. Arr-roule - Arr-roule! .. all howling at the same time!
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Sherrel, my beagles seldom bark together because Tucker is abnormally quiet for a beagle. Sometimes he will join in with Sophie if I am outside with him and they see a squirrel or a cat. The only time the both howl together is when I come home. If I join in with them they will howl louder and longer. My neighbors must think I'm crazy, but I don't care what they think, it's so much fun!

I would have loved to hear that chorus of 8 beagles!
 
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