Running Bear's March 2019 Coffee Shop

[Boris]

I ordered a Rapido SOO Line SW1200 that due out at the end of the year and this run promises to sell out like the previous production. I may order a Milwaukee Road or two locomotives before the June deadline is here. I really like my Rapido Budd RDC.

Greg: Both of my Rapido RDCs are fantastic. I have a Penn Central RS11, and a Penn Central SW1200 on order, and an FL9 passenger diesel. Rapido locos are great runners, and well detailed.

In 1954 the PRR started dedicated LCL trains (I believe there were 6 or 7 dedicated LCL trains) and by 1958 there none left in service. If I'm in error I'm sure Joe will jump in.

Curt: Your synopsis is correct. The LCL symbolled trains were re-symbolled as TT (Truck Train) beginning somewhere around 1958. Pressurized Containers, (in gondolas), lasted into the 60s and were a precursor of the PC's Flexi-flow services. Meanwhile some of the FM Flats and numerous containers lasted into Conrail as MW flats, and storage containers. X29s lasted in Mail and Express service through the late 1960s. PRR discontinued traditional LCL service in 1962, however, they continued with LCL service through third party forwarders, such as "Chicago Shippers" in Greenville, (Jersey City, NJ), well into the Conrail era. The big reason for the demise of conventional LCL service was that it was manpower intensive, and the railroads were trying to reduce labor costs. The financial issues faced by the PRR during of the late 1950s, the 1956 - 1959 recession and recurring steel industry strikes, caused a rapid change, a premature end to steam operation, reduction in passenger operations, and LCL service, plus the rapid expansion of TOFC.

Willie: I like the DPM "Flats" in the background.

Chet: Nice video. I enjoyed it.

Dave & Garry: Nice photos. Dave, the cattle scene reminds me of a Varney Stock car kit, I built in the early 60s. Are the cattle pens of Walthers heritage? Garry: I always remember MRC's F7s as being criticized for an appearance flaw. Exactly what was the problem with them? They look good in the photo.

Boris

 

[Beady]

Hi Greg, I think you told me before but refresh my memory, what town is the cabin located near?

Better yet, what are the gps coordinates and elevation?

 

[Beady]

Dave: The town nearest by the cabin is Saxeville, Wisconsin, but we're between Wautoma and Waupaca, Wisconsin. Saxeville has an interesting history dating to the pre-civil war era. Google Saxeville, Wisconsin and read about Capt. Saxeville.

Greg

If the town was named after Capt Saxeville, wouldn't it be Saxevilleville?

 

[migalyto]

After a very long hiatus, (really?), I'm glad to see the Ol' Coffee shop still Goin'. Health not as good as it was, (COPD), still runnin' trains, doin' a few shows, helping a good friend, with a ginormous n-scale layout in his basement, and just tryin' to keep the Mrs. happy.

Hi Dana, Welcome back!

 

[trainmastr1]

Thnx for the welcome back Willie. If I can get energetic enough, I'll try and get some pictures up in the future of the C&PS home layout I help a friend on. I have worked every scale from 1:160 to 1:1, but currently heavy into "N". And hello to everyone else.

 

[trainmastr1]

The gauntlet bridge over the Cascade River on the C&PS.

 

[Trussrod]

Good morning. Checking in late. Went to breakfast with some friends (not at IHOP) and picked up a few items while in town. Started off at 16 degrees early this morning, but it is already up to 35.

Our resident wabbit found the rabbit food we put out for him. (or her). With so much snow cover, I have no idea where it's finding anything to eat.
View attachment 35088

I did get somewhat bored yesterday and plowed the driveway again trying to scrape as much snow as I could off to the edges so when the snow melts the water can go into the ground instead of turning the drive into a lake.

David - Is this the photo you wanted ??

View attachment 35089

Willie - The town is coming along nicely. Keep the photos coming.

Mark - All of the snow does look familiar. We also have huge icicles hanging from the roof.

Dave - Another nice photo. I had thought about stringing power and phone lines but I'm sure that I would tear them out reaching into the layout.

I did run trains yesterday again. Did some switching and then let the NP F units run while working on updating some of the older parts of the layout.
Here it is dropping downgrade into the hidden staging area. This will be my rail video for today.

Later

Chet: Yes, that's it, thanks. I'd like to learn about it. I know that Grandt Line had a small version of it but never noticed any others ?

Thanks again.

 

[Sirfoldalot]

A little consist for you power experts - A GP-40, An F-7 B-Unit, and a U30B.

 

[tootnkumin]

A little consist for you power experts - A GP-40, An F-7 B-Unit, and a U30B.

View attachment 35126

Just so long as when they consisted them, they remembered to set the direction of travel for each.

 

[Trussrod]

Good morning all, +37 with some light drizzle. The birds were really singing this morning, I guess they are as happy as me about the mild temps.

Curt-- The Funaro kit really turned out nice! I assembled a gondola from that outfit and it was a challenge but really looked nice as well.

Mark-- The warmth didn't start till Monday. Now the snow is dropping, the temperature rose throughout the night.

Boris-- It took a couple of tries to get the sag even with the multiple wires. I used a drop of hobbie tac to get the wire in place then a drop of CA glue for the permanent fix

Willie-- more nice scenes, really nice job on the "mortar" with the background Fertilizer and Feed front

Chet-- really nice work on the video as usual

Here is my layout shot of the day. I worked on these cows over and over to reduce the shine, however was never fully satisfied with the look of them:

View attachment 35107

Have a great day everyone!

Dave -LASM: As Garry said very nice detail with the figures along with the guy by the stock car door and the Scotty dog near the bails of hay. Did you make them by chance ?
One thing I thought I'd mention is that cows and horses don't eat directly from a hay bail but rather they eat the flakes of hay, about a 2" or 3" thick section of hay the bails are made made up from. Those might be a
bit of a challenge to model though.

 

[Bruette]

Good morning Everybody,

I'm still busy, thank God. I hope to catchup with everything soon. As soon as I think I have crested the hill, the phone rings.

I hope you all are doing well, I miss my train buddies!

Pitching for Connie Mack’s Philadelphia Athletics and later the Boston Red Sox, Robert “Lefty” Grove became one of the most dominant pitchers of his generation.
After several minor-league seasons with the then-Double-A Baltimore Orioles, Grove was sold to the Philadelphia Athletics in 1924 for the princely sum of $100,600. Though his rookie season of 1925 produced mixed results, he had a league-leading 116 strikeouts to go with a 4.75 ERA. Grove bounced back in his sophomore season to lead the league with a 2.51 ERA and recorded 194 strikeouts. It was the first of nine seasons that Grove led the AL in ERA, and the start of a run of seven consecutive seasons with the most strikeouts in the league.
Grove led the Athletics to two World Series championships during that span (1929 and 1930). He also recorded two triple crown seasons (1930, 1931) and won the 1931 AL MVP Award. After being traded to the Red Sox for the 1934 season, Grove continued to be an All-Star pitcher, leading the league in ERA four more times.
Grove posted a 300-141 record in his 17-year career, giving him the highest career winning percentage among 300-game winners. He was inducted into the Baseball Hall of Fame in 1947.
Portrait of Philadelphia Athletics' Robert “Lefty” Grove, 1925. (Getty Images)
Baseball Digest

 

[NP2626]

A little consist for you power experts - A GP-40, An F-7 B-Unit, and a U30B.

View attachment 35126

And Shirley is the WINNER in today's earliest poster to the ANPL Thread! Congratulations Mr Shirley! Your prize is in the mail, similar to how the check is always in the mail!

We are sitting right at freezing and it is still raining. Weather Underground is showing it to transition over to snow at 10:00 this morning. Then we will be taking a dip in temperature to a low of +7 degrees on Saturday Morning; but, the precipitation is supposed to stop by midnight tonight.

Miss Flo, Cup of Hot Joe and two eggs over easy with hash browns, toast and a couple slices of bacon. Thanks!

 

[santafewillie]

And Shirley is the WINNER in today's earliest poster to the ANPL Thread! Congratulations Mr Shirley! Your prize is in the mail, similar to how the check is always in the mail!

Not fair! He posted at 10:15 in his time zone last night.

 

[Bruette]

Not fair! He posted at 10:15 in his time zone last night.

Don't worry Willie, I think we have a better chance of actually winning something from Publishers Clearing House.

 

[NP2626]

Don't worry Willie, I think we have a better chance of actually winning something from Publishers Clearing House.

Very observant!

 

[santafewillie]

Good Morning All. 46° and clear but no sun yet. Seems like I was seeing it at this time last week! Happy Pi Day. I just read that a Google employee in Japan just set the world record for calculating pi out to 31.4 trillion decimal places! Who the heck cares? 3.1416 has always worked for me. It would take 332,064 years just to recite the 31.4 trillion number according to BBC!
Looks like I received a total of 1" exactly in the rain gauge yesterday. Clear skies and high pressure dominates the next eight days of weather here, with high temperatures in the mid to upper 60's except Friday and Saturday which will be a little cooler. Still dealing with windy conditions which will turn northerly tonight. Basically, Johnny is sending yesterday's wind back to us.

Thanks for the comments and likes on the feed dealers and GP40X's, Dave, Garry, Joe, Phil, Chet, Jim, Curt, Tom, David and anyone else who I inadvertently missed.

Out in the train shed yesterday, I did more ground cover and cleaned up the workbench a bit, very little bit! A made a couple more trees to add to the current scene, getting closer to the finish line here.
Elsewhere on the layout, here's a picture along the main line in Vernon. That is a unit grain train on the passing siding waiting for the north bound intermodal to pass.

Here I have moved that grain train out to the main to get some better pictures.

Joe -

Not for nothing, the modeling that Chet, Curt, Dave, Garry, Greg and Willie treat us to each day, is outstanding. Their work challenges me to place more effort into my own modeling efforts.

Thank you in return for all of the prototype information that you provide us. Even though much is Pennsy/Conrail/Amtrack related, it is all helpful to me.
Dave - Yeah! Those cows are just too clean. Nice scene though.
Garry - Nice scene also.
Greg - Returned PM yesterday. I like snow pictures, that is pictures. Glad that you're keeping it up there!
Johnny - At least the wind brought you warm temperatures with the rain.
Sherrel - Sandwiching an FB unit between road units was somewhat common for Frisco on their line that ran next to where I worked. I would see that about once or twice a month in the early 70's.. Always looked awkward to me but it worked.

Everybody have a great day.

 

[Boris]

Good morning y'all! 45° and sunny, with this afternoon looking like Spring.

Interesting consist, Sherrel. To the "Power Desk", that consist was 12 Axles, regardless of type. Locomotive consists were based on an axle rating chart, that is so many tons per axle for the territory traveled on.

Louis: I used to accompany my father to a "Billiards Parlour" owned by a fanatic Philly "A's" follower. He had a poster sized autographed photo, of Lefty grove framed and hanging on the wall along with other A's memorabilia. His baseball stuff would keep me occupied while dad shot pool.
I have long been of the opinion, that the wrong team left Philadelphia, and I still feel that way.

Dana: That's an impressive set of photos. Interesting bridge under the suspension bridge.

Willie: I like the photos of the Grain Train in the siding "waitin' on the Pigs".

Boris

 

[montanan]

Good morning. 27 degrees to start off the day with a high expected to be in the 30's. Only got a couple of inches of snow out of the winter weather advisory, but the center of the country looks like it is getting hammered.

Ran trains for a while in the morning and then finally got a path opened up to my shop where I did some work on the Buick. I had the window regulator crap out for the passenger side power window last week and finally got it replaced. I will have to give 3M a lot of credit for their clear packing tape that I had holding the window up for a week in sub zero temps. Also had a code come up on the Buick the day after the window died and it ended up being a thermostat that was stuck open. Engine temps were running between 155 and 160. Now they are back up to the 180/190 range where they should be. While the car was in the shop I also did an oil change. There went that day. Figured that I had better get this done with shoulder surgery coming up next Tuesday.

Curt - Thanks for explaining the freight cars. Quite interesting. Between your explanation and Joe's input, I learned something. I am not very familiar with east coast railroading.

Sherrel - Nice Frisco photo. Like the B unit being used.

Dana - Welcome back to the forum. Impressive photos you posted. Keep the pictures coming. I was in N scale in the late 70's, but with the crappy locomotives that were available back then, I tore everything out and went with HO scale. I had over 11 scale miles of mainline. Todays N scale locomotives are quite an improvement over what was available back then.

Willie - Some more outstanding photos. The layout is coming to life. Keep them coming.

With high pressure moving in along with warmer temps in the forecast, I will plow the few inches of new snow later today out of the way and hope there will be a slow thaw.

Will probably head down and run some trains for a while and after lunch head out and get things done.

Here's a rail picture for today.

Later

 

[migalyto]

Good Morning all,

Currently 53 degrees, but that is our high temperature. The strong winds that were predicted are starting to blow now. Supposed to be around 35MPH gusting to 50. Temps will fall back into the 20s tonight with a mix of rain and snow for tomorrow. Guess old man winter has totally given up his grip.

Have a great day,

 

[Raincoat2]

Good morning everyone. 58 and getting sunnier out there. Winds picked up in the night and it's pretty blustery today, but will die down this evening. Weekend still looking nice! Finally!!

Willy - we're having a ping-pong game with these winds. Looks like Texas has sent them back our way today. By the way, nice photos of your layout.
Chet - Forgot to mention, I enjoyed your latest videos as well as the photos from your layout. You, Willie, L&SM Dave, and several others put some real detail in your layouts - seeing those photos inspires me to be more meticulous in my own detailing.

Stopped by daughter's house after work yesterday and spent some time playing with granddaughter #2 (the 2 1/2 year old). Got in late which left little time for trains. I did take some videos but I have to email those to my computer first before uploading them to the forum, and my email provider says the videos are too big. As soon as I figure out how to shorten them, or shoot shorter ones tonight, I'll share them in my post.

Yes - Happy Pi Day. Back in the day, one of my high school friends was a math genius, and we challenged each other to memorize places of pi. I memorized 50 places and stopped, he went on to about 100 places, as I recall. I can still recite those 50 places today - useless, I know - but I can't remember important US history lessons

Have a good day everyone.