Bedford Park Yard Office and Employee Lot Upgraded.

Greetings All,

The latest scenery upgrade to the N.Y.C.T.L. is the Bedford Park Yard office and employee parking lot. This comes on the heels of Bedford Park getting a scenery upgrade a few weeks ago.

Let's take a look at the history and the project;

Here is American Hardware Supply and the area that would become Bedford Park back in 2013.

Same area in P.C.C.M. 22B in November 2016. Bedford Park Yard is in but the yard office and parking lot are being used for trailer parking. At least the plywood is painted! 

 

Here we are in the most recent P.C.C.M., #39 in early September 2017.

After the recent Bedford Park Yard scenery upgrade in early September 2017 right after P.C.C.M. 39.

And now with the Bedford Park Yard office and employee parking lot upgrade with better scenery, people and 'stuff'.

Some figures bring the scene to life.

The yard master checks on 1/87th scale Muscles Marinara who's enjoying a cold soda on yet another break. The stand to the right is for air hoses.

 Coupler Toss! Garbage sack toss! Two RR workers 'working'

1/87th scale PC Ralph and his trusty brakeman/conductor mull over the new lot and personnel. A 1972 Ford Pinto station wagon is parked by PC Ralph's jade green corvette.

Some additional work to the Bedford Park Yard area includes new advertising from All-City Storage's best customer, Peerless Appliance. 

The big tank has been relocated to ground level and new cars are parked awaiting local transport from the Ford Plant.

The view as you enter the room from the right side door. Much better!

There was still something missing...Signs!!!

 Now everyone knows that this is Bedford Park Yard.

Wait, that's better!

Thanks for reading!

New Subway People

Greetings All,


Over the course of several days I recently painted a large number of 1/100th scale figures for my subway stations. Since the re plumbing project of my house earlier this year my subway system had not yet been put back into service. Before I dug out the subway cars I ordered a set of 100 1/100 scale figures on ebay. After their arrival I set about to repaint some and touch up others to add to the stations. After all, what's a subway system without riders?... 

A bare Fulton Street station and the undecorated lower level portion of the layout. North Side Yard sits above this area.  

Lots of figures and lots of paint. I glued the figures to the stick and the plastic cases so I could work on a whole bunch at one time.

Fulton Street with would be subway riders awaiting their train. How prototypical is that!

Fulton Street from the opposite side.

Grand Central / 42nd Street station with some signs of life.

A nice mix of people waiting for their train includes this Transit Police Officer. 

A local pop group "The Facades" practice a tune while waiting for their train to arrive.

 Kids, parents and tourists with cameras at Fulton Street.

Grandfather and grandson discuss the day's trip while a nattily dressed traveler marvels at the cleanliness of the Empire City Transit Authority.

What's a subway without subway cars? Proto 1000 subway cars at Grand Central / 42nd Street. The silver and blue car is a N.Y.C.T.A. R-17 (I think) based on the round door window. The green car is an

 R-21 (I think) based the square end door window. 

 The Times Square Shuttle at Fulton Street station.

The IRT #4, the Lexington Ave Express, originated at Woodlawn Road in the Bronx. Below it bypasses Fulton Street on it's way south through the city to Utica Ave in Brooklyn.

Thanks for reading!

Some T.O.F.C. Car Projects

Greetings All,

After putting a dozen or more coal hoppers into revenue service I've turned my attention to some Trailer On Flat Car projects. Known to railroaders and modelers as T.O.F.C. these are some of my favorite freight cars and trains. 

In the virtual ops Ralph and I have a modest exchange of T.O.F.C. traffic and 1:1 Sir Neal does not model T.O.F.C. He does model C.O.F.C on a grand scale though but that era is beyond the scope of the virtual ops at this point. Ralph and I use 50' flats to convey our trailers from layout to layout and one of my T.O.F.C. projects is to paint and letter a car that better represents the flatcar Ralph uses. 

Let's take a look at the recent T.O.F.C. projects. E.B.R.R. 794035 with an E.B.R.R. trailer emerge from the shop. Truthfully I like the trailer. The flat car not as much. This will be a do over.

Here's a project car that I think turned out very well. Not a purgatory box project per se but a project car never the less. I think this is an old McKean TOFC. It was lettered for the C&NW. 

Here it is early in the P.C.C.M. 39 series heading towards Williams Yard with an E.B.R.R. trailer.

And here it is after the repaint. That's a keeper! 

Another purgatory box project is this Model Power T.O.F.C. car 
that looked like this when I received it as a gift about 20 years ago. Over the years I weathered the deck, added body mounted Kadees and metal wheels. But I hardly if ever used it as I didn't like lettering and the way the trailer was secured to the car. This attachment allowed for only the Marathon trailer to be used. 

Not anymore! PC 788430 is ready for revenue service and the virtual ops! The trailer landing gear attachment has been removed to allow the Walthers and Athearn brand trailers to use the car. This is close to the car Ralph uses so it will work well in the virtual ops

McKean and Model Power T.O.F.C cars now proudly wearing PC paint. Much better!!! 

But not so fast. As I reported, I removed the part that holds the landing gear in place to use all of my trailers on this car. After a few laps I wasn't thrilled with this so back to the shop it went.

Here it is with a pedestal trailer hitch hijacked from the parts box and some inner rub rails installed. All painted in my version of PC green of course. This set up will allow the flat car to be used with all of my trailers that have a king pin.

Looking better, more secure and back in service! 

Some purgatory projects on display! PC T.O.F.C cars on the lower level. PC, KP&W and E.B.R.R. coal hoppers on the upper level. 

And guess who just rolled out of the paint shop! No longer an E.B.R.R. flat I lettered it of the NYC and painted another trailer red and gray. I have some old NYC Pacemaker Freight Service dry transfers that I'm going to try and use on the newly painted trailer.

If all goes well I'll have something that looks like this;

From 3' away the Pacemaker Freight Service trailer looks pretty good. Up close on this side not so good. The other side however looks fine up close. But it's done and the old dry transfers have been used.

Here's a short video of the T.O.F.C train on the lower level of the layout shot before the Pacemaker trailer was completed. 

Here's a quick video with many of the newly added coal hoppers.

Thanks for reading!

A Few More Hopper Cars From The Purgatory Box

Greetings All,

I think I've pretty much exhausted my purgatory box supply of coal hoppers!  Three more cars have been stripped, painted and lettered with the Empire Belt getting two and the Penn Central getting one.

E.B.R.R. #416079 and #416082 roll out of the Terminal Yard Shop into the florescent lights after many years in the darkness of the purgatory box. Both hoppers are from Bachmann. 

One was a red M&STL. 

and the other a blue Rock Island RR.

IM metal wheels and body mounted Kadee couplers have been added to one of the cars. With all the purgatory box projects I've exhausted my stock of metal wheels and Kadee couplers so one car will be coming back to the shop once I restock.

PC #483442, a 100 ton hopper, is next out of the shop. This is an honest to goodness PC H43D hopper car. Decals are from Highball Graphics. 

The car is a former blue Rock Island hopper from Life Like.  

















Walthers later released this same car (PC 473972) in their Proto 1000 series.


That's enough coal hopper projects for a little while. 1:1 Engineer Ed just bestowed upon me ten Bowser H21A hopper kits with four stripped of paint and the other six in PRR paint. I'll tackle these after I restock my supply of metal wheels and Kadee couplers. Thanks Double E!!! At this rate I'm gonna need another coal mine!

Next post we'll take a look at some recent T.O.F.C projects with at least one car from the purgatory box.

Thanks for reading!

Bedford Park Scenery Upgraded!

Greetings All,

The virtual ops catalyst strikes again! Bedford Park on the N.Y.C.T.L. has finally been upgraded. That's right! 

Bedford Park was one area of my layout that resisted the virtual ops catalyst for a long time. I wasn't sure I liked the close environs of this area and tight curves. It's lack of scenery and identity often left it as an afterthought.

I tweaked the area more than once going so far as to build some imagineered structures and adding Bedford Park Yard. And that was it until the more recent virtual ops and the increase in freight traffic. Add in Penn Central C424 #2415, 1/87th scale PC Ralph holding down the BPY Turn, some decent looking and working auto racks and the increase of rail traffic to and from this area and it was time to get it upgraded.

Lets check out the project;

In the last P.C.C.M., #39C,  we saw 1/87th scale PC Ralph at Bedford Park Yard getting ready for work. PC C424 #2415 is to the right.

#2415 shoving past American Hardware with little to no scenery.

Pulling two coil steel coaches from Ford. The Bedford Park Yard office looks nice. To be honest not much else was satisfactory.

A quick trip to my local Lowe's and I picked up a bag of paver base. The bag I purchased is a gray colored material. It's all about the base!


Next I stripped the area and got to work.

The paver base has been sifted thru a piece of old metal window screen and applied. I used alcohol to allow the diluted glue to penetrate and here we are waiting for it to dry. I set the coil steel unloader into the wet mix so it would be steady and level.

The tank car unloading platform to the left as also set into the wet mix. The Ford Plant flat needs some loading dock junk and debris along it's base to give it that rail siding feel.

Beford Park Yard and All City Storage looking much better.

American Hardware Supply is in place and the spreading of the paver base in this area is complete. I used a thinner layer of paver base applied directly to full strength Elmer's Glue without the alcohol and diluted white glue mix under A.H.S. and in BP Yard. Hence the lighter color.

An overall look at Ford and the turn to the Cornelius Vanderbilt Memorial Bridge. The far side of the curve has been scenicked  with the paver base, Woodland Scenic grass and some Lichen from Hobby Lobby. (Use your coupon for 40% off!)

The right side of the curve is looking much better. No longer painted plywood like the left side!

 The approach to C.V. bridge. The paver base looks pretty good!

With both sides upgraded this area is no longer one to be avoided when taking P.C.C.M. photos!

 The Ford Plant is back online!

And so is PC Train BP-12... RALPH!!!

Looks like 1/87th scale PC Ralph heard about 1/87th scale Senior Engineer Sir Neal and AT JOE's escapades in P.C.C.M. 39 and thought his engine could make it under the building as well. Completely forgetting his engine is an Alco!

After the smoke cleared I added some little details here and there for more visual interest. Some painted wood cubes with a figure and pallet jack are on the team track. I added similar cubes to the rear at All City Storage as well.

A Ford Pinto station wagon graces the yard parking lot while American Hardware Supply received some loading dock crates and a barrel on a pallet. A forklift can be seen in the distance going up the ramp into All City Storage.

Coil Steel Coaches AKA Breadbox Trough Cars or Clam shell hoppers are in position on the steel unloading track.

60' auto parts cars are spotted at Ford. Some loose lumber from busted pallets and shipping crates have been added. A three dome Gulf tanker car occupies the tank car track. 

A long overdue project is now in the the books. A little more 'stuff' can be added here and there but I think Bedford Park and BP Yard are ready for prime time!

Thanks for reading!!