Tuscarora Mountain RR visit

Greetings All,

My good buddy 1:1 scale Engineer Ed arranged for us to visit this excellent two rail O scale layout. Have a look it was a very impressive layout and our host was most generous with his time and hospitality.  Check out these photos of this beautiful layout;

Thanks for looking

Draw Bars For Close Coupling and Coupler Mounting Alternatives

Greetings All,

A follow up from my prior post;
http://newyorkcentrallayout.blogspot.com/2017/02/building-box-car-kit.html

In my last post about building a shake the box kit fellow blogger and modeler John Bruce added comments on his method of installing Kadee couplers on the old tried and true Athearn Blue Box kits. I communicated with John and asked that he post a 'how to' on his blog. The timing was right as he had an Athearn Blue Box box car kit ready to build. John's approach offers a simple way to overcome the dreaded Athearn Coupler Box clip failure that most modelers have experienced at least once or in my case several times. I was impressed with the simplicity and effectiveness of the alternatives John employs on his car builds. Check it out here; Athearn Bluebox Upgrade

For more on John's modeling activities check out his other blog posts. He's always got an interesting project going;
https://modelrrmisc.blogspot.com/

Today's other topic deals with the alternative of using draw bars instead of couplers in some applications. The recent painting of NYC F7A #1645 led to another project of getting the 1645 and 1644 to couple closely together. Years ago I used the Kadee close coupling kits for Bachmann F units but was never really happy with them. Along the way I came up with a very simple draw bar system to get my Bachmann units closely coupled. This same system can also be used with Athearn BB units.

The Kadee close coupling kit

 

I used the Kadee close coupling kits above on these FT units. 
Not that close are they?

 

This is after the draw bar conversion. Much better

The idea for the draw bars came from a magazine article I read in Classic Trains magazine about ten years ago about the Lackawanna draw bar equipping their FT A and B units. 

The first units I tried the draw bar conversion on were a pair of Athearn BB New Haven F7As in 2012

One thing about these projects is that the modifications are easily reversible if you want to go back to a regular coupler. 

After installing the draw bar for the 1644 and 1645 I turned my attention to an A-B-B-A set of PRR F7s and an A-B-A set of B&O F units.. Let's take a look at this super easy way to get the units looking more prototypical; 

The 1645 and 1644 sitting at Bedford Station coupled by draw bar.

 An A-B-A set of F7s in need of draw bars. The F7A to the left and the B unit have had the close coupling kit installed. It's a little closer than the standard Bachmann coupler boxes. But not that much.

With a Christmas delivery of an A and B unit to the P.R.R. fleet of my son I secured permission to use draw bars to couple these units together. Seeing these 1:1 scale units in the Green Frog Pennsylvania RR Heritage video sealed the deal for this project.  

This consist is going to be tough to get back into their respective boxes! The four unit lash up looks great and runs great. It really looks good at the slow speed train crawl with about 25 to 35 cars behind it. 

Here are the B&O units getting ready for their drawbars. The draw bars are made from old IHC /AHM / Rivarossi light weight 2 axle long shank horn hook couplers. I cut off everything and just use the shank. Note when doing a multi unit lash up I make sure I can mate two F7s together before proceeding with the B units.  

 The B&O A-B-A units close coupled and looking good. Another consist that's going to be hard to put away.

The obligatory meet on the Empire City viaduct. Another B&O B unit is now on the shopping list.

As I enjoyed running these engines on the layout it struck me that I had another set of A-B-A units that could benefit from the draw bar application. An Athearn BB New York Central PA-PB-PA to be exact. So back to the work bench I went and here's what happened;

The Athearn PA-PB-PA units coupled up nice and tight at Empire City Station 

 These units have talgo mounted couplers. Note the washers on the B unit lowering the draw bar. This is necessary so the weight of the A units pin sitting on the draw bar doesn't raise the rear wheel of the B units truck off the rails. The amount of washers used was based on trial and error.

The bottom of the unpowered B unit shows the draw bar on one end and the pin on the other. Obviously the A unit to the left is equipped with a draw bar and the A unit t the right a pin. The masonite pad turns this car into a track cleaner which I really like.

Four roofing nails attached to the pad with adhesive. The slide thru the empty motor mount holes in the bottom of the frame. Note the nails are off center which coincides with the empty motor mount holes.

The PA-PB-PA units lead a passenger train around a curve coming out of Empire City Station

The PA-PB-PA climb the grade thru Bedford NY as the train heads towards Terminal Yard and points beyond the layout. The two powered PA units have plenty of power for the grade and the B unit is shining the tracks as it goes. Not a bad combination!

So there it is. A couple of easy upgrades that are cost effective and easily reversible if you should decide later to undo the draw bars.

Thanks for reading!!!

Building a Box Car Kit

Greetings All,
After a recent train show with plenty of 'shake the box' kits from Athearn and Roundhouse available unbuilt and in the box I thought we could take a look at building a basic shake the box HO scale model train kit. Hopefully this will help some readers who are new to the hobby or reentering the hobby. 

We'll the use still very common Athearn Blue Box kit for today's sample. Hobby shops were once flooded with these HO scale shake the box kits. They were very reasonably priced and can be found on most layouts. Even though Athearn no longer produces these kits they can still be found at hobby shops and at train shows in large numbers.

Today's subject is this 40' TP&W boxcar. This car was purchased from my local L.H.S. in December for use in the virtual ops between the .N.Y.C.T.L. , K.P.D. and A.P.R.R. 

Yuck! The old Athearn metal parts have rusted over the years while sitting in the box. Not uncommon and not a big deal. A wire brush for the metal weight and an emery board for the coupler covers will remove most of the surface rust. 

The coupler covers have been cleaned. Both the covers and the freight car trucks have been painted flat black. The original Athearn wheels with their rusty axles have been left in place and used here to keep the paint out of the freight car journals. The old wheels will be replaced with metal wheels. You can keep the original wheels for the next car that needs to have it's trucks sprayed.

With the rust wire brushed away, the metal weight, car floor and under frame have been sprayed flat black. Try not to spray too much in the coupler boxes on the ends of the frame. 

A look at the kit parts and some of the materials used. Kadee #5 couplers are on the lower right. The car floor that will be visible with the car door open has been painted tan to simulate wood flooring. The 96 cent can of flat black is used when possible. I try to save the $4.99 can of Testors Dullcote for the shell when possible. 

Here is the meat and potatoes of the whole kit building process. Do the couplers line up with the Kadee Height Gauge? They do now! This car required one Kadee red washer (envelope in background) on each bolster to achieve the correct height. And does the car roll freely. These are the two most important things for any model train.

TP&W #627 being shoved into an industry siding. The car is now in revenue service and is being loaded.  

Newer kits on the hobby shop shelves include these Kit Classics from Scale Trains dot Com. Easy to build and fun to operate. These kits come with metal wheels which is a big plus and a semi scale knuckle coupler which looks very nice. Under the stresses of railroad operations the couplers however were prone to failure and replaced with Kadee couplers. If not having ops sessions I wouldn't worry about the couplers. They worked fine just running around the layout.  

So there it a basic primer on building a shake the box kit. Here are some past car builds that readers may find helpful;

Have an Accurail car, check this build from 2013;
http://newyorkcentrallayout.blogspot.com/2013/10/build-simple-freight-car-kit.html

ConCor Express cars: 
http://newyorkcentrallayout.blogspot.com/2013/11/new-express-boxcars-join-fleet.html

 Not sure what coupler to use, check the Kadee Web Site;
 https://kadee.com/conv/hocc.htm

Coupler installation and adjustments
http://newyorkcentrallayout.blogspot.com/2012/07/coupler-upgrade-made-easy.html 

Thanks for Reading!

Train Show Finds

Greetings All,

My good buddy Engineer Ed and I recently attended a local Train Show. After scouring the show for good deals on items I could use for the N.Y.C.T.L. I made the following purchases.

Roundhouse New Haven 40' boxcar with the older script herald. This was new and and still in kit form in the box. Kadee #5 couplers and 33" metal wheels were added. Ever since I bought my first MRR magazine with John Pryke's New Haven on the cover I've been a big fan of this road.

 PRR 40' boxcar. manufacturer unknown at this time. This car came equipped with Kades and I added metal wheels.

PRR 50' boxcar with Railway Express Agency lettering. This is a Roundhouse product. Kadee #5s added.   

Roundhouse 50' PRR boxcar with REA lettering and a PRR 40' boxcar from unknown manufacturer in service on a mail and express train.

Accurail WM ACF Covered Hopper. Came with metal wheels but needed new couplers.

 D.T.&I. Athearn BB 50' Gondola. Came with horn hook couplers and original wheels. Added Kadee #27 under set shank couplers.

WM Athearn BB 50' gondola. Came with horn hook couplers and original wheels. Added Kadee #27 under set shank couplers.

 B&O Athearn 50' Gondola. Came with horn hook couplers and original wheels. Added Kadee #27 under set shank couplers.

The three gondolas and the green PRR 50' boxcar came as a 4 for $15.00 package deal.  

The highlight of my purchases was an Atheran BB Chessie System bay window caboose. After cleaning the car I found it was a pretty accurate model of the prototype so I painted the ends silver to match the 1:1 scale counterpart.

 The 1/87th gang has assembled at the paint shop to check out this cool looking caboose. B&O 903010 will be a welcome addition to my youngest son's B&O fleet.

 Prototype and model. Not bad!

Another Evans 5100cf RBL boxcar from Scale Trains dot com was purchased at the train show from my LHS who had a nice corner set up for their wares. 

The new one will fit in very nicely with the second one below that my youngest son received for Christmas. His Chessie System / B&O fleet did very well at the Train show with addition of this car, the gondola, the two WM cars and the bay window cabose.

Here is B&O 903010 passing North Side Yard. I added window glazing. The caboose came equipped with Kadee #5s.

Thanks for reading!