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Staying On Track - May 1997
Lubbock Model Railroad Association Newsletter
Back to LMRA Home Page
May 5 meeting
at Highland Baptist Church Activity Center, 7:30pm. Jack Seay will be showing how to make trees, glue-shell scenery, and glue-shell scenery without glue. We will also have a book review by Jerry Dukes.
The June 2nd meeting will feature Bob Anconetani with "Operations on the South Plains and Santa Fe".
Get newsletter articles (they can be very long for the web page) and pictures to your editor, Jack Seay.
Lubbock Arts Festival
was a monstrous success. We had hundreds of people look at the HO layout. It was noisy, but fun. A Z-scale caboose diorama mysteriously appeared on one of the flatcars.
Thanks to all those who helped.
Shows and Tours
Amarillo will host the Great American Train Show, Sat. and Sun., May 3 and 4.
Lubbock Layout Tour will be May 24. Bob Anconetani will coordinate.
Texas Tech Museum in Lubbock will host a special event Sun., Nov. 9 - "A Century of Progress: The History of the American Railroad Industry", in conjunction with the railroad exhibit. Lunch 12:30 - 1:30, speaker 2:00. It will be in gallery 1.
LSR Director
Nancy Reed is running for LSR director. If you are an NMRA and LSR member, be sure to vote before May 29.
Executive Committee Meeting
The next Executive Committee Meeting will be Tue., 7:30pm, May 20th, at Jan Kutch's house, 3611 Chicago (on a cul-de-sac).
Hobby Shop News
There will be a contest soon. The models will be displayed in the show cases at Wings N Things. They now have the Aristocrat wireless remote control in stock. Kato C44-9 will be in shortly.
Don's Hobbies And More - 10% sale on train stuff through the end of May.
Ken Riediger has moved to Abilene.
Devon Jackson is marrying an N-scaler.
QUIZ on Railroads and Railroading in the USA
- What is the origin of the word "hobo"?
2. What three private U.S. (non-RR) companies owned the largest fleets of freight cars (55,000; 39,000; and 36,000) in 1941?
3. Which two Class I, line-haul U.S. railroads were operating the most miles of "electrified" road/track in 1941?
4. Identify the following types of steam locomotives, by wheel arrangement: 4-4-2, 4-6-2, 4-6-4, 4-8-2, 4-8-4, 2-6-0, 2-6-2, 2-8-0, 2-8-2, 2-8-4, 2-10-2, 2-10-4.
5. The first completely air-conditioned (mechanically, not with ice) passenger train began operation in what year, and on what R.R. line?
6. What were the three "named" U.S. passenger trains named for women, and what R.R. lines did they operate on?
What I learned from my first layout.
It was 2 1/2 feet square, with three loops, 2 tunnels, a mountain, a lake, 2 bridges, one turn-out, and in N-scale. I did a few unusual things for such a small layout, just for the practice.
I used some ideas from "How to Build Model Railroad Benchwork" to build a short framework based on L-girder methods. I couldn't find any homosote locally, so I used ceiling board. It cracked a few times, but was usable. I wouldn't recommend it for a big layout. Another alternative to homosote is foam-core board. This stuff is very light and strong.
Almost every piece of track was separately wired so it could be rewired later for five blocks. This took about 10 hours of soldering. Using insulated joiners in curves is not a good idea; it is difficult to avoid getting kinks in the track. Some of my curves were of such small radius that I had to reshape them several times to keep the locomotive on the track, and had to trade my 6-axle for a 4-axle to keep all the wheels on.
For the "mountain" in the center, I built a mesh using poster-board strips, hot-glued together. Use a low-temp gun. I started with a hi-temp gun and got a few minor burns. When I started putting the plaster soaked paper towels on this grid, it started to collapse. Support it with something such as wadded up aluminum foil, or cover it with plastic wrap to keep it from getting soft from the wet plaster, or use heavier corrugated cardboard. On my second layout, I tried putting the shell directly on top of wadded up aluminum foil, without a grid. This produced a bumpy shell, which is requiring quit a bit of rockwork to make the shape look realistic.
Before I started the layout, I read onto tape, "How To Build Realistic Model Railroad Scenery". I listened to the tapes about 5 times before starting and another 5 or so times while working. A lot of time was spent standing back and looking for places to add more texture, variety, and details. Ground foam covered all lichen used for bushes.
Water was Woodland Scenics plastic water. I made the mistake of not pouring it all at once, and when I poured more around the lake edges, the center had already cooled. This left a visible line in the plastic, so I had to buy a heat gun and re-melt the plastic. The air from the heat gun put waves in the water, which wasn't planned, but looked good. On my second layout, I heated the plastic too much, so it had air bubbles. I had to re-melt it several times with the heat gun to get the bubbles out. My banks were also not high enough on the second layout, and the water overflowed them. Maybe by the fourth or fifth try, I'll get it right.
I plan on making several more small layouts before I try anything big.
Jack Seay
Easier Internet Access
There is an incredible amount of information about all sizes of railroads on the Internet. My advice if you want Internet access and don't have a computer yet: consider one of the new "set-top boxes". It will cheaper and easier to use than a computer.
Answers to quiz
1. 19th century Amer. "ho! beau!", a call of greeting between vagrants.
2. General American Transportation Corp. (GATX); Union Tank Car Co. (UTLX); and Pacific Fruit Express Co. (PFEX).
3. PRR and CMStP & P.
4.
4-4-2 ooOOo Atlantic
4-6-2 ooOOOo Pacific
4-6-4 ooOOOoo Hudson
4-8-2 ooOOOOo Mountain
4-8-4 ooOOOOoo Northern
2-6-0 oOOO Mogul
2-6-2 oOOOo Prairie
2-8-0 oOOOO Consolidation
2-8-2 oOOOOo Mikado
2-8-4 oOOOOoo Berkshire
2-10-2 oOOOOOo Santa Fe
2-10-4 oOOOOOoo Texas
- 1931, B & O RR.
6. "Nellie Bly", RRR and PRR-Reading Seashore lines; "Ann Rutledge", Alton RR; and "The Pocahontas"; N & W RR.
Lubbock Western Timetable
May
3, 4 - Amarillo Great American Train Show
5 - LMRA meeting
20 - Executive committee meeting
24 - Layout tour
June
27 - 29 - LSR Convention, San Antonio, Nancy Reed running for Region 5 Director.
July
27 - Aug 2 - NMRA, Madison, WI.
Nov
9 - Tech Museum - "A Century Of Progress"
Dates not yet set
Tolk Station rotary coal dump tour
Lubbock show
Model contest at Wings N Things - first part of July, after LSR