Monday, November 3, 7:30 P.M. Highland Baptist Activity Center. Jay Vollett will tell us about cattle operations on the railroad.
The December 1 meeting will be a gift exchange at the Science Spectrum.
at http://home.earthlink.net/~jackseay . My email is now jackseay@sbcglobal.net mailto:jackseay@usa.net, . If you want to write a newsletter article, give it to me at the meeting, email it to me, or call me.
As you may have noticed, we missed having a public show this year. It is time to start planning for next year's before it slips away again. If you could help with a portion of planning for next year's show, please sign up at the next meeting, or let any board member know. We need people to secure a time and place, contact venders and get prizes, set up, train master, coordinate clinics and contests, and run children's activities. This is separate from the board, but you can certainly volunteer to do both!!!
Your can avoid our usual IRS style collection tactics by paying your dues early. $12 individual, $18 family.
Wings N Things - Atlas GP40-2 N-scale, Walthers HO catalog, Bachman HO Doodlebug
Saturday, October 25. Leave from HBAC promptly at 7:30 A.M. Share ride and/or provide own transportation. Our experienced guides will show us the best places to photograph the BNSF in Lubbock, Southland bridge, and Slaton. Lunch where you like in Post or maybe a picnic at that trackside roadside park if it stays warm. With luck the trains will show up, so bring your cameras. This is your chance to get out to see the prototype in a big enough group to feel comfortable....That was the plan.
Here's what actually happened: Today, we had the photo stop tour at Buenas, between Slaton and Post. There were seven of us that showed up. We found a nice hill to take pictures from about 1/4 mile east of the highway bridge. Unfortunately, the Garza County sheriff's department didn't share our enthusiasm for our chosen scenic overlook, so we all got slips of paper "thanking" us for visiting railroad property and inviting us to come back for personal audience with the judge. We did get a few pictures of a train with a lot of autocars. Next time, we will know to stay far away from the tracks, right of way, and access roads if there are any "No Trespassing" signs or fences to be seen nearby, even if the fence is not all inclusive, the chain gate is down, and it is out in the middle of "nowhere". Buenas is a great place to view and photograph trains, but stay at the highway bridge entrance to stay out of trouble.
Set up Nov. 22,23 and take down Jan. 3,4. Open when we can be there Mon - Sat 10-5:30, and Sun 1-5:30. Not open evenings except for groups.
We will be in the smaller room that is only open from the museum. It is to be locked except for times display is manned. We will be teaching the staff how to run the trains so they can display them. Room is roughly 25 by 50 feet. We need all modules, especially corners and yards. There is a built-in VCR.
Texas Tech Museum in Lubbock will host a special event in gallery 1, Sun., Nov. 9 - "A Century of Progress: The History of the American Railroad Industry". It will include a photo exhibit ranging from 1869 to 1969. Lunch 12:30 - 1:30, speaker 2:00.
Digital Control (DCC) and BendTrack modules will be demonstrated at Atlas Fasteners, Monday, Nov. 10 at 7:30pm. 4910-B Homestead Ave., two blocks West of Loop 289, one block South of the Brownfield Highway.
The next Executive Committee Meeting will be Tue., 7:30pm, November 16, at Jan Kutch's house, 3611 Chicago (on a cul-de-sac).
Operations can be daunting to get started in, so I developed a crude and fast method that works. I built a small circle in Z-scale with only four turnouts, 2 left and 2 right. I had 5 freight cars and a caboose. The circle is used as a runaround track: just drop a car off, run around and push the car onto the siding using the front of the locomotive. Reverse the procedure to take it off the siding. All my cars are different types, so I dispensed with road names and numbers. One letter abbreviations are used for the industries. Here's what my switchlist looks like:
Car from 2 box C P 4 box D D gon H P tank P H stock H C
The cars were 2 and 4 door boxcars, a gondola, and tanker and a stockcar. The "industries" were a House, Depot, Church, and Paint bottle. The from column was the location of each car at the beginning. The second column is where each car is to be moved to. The next session, it becomes the from column and the next column over becomes the to column. Each industry letter was written on two small squares of card-stock, shook them up in my hand, pulled out one at a time, and wrote them down in the to column. This design for a switch list should be simple enough for even adults to figure out, and introduces concepts that will make more complex operations easier to take on.
It can take quite a few movements to spot the first car, as the caboose has to be dropped onto a siding, maybe one or two cars temporarily relocated, and possibly several runaround movements.
Nov
3 - Meeting 7:30pm, Highland Baptist Activity Center
9 - Tech Museum - "A Century Of Progress"
10 - Open House: DCC and Bendtrack - Atlas Fasteners, 7:30pm
22, 23 - Science Spectrum setup
Dec
1 - Meeting/Hobo gift exchange 7:30pm, Science Spectrum