Mom 1936-2014

RIP Mom

Words cannot convey the pain I feel losing both parents within the past two months.

A Working Spray Booth and Other New Tools..

Things are finally settling down after dealing with everything needed to get done after my Dad passed away this month.  I was able to do some work, mostly cosmetic, on the layout, like staining the turnout ties, and weathering all of the exposed track.  

A closeup of the rail weathering.  I've been using the Floquil rail brown paint markers.

Another look at the rail weathering.  I've since cleaned all rail surfaces and test run trains over the entire layout to make sure I didn't miss any spots.

I stained all the Fast Tracks turnout ties with Hunterline Tie Brown Stain.

Two of the more exciting developments have been things not directly related to building the layout per say, but help with my enjoyment of the hobby as a whole.  I was able to get a blower for my homemade spray booth and I finally purchased a Dremel drill press and a new Dremel Moto-Tool to go with it for my work bench.  Two of my excuses for not trying to tackle building some of the resin kits I've acquired through the years was one: I didn't have a functioning spray booth to paint them, and two: after trying with much frustration to drill holes for grab irons with pin vises, I really wanted a way to drill them out with some sort of powered drill press.  I had tried using some high speed bits in a battery powered Dremel but broke bits because I didn't hold the tool steady enough. (Pierre, I know I was not doing something right, but I couldn't figure it out)  I hope using the new Dremel at low speed in the drill press will help me make short work of drilling grab iron holes accurately.

I picked a blower for the spray booth via Harbor Freight when it was on sale plus I had a 25% off coupon which saved me another $20 on it.  This particular blower is used normally for a dust collector, and has a high CFM output.  That's a 10' flexible vent hose and there will be another on the output end of the blower to direct fumes out the window vent.

The Dremel Drill Press was something I always wanted, but never got around to buying.  I had a bunch of points to use on one of my credit cards and I redeemed them for Lowes gift cards which I then used to buy the new Dremel and Drill Press. 

Hopefully next month I will have a few of the guys over to help shakedown the layout.  I'll be "leasing" some motive power though till I get my fleet equipped with their sound decoders and stay alive capacitors. 

My Dad: 1932-2014

My Dad and me doing one of the things we loved to do together, watch baseball.

My Dad:  

The man who bought me my first train set  (HO scale Lionel).

The man who taught me the value money and of working hard.

The man who shared the love of baseball, and the Yankees with me.

The man who I didn't get along with and couldn't stand in the first half my life, who became my most best friend who I loved with all my heart in the second half of my life.

My Dad, Carmine DiIorio passed away peacefully Monday morning at the NJ Veterans Home in Menlo Park NJ, the same place he had spent so much time volunteering to help out all the veterans who lived there.

Was he a perfect man?  No, but then no one is. But he still was a great man to those he helped through the years, especially the veterans.

Love you Dad, RIP.

GSD Works in Progress Meet/Valley Forge RPM

1 week ago the Garden State Division of the NER/NMRA had a meet at the Scotch Hills Country Club in Scotch Plains NJ.  They used the WIP format (Works in progress) of clinics where there are stations where a clinician will be located and the attendees rotate every 30 minutes from one station to another.  Each station covers a subject that the clinician presents with about 15-20 minutes of info and 10 or so minutes of Q&A.  They also can be hands-on clinics where attendees can work along with the clinician and pick up a new skill.  I gave a clinic on standardizing your car fleet: proper weight, metal wheels, couplers all the same and at the right height etc.  I discussed the importance of setting your standards and having each car meet those standards before they ever hit the layout.

Other clinics presented at the meet were:

Dave Ramos- Building Fast Tracks turnouts

Craig Bisgeier- Casting parts in resin

Tony Koester- Kitbashing buildings

Ralph Heiss- Weathering rolling stock

Joe Calderone- Creating retaining walls out of meat packaging containers

Bruce De Young- Applying and weathering dry tranfers to rolling stock and structures

Ted Pamperin- Using creative methods and materials in building your layout

The WIP format has been used in the NJ Division for a few years and has been successful.  GSD’s version was a big hit and my hat goes off to Jim Fawcett and the whole GSD crew for putting together a fun meet.   

Here are some pictures from the day’s event:

Craig Bisgeier demonstrating resin casting.

Joe Calderone demonstrates how he builds retaining walls from meat packaging.

Bruce DeYoung and his dry transfer clinic.

Yours truly and my clinic on car standardization. 

The Commodore, Ralph Heiss and his weathering clinic.  (See!  He's still alive even though he doesn't update his blog! :)

MRP editor Tony Koester and his kitbashing clinic.

Ted Pamperine discussing using some different and unique materials to build your layout.  Ted was a major influence and help to me in developing my Gator Foam bench work. 

Dave Ramos giving his clinic on building Fast Tracks turnouts.

All in all, every clinician was in agreement that the time flew by and we all had a lot of fun doing the GSD meet. :)

 

On another note:  The Valley Forge RPM Meet is coming up fast and again will be held at The Desmond Hotel and Conference Center, March 28-30 in Malvern PA.  I'll be there again and I will be doing an update to my last clinic on modeling the Ma & Pa RR 1943.  Last time out the clinic was well received and we had a lot fun during it.  Now, just know that if it's after 12 noon, there will be a good chance of a Stoli Martini with a twist sighting in the general vicinity of my lectern.  I like to keep my clinics informative, but also lighthearted.  I do not try take myself too seriously. If you plan on attending the Valley Forge meet stop on in to my clinic and say hi. :)

 

"Kung Hei Fat Choi! Congratulations and be prosperous!"

Kung Hei Fat Choi! Congratulations and be prosperous!  Another year has past and today a new lunar year starts!  Unfortunately it starts with me coming down with a double whammy of bronchitis (or as those of us who attend the big Amherst Railway Society Show each January call it the dreaded Springfield Plague) and conjunctivitis (pink eye)  so let's say I'm not off to a stellar start for the new year.  But as the Dr. (who is Chinese) put it today, this will be the first and last time for me being sick this year.  Let's hope she's right. ;)

Anyway, from our family to yours, we wish you Happy Chinese New Year!  Kung Hei Fat Choi! Congratulations and be prosperous!

Shakedown?

Happy New Year everyone!

I've been working on fixing a lot of "little" problems on the layout that would add up to be big problems during an op session, with an eye towards having a shakedown op session (or as Marty calls them "Sea Trials") to see what other bugs pop up and need to be fixed.  One thing that was a consistent problem was a lot of the sidings had slight grades on them.  Unless I leveled them out, I would need some kind of "hand brake" system to hold cars in the sidings.  So, I've spent the last week going over each siding, testing with a torpedo level and a free rolling car, and fixing the siding when needed.  Mission accomplished on that job.

It took quite a bit of sanding and or shimming to get each siding level.

Another one finished.

The Knisely Coal siding needed some shimming to level it out.  You can see in this picture just how bad this particular siding had become.

As I found problem sidings, I marked down there location and once done, marked that they were OK.

Success was not only measured by the torpedo level showing level, but also by parking a car or two on the siding to make sure it didn't roll away.

Another problem found during some test running was two turnouts had rail that let loose from their PC ties close to the frogs.  So I used my NMRA gauge and spiked them down to fix the problem.  I was afraid if I tried to heat up the PC tie up to re-solder the rail, the other rail might let loose.

Spiking down the problem rail.

Another thing that needed to get done was to paint the fascia on the helix, install the sign for Yoe, and the throttle plug.

Last thing accomplished this week was to lay the track on the portable active staging modules.  I just need to devise how I'm going to attach them to the layout during op sessions and build some detachable legs too.

One finished, one to go.

Both staging modules with all track installed.  I just need to put in feeders, bus wires with a plug to connect power to the main layout, and detachable leg system.

I'm hoping to schedule a shakedown op session for sometime in February.  I can't wait to see how it goes! :)

Merry Christmas!

"I knew I should have used a Woodland Scenics tree instead."

Merry Christmas!

From my family to yours!