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Wednesday, November 27, 2024

November Anniversaries

 


30 YEARS OF OPERATIONS ON THE S.N.R.!

November 1994 was an important month in the history of the Suffolk Northern.  For one, I broke my leg skiing at Breckenridge, CO, and spent my Thanksgiving weekend getting a titanium rod screwed down the center of my left tibia**.  That hardware is still in place.

** -- What does that have to do with the SNR you ask?  Well not much really -- 
mainly it was the "other" big thing that happened that month.  
Although the downtime from being in the cast did allow me to get the 
Central Valley truss bridge built for the river crossing at Dominion.  👍🙂




But more importantly, just before that happened, the original crew and I held the first shake-down operating session on the SNR -- at least, on the portion of it that was in the previous house.  I was proud to have gotten that far with the layout, a mere two years after buying the place.  What's better is that like the titanium rod, that layout is also still in existence -- it just got moved to the Apple Hill house, and expanded to the current configuration.

So in celebration of 30 years of operations, I thought I'd reprint a page from the website that follows the four stages in the layout's evolution -- affectionately called "HO Railroad That Grows," after the classic old Kalmbach book. That's down at the end of this post, following the announcements. 

It's operating with friends that makes the whole enterprise come to life -- it's the big payoff on all the effort and time.  The modeling and layout-building are just there to form a map on which to play the game -- at least to me.

So come celebrate with me.  And if you've operated over here, thanks for being a part of it.  Take a look below to see how it came to be.




ACQUISITION OF A LONG-SUFFERING SPOUSE

November is also the month of our wedding anniversary, and 2024 marks 35 years.  I'll spare you the mushy details, but I thought you might enjoy the card I created for Barri.



Tanks    for 35 great years

I don't know what you ever saw in me...

And after this card, you may be wondering yourself...



Let it be known that I did not, and would not, set out specifically to acquire two tank cars with our names on them just to create an anniversary card.  That would be pretty tacky.  Even for me. 

BUT -- having already acquired those two models... innocently... independently of one another... I would be remiss in my role as a smartass not to use them, to remove the seriousness from what otherwise is a pretty important event.  I believe it was Barry Goldwater who said "Extremism in the pursuit of comedy is no vice."  Or was it Stan Freberg.  

Anyway -- having a couple of well-developed senses of humor is fundamental to what's kept us together for so long.  Thank God she tolerates the railroad, let alone me.  It's a wonder I push it like this...




THANKSGIVING



Speaking of being thankful, November brings with it Thanksgiving.  And always at the top of the list of things I'm thankful for, just after my family, is the hobby of a lifetime -- and especially, friends to pursue it with.  Just as we led in with, it wouldn't be worthwhile if guys didn't enjoy coming over to run my railroad with me.  Or at least, tell me they do.  It was my primary goal for the whole expedition.  Friends old and new, from 4 years to 45.  Can't beat it.

So a very happy Thanksgiving to you and yours -- and please remember, you're on somebody else's list too.  







H.O. RAILROAD THAT GROWS

"I get attached to things, Reggie!"
-- Nick Nolte, Another 48 Hours

I wouldn't say I never throw anything away.  But I pretty much hate to throw things away.  Especially if they've got remaining value, and/or, invested "sweat equity".  And I definitely hate to do things over.

There is some combination of influences at work that includes:
    • The lazy man,
    • The thrifty Dutchman,
    • The conservationist,
    • The waste-abhorring accountant, and
    • The aging frugal Dad.

Anyway, the current Suffolk Northern contains elements from (count 'em) three prior layouts.  I didn't exactly begin life in the hobby with the expectation I would re-use almost everything I'd ever built.  However, every time I had the opportunity to build a new layout, the previous one just seemed to fit right in.  The real estate developer will tell you it's cheaper just to bulldoze and start fresh, but for me that wrecks a lot of character and history.  Plus I like the challenge of adapting what's already in existence.

The track plan below shows the evolution of the current SNR.




I built the Timesaver the summer between high school and college, mainly to prove to myself I could handlay track, so that I'd never have to do it again.  I even cut my own ties on a table saw - my friend Darren Williamson is fond of pointing out that such an effort should have yielded approximately 4x as much sawdust as product.  (It did.)  The Timesaver folded up so it could be carried, like a briefcase, and the original hinges are still in place under the buildings in St Amour.  It's bumpy track, but reliable - fairly ideal for an industrial area.

I extended the Timesaver into the shelf layout for the first apartment my wife and I had, which was the first floor of a two-family.  From there it went with us on a two-year assignment to Seattle and back.  It featured staging on a piece of shelving that could be attached to the RH end, allowing cuts of cars to be moved on and off the layout similar to a car ferry.  That shelf is still in use too (although now stationary), above the workbench. The house sits at the corner of Stettinius & Erie avenues, giving name to a key SNR predecessor road.

In the previous house I re-used the shelf layout as the back half of the industrial switching district, St. Amour, which was handy since the building flats were already done for it.  The layout occupied about a 12' x 16' space, plus the staging loops around and behind the bridge module.  The house sits at the corner of Millsbrae & Atlantic avenues, also giving name to a key SNR predecessor road.

When we moved into the current house, some of the track alignments had to be changed at the interfaces with the new parts, but the components are all substantially the same as when originally built in 1993-94.  




Thanks for reading, and let me know what you think!
















Friday, November 8, 2024

SNR Centerflows!


This just in -- Patrick Harris, of the Three Notch Rail FB group, who did the special run of SNR 3-bays earlier this year, has just announced a run of Accurail Centerflow 4600sf covered hoppers, factory decorated for the Suffolk Northern.  Patrick's FB page is at https://www.facebook.com/groups/4133403420112674.

If you are interested, we need to act fast -- in 24 hours, almost half the run has been reserved!  Details follow.



The design uses the SNR's 1968 multi-mark, which graces the Evans boxcars many of you modernist guys have running around, with the same Futura font.  If you're curious how the SNR's signature hexagon ended up 7' tall and time-warped into the future, check out Suffolk Northern Ry.: Evolution of the Herald.

The run will include two road numbers, and the build date is 1975.  Price is $28 per car, plus shipping.  The expected production date is late December to early January.  

👉As with the 3-bays, I will cover shipping in a big box for Cincinnati-area guys, COD, but I need to hear back ASAP, best by this Monday Nov. 11. 👈

For non-Cincinnati fans in the "SNR Nation" (really more like the "SNR Bus"!), you can pre-order them directly from Patrick's FB page.  You can also email Patrick at ThreeNotchRail@outlook.comAgain, run don't walk -- inexplicably, they are going like hotcakes.

If you've ever played Monopoly with me, you probably expect I'm making money on this somehow.😄 But no -- it's just quite an honor to see interest in the SNR at this level.


Thanks folks for all the interest and support!



  

Thursday, November 7, 2024

Finishing up at Bryan Ferry


They say "the last mile" is the hardest, and my layout is living proof.  There are countless bare spots covering only a couple of square feet each, yet they remain unfinished as the trains and years roll by.

Well I'm trying to knock out those eyesores one by one, and the most recent beneficiary is Bryan Ferry, Va..  The mains, hillsides, depot, creek, etc. were all completed back when, but the industrial area has gone begging -- for long enough!  




After adding ballast, weeds, and debris to the spur track, the first priority was pavement and sidewalks -- for the street that runs between the two main industries in town, Kress Milling Co. and the Aidan Castings Inc. foundry.


A while back the Railway improved the main crossing in town (over at the depot) with automated flashers -- and so in trade, closed the less-used Longdale St. crossing.  The former thoroughfare is now a stub that employees of the adjacent businesses use as a random parking lot.


 




The once-elegant brick pavement was obliterated entirely on the main by the ever-rising high iron, whereas on the industrial track... it was just left to deteriorate.  More bricks were unceremoniously pulled up out of the middle of the lanes to sink posts for the guardrail.






Next door, on the Aidan property, concrete storage bins for raw materials -- in the foundryman's four favorite flavors: sand, pig iron, limestone, and coke -- radiate from a single, pivoting unloader.  Both the bin walls and the heaps are sectioned in front, at the fascia, to fit the oddball space.  We talked about building the bins in a post earlier this year (link: "Bulk Storage for Aidan Castings").







In the current effort, the unloader got some finishing touches, including a transfer pit, a ring path for the conveyor's wheels to ride on, and of course, generous amounts of spillage.  







The foundry's yard is stained with rust from the countless  tons of iron that has been unloaded here to feed the furnace.  Much of it has been supplied by Allegheny Scrap Inc., up the way in St. Amour.  So the stockpile was made using chunks right out of the same supply that gons are loaded with.  







And like Allegheny Scrap's crane, Aidan's is also a BILD-OLL product, improved from a basic Walthers Scenemaster model with paint, weathering, cab glass, and foil for the treads.  And of course, a nameplate. (Click here to see the post about completing Alleghany Scrap.)  







Over at the mill, we can see the new order of business in post-war America has come to even little Bryan Ferry, Va., as a national conglomerate has recently purchased the venerable, locally-owned plant.  (If you'd been wondering why those two panels never got any weathering in the past 20+ years, now you know.  Just took a few decades to get around to having blue decals made.)







Kress Milling's lot was constructed the same way as Aidan Castings' yard and most of the other gravel paving on the layout:  a ballast blend is ground into wet plaster using an HO scale vehicle, creating ruts and chuckholes and exposed mud.  Tread impressions are added too, where tracked machines are in use.  The plaster is then painted with a wash of mud color, and then fresh gravel is applied sparingly to the perimeters, where it might have escaped getting driven into the dirt.  







And after all these years, the coal that Kress Milling receives each day finally has a storage bin, and the sideyard under the viaduct has some texture.


The corrugated iron covers an underground conveyor, which feeds fuel from the storage bin into the mill's boilerhouse.  You can see a depression in the coal heap where the conveyor has carried away half a carload's worth of coal.  






So that's (hopefully) one less eyesore.  Thanks as always for reading, and let me know what you think!