Dismantling the ONR Ramore sub for the move.

With an April 28 move fast approaching we started dismantling the ONR Ramore sub Friday night. Thanks to Paul, Steve, Keith, Ken, John and Colin for their help. We were very pleased to see Steve who had just flown in from Germany in the afternoon and who took the time to come and see us and give a great helping hand. Keith was also in town or the first time in some time took the time to come over as well. We started the night packing the rolling stock and then took down the shelf cartridges and took them downstairs. We then removed the first module, Kirkland Lake. I was quite concerned about this one as it was installed in a very non conventional manner but it did come loose. Afterward we unbolted the two modules along the wall nearest the desk. These worked out well as expected. Prior to the dismantling my good friend Bran visited us this week from Montreal. We ran a 40 car train as the last run with the one Hobbytown RS3. See the photo below. Thanks all for your help. Next week we will move the modules to Mark’s. The Kirkland Lake module sitting on the floor.

Dismantling the layout. The scenic divider is removed.

The last run, a 40 car train with Bob's visiting friend Brian.

Friday 3-25-11 work session at John's

[Text & Pictures by Rick Wade]

It was fun at John's home Friday 3/25. In attendance were: Rick (with Midge upstairs with Shirley), Mark, Collin, Paul, Bob & Ken. John had lined up a few tasks including painting the wall and putting up shelves that he bought from Steve B. Yummy snacks were provided including home made chocolote chip cookies, double stuff Oreos, candied pecans, and drinks. The pictures are in no particular order....enjoy!

Somebody has to supervise these guys and John had his hands full while Ken & Paul work out the details.

Paul, Mark & Rick worked on the wall and were having some difficulties with blending the lighter blue with the darker blue.....then Bob showed up to give his advice and things went better.

Collin is taking a phone break. He cut the 2' x 2' x 48" legs and then Rick helped him install the adjustable feet.

Bob in deep thought.

Bob, Mark & Paul installing the shelves after the lengthy process of locating the studs.

Mark was looking a little sad, so I gave him one of my Oreos (he started looking much better!)

After the wall was painted it took awhile to get those shelved mounted. Ken puts in his two cents worth.

Many thanks to everyone who helped and to John and Shirley for opening there home, and to Shirley for entertaining Midge.

Friday night March 11th at Paul's home

{Story by Paul - Pictures by Rick W.}

So here's my report for Friday night, at last! It started a little early, when Mark arrived and Donna sent him downstairs...

I was showing Mark my progress on the narrow gauge on the upper level, including my Blackstone K-27 Mikado with 15 cars behind it. I showed where there is one point where the pilot wheels tend to leave the track around a curve, and left him with the train as the others started arriving. John, Rick, and Midge came, and Cliff Smith, a potential new guy got introduced around. Cliff lives about a mile from me, and is interested in re-joining the NMRA and building a layout. Then Ken arrived, and I showed Midge what progress I've made since she last saw the layout in 2009, and I gave Cliff the rundown at the same time. Then Bob came, with Colin in tow, and I had to show it all all over again....It's really tough for me to show off my trains! Then we trooped upstairs for cookies and soft drinks, and to talk with the girls. Our neighbor Vivian, whose husband is off to Daytona for Bike Week, came over, too, to watch Calendar Girls with Donna and Midge. We finally got to work, cleaning up the mess I've been making while making progress on the narrow gauge. Bob, Colin, and John organized the lumber I had jumbled along the basement wall, and Cliff got to vacuum up debris from making spline roadbed, and Ken and Mark collected tools and threw away various pieces of stuff I had lying around. Rick removed some cardboard drop cloths covering the lower level, and cleaned track in preparation for running. Not the most interesting night for the others, but I got stuff done in preparation for my open house today that I couldn't do alone. Most of the guys left a little after 10, but Colin wanted to run his GE Demo loco, so he, Bob, and I fired up the Zephyr. Which of course, started acting weird - when we put the Challenger on the tracks, it instantly started off at full speed in reverse, and nothing we could do to it on the programming track seemed to have any effect. So I got out a brand new Atlas diesel from its box, and set it on the track. It instantly started running in reverse at full speed....
We fooled with this for nearly an hour, and finally left off around 11:15, when Bob and Colin had to leave. We figured it would behave the next day, because it's electronic after all! When I went downstairs to shut down the system, I couldn't resist trying one more time. I reprogrammed the new diesel to its cab number, and it worked perfectly. Then I got out another diesel which had never been on the track, programmed it to its cab number, and IT worked perfectly. So I played with trains a bit, to set up 3 trains ready to run.

Donna and I spent most of yesterday downstairs moving some more lumber, and straightening the pile of boxes in front of the curtains the block the view of the mess behind the cinder block wall, and she cleaned up my workbench. And today I'll vacuum up and hide the last bits of mess in Donna's side of the basement...

Ken's coming today to operate trains, and if anyone else can help out, it would be nice for him to have some relief. I figure I'll just let the visitors run trains, too! Anyway, thanks everyone for your help, and today will be wonderfully successful!

Paul

My expectations were derailed!

A business meeting lead me to Tampa, Florida and before the trip I searched for local model railroad stores in the area (like all good model railroaders do!) and discovered "The No. 2 train store in the country" according to their claim (made by others).

What I discovered on the web was H&R Trains located at 6901 US Hwy N. in Pinellas Park, Fl. Below is a picture from there site with their claim to fame. I was excited to be able and see this store especially since it's THE SECOND LARGEST IN THE COUNTRY!!!

Now, I like a good brag as much as the next guy, but come on - lets get real here! He is a picture of the shop from the air and note the car in the lower left to give you some idea of the size of the building.

As I entered the store with great expectations I was greeted by the silent stare of a store employee (or owner?) with narly a word of greeting, and while I roamed around NOBODY approached me to greet me or ask if I needed any assistance. And they were NOT busy - there was only one other customer in the building.

So if this building isn't exactly HUGE perhaps it's jammed with inventory? NOT!!! I actually counted the number of HO freight cars around 60! The N scale wasn't that big either. The did have the bigger scales.

I actually did purchase a freight car (reduced their inventory by about 1.6%) along with a couple of other items. When I put my items on the counter to check out the same "friendly" employee (owner) that ignored me to that point continued to be speechless for about 30 seconds (also not wasting eye contact on me!) before he finally "let" me pay.

In summary, if this is the "Number 2 train store in the country", then my little inventory at home would qualify me as "Number 3". If I had the money I'd pay for a round trip ticket for these guys to see TrainMasters - it would knock their socks off!

Rick

(Owner of THE LARGEST RICHLAWN RAILROAD IN THE WORLD!)

It lives on!!!

Guys,

I was in Gainesville today doing a little railfanning waiting by the mainline for some action when I heard a train on a siding switching a grain plant. I walked over and what did I see on the CSX powered train but TWO Family Lines SCL /LN covered hoppers! Now, I know that Ken wouldn't be excited by this even though he's an L&N man because he is a pre - SCL guy. I'm glad to see anything with L&N on it.

I went and had lunch at a local cafe within walking distance and then returned to wait by the mainline. No luck by the mainline; however, the same train with the SCL/LN's was backing onto the same siding and this time it had FOUR of the Family Lines SCL / LN covered hoppers!

Dummy me didn't bring my regular camera, so I used my cell phone to take a number of pictures.

L&N - "Gone, but not forgotten"

Rick

Richlawn RR Alcove Expansion - Benchwork

The work continues on the expansion of the layout into the alcove area and I've recently installed the joists on the L-girders. The weights are on the benchwork at the right are there because of a nasty twist caused by warped lumber. Once I attached the benchwork to the floor it won't be a problem.

I've never been happy with how flimsy the joists seemed when the risers are attached as the risers act as a "lever" to twist the joists from side to side. I don't like benchwork that isn't rigid, so I added stiffeners to the joists and they are much more rigid now.

The stiffeners are made from 5/8" sandply plywood that I cut using my 50 year old DeWalt radial arm saw. I had a bunch of scrap plywood, so other than the cutting time it was easy.

Here is a closer view of the joist and the stiffeners. The joists are attached to the top of the L-girder from the bottom using 2-1/2" coarse thread drywall screws screwed into pilot holes to avoid spliting the plywood. I attached the stiffeners using 1" coarse thread drywall screws without using glue. I may need to move things around a little bit for turnout motors, ect. and I wanted that to be easy to do.

Here's a little closer view of the stiffeners and joist showing the mounting screws.

Some might say that this is "over-designed" or "over-built", and that might be true; however, I'm all for "over" when it comes to a strong, stable benchwork.

NCIOG visit to John & Shirley's home 1-22-11

Today we went to John & Shirley's home at their invitation to check out the current and future model railroad plans. In attendance were: Keith, Mark, Ken, Rick, Midge, Bob & Halina. It was nice having the ladies to beautify the get together! We were greeted by a nice welcome sign and a wonderful lunch spread of sandwiches, scrimp, chips, cheese dip, drinks, and homemade brownies! We chatted while we ate and then headed downstairs for the tour.

Welcome!.....to wonderful hospitality and food!

I never thought of organizing my train stuff by putting it on pegboard, but it makes great sense. This wall is in the existing trainroom which is being dismantled.

Keith & Mark discuss all the goodies on John's workbench.

Ken & Midge look on as the rest of us tour the room.

Mark is explaining something very important to Keith

Check out this neat bridge!

Organization is the key to a successful railroad, and John's using plastic drawer to keep everything in order. Note the remains of the bench work from his old layout.

More viewing of the existing layout area - soon to be reclaimed by Shirley.

Here's a view of the new layout room looking from the old layout area. This is a much larger area - thank you, Shirley!

This is the new layout room looking from the other end. The furniture will be moved into the room right behind the photographer.

Bob & Halina arrived a little later than the rest of us and stopped upstairs to grab some food before joining the group.

While the ladies chatted the guys got to work measuring the new room and making a sketch with dimensions for Keith to make get the layout plan in 3rd Planet(tm).

Here's the existing plan that John has drawn up for the new layout.

Keith got to work using John's Apple laptop to attempt to draw up the plan; however, using the Apple was at the "core" of the problem as Keith is used to the PC world. Keith volunteered to take the plan & dimensions home to whip up a 3rd Planet(tm) plan.

We all had a wonderful time and want to say a big Thank You to John & Shirley for their excellent hospitality!