The waiting is over

I am now taking orders for the first kit of my resin kit line, the Wabash Stock car.
Ordering info can be found at Yarmouth Model Works.

I also expect to shortly have available detail parts. My plan is to offer those parts that I've been looking for, for my own models and have had to have created.
The first ones will be a bit of surprise. Check in every now and then.

Traffic Analysis

A fellow blogger, A R Pollard, who pens No Two Alike recently wrote a well thought out piece on traffic patterns and freight car fleets, which as inspired me to bang away on the keys a bit to share my thoughts on this topic.
Let me preface this by stating that I have an enormous amount of respect for Tim Gilbert, Tony Thompson, and all the others who have worked very hard to create the traffic analysis data that is the mainstay for much of the thinking that currently covers this topic. And for the most part much of what they state is irrefutable.
But the thing to remember is to never say never.
Case in point is the photo above. Look at the DL&W car to the right of the 0-6-0. It is a stock car that has been lined on the inside for coal service. When I first saw this image I was confused about the sheathing on the car. Because of how the light is hitting it, it looks very much like clapboards with braces over top. Which we know is not how cars are built. But I had to inquire on STMFC.
The gentleman who replied,(and I apologize, I can't remember his name) was shocked to discover that this photo was taken in Windsor, Ontario. Yes that is Detroit in the background.
He was a major DL&W fan and until he saw this image would have sworn that that class of car never went offline. And yet there it is in Canada.
Further, of the first 16 cars covered by Ted Culotta in his Essential Freight Car series, 12 of them showed up in Palmerston, Ontario between 1945 and 1952. Not bad for a small Canadian branchline hub.
So my point is to restate something another freight car researcher once said to me. In the postwar era and into the 50's, just about everything went everywhere. Within reason.
If you like a car, put it on the layout. Let the experts prove you wrong.
Never say never.

A Tribute to My Friend

On Thursday last, my friend and fellow modeler, Rich Chrysler, passed away after a short battle with pancreatic cancer.
Rich was a talented modeler who was instrumental in my evolution into prototype modeling. His skill sets were only overmatched by his generosity and his willingness to share.
His CN Hagersville Sub can be seen here in video made by his son and accomplished modeler in his own right, Geoff. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=giAlsus-SPQ
Rich's other passion, other than his family, was restoring and driving Austin-Healys. So I've decided that a fitting and permanent tribute for Rich will be to place an Austin-Healy on my layout.

The car is seen in this photo crossing the main in Aylmer, but it will have a permanent home on Highway 6 as crosses the main in Jarvis, once I have the scene completed. Rich's Hagersville Sub shared the mainline with the Cayuga Sub from Jarvis to Simcoe, so I imagine that had he been able to, Rich would have driven that road many times in his favorite car.
Rich also modified the 2 brass Moguls I have to run the CN trains that shared the main with the Wabash trains, so his presence will linger for many years to come.
I'm going to miss my friend a lot.
Thanks, Rich.

Twist, twist, plant. Twist, twist, plant.

That's been my mantra for the last couple of days.
While waiting for glue to set on an O scale caboose kit, we'll talk about that another time, I've been creating corn fields.
Busch makes a very nice plastic cornfield detail item that I got through those fine people at Scenic Express. The kit is a bunch of injection molded corn stalks on base. They've even modeled ears! Since it's cast flat it needs depth, so every stalk is twisted on it's axis a few times along it's length to create a sense of 3D.

The parts all received a light coat of flat green paint and once it was dry it's Farmer Brown time! Into the field we go. The nature of the product requires that each strip be glued and pinned one at a time. Makes for very slow progress. Then Woodland Scenics Earth is poured on covering the bases and filling in between the strips.

I'm about a third of the way in this photo.
My new favorite people are those awesome creative types at Silflor. They have created a stunning line of scenery products. I just had great fun creating a small field of crops using their Crop Row product and I couldn't be more pleased with the result.

I'll be spending more money with them for sure.

Something new

I've added a new page to my website. It's a listing of resin cars that I have for sale. I'll be adding items from time to time. Have a look.
http://www.elgincarshops.com/forsale.php

Treats from Germany

A couple of years ago now, I was in Germany for a Fremo meet in the town of Nordhorn. A truly inspiring experience. The level of craftsmanship was stunning and the collegiality was overwhelming.

 
These 2 images barely scratch the surface.
The other thing I came away with was a desire to get my hands on some of their throttles. Fremo uses the Digitrax Loconet protocol for their DCC operations, but have created their own hand held throttles. FREDs.
I found them to be far more ergonomic and more pleasant to use than the Digitrax throttles. So I prevailed upon my new friends and I now own 5 FREDs.

To assign a locomotive one has to dispatch the address to the FRED via a DT400. The good part of that is no one can steal your address. A good way for guests to run the layout.

Autocars anyone?

Given that much of the Wabash traffic along the Buffalo Division was for auto plants, it's no surprise that a few autocars will be required.
This car is one of a few styles of 50' autocars the Wabash had built over the years and it is easily recreated using a Sunshine Mini-Kit and a Proto 2K kit.
The Proto kits can be found on Ebay and the Mini-kits are usually available at shows where Sunshine is present.
The Mini-kit consists of resin cast Superior doors, side sill reinforcement, tack boards, door locks and decals. The modeler has to supply the 50' car kit.
Personally I find most of the supplied details from Proto to be too coarse for my tastes. So I've replaced the ladders, bracket grabs, drop grabs, AB brake components, hand brake, brake step, cut lever, etc.

The mounting holes in the car body were plugged with styrene rod and puttied as needed.
You can also see in the left hand corner the ladders. They are photo-etched stiles with preformed grabs for rungs. I'm really loving how the ladders turn out.

The layout of the brake components follows convention. Nothing too fancy. A-Line stirrups are mounted as well.

Bracket grabs are from Kadee. These are the best bracket grabs I've seen. And they're cast in a rubber like compound, which means they can take some handling without breaking.

The end is detailed again following normal convention with a photo to help.

The car is painted with Scalecoat Oxide red and the supplied decals applied. A little weathering and away we go.