Post #4- Cape Cod Railroad #1114 Paint & Decals

            Yesterday I finally completed a project that I'd been meaning to get around to for months: paint and detail an F7A for the Cape Cod Railroad.

            As you can see, there are a few flaws with it. First of all, this locomotive is an F7A, not an FP10 like the actual #1114-that's because no one makes models of the FP10s, at least from what I could find, and I had this F7 just sitting on my desk taking up space. This problem may be remedied in the future with the addition of red marker lights on the front, which is really the only visible difference between the F7 and FP10.Also, this unit has a hole for an additional head light-where the Mars gyrating warning light(more about those here: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mars_Light) would have gone. That's because this unit was an ex-Santa Fe unit, which was a railroad that had Mars lights on most of their F-Units. That will be patched with a piece of styrene sometime in the future.
            In addition, I ended up not having enough yellow striping to go around the whole engine; I lost one of the large "1114" decals that go on the rear of the engine, so the right side doesn't have that; and finally, the paint lines could've been better. Nevertheless, considering that it is my first actual paint job involving the use of tape, and that it is my first job to have included decals, I think it came out looking pretty good. I also had an Athearn RTR Ford Stake Bed Truck that I didn't know what do with, and I wasn't using the passenger car decals, so...

....More to come soon.

Post #3- Fairhaven Rail Yard Track Plan

            This is the map, published in June 1915, of the Fairhaven Branch Railroad (which by this time had been swallowed up by the Old Colony and New York, New Haven & Hartford railroads to become part of the Old Colony System of the NYNH&HRR) Yard on the Fairhaven waterfront. You can find the original map here: http://images.lib.uconn.edu/cdm/singleitem/collection/maps/id/1700 . I outlined the major and important features on this map, using Microsoft Paint.
            On another note, I have discovered a piece of plywood in my house. The board has some pieces missing out of it, but I think I will be able to work with it, as the pieces are taken out of the top, where the ferry slip and end of the yard will be. More to come.

January Update

Update: I have not posted in a while. I am in the process of designing a track plan and will post soon.

Post #2- How to: Make an HO Scale EOT Flag for Your Trailing Car

  

Picture Credit: Autoorb.com/Google Images

EOT Devices, or End-of-Train Devices, are used throughout the United States to signal the end of a train. These can vary from simple flags to FREDs (Flashing Rear End Devices). Today I will show you how to create a simple flag for the end of your consist.

First, You will need the following materials:

                                             -A piece of blank paper (preferably white)

                                             -Scissors

                                             -Glue (I used Gorilla Glue for clarity, but Elmers should work fine)

                                             -A Toothpick, or the end of a skewer

                                             -An orange marker or Sharpie

                                             -A car with knuckle couplers to test the finished product

Start out by marking the toothpick at 3/4 of an inch, and cut.

 

Next, color in a rectangular portion of your paper, about 3/4"x1/4". Then cut it out. Try to make the edges you cut as straight as possible.

Now  glue the flag to the toothpick. Once the flag is glued, don't let gravity pull the flag down; hold it up in the air for a minute or so, but hold it horizontally so it is not pulled down vertically.

After holding it up to dry, put it down and let it dry for a additional few minutes. Now you are ready to test the finished product! Put the flag in the coupler on the designated testing car and run it around the track a few times.

 

Also, make sure your couplers are in the closed position before you insert the flag, as shown above.(Sorry for the bad picture quality!) If the flag falls off a few times after you start using it, just adjust the flag position or the coupler; if this persists, then you should probably use another car at the end of your consist. Thank you for reading.

Post #1- New Cars

Yesterday I received 3 cars as birthday presents. One is a Maine Central Flatcar with a crated and strapped down load. Another is an Accurail 36FT. Panel-Sided Hopper for the New Haven Old Colony Division. This is an exclusive club car availible from the Old Colony Model Railroad Club. You can find their website here: http://oldcolonymodelrailroad.tripod.com/index.html . Finally, the last car was bought at a train show. It is a used Bev Bel passenger car for the Boston & Maine. I also received a 10-pack of Kadee No. 5 couplers, which I will eventually use to replace the horn-hook couplers on some of my older cars.

                                    The MEC Flatcar with load, road number 7504.

                            Exclusive Old Colony Model RR Club Hopper, with reporting mark      "OCMRRC" and road number 770768.

  It's blurry, but here it is: the Boston & Maine Passenger Car No. 4625.