Just got home from the Western Pacific Railroad Museum and a wonderful hour of running a F7A locomotive. After a quick discussion of the controls in the cockpit, when and how to use the bell and whistle, I was released to take the locomotive out on the rails. I was rather surprised by how well the brakes worked and how smooth was the process of stopping. One question I forgot to ask was why the controls were on the right side of the locomotive. Perhaps someone here will have an answer for me.

Here are a couple of pictures for you to see.

Inspired by the GLW Freight House, I spent some fun hours building Rena's Tavern and Art. The structure started as a Woodland Scenes kit. Years ago, when I still had hair, I built a similar kit on my first layout. Building this one brought back fond memories. Hope you enjoy...

I like the idea Bill Michaels has come up with to set some goals for building on our model railroads over the summer. Sharing our ideas, progress and hopefully final creations should be not only great fun but also very motivating for all of us.

Here is my project and what I want to do with it. Please if you have any ideas, let me know! 

I have been studying many examples of heavily weathered prototype box cars. Also, I have been reading some great "how to's" found on the website called THE WEATHERING SHOP. Jeremy St. Peter does fantastic weathering and he shares how he does each car. 

So here is my latest weathering job. 

Many of you have come to realize my uncle is a very eccentric. He has more money than he knows what to do with it yet he ends up buying junk for his railroad and then expects me to make it run perfect. Oh, and of course don't spend much money doing so! There are broken hinges, missing steps and screeching noises when any part is moved. Better get to work...

Gary

My uncle, the owner of Grizzly Creek & Grumpy Flats Railroad, decided he needed a car to keep control of the weeds along his rails. He found an old Union Pacific flat car, an old scrap tank and told me to make him a "weed car". Horace, the black cat is even part of the crew.

Gary

I am about 7/8 finished with my rock carving of the first section. This has been a fantastic learning experience. And yes, I have redone most of my first attempts!. So what have I learned you may ask?

1. Pictures, pictures, pictures!!! Have lots of pictures of the kind of rocks you want to carve. Thank you Joe for that bit of advice. 

2. Facet surfaces. The gentleman on this forum who does a Civil War dated layout created a video on rock carving and when he talked about rock facet faces, a huge light bulb went off in my head.

I seem to be a little too dense to add photos to regular discussion forums. I wanted to share a couple of new photos on Driline WPF 1-13 thru 1-15 but can't figure it out. So here are a couple of new shots of my layout. By the way, comments and suggestions are always welcome.

Gary

After all of the cardboard, taping and paint, it is time to apply the thin coat of plaster. I estimated I had about 30 square feet of area to cover and was not looking forward to slowly applying the thin coat of plaster by hand. I decided to try using a wall texture spray gun. It worked great!

I applied three layers of my plaster mix allowing each layer to set up before adding the next layer. The plaster was still wet, but solid to the touch. 

Here are my pros and cons to the technique.

Cons:

I added paint to the masking tape and it took on a whole different feel. 

I am using many of the techniques Joe describes in his video building Tenmile Creek. I had never used masking tape to cover the frame work, but it works so well. 

With so much vertical walls to cover with plaster, I am going to try a different technique to applying the base plaster coat. I will let you know if it works.