During 37 years as a frontline #Paramedic, model building and model railroading was my destresser from the difficult calls of the profession. Now retired, my profession has crept into my hobby.
Just completed this N Scale (1:160) model of my old Ambulance, that I spent many years responding in.

In today’s video we are going to run some trains and I am going to do an informal review of the new Digitrax Throttle, the DT602D.

Bloopers at the end of the video.

Arduino microcontrollers have great potential to be used in model railroading for layout automation. Their low-cost and a huge community around it makes it a good tool for hobbyists, especially beginners.

If you want to get started in model railroad automation then this might be a good place to start.

Starting with the layout

Here, we are going to build a simple oval loop:

I am looking for a bunch of buildings I can print out cut and make a 3d looking background flat buildings from.

The buildings are to be used behind the roundhouse area on the layout to break the scene as there is a track going up to the coal mine that is far off to the right.

Also, have around 35feet of a flat concrete wall I am looking to stick a background to. These are for my model railway club and one of the members can get the background printed by a sign maker. 

I am after something that I repeat and is also fairly cheap/free to use. 

I enjoy stripping cars and locos down to bare plastic and repainting/decalling them. For the last few years I’ve been using spray cans to include Rustoleum, Krylon, and various hobby brands. Results have been sometimes very good but usually inconsistent and I knew deep down it was time to move to an airbrush. Plus the weathering possibilities are very intriguing. I even picked up a Badger Patriot 105 and a little spray booth last year but have been intimidated by the whole thing....

Just completed two CNR Maintenance-of-Way vehicles to add to my layout, the Trenton Subdivision in N Scale. These are resin and metal casting, Magnuson Models Hi-Rail crew cab trucks that I purchased several years ago. Decals are Highball Graphics CN MOW, Microscale Canadian flags and Hazmat placards. For the solid cast windows, I first applied a layer of gloss black, followed by a coat of Tamiya Clear Green.

I am interested to see some pics or plans on how folks have modeled power plants on their layouts.  Interested to see how you laid out track work and buildings, etc. to get some inspiration.

Since my last post I have installed the feeder and bus wires for Sorethroat and I also installed the mechanical turnout actuators. What I have still to do is solder in the wire for the polarity of the turnout frogs. Today I was able to run the first train at Sorethroat, which I want to share with you. I hope you enjoy it.

A while back, I came across an Instructable which showed how a stepper motor can be turned into a rotary encoder. Since I had a bunch of stepper motors in my collection harvested from old printers and scanners, I decided to give it a try.