Decals, Flatcars and a Whole lot of Foam

     This week has been very productive. I opened by glueing down a good portion of the upper level  roadbed with Woodland Scenics foam risers (2" with an underlay of 1" foam sheets.)  I also finished the basic construction of the 3 flatcars I was working on. I narrowed 3 Gilbert/ AF 40' flats to TT Scale. Two had the pockets still on, one did not. There are 14 stake pockets and they make a good representation in TT. You just have to square them off with a file.  I built new underframes for those two and used an shortened Train Minature box car frame for the 3rd one. I used some Grandt Stake pockets I had laying around from some undetermined HOn3 project. (Rule 1 of TT; Buy it when you see it!) The first two received Widened Kadee 726's and the third TT Scale rollerbearing trucks.
      I received my decals for wheel dots and ACI labels this week (A must have for the seventies!) and decaled a Christoph car and a Gold Coast Boxcar. I also added some Consolidated Lube Stencils from an N Scale Conrail Boxcar set.
     Tonight I built a short 50' thru girder bridge from an Atlas HO base and Central Valley girders. The girders are a bit smaller than the Atlas and work fine for TT scale. The Testors Liquid cement didn't hold so I used some Zap-A-Gap to finish the job. Well back to the foam...

Tracks are in!

It has been a while since I posted. Still working on the layout. Most of the main tracks are in, for the TT,  with the exception of a few spurs that I will hand lay. Had an issue with the turnouts as Iam using Caboose Industries hand throws and they didn't mate up with the Tillig turnouts very well. Had to build styrene linkages and use tiny screws to connect them, that along with a guide base to support the linkage for each turnout. Wiring is done, just need to build a control panel. Put up the double-sided backdrop as well. I cut the plywood for the Hon3 side and supports for that. Haven't installed that yet as I made a few changes (improvements?) to the Hon3 side. I have all the cars and locos for the Narrow Gauge side, but have spent a lot of my time in the last year building TT rolling stock. Still need to paint and decal a bunch of stuff.  I am taking a break from building 3f flatcars from HO Gilbert 40ft cars. They make a nice 57 ft General service flat when narrowed. Heres a few pics of various stuff. Hope to start doing scenery once I do a few roadbed supports for the high line on the TT side.

 PROGRESS AT LAST! Been a while since I posted. Got the move done. The layout is finally up, no major changes, just minor adjustments to the curve centers on inner loops. The Tillig track is great, very smooth and bends easy. I just finished laying out all the tracks on the TT side and then I will finish the backdrop., which is removable, which is good, coz I'm moving again! This time I'm gonna stay put for a while... Here are some photos. First photo is the Lemon Heights yard. It is looking Railroad west. Packing plant will be on the left of the near curve. Note in second photo the caboose in front is TT, the one in the back is back is N scale

TT Multi Scale Layout

I am working the design for the new layout as I am moving. My current layout is an HOn3 that was to built in three sections. The radius was to be 16 1/2' for the loop part, which would have been too tight for my locomotive (MDC 2-8-0). I enjoy narrow gauge but TTn42 is so close in  gauge (1.5mm) that it wasn't worth it to me when a reasonable amount of stuff is available in HOn3. But I love TT scale and well, even HO is too big to do what I want. So..., what to do? Eureka! I have decided to model a multi scale layout! One half will be TT and the other half of the 4x8 will be HOn3. The HOn3 will be higher in elevation. The TT side will have a staging yard under the HOn3 half and the HOn3 tracks will be in the back of the TT section. They are a mm and a half smaller and will offer a bit of forced perspective. I just won't operate them at the same time. I am building the continuos loop first and not just the yard like my previous layout. Just looking at the preliminary design I can see you fit a lot in in 1/120 scale. I was so used to the constant compromise in HO. Every time I got an idea I would have  to adjust. TT is great,  as I can "fit" stuff in and it is a good feeling. I have one other thing going  for the layout as I built the track layout in HO in the 80's/90's and I know what will work. That layout was an eleven foot shelf layout. I just have to bend it slightly at each end then use curved turnouts on one end and add an oil refinery (partially on the backdrop) and it's good to go. I want to get a quick start on the layout, so I am going to use commercial track (Tillig. It looks great!), then relay it later with code 55 hand laid track and Fast Tracks kits. N Scale cork roadbed works well in HOn3 so I think I'll use it for the TT. Of course, because of the design I'll have to scratch build the structures, but I  have to do that in TT Scale anyway and the HO buildings were heavily kit bashed from DPM kits.  Although Walthers has a nice N Scale Printers building that can be "raised" with a concrete foundation and scale doors. Although it seems to be easier to  "cut-down" HO buildings.

Sept 15, 2017
 
      Well it's been a while since I posted. The reason, I must admit is as an unsuccessful foray into N scale. I gave up as it's just too small to any kitbashing for me. And since I don't have the room for HO, TT it is. I decided to build a smaller layout then I had previsously envisioned. Actually I am going to start with sectional code 80 track to get a quick start. I was setback by the cost of fastrak switches and the time involved, which I don't have...! That plus the TT layout I was going to build was a switching/shelf layout. I have had an epiphany since then when I came to realize that everyone of the successful layouts I have had was a continous run layout. I have to get the trains running or I lose interest too fast.  So I will be building with a quick start option and upgrading to handlaid code 55 track later.
      I kept my TT stuff,  borrowing the trucks I had built for a bulkhead flat (HP kit with rebuilt styrene sides.) I used the trucks (precision scale 4'9" vulcan with roundhouse Hon3 re-gauged wheels) for an HP chemical tankcar kit. I plan to build at least one train before I break ground on the new layout. (Which will be 6 months or so as I am planning another 500 mile move) I will use the legs from my current Hon3 layout with a new board for the new layout.  But mostly I just want to have fun and I find TT scale to a lot of fun...

TT scale HP Covered Hopper

Well almost finished with my first TT scale car. It's an HP covered hopper kit. It was put together when I bought it. Im using the HP trucks for now. I added an etched brass N scale roof walk and brake wheel (they are a bit oversized.) I glued a styrene strip for a nameplate on the side, added Kadee N scale couplers and there you go. It is a bit light. I would've added more weight, but the kit was all ready built up and it would have destroyed the model had I opened it up to put weight inside. So for now I will let it be. paint is next then decals. I'm gonna see if I can find an N scale covered hopper set for the numbers,etc,... Pictures to follow...I have also been working on using pre-printed TT scale doors to use in converted HO buildings.. I use HO scale plans reduced 72%, then colorized, glued to clear or solid  styrene and built into the HO door frames. Let you know how that works out...

HOn3 for TT?

                                                HOW MUCH HOn3 IS USEFUL?

December 9th 2015 I was surprised at much is actually useful; especially if model the WW 2 era and before.The best I've found are the Micro Trains C&S cars. Unfortunetly they are currently out of production. These cars and any of the D&RGW boxcars (Precision Scale, Blackstone and Rail Line) make good wooden boxcars if you build your own underframes. I prefer styrene channel stock, but brass would work as well. Precision Scale and Blackstone tank cars are excellent, even for modern era. ( I saw welded 40 ft tank cars with friction bearings in chemical service even in the late 1970's. They would bring out lead compound for gasoline to the refineries in LA in Dupont  tank cars on the Santa Fe. They had leaded gas then!)It would be hard to model passenger cars though. I'm thinking about using wooden sides kits and flipping them inside out and using the smooth side, using two kits  to get one 80 ft car. of course I model modern in TT so this is problematic as to era. But these could be used for MOW cars. What I'm most impressed with is the wheels. After buying some TT cars (HP, Kemtron, Gold Coast and Zeuke) is the Hon3 wheels are a really good match. MDC is the best as are Micro Trains/ Kadee.  I put them in the Hon3 Bettendorf trucks and they look good. Precision Scale, Blackstone and Rio Grande Models are a bit too wide. I use them for my Hon3 models.Example: A Rio Grande Models Vulcan truck with Micro Trains wheels (axle spacers added) look good and the RGM wheels will be used for Micro Trains or MDC archbar trucks. Synergy! MDC wheels look good on Zeuke tank cars. You just have to spread the wheels to 12mm, file down the axle ends. Some of the HP wheels I have have larger flanges then some of the others. I wonder if the larger ones are older? Anyway the smaller ones look OK and the Kemtron wheels seem to in scale. But I mix things up depending on the look I want and the type of cars it is. So far I am very happy in TT scale. Who would've thought going back to the future would work for me. After all the hi-tech stuff recently I find it rewarding to actually model stuff...