Your golden-era model railroads!

[p51]

I'll start with mine, which takes place in Eastern Tennessee in the summer of 1943.

It'll be in a magazine coming out any day now: http://on30annual.com/current-issue/

 

[p51]

I took this with my cell over the weekend:

 

[p51]

Come on, nobody else has a 30s-40s themed layout?
I moved the civil war memorial into some trees, and I think it looks way better there.

Adjacent to that, I just completed a cow field, complete with hay pen, water bucket and cow pies. All I need to do now is to finish painting the two cow figures I have for it:

As for the fence there, I was looking to make the type of gate my parents described to me in use as late as the 60s or so. People would make pockets for boards to go across an opening as nobody could afford a 'new fangled' gate of any kind. Here's what a real gate like that look like along the ET&WNC, around 1949 or so:

As I put the fence on my cow pasture onto the layout, I tried my best to re-create that. Here it is before the glue dried:

 

[DocCasualty]

Awesome setup! I haven't been into model railroading since we had Lionel classic 3-rail O gauge when I was growing up. Hardly a comparison to what you've done there.

Just so I understand, this is O gauge trains/layout on HO track?

 

[Edward]

Alas, I simply don't have the space for a trainset in my flat, but I'd love to built a set-up like yours - even better if I could make it look like it was in a ruined European city as a tabletop for wargaming!

 

[p51]

Just so I understand, this is O gauge trains/layout on HO track?

Width-wise, yes, but the track itself has ties that are correct for O scale.

 

[EdwardM]

p51: Do you lay your own track?

 

[p51]

Do you lay your own track?

Nope, that's flex track and turnouts from the same company, Micro Engineering. Their stuff is pretty fragile while you're putting it in, though...
I wanted track that was solid and as trouble free as I could get. Every section is connected to feeder wires off the main bus.

 

[p51]

I took these yesterday with my cell, noticing the afternoon light...

 

[p51]

I built some metal figures I got from the UK and painted them last week. I'd never done much figure work before and though they're hardly perfect, I am okay with how they turned out.

 

[kampkatz]

I built some metal figures I got from the UK and painted them last week. I'd never done much figure work before and though they're hardly perfect, I am okay with how they turned out.

P51, The figures look appropriate for the scenes. Your detailing is fine and the scenery/layout is worthy of Model Railroader.

 

[p51]

Your detailing is fine and the scenery/layout is worthy of Model Railroader.

Ironically, Model Railroader was the only magazine I pitched an article to who turned me down totally. They said they had enough On30 articles. They don't like that gauge as they were the last magazine in the hobby to refer to that gauge as such and hardly ever run anything about it. MR is mostly HO and N standard gauge-centric.
Yeah, they might have had enough articles already, but they don't run them.

 

[David Conwill]

Wonderful stuff! I grew up with an HO-scale layout in the basement set in the early- to mid-1960s. I am interested in someday trying my hand at an HO- or N-scale layout set in the '20s or '30s and capable of operation.

 

[p51]

Playing around with my cell again:

 

[GHT]

Your model railway is incredible, so much attention to detail. it's obvious that it's a labour of love. Like Edward, I just wouldn't have the space, probably wouldn't have the time either, but all the same, it does stir the blood.

If you would like to see others then do yourself a favour and look up the music impresario, Pete Waterman, his model trains are spectacular. Just put "Pete Waterman model trains," into the YouTube search.

 

[David Conwill]

There is a fellow on Instagram who models the Boston & Maine in the area where I live during the 1940s. Some of his shots are incredible.

 

[p51]

Your model railway is incredible, so much attention to detail. it's obvious that it's a labour of love. Like Edward, I just wouldn't have the space, probably wouldn't have the time either, but all the same, it does stir the blood.

Thank you very much. My room is only a 10X11 foot space, which is why I can devote so much detail. I'm at a point where the details are my primary goal and I'm enjoying this aspect more than any other during the time I built everything.

If you would like to see others then do yourself a favour and look up the music impresario, Pete Waterman, his model trains are spectacular. Just put "Pete Waterman model trains," into the YouTube search.

I just looked it up. Really good work! I buy some of the Brit model RR magazines every now and then (for some 'out of the box' thinking as Brits have a totally different take on model railroad layouts than Americans do. I've seen his work before.

 

[p51]

I just completed a new article, which should be running in this magazine sometime in 2018: http://www.ngslgazette.com/
I wrote it in the context of finding a footlocker at a garage sale and finding a box of negatives at the bottom.
Here are some castoff shots that didn't make the cut, as well as photos of my new Quonset hut and the Army R HQ area.

 

[p51]

On Saturday, I had a show at a regional RR photography slideshow. People come from all over for this and my 11-minute show went first. But before that, they aired this word from their sponsor, which was met with huge laughs:

Yesterday afternoon, I did a bunch of stuff to get the layout ready for the all-day operating session event (put in by a Olympia group, people are coming from all over, to run in two three-hour sessions at various layouts in this area). I cleaned the track, got all the paperwork correct (there are cards that tell you where each car is supposed to go) and the track switches marked. I also took a couple of photos just for the heck of it, making up a longer commuter train at Winner:

 

[p51]

I finally got around to working on a GMC 2 ½ ton truck model I’d gotten off eBay a while back. They make them and only sell them in Europe, so finding one is really tough. I was lucky to get this one. I think it makes a good addition to the Army area on the layout as the GMC is a classic WW2 vehicle. It came on Spanish Army markings, so I had to do a lot of work to get those off and get the stateside early-war US markings in place.

Here’s what it looked like by the time I was done:

And placed in the ‘motor pool’ on the layout:

Then, I couldn’t resist taking an ‘eye level’ shot: