SRY #151

  A couple of years ago when I decided to get back into HO scale, I was browsing on Credit Valley Rail website The Credit Valley Railway Company Ltd (cvrco.ca)   ,   I came across this Atlas MP15DC locomotive and noticed it was ESU sound equipped, it was from a Canadian Road (Southern Railroad of British Columbia), and most importantly it was on Sale. It was on a bit of an impulse buy, but at the time I didnt have any experience with ESU sound decoders (which i wanted to get), and I thought that because I was getting such a good deal on it that worse case scenario that I could sell it in the future and get my money back. I say this as even at the time, I knew that a release for a Road Name for a small Canadian Short Line such as this would be hard to acquire in a few years time once they were all sold out - this seems to be the case with what I have been seeing on Ebay and the like lately - Locomotives that were released years ago are going for prices above what they sold for new! As an ESU equipped Atlas, it runs exceptionally well and I have fine tuned the programming to make it even better. The only modification I made was to swap out the plastic couplers for Kadee Scale Head couplers. The model mainly sits in my display cabinet and I take it out a couple of times a year to give it a run. I like it very much and have decide I am going to hang on to it for now...you never know where my modeling direction will take me in the future. Till next time....

Freight car Friday

 Hi Folks. Well browsing through my recently received March edition of Model Railroader magazine ( I have been a subscriber for ~ 25 years). I came across an article by Lou Sassi on modeling a tractor load for a flatcar in On30. I myself did this several years ago and pretty much did it the same way as Lou did with the exception that I only had one tractor as the load, not two as Lou did. My On30 layout is suppose to be set in an early 50's timeframe, so when I decided to create the tractor load, I had to go on the internet and find a suitable tractor to fit that time period. I was able to find a McCormick -Deering WS6 model and after researching it , I was able to see that the last year of production was 1953, so it would fit right in. Here is a link to the history of this tractor   TractorData.com McCormick-Deering W-6 tractor information

Once I received the tractor, I used one of my existing Bachmann On30 flat cars - already lettered for NBR&N and with a Laser cut wood floor already in place. I cut suitable wheel blocking braces and glued these into place so that the would secure the wheels of the tractor . I used Tichy brand NBW casting (painted a rust color) and glue them onto the tops of the wheel braces. Pre blackened A -Line chain was used to "tie" down the tractor to the deck. The ends were glued into the side pocket stakes of the flatcar. This was a pretty easy one night project , and the result is an eye catching load for a flatcar. Take a look:

McCormick Deering WS6

Davenport #16 shoves the flatcar with the new tractor