nkncat

Electra under Cover

2011-12-29T21:01:00.000-08:00

It's been quite a few years since I've been to Travel Town, a railroad museum in Los Angeles's Griffith Park. (Here's the LA Park Department's official Travel Town page, and here's one for the Travel Town Museum Association.

Travel Town is basically a static display of old equipment, mostly steam engines, some heavyweight passenger cars (which can be rented out, as my wife did once to throw me a surprise party--thanks Hon, that was awesome!), a some narrow gauge cars, and a few pieces of traction equipment, such as the Electra:

This little steeplecab has a bit of history; it started life on a Northwestern Pacific predecessor in Marin County, and spent its latter career on the PE. In 1906 it did a stint in San Francisco hauling trains of rubble.

(Image from the UC Berkeley Bancroft Library)

A Seasonal Item to Stock Up On

2011-12-24T01:15:00.000-08:00

I'm planning to add lights to buildings on my layout soon. An article in the December 2010 issue of Railroad Model Craftsman (about building and lighting a sandhouse) recommended "warm white LED" Christmas lights, like these

with a 9v source and 300Ω resistors, for a warm incandescent light effect. I'll give it a go. I think one box ought to last for a year's worth of model-lighting projects!

LEDs tree lights come in standard ("icy") white too. Those might work for well-lit modern scenes (station platforms, for example).

If you want to try this, make sure to pick up a string of lights fast, or you'll have to wait til Christmas 2012!

Sprinter

2011-11-02T18:20:00.000-07:00

This August (sorry to get behind in my posts) Wini's Ice Theater team took part in the 2011 State Games of America, in which thousands of young athletes converged on San Diego. The ice theater part of this even took place in Escondido, the eastern terminus of San Diego County's new Sprinter Diesel Light Rail line.

The western end of the line is the Oceanside Transit Center,

connection with AmTrak Pacific Surfliner, Coaster, and a block from the beach.

Nathan and I made as many trips by Sprinter as we could.

He really liked watching them, too.

And face it, that's a nice looking train. Those are Siemens Desiro's, which come in both Diesel and Electric versions, and run in many countries; in the US, they also run on Austin Capital Metro.

The Sprinter maintenance shop building, or "barn" as old-fashioned fans call'em, is in Escondido.

It has a few unusual features that seem to suit the inland Southern California climate well: a bank of solar panels, and fairly successful vegetable garden, with bean vines spilling over into the fence.

The Sprinter line runs on a Santa Fe (well, now BNSF) branch that still has a few freight customers. Freight trains run at night, after Sprinter shuts down. The Desiros are "non-FRA-compliant", which basically means they are not built to withstand a collision with a freight train, so this "temporal separation" is a legal safety requirement. Using this freight line for a right-of-way gives Sprinter somewhat more rustic scenery than the typical urban light rail line.

As far as the "business" part of the trip goes, the ice theater team's performance was a hit, winning first place.

(These photos by Wini's cousin Anna, who is an excellent action photographer).

Firenze

2011-09-03T11:20:00.001-07:00

I recently attended a professional conference in Florence, Italy--a beautiful city with famous cultural attractions, like this, stunning views, and renaissance architecture. Sure, I like all that, and between lectures about new developments in speech recognition, I also made sure to sample local cuisine (everyone asks about the pizza, but the ice cream is not to be overlooked--and nobody looks askance at a grown man walking around with an ice cream cone in Italy, either).

But I was really looking forward to checking out Florence's brand new tram system. Here's an official site of ATAF, Florence's transit agency, but here's a more informative tram-fan site, and here's the Italian Wikipedia page about Tranvia di Firenze.

The tram line starts at the main train station, next to the historic part of the city; but if you visit note that the tracks right in front of the station are not yet used--you have to walk through the station (or go through the underground mall beneath it) to the side away from the old city.

The cars are a nice, modern, low-floor type.

The line heads out into residential areas; mostly fairly modern, although it did pass this apparent castle.

A scenic part of the line goes through a large park, where there was a (semi-permanent?) carnival going on.

The outer end of the line is at the edge of the city, and quite rustic.

The tracks even go by an old vinyard.

It's a scenic terminus, and modelers would do well to remember that in the classic streetcar era so many of us try to reproduce in miniature, ends-of-lines at the border of city and country were common. It would be an interesting scene for a layout.

On the ride back, I made a practical stop at a less scenic, and very familiar environment, by a strip mall with a large new Coop, an originally Swiss grocery chain expanding into Italy, to pick up components of a makeshift dinner. Can't eat out every night! Some bread, some cheese, salami and grapes from a supermarket makes a pretty meal when it's from a supermarket in Italy.

Wine Box to Wooden Train Bridge

2011-06-12T17:39:00.000-07:00

A few weeks ago I picked up a wooden wine box for a buck or so at a garage sale. I figured it would be a classy container for organizing (train) stuff in the garage.

Inside there were two pieces of wood with round cut-outs for holding wine bottles, like this (adding a bottle from my cabinet for illustrative purposes!):

Stand it on it's edge, and it sure looks like a bridge.

I thought Nathan could use something like that for his wooden trains. Instead of one long bridge, I cut out the middle arch and made two segments like this. (It's all held together with wood glue--if that doesn't hold, I'll add some screws).

This gives us a little more flexibility in arranging elevated track layouts. The "feet" are for stability and to elevate the roadbed up to the level of other bridge pieces we have, which are high enough for trains to go under.

I rummaged through our boxes of wooden tracks and found some straight pieces. They're just long enough to leave a bit of the bridge support exposed for connecting pieces of track to rest on.

Put it all together, and it starts to look like something sure to make Nathan happy--a BART layout.

He seems to be enjoying it.

"Go, BART train, go!"

Railtown 1897

2011-06-11T21:56:00.000-07:00

I have had the good fortune to have an online friend turn into a real-life one, and one who has a tradition of having birthday parties at railway museums. This year's was at Railtown 1897, on the Sierra Railway, at Jamestown, CA.

Our train was pulled by Sierra Railway No. 3, recently restored, and the star of numerous movie appearances down the decades (people of my generation are most likely to remember Back to the Future Part III).

An interesting feature of this museum is that it is housed in a roundhouse and shop complex in continuous use by the Sierra Ry since it's founding. Shay No. 2 was poking it's nose at one of the doors.

Inside the roundhouse were a few piecces of famous (to railfans and modellers) pieces of equipment that I was familiar with from reading but had no idea still existed. This railbus was used on the Hetch Hetchy Ry, used to build the dam by the same name. This being a project of the City of San Francisco, the bus was built in the Municipal Railway's streetcar shops, and delivered to the SP for shipment to the mountains by simply driving it on streetcar tracks down to the station during the middle of the night!

A sketch of this bus has appeared at the top of the editorial page of the Narrow Gauge & Short Line Gazette for many years.

This combine probably looks familiar to anyone who's ever been a model train shop--it and a companion coach (which I don't know the fate of) are the prototypes of the MDC/Roundhouse 34' "Overton" cars.

These cars were specially built for a particularly twisty branch line, to Angels Camp, CA. Even in 1:1, that car is cute.

A group of antique gas engine restorers had some of there work on display, and one of them had brought this restored forest service truck,

which he happily let kids climb in to "drive", an oppportunity which Nathan did not pass up.

Railtown is on a list of state parks set to close later this year if California is not able to improve its finances. Hopefully it will not come to that, but if you'd like to visit, coming this summer would be prudent. And if you live here, let your representatives know that decimating our park system is not the way to solve our budget problems.

(By coincidence, a few days after I posted this, the July 2011 issue of Rail Model Craftsman arrived in my mailbox, with several articles about the Sierra at Jamestown).

BART Construction Photos

2011-05-23T08:07:00.000-07:00

Here is a nice photo article from SFGate/SF Chronicle.

I seem to have been sitting on this post for a while... well I'll push it out now, since the linked-to article is still up (but somehow the Chronicle's web server is confused and makes the article appear to be published in the future).

Model Model T

2011-05-01T08:11:00.001-07:00

Here's a photolog of building a Model T kit from Micron Art (aka µA).

First some prototype research--a local Ford dealership conveniently had a Model T on display (although a more sporty style of one), in a well-lit showroom, which I photographed after hours under cover of darkness:

Now to the N scale version. Here's what you start with, just a brass fret and instructions. US quarter for size comparison. One sheet is actually for two models.

On a tip from a friend, I lightly sanded everything with a fine-grit sandpaper, to help paint stick on (hopefully) without primer. (I just did the right half).

Making a brass model is a lot like making a paper model. You cut out parts and fold them up on dotted lines. Here's the main chassis piece.

Micro-Mark sells an interesting-looking tool called the Etch-Mate for making these folds precisely, but I'm just using a pair of non-tooth pliers (don't want to leave "tooth marks"), itself a slightly unusual item but you can get them in hardware stores (got mine at OSH), and folding things against a hard surface.

Here's the main body piece. The doors are separately applied pieces. So far I'm gluing things with the regular kind of crazy-glue cyanoacrylate (runny) that you can get at any drug store or even supermarket.

The seats are now folded into shape and installed:

One last interior detail is the steering wheel. Next, the instructions suggest that this is a good time to paint the interior, so I did, following their color recommendations. Red leather seats--nice!

Looking at close-up photos like this, I always see little goofs I've made. I guess if I didn't notice them in real life, even with reading glasses, I shouldn't worry too much.

I feel like Godzilla trying to do a detail job on a 1:1 car.

The body is folded up, and the cowling glued on the front. Starting to look like a car. I'm using gel-type superglue, then sanding the corners round.

Next up, finish the hood, put the body and chassis together. I could stop here and call it a retro hot-rod motor sled.

Glue on the roof. If there was anything else I was supposed to put inside, it's too late now :) ... fold up the fenders and glue the radiator onto the front, then bend the front fenders down and glue onto the little arms that stick out from the radiator piece.

The next piece to attach is a combination rear-axle, driveshaft, diagonal frame piece, which goes on the bottom, naturally. There seems to be a mistake in the instructions here. They show a fold between the axle and the rear support springs, keeping the axle bit horizontal; I think you should really keep the axle bit vertical and fold at the joint between the axle and the driveshaft and diagonals. The instructions do caution you to make sure the axle is positioned so that the rear wheels won't scrape the fenders, and doing it the way I'm suggesting gives them much better clearance.

This also puts the rear axles on the same level as the front axles, as you can see below, which should make the whole car sit levelly when the wheels are on.

I did not figure this out immediately. The instructions include the helpful advice that you can unglue CA/superglue with acetone (nail polish remover), which proved true, although I messed up this delicate piece in the process. As I noted, you actually get parts for two cars from the kit, so I cannibalized from the other half. I'll figure out what to do for the other one when I get there (but perhaps the point of the double kit is not so much than anyone builds two, as an acknowledgment that few modelers are likely to complete the kit without breaking or loosing at least one tiny part).

At this point the model is almost ready to paint. But there was a hole between the running boards, front fenders, and nose of the car that isn't there on actual model T's. Can't blame the kit for this--it's just a limitation of what you can make out a folded sheet of brass. I decided to fill it with Microscale Micro Krystal Klear; I don't care that about it being transparent (it'll be painted over, anyway), but it's good for filling little gaps.

Time to start painting. Of course it's black! For models this small, I brush-paint. It took several passes to make sure every obscure corner was covered--I actually found a lot of places that needed touching up by taking pictures and looking at them on my computer.

One thing I learned the hard way, too late to fix it for this model, is that blobs of glue, which aren't very visible before painting, since they're transparent, show up as obvious blobs afterwards. Next time I'll make sure to sand them down first.

Here I'm using Micro Krystal Klear for it's intended purpose, window glazing--also a dab on each of the headlights.

It looks like glass when it dries.

Per the kit's recommendations, I painted the wheel spokes brown, and the tires light gray. I've never seen light gray tires, except maybe on a bike, but perhaps this is an area where even vintage car restorers choose modern, safer materials over authenticity.

The instructions recommend painting the wheels and tires while they are still on the frets, and I think that's probably a good idea, but sometimes I forget to read instructions.

Put the wheels on the axles, add the tiny round nuts (the instructions say that's optional, but I didn't come this far to skimp on the last detail--also I figure they really will help keep the wheels on), done!

Fill'er up!

A Pair of Pies for Easter

2011-04-25T21:33:00.001-07:00

We had company for Easter, so I was feeling festive and seasonal--so I made a carrot pie. Basically: just follow a pumpkin pie recipe, but substitute carrots--microwave the heck out of them first, and then put the whole filling mix in the blender long enough to make sure it's not stringy.

It's pretty good (it actually tastes remarkably like pumpkin though, or maybe butternut squash).

The carrot pie was a success, and disappeared quickly, so I decided to bake another pie. I decided to try something I've been meaning to try for a long time.

This is ube. It's a purple yam from the Philippines. It's dull and gray on the outside, but bright purple on the inside. (It is not to be confused with Japanese purple yams, which are next to ube at my nearest Asian market, but purple on the outside and white on the inside. Go figure!)

Peel it, chop it up, and steam it in the microwave for 10 minutes or so. Then mix up everything in the blender, as with the carrots, and pieify.

It comes out purple,

and yummy!

Ok, for a trolley connection--if you like ube, you need to try ube ice cream at Mitchell's in San Francisco, an easy walk from the J line.

How Should I Power This?

2011-04-03T21:40:00.001-07:00

A local store which sells odd remaindered items had this egg-trike contraption for sale; I think you're supposed to put it in your garden to hold plants.

But the wheels actually turn, and the handlebars work, and a small person at least can sit in it.

It would be fun to turn this into an actual vehicle. Make it pedal-powered. Or install a battery and an electric motor. Or maybe it should be steam-powered?

In other springtime shopping, we encountered this cat who lives in the garden department of our local (Redwood City) OSH. The people who work there put out food and water, and even installed a kitty bed under the plant display.

The cat is elusive, but Nate made friends.

Even though I go to this store fairly frequently, I hadn't seen this cat for a few years--basically since Wini was this age. She also got to pet it a few times. The store staff tells me this cat has been here for years, so I guess it really is the same one. It just likes kids!

Simple Throttle with Momentum

2011-03-26T09:15:00.000-07:00

A few weeks ago I posted about running trolleys and trains with a 9v battery and a home-made, minmalist transistor throttle.

The design of that throttle was like this (I redrew it in a way that makes it a little clearer how it all works, to me at least).

This design, like most basic train controllers, lets you start and stop as fast as you want. Part of the challenge of operating a train or a streetcar is that they don't stop on a dime, and I always thought running miniature ones might be more interesting if you had to take stopping distance into account. My main throttle, an MRC Tech II, has this feature, but seems to be designed for long trains on large layouts--if I turn it on, even pressing the "brake" switch, a streetcar will make it most of the way around my tiny layout before it stops!

So here's my effort to add some a slight momentum feature to the simple throttle design. There's no separate "drift" and "brake" modes; the idea is that when you turn down the speed knob, this represents applying the brakes in a normal, non-emergency, "not making all the passengers fall over" way that brings the car to a stop in a reasonable distance.

The key idea is to use a capacitor to keep some slowly-decreasing current flowing through the the "control" B->E circuit through the transistor even after the potentiometer turns off (or close to off) current flowing from the battery. After some experiments and getting some advice, I realized that the two diodes are necessary to keep the capacitor discharge from flowing in unintended directions that allow it all to dissipate at once (and, apparently, even burn out the potentiometer).

The size of the capacitor (in conjunction with the resistance in the discharge path) will determine how quickly the control current goes down. A 47μF cap I had on hand seemed about right for my tiny layout. Experiment and see what suits you.

You could use a much larger cap to simulate coasting, and add another switch (push-button, probably) leading to a lower resistance, faster discharge path, for braking.

Goodbye Carl, and Thanks

2011-03-07T08:25:00.000-08:00

Carl Arendt, creator of the Small Layout Scrapbook, has passed away. Us fans of small train layouts will miss him and his "monthly" updates to his website (most months he put out an "extra" mid-month post).

Traction lends itself to small layouts, and traction-related posts were frequent. (The site has a built-in search function, so you can find them easily.)

An Odd Backstreet Discovery

2011-03-05T17:51:00.000-08:00

I volunteered to help with props for Wini's Ice Theater team. It was a nice day so I decided to bike over to the rink to help pack up props today. Somehow I got roped into painting props, and then ran out of paint. The local hardware store wasn't too far, but it wasn't exactly a scenic ride through the industrial side of Redwood City.

But I did come across this oddity, and old rubber-tired, fake cable car, lettered for both the California St. Ry and the Asiya Shrine Clowns, probably a veteran of numerous parades.

There have been several Cal Cable cars #49; it's s reasonable replica of the overall design.

Minimalist Throttle

2011-02-26T19:44:00.000-08:00

The rest of the model railroading hobby may be embracing DCC, but I work on software for a living, and the last thing I want to do is to get computers mixed up in my hobby. It's still fun to dabble in analog electronics, though.

Lately Nathan & I have been running trolleys and trains independently of our regular layout, just snapping together extra pieces of Tomix Fine Track on the dining room table. For quick set-up and disassembly, I thought a simple, battery powered controller would be nice. Tomix actually makes such a thing--it looks like a miniature vintage streetcar controller (cool!). But I thought it would be fun to put together a simple transistor throttle, basically a 9v battery combined with a minimalized version of the "NTrak Basic Throttle".

Putting together some basic components (most from Radio Shack, some from Fry's) I came up with this:

Schematically, as below. (Here I'm adding two switches that I don't have in my breadboard mock-up version, but which are really necessary for a usable throttle--an on/off switch and a DPDT direction switch.)

The potentiometer is 1.0k linear, the fixed resistor is 100 ohms, the transistor is a TIP 120 Darlington. (A Darlington Transistor is actually a bundling of two transistors in one package, for double amplification).

The basic idea is that a small amount of current flowing from base (B) to emitter (E) controls/scales the amplitude of a larger current flowing from collector (C) to emitter (E), and from there through the motor. The controlling B->E current depends on the setting of the potentiometer; sliding that arrow "up" and "down" determines how much resistance there is in the B->E path vs the "vertical" path through the potentiometer that bypasses the transistor and motor.

It works!

I'm going to add one last tip: the package of the transistor (at least the one I got) explains which lead is which, but there's no markings on the actual thing--so put a dab of paint on each, in different colors.

Down by the Port

2011-02-20T18:18:00.000-08:00

The welcome sign to our town, Redwood City, CA proudly proclaims it to be a world port. The port is a narrow strip of land jutting out into San Francisco Bay, over which a road and a spur line connect to ship loading facilities and a few industries.

View Larger Map

Those strangely-colored regions are salt evaporator ponds, at various stages of their process.

Taking advantage of the first sunny day after several of steady rain, Nathan and I visited the port area to find a geocache. Nearby, we encountered an old centercab diesel, Port of RWC #1:

The ship in the background was being loaded with some sort of bulk material via conveyor:

Nearby was an occasionally used, but unlocked switch and switchstand, so I had a chance to show Nathan how these things work (both branching tracks went through locked chain link gates, so I had no worry that a train was going to come rolling through without stopping and head the wrong way because of our meddling).

AOL Adwrap, Roadrunner Sign

2011-02-06T10:51:00.000-08:00

Here's the latest Adwrap on CalTrain. AOL is hiring.

Nate & I have been making nocturnal transit trips out of Millbrae.

Sticker put inside a BART car by maintenance crews.

BART trains do say "beep beep"--just ask Nate!

Indoor Garden Layout

2011-01-30T21:03:00.000-08:00

Nathan, his grandparents, and I visited the Conservatory of Flowers in Golden Gate Park.

It was a cold day, and the Conservatory's tropical wing was a nice place to warm up.

But we were really there to see an "indoor garden layout" at the other end of the building.

The layout has models of local landmarks, all made cleverly from recycled/repurposed materials. Here's the Ferry Building, note the cheese grater tower with a kitchen timer clock, and architectural elements made from utensils. Like the original, it has a sign reading "Port of San Francisco"--made out of Scrabble tiles.

Here's the Ghiradelli Chocolate factory, made from electrical outlet and switch covers; the Chinatown gate has circuit-board roofs.

Here's the Transamerica Pyramid:

If you're curious about the materials, here's a close-up.

Flip on the Lionel

2011-01-01T23:48:00.000-08:00

I put a Flip video camera on my Dad's Lionel train.

Flip on the Lionel (view larger here) from Nick Kibre on Vimeo.

Subway Ride to Hollywood

2010-12-28T16:42:00.001-08:00

Wini and I visited Hollywood via the LA subway on Christmas.
We started at Olvera St (on an ordinary day I would recommend getting there via Metrolink or the green/blue/gold light rail system instead of driving downtown, but like I said, it was Christmas), where there were Aztec-costumed dancers on the town square, and a manger scene in the bandstand. From there we walked to Union Station, where we saw a cat--must have been Skimbleshanks!

We took the red line to Hollywood & Vine, which is not quite the center of activity I had imagined, but the station itself is worth a visit. It appears to be modeled on palatial 50's movie theaters.

We had a few sidewalk stars in mind to visit (you can look up their locations on this Wikipedia page). They proved to be a bit of a walk away. Hollywood Blvd is kind of scruffy but almost all the people we encountered were just other tourists who, like us, seemed to know they wanted to visit Hollywood but didn't actually know what to do when they got there.

Eventually we found some stars of people we're fans of.

These are hand and footprints of the cast of Harry Potter, in cement in front of Grauman's Chinese Theater.

Also, there's a penny smasher (we collect 'em) in front of Madame Tussaud's wax museum.

We returned via the Hollywood & Highland station, not quite as architecturally interesting (IMHO) as Hollywood & Vine, but not bad.

Along the way I snapped a few pictures of the type of classic American urban buildings that I think really deserve to be modeled more often.

And back at the town square is this old fire station, which I liked for the opposite reason--it looks exactly like the stereotypical small town building seen on every layout.

I liked this collection of signs. This is one seriously multicultural city!

Merry Christmas!

2010-12-24T20:37:00.000-08:00

Some seasonal modelbuilding, in an ephemeral medium!

Nature or Nurture?

2010-12-17T07:28:00.000-08:00

Nathan has been reading my copies of Blickpunkt Straßenbahn.

And studying CalTrain schedules.

As much as I've encouraged his interest in electric railways, this seems to show innate effects of a railfan gene.

Reading up on your Favorite Line

2010-12-06T12:07:00.001-08:00

Try this:

Go to http://books.google.com.
Type "electric railway journal" + keyword(s) for your favorite line (road name, city name, etc).

Searching for Petaluma, I found this from 1912:

Petaluma & Santa Rosa Railway, Petaluma, Cal.--Surveys for the extension out of Petaluma have been made by the engineers of this company as far as Tomales. The projected line will branch at Two Rocks, one line extending to Valley Ford and the other to Tomales, then down Keys Creek to the ocean beach.

Nothing ever came of this except a short extension to a quarry at Two Rock, a few miles west of Petaluma.

Above it is a notice about the start of construction of the PE's subway.

Toy Recommendation

2010-12-01T07:28:00.000-08:00

Plan Toys calls this a modern train.

To Nathan, it's ORANGE BENDY TROLLEY!!!, his favorite present from his recent 2nd birthday--actually, his favorite toy of all time, I think:

He's had wooden trains and tracks (btw for basic track and train sets, I recommend IKEA), and a DIY train table to play with them on for some time. They're generally rated for ages 3+; he's never shown any inclination to eat his trains, so I haven't worried about the are recommendations, but he hasn't really played with them as trains til now--Toddlers aren't quite coordinated enough to keep a magnetically-coupled train together while rolling it around.

This one, however, is a more or less permanently-articulated set, held together by plastic hooks that snap together. Nathan has only accidentally uncoupled it once. So he's able to roll his trolley around a track loop and up and down bridges, and I added some switches so it can go around different ways--and he'll play with it happily for quite a long time.

San Jose Christmas in the Park

2010-11-27T14:40:00.000-08:00

Christmas in the Park is an annual tradition in San Jose's Plaza de Cesar Chavez Park (a.k.a. the oval park in front of the Tech Museum).

Christmas in the Park features kiddie rides, displays with animated elves, and an outdoor ice rink. This year, Ballet San Jose advertised their Nutcracker show by having kids in their costumes skating around the rink. Wini, as a member of our local Ice Theatre troop, was invited to come help lead them around.

We parked in a deserted office park in North San Jose, and took the VTA light rail downtown (other years they have run vintage Milano trams, like Muni's but with pantographs, but they're kind of hard up this year). Nathan was very excited and basically said "trolley trolley trolley trolley!" the whole way.

We arrived with time to spare, so we visited the San Jose Museum of Art which had an exhibit of electronic art lit up with LED's. This was pretty cool.

Here's Wini helping some mice to skate.

and Clara

We had dinner nearby; it's a heckofa lot easier to find somewhere to eat in downtown SJ than when I first started passing through in the late 80's--credit the light rail with giving it a "there".

We rode back, and as we walked to the car and our train rolled off into the night, Nathan yelled "bye bye trolley!"

A Busy Day for Bay Area Transit

2010-11-03T09:15:00.000-07:00

That says "GO GIANTS". There's a parade downtown, and trains to the City are packed. I saw this post on the CalTrain (rider-supported) status feed:

Caltrain radio just said @sfbart informed them not to let people off at Milbrae. @sfbart is FULL. T08:53

Happy Halloween

2010-10-31T23:08:00.000-07:00

No surprise, we carved pumpkins today.

This is our twist on trick-or-treating: kids play pumpkin bowling (roll a pumpkin down the ramp, knock over pins) to win candy.

I built this "spook". Not too impressive in daylight.

But after the sun goes down, add some lights and a fog machine, and it's respectable:

Fruit and Veggie Train

2010-10-25T14:09:00.000-07:00

My train to work this morning sported and ad-wrap advertising Target's new produce section.

Nathan's Newest Word

2010-10-17T09:51:00.000-07:00

Is "trolley"!

We did some fanning at the VTA Bascom station while Mom & Sister were at a Girl Scout event nearby.

The VTA has been doing more adwraps lately, including this car decked out for the National Hispanic University.

Nathan can also tell you that sheep say "baah", tigers say "roar", robots say "beep", and trolleys say "ding"!

Installing Street Trackage in 1:1

2010-10-16T20:21:00.000-07:00

Here is time lapse video of a recent track renewal project at Church & 30th, San Francisco, on the J line. Long ago this was the end of the line--and my stop!

The Fan Seat

2010-09-17T12:45:00.000-07:00

CalTrain engineers don't often leave the cab door open, but when they do, there's a perfect "fan seat" where you can sit and watch the action.

DIY Double-Decker Bus

2010-09-13T14:55:00.000-07:00

It doesn't run on tracks but it gets points for personality.

Seen on the Stanford University campus.

Ghost Trains and Wild Grapes

2010-09-12T22:43:00.000-07:00

We drove into the country to visit Capay Farms, from whom we receive a biweekly box of produce. The Capay valley is an obscure corner of California we've never been to before. On the way, we passed through the town of Esparto, where we found an abandoned depot.

This was the SP's Winters Branch, abandoned in the 70's. It turns out the depot is for sale (pictures taken during a wetter part of the year!)

The street face of the depot was overgrown, and in the middle of the bushes were wild grapes.

I tried some. Some were perfect for picking and some were drying up on the vine, and they had seeds (wild grapes would have to, I suppose), but overall they were pretty tasty.

IKEA Paint Mixer

2010-09-07T09:17:00.001-07:00

I saw this "Produkt Milk-Frother", officially for making cappuccinos, a few months ago in the cheap bins by the checkout line in IKEA.

A model railroader is always on the lookout for anything that can be used for something other than its intended purpose, and to me the obvious application of this device was not coffee but model paint; the ring at the tip is just the right size to fit in standard jars.

I bought one, and got around to using it yesterday. I thought it would just vibrate but it actually spins--fast! I took off the spring-like "frothing wisk thingie" since that looked like it would be hard to clean--and probably result in a huge mess. The bare wire ring is fine for mixing paint, since we don't want bubbles.

The paint I wanted to use was metallic, "stainless steel", which made a good test, since it had separated and needed a lot of mixing. The "Improvised Produkt Paint Mixer" did a pretty good job. The only downside was that it spins pretty fast. I had to use short spurts to keep the paint from sloshing right out of the jar. A better solution might be just to use halfway used-up batteries.

Cleaning the tool is easy--run water over it, then take it outside and turn it on.

Layout Planning with AnyRail

2010-09-06T08:54:00.000-07:00

I have recently learned (via ntramblog--another blog, which if you're reading this one, you will probably like too!) about AnyRail, a new layout design program.

AnyRail has several things going for it;

It's easy to use
It has track libraries covering just about everything--including Tomix Fine Track
You can download it and try it for free--the main restriction of the trial version is that you are restricted to designs with 50 pieces of track

So here's the plan;

now back to implementation!

San Francisco Bars

2010-08-18T21:30:00.000-07:00

I came across an odd estate sale; some ladies were selling a large assortment of old items out of two shipping containers in an industrial parking lot. I picked out a bag of reproduction (I assume) Roman coins, a planer, and a how-to book about drawing; I asked if they had any old postcards, since I collect vintage postcards with a theme you will have no trouble guessing.

They didn't, but they said they had some old pictures I might find anything. Apparently this sale was the estate of a late relative who had managed bars in San Franciso, and there were a few pictures he had taken of them.

Four of the five pictures can be arranged in a sequence to show most of a city block (click on them for larger version):

I was curious where exactly these buildings were, and if they might be still standing. First I tried "old school" research methods: I found a local SF genealogy website with a collection of scanned city directories. I found one of the hotels listed in a 50's city directory, but only one. Of course hotels go out of business, often leaving their signs up, carrying on as rentals.

Noticing the fairly unique sounding name of the establishment in the last picture above, "Jay Hurley's Sportorium", I tried an internet search and found a listing of negatives from the SF assessor's archives, listed by address.

Third Street, 44  Hotel King, Jay Hurley’s Sportorium, Barrel House
Third Street, 48  Barrel House
Third Street, 56  Kentucky Rummy
Third Street, 66  Westchester Hotel, Golden Gate News, Kentucky Rummy
Third Street, 82  Kurant’s Western Outfitters, Knox Hotel

Score one for modern/lazy research methods.

Unfortunately all these buildings are gone; the site is now occupied by an architecturally uninspired Westin Hotel.

View Larger Map

The Office Depot + garage across the street is worse.

In the pictures, note the streetcar tracks. Those are for Market St Ry's 15/16/29 lines. The 15 evolved into a Muni bus line, which was recently replaced on most of its route by the T Third, though not on this part of 3rd Street.

The fifth picture has a small building, with only a small sign not legible even in my physical copy, and remains a mystery.

Aquarium Adwrap on the VTA

2010-08-12T10:05:00.000-07:00

The Santa Clara Valley Transportation Authority has been doing a few adwraps on their light rail trains; a few months ago there was a McDonald's train, which I never got a picture of, but which you can see here; this morning, getting off CalTrain at Mountain View, I noticed a nice blue adwrap on a light rail train, just pulling out of the adjacent VTA station, and whipped out my klunky but dependable old "always keep in my backpack in case I see something interesting on the way to work" camera.

The ad is for the Monterey Bay Aquarium.

America in Color 1939-1943

2010-07-30T08:16:00.000-07:00

A few years ago the Library of Congress put together a show of color photographs collected by the government to document the depression and domestic effects of WWII.

You can see it online at the L.O.C. site, or (imho better presented) at this Denver Post Photoblog site (and note that blogger shrunk my samples when I posted them, so you can see them much better on the original sites).

The collection has lots of great pictures from the "classic railroading era" that lots of us like to model--in color, which we rarely get to see. I didn't see anything specifically trolleyish, but there are good shots of urban scenery, like this:

and more of rural life

and plenty of railroads, and classic modelable industries

I've mostly posted scenic examples, but there are lots and lots of pictures of people--at work, out and about, kids playing, etc.

There's lots more there--check it out!

The New Becomes Historic in Los Angeles

2010-07-21T22:44:00.000-07:00

LA's blue light rail line, resurrection of the Pacific Electric Long Beach line, turned 20 years old last week.

The Militant Angeleno, a blog combining urban history, exploration, and advocacy, has a nice post here (if you watch his video of the opening day, note that the trains start about 3/4 of the way through).

Here's a picture I took back in what may now be considered the line's youth:

Admittedly I have unconventional ideas of tourism, but I recommend a ride on the line if you visit Los Angeles. The Watts Towers are an interesting midline destination.

Watching the F Line from Pier 39

2010-07-14T17:34:00.000-07:00

Last Friday we met up with some family at Muir Woods--just to tie that into theme of this blog, there was a time when you could have reached Muir Woods via a Northwestern Pacific ferry and 3rd rail interurban, and then the Mt Tamalpais & Muir Woods Ry, powered by shay locomotives (up) and gravity (down).

On weekends, you can still get there by ferry and a connecting shuttle bus, and given that parking was scarce already on a Friday, if you go on a weekend, I'd recommend it.

On the way back we stopped and walked around Pier 39; a tourist trap, but also a good trolley watching spot since it's at the end of the F line and has a convenient pedestrian bridge.

Nathan was very interested.

This car made a short turn, but hit a rough spot in the overhead.

Rewiring poles is part of the job.

Mardi Gras--Laissez Les Bon Temps Rouler

2010-07-10T00:20:00.001-07:00

Sorry to sit on this post... anyway, back in March my family and I went to New Orleans for Mardi Gras.

I was pretty under the weather, so my first stop was to a convenient clinic. Sufficiently medicated, I started to feel better. The doctor also advised that I take it easy for a few days... sorry, Doc!

Through family connections, we had an ideally situated hotel room overlooking the action on Canal St.

Said action initially being streetcars, and as carnival week got into full swing, switching to parades.

There were a couple of streetcar-themed floats, too.

One of my favorite parade sights was an actual rolling steam calliope. (Warning: this is loud!)

One evening when Nathan had had enough of Parades for a while, we snuck off and rode the Riverfront line. This is the only streetcar line running when Mardi Gras is in full swing--all the other lines are shut down because Canal, St Charles, and Carrollton are taken over by parades--and it's not like anyone is going to work, anyway!

We all rode again during the day, but the RTA was having some technical difficulties with a switch.

We didn't get a chance to ride the Canal St on this trip, just took one picture:

Mardi Gras is something to experience, but I am also looking forward to a future visit to the Crescent City during a normal, non-insane-citywide-party time of year too!

EXTERMINATE!!!

2010-06-06T14:31:00.000-07:00

Wini told me that the moment she learned about her 4th grade circuit project assignment, she knew she had to make a working Dalek (see the official fan site or Wikipedia).

Her design for a self-propelled, steerable Dalek was inspired by looking at the underside of our Roomba robot vacuum cleaner. There are separate motors for the left wheel and the right wheel. Turn on the left one to turn right, the right one to turn left, and both to move forward--also satisfying a requirement of demonstrating a parallel circuit. Here's her schematic, which also includes two white lightbulbs on the top (to demonstrate a series circuit) and a blue LED "eye" on an antenna (because real Daleks have them, and LED's are cool)!

The body of the Dalek is a hacked up plastic pitcher. Here it is on display at school.

The mechanical side of the design was my department. The Mark I design had motors driving wheels by gears, but did not work well because it was difficult to keep things in alignment. The Mark II design used rubber bands and was more successful. I built up motor mounts from scraps of wood (crown molding with a quarter circle cut out of the profile, arranged in fours to make a cylindrical space for each motor).

Here's a test run in front of our house, where the Dalek moves ok at first, and then EXTERMINATES itself.

Here's a less self-destructive run out back, demonstrating the Dalek's ability to steer by using the left and right wheel motors separately.

My Boy's got the Bug

2010-05-09T10:01:00.001-07:00

Merry Christmas

2009-12-24T22:42:00.001-08:00

And have a trolleyriffic 2010!

A Building I Need to Model

2009-11-24T21:11:00.000-08:00

The San Francisco Chronicle prints occasional articles about architecture in the City, and this one, about a 1909 department store building on Market Street, caught my eye.

The article probably won't be up on their site forever, so I'll copy it here.

Cityscape: This false front can hold its own

by John King

Architectural overstatement can be a virtue - at least when you're bidding for attention in the middle of a block, and you strike your pose with stylish force. The department store that built this is long gone, but there's still something wondrous about the monumentality of a single broad five-story bay framed by ceremonial Corinthian columns. Equally impressive: This masterpiece of self-promotion maintains its dignity on a tawdry stretch of Market Street that civic forces have let fester. Let's hope that soon, finally, there's action instead of talk.

1019 Market St.

Architect: George A. Applegarth | Style: Greek revival | Size: 6 stories | Date built: 1909

Here's a Bing Maps link, which lets you see the front and roof of the building (if you click bird's-eye-view and rotate), and here's a link to Google Maps street view.

This is a building that needs to be moddled--but keep pictures handy for any nitpickers who don't think there's a real one that looks like that!

New Recruit

2009-11-16T19:03:00.001-08:00

This is my friend Loic, from Zürich,

trying out my trams. He's reportedly been asking about trains ever since.

Intermodal Urban Traction

2009-10-19T12:49:00.000-07:00

Here's an interesting prototype: The transit system of Stuttgart (a quite hilly city) includes a cog railway, the Degerloch Zahnradbahn, which has a special open-air bike-rack trailer car.

More information on this Stuttgart Transit site in German, and in English in this Cyclelicio.us Blog post where I found out about this.

Gold Medal Models makes some photo-etched N-Scale bicycles. Hmm!

High-Speed, Narrow-Gauge, Low-Floor, Under Wire

2009-07-14T15:58:00.000-07:00

This new train is the fastest narrow (meter) gauge train in the Swiss network.

It runs at 120km/h (=75MPH).

Original story in German, or in English via Google.

Like this one, a lot of Swiss regional trains look like slightly scaled up versions of what we consider Light Rail vehicles in the US.

Best Father's Day Present Ever

2009-06-21T13:47:00.001-07:00

It's a Trolley X-ing Sign!

New at Washington-Mason

2009-06-13T22:30:00.001-07:00

This is the latest creation of the craftsmen at the SF Muni's cable car shop, just delivered to the barn for its test run.

Thanks to gripman Val Lupiz for letting me post these pictures here.

A Micro-Layout Staring me in the Face

2009-06-10T14:38:00.000-07:00

Five days a week I wait for a train home on the northbound platform the CalTrain's Mountain View station, which gives me a good trolleyfanning view of the adjacent VTA light rail station.

This is the western terminous of the VTA's Tasman West line. During rush hour, light rail trains do an interesting dance--one train will arrive, another will depart (they have to be syncronized because the last few miles of the line are single-track). And sometimes trains pull in and out of a pocket track. The track arrangement is a double X-over, like this:

Or scroll around a satellite view via Google Maps:

View Larger Map

Anyway, it recently occurred to me that this whole terminal could be an interesting micro layout. For a little bit more interest you could build up the pocket track into a small servicing area (a minimal barn with room for one or two cars plus some work equipment--maybe squeezed into some into some random unused urban space, like Portland Streetcar's under a freeway) and let the rest of the system be "off layout staging".

I've posted a few pictures and movies of the VTA here over the years, mostly centered around Mountain View; you can find them all under the Contemporary tag.

PCC Body Design Patent

2009-06-08T10:28:00.000-07:00

It is US Patent 110,384 "Design for a Rail Car or Similar", invented by Dan H. Bell, assigned to the Transit Reseach Corporation.

I hadn't realized that the body design itself was patented (though I have heard that Brill was forced to pay royalties for their look-alike Brilliners).

Searches for Transit Research Corporation lead to other interesting patents. Enjoy!

New P&SR Book

2009-05-24T21:08:00.001-07:00

Fresh from the presses of Arcadia Publishing:

Petaluma & Santa Rosa Railway, by John & Kristina Schmale

Check out the Google Book Preview.

This is the first full-size book about the Petaluma & Santa Rosa (not to knock the writeup it got by Stanley Borden many years ago, in a special issue of Western Railroader Magazine--which any P&SR fan should still nab a copy of if they can...)

Tomytec Toyama Articulated Tram Available

2009-05-19T23:48:00.001-07:00

Here's a flyer.

I'm putting in an order with HobbySearch--one to build as-is, plus a few extra body shells to kitbash a Zürich Cobra (some day!)

Relaxation

2009-04-28T20:31:00.000-07:00

Today I...

- Was in so many meetings actual work seemed like a break

- Discovered my bike had a flat at quitting time

- Couldn't get on the train because the bike car was full (@#%$& bike-to-work day brings out all the newbies)

- Got lectured by a cop for crossing a street in the crosswalk against a flashing red-hand/don't walk sign

Seemed like a good night to try out my new Arnold/Duewag articulated tram (thanks, eBay.de). Yes, it can make it around the curves of the Tomix finetrack (103mm radius) track on my layout (whew):

Note "Cuddlecat Mountain" and the Salt and Pepper storage silos of the condiment factory in the background.

Going out with the kids for pizza helps after days like this too :)

Quake and Rebuilding: An Archive of Streetcar Pictures

2009-04-17T21:19:00.000-07:00

San Francisco's major transit provider at the time of the 1906 earthquake, the United Railroads (later reorganized as the Market Street Railway, later merged into the Muni), kept meticulous photographic records. Some of the have recently emerged from the City's archives, and show both the devastation caused by the earthquake and fire,

and hurried rebuilding:

Here's an online SFGate/Chronicle story with more pictures.

Nathan's New Toy--A Rotary Converter?

2009-04-03T07:14:00.000-07:00

This is a pretty cool toy; kids can spin it, it sings, and says a letter or animal that it ends up on (like a roulette wheel).

But it reminds me of a rotary converter:

Worlds Largest Model Railway Video

2009-03-22T11:56:00.000-07:00

Here's a video of Miniatur-Wunerland in Hamburg, Germany.

Some of it's under wire. I actually thought some of the animated non-rail vehicles were pretty cool, too.

I can't believe a train layout actually has a bigger control room than we have at my (telecom/internet-oriented) work!

And Another Link

2009-03-14T21:45:00.000-07:00

West Texas Joe is another blogger writing about trolley modeling, this time in N scale.

Some Recommended Reading

2009-03-12T07:35:00.000-07:00

I'm not going to have any model building to report for a while, but I've recently discovered Dan D. Spark's (HO) model trolley blog, and thought you folks might enjoy it too.

Light Rail Work Equipment

2009-03-07T21:42:00.000-08:00

Like the trolley lines of earlier days, modern light rail systems have their share of work equipment. It generally isn't electrically powered, but can be funky and interesting nonetheless.

Baltimore's light rail gets points for both style and saving taxpayers money by using this classy vintage centercab diesel:

Here's a tamper machine on the (San Jose) VTA:

The crew seems to be deciding what to do next:

They also have a Hi-Rail truck:

Hi-Rail trucks are familiar sights on mainline railroads like CalTrain:

Commuter railroads also use full size trains for work equipment, like this ballast train on CalTrain:

SF Muni keeps vintage equipment in active duty in the non-revenue department, just as it does with its more visible streetcar equipment. This line car was inherited from predecessor Market, and has been rebuilt significantly over the years (especially for work in the subway), and is still giving good service as it approaches its 100th birthday.

New Orleans RTA keeps this even older (1899) single-trucker on the property as work car:

Tramways Monthly--A New Online Magazine

2009-03-05T21:43:00.000-08:00

Visit http://203.122.240.118/tmonthly (no domain name, apparently) to download current (#2) and back issues in PDF format, and/or subscribe to get future issues by email.

The coverage is international but seems to be UK-centered.

You could read this online, or since each issue is a PDF, if you have a color printer and don't mind blowing through a lot of color ink <cough>print it at work</cough> you could read it like a physical magazine.

Trolley Shopping on eBay

2009-02-23T15:22:00.000-08:00

I do a lot of that, but mostly the 1:160 variety. Here's one in 1:1.

Tram Mug

2009-02-21T18:04:00.000-08:00

One of our other hobbies is pottery painting. Our local studio of choice is Laurel Street Arts, in San Carlos, CA.

Expanding my appreciation of streetcars to another medium, on our last visit, I made this wraparound Zürich tram mug. It's vaguely like a Cobra (but not nearly long enough).

Today I tested it in a suitably Swiss manner, with our fancy automated espresso machine (though this seems like the hip brand over there).

It works!

Cortland & Folsom

2009-02-19T13:34:00.000-08:00

This is a 1937 B&W photo by noted old-school SF transit historian Charlie Smallwood, colorized by noted modern SF transit historian Emiliano Echeverria:

The location is Cortland and Folsom, where the Market St Ry ended it's Cortland St line just before the Cortland begins a steep descent down the back of Bernal Heights (the hill I used to live on).

I used to cross the street right here to get to school, unaware that there were ever stretcars here.

The same little house is still there:

View Larger Map

The neighborhood is physically unchanged, it's just gone a bit upscale since 1937 (or even the 70's when I was around)!

Cars did occasionally overshoot the end of line, and I hear from Emiliano that in 1945 one slid down the hill sideways!

Colorization is a venerable technique, btw--all the vintage "color" postcards from the streetcar era are colorized, rather than actually color pictures.

San Pedro Red Cars

2009-01-21T06:57:00.000-08:00

We made a family trip to southern California last weekend and went for a ride on the Port of L.A. Waterfront Red Car in San Pedro, a re-electrified piece of authentic PE trackage, which uses a restored (sort of full-scale kitbashed) PE "ten" and two replica "fives" (these are the ones usually running).

The cars are really wonderful.

The world's most beautiful trolley?

This was Nathan's first trolley ride!

The cars are painted a really dignified dark red--much darker than I'd imagined for PE, based on color pictures I've seen. The crew assured me the shade was authentic, but that the paint tended to fade into a red over time in the sunlight; and in fact, since the cars are never turned on the waterfront line, one side (west?) that gets more sun was already looking lighter than the other.

Then, too, maybe the PE was painting its equipment a more conventional red by the time railfans were taking color pictures of last runs in the 50's.

At the north end of the line there is a cool fountain that shoots jets of water to music, designed (again according to our conductor) by the same people that did the fountain at the Bellagio in Las Vegas.

We first approached it while it was between runs... and got more than a little wet when it started its next show! You aren't allowed on the trolley soaking wet, so we had some time to kill. It was a surprisingly warm day for January (still winter, even in LA!) so getting dry was no problem. A stand nearby sold snowcones and roasted corn. The corn was pretty good, actually.

We got off at the Downtown/6th St. station for lunch. At our conductor's recommendation, we went to Green Onion, a reasonably kid-friendly Mexican restaurant up 6th St (he also said that Acapulco was good, but would probably be crowded--we saw it, more directly on the waterfront, and it looked kinda trendy; still, if you want a view of the harbor, it'd be nice).

I'll close this out with one more quick video (if you watch it, YouTube will suggest lots of other Red Car videos, too).

Zürich Tram Drawings

2009-01-20T12:23:00.000-08:00

The VBZ also has a page of scale drawings of their trams (and busses).

The files are in PDF format and look like they would resize nicely (i.e., they are actual line drawings rather than scans/bitmaps), so it would be possible to print out copies scaled perfectly for building a model in whatever scale you like.

I wish more transit operators were so considerate of the needs of modelers.

Many thanks to Andrew Moglestue, author of the Trams of Zürich website, for directing me to this.

Sondertrams (Special Trams) and Bears!

2009-01-16T13:52:00.000-08:00

Zürich's VBZ (city transit) web site has a gallery of specially decorated trams, like this Zoo tram:

I wonder what the story is behind this tram full of bears...

Modelling Time is Limited

2009-01-05T21:47:00.000-08:00

But I'm recruiting a new junior motorman!

Fondue-Tram

2008-12-29T20:33:00.000-08:00

Our friends in Zürich sent us a pack of goodies including a pamphlet for a Fondue-Tram.

"Cheese lovers can rejoice--the Fondue-Tram is running again!"

There are two cars in "Fondue Service". The top two pictures on the right are the exterior and interior of the more modern one; the bottom picture is the interior of the "Oldtimer", which I'm guessing is this car:

that I had the good fortune to see trundling by on a previous trip to Zürich.

Looks like you can walk up and board any time for a traditional cheese fondue, but if you make a party reservation, they offer a few variations, with various cheess, and additions mushrooms, tomatoes, grappa... yum!

I'm on Facebook

2008-12-15T08:11:00.000-08:00

Here's my page.

Naturally I'll add anyone interested in N Scale Traction as a friend!

Streetcars in the Snow--In New Orleans!

2008-12-12T20:59:00.001-08:00

From the Times Picayune.

Merry Christmas!

The Lompoc Local

2008-12-03T17:22:00.000-08:00

More new scans from the old photo box.

We used to live in Lompoc, CA, served by a 10 mile branch off of the SP (now UP)'s Coast Line.

The branch's reason for being is to serve a Diatomaceous Earth mine in the hills above town. (My wife worked in their office, arranging shipments, though her territory was the west coast so her customers mostly shipped by truck).

D.E. is highly porous so it's shipped in covered hoppers.

Trains reach the mine with the engine pushing up the grade. There are lots of grade crossings, so the train always used a caboose (pretty rare already by the 90's) on the uphill end of the train, where a crewman could stand on the platform. The caboose seemed to have formerly been in railway police use.

Unfortunately I don't have any shots of the train working up the hill. Here's a train in the Lompoc "yard", a two-ended siding used for run-around moves.

Trains entered (or in the case if this picture, left) town by going down the middle of a street.

Here's a train heading past the edge of town, starting it's ten mile trek through farmland to join up with the Coast Line at Surf.

Other traffic passes through town sometimes too. I assume this US Army critter was headed to nearby Vandenberg Air Force Base.

How often do you see a train on a train?

Ghost Tracks

2008-12-03T16:18:00.001-08:00

Rummaging through old photos, I came across this:

It's the intersection of Bath and Junipero, Santa Barbara (next to Santa Barbara Cottage Hospital, where my daughter was born).

The curving cracks in the pavement trace the rails of Santa Barbara street railway, which was so solidly built that most of its track is still in place, buried under asphalt.

Are there ghost tracks in your town?

I'm Taking a Break from Modelling

2008-11-26T00:12:00.001-08:00

NCat Publications Online

2008-11-22T21:20:00.000-08:00

In the NScaleTraction Yahoo group's files repositiry (click on NCat Publications)--thanks to Tom Savage.

Pumpkin Patch--Finished (a Year and) a Few Days Late

2008-11-06T20:58:00.000-08:00

I started this mini-scene last Halloween, and just wrapped it up.

The main addition was some ground foam, figures (kids!), a laser-cut picnic table to hold more pumpkins, and gluing down the truck and all those pumpkins.

Trying a New Camera

2008-11-06T20:47:00.000-08:00

It's a Casio Exilim EX-FH20.

Mostly we liked it for it's rapid-fire mode, which should be useful for taking pictures of ice skating. But the 9 megapixels are nice for closeups of N scale models, too, like this GHQ railway express truck kit.

Actually, maybe the full resolution images show things a bit too clearly, at least for a brush-painted model!

1925 San Francisco Street Map

2008-10-14T22:18:00.000-07:00

Can be seen here at Dollar Bin's Flickr photostream where you can see a higher resolution image.

All the red lines are streetcar and cable car lines.

World's Smallest Layout Challenge

2008-09-23T21:21:00.000-07:00

Take a look at Carl Arendt's Small Layout Scrapbook.

What type of layout is more suited to minimal size than an N scale traction layout?

Overhead!

2008-09-21T08:53:00.000-07:00

Not on the actual layout, yet, but I'm working up to it.

First I built a line-pole jig, and banged out a dozen or so poles, following NCat designs.

This picture shows a pole with the cross-arm attached, but before the hanger/ear thing is attached.

I should come up with a jig for making the hangers, too.

A few things that helped the soldering work better:

File a flat edge on the soldering iron tip, use that surface to get good contact to whatever you're soldering.
When soldering the cross-arm wire to the pole, put the iron on the wire just a teeny bit from the pole, and put the solder one the joint itself--this gets the solder to flow around and make a good joint.

After I had a pile of poles, I put some track onto some scrap lumber, and drilled some pole holes, and strung up some wire.

I switched over the Arnold tram to run from overhead. You do this by turning the screw on the roof.

It works! And with two power packs, one for overhead to one rail, and the other for two rail equipment, I was able to run two cars independently (though not very far without a head-on collision!)

Tangent track is one thing. Curves, especially tight ones like you'd find over street corners, are another challenge. I built another test track and gave it a try. I used a pretty simple design with single pull-off wires between the poles.

I was mostly paying attention to where the contact wire went, trying to keep it over the track, as I soldered, pushed and pulled, and bent the poles. From above it all looked kind of reasonable. Then when I looked at it from a normal viewing angle, I realized things had ended up kind of crazy.

But it works!

For building curves on the actual layout, I think I'll have to make some jigs.

Still More SF on YouTube

2008-09-12T22:46:00.000-07:00

This film's from 1940, and in color!

Tomytec Steeplecabs

2008-09-08T15:54:00.000-07:00

These were available briefly before, and I missed my window. Not this time!

Improving and Zurichifying a Kato Tram

2008-08-24T21:16:00.000-07:00

The Kato single truck tram (if you can find one) is a nice little model, but like anything, can be improved on.

Its main deficiency is that it is very light, which makes for poor electrical pickup. It's small enough that adding weight is tricky--to give mine a little more heft, I added some square A-Line lead weights, and the best way I could find to fit them in was to attach them to the bottom of the roof and cut holes in the top of the main body piece for them to stick down into (this seemed better than glueing them to the mechanism itself!).

Even with extra weight, the car still annoyingly stalled over turnouts--and sometimes even just plain straight track. Helpful members of the NScaleTraction listgroup suggested complete disassembly and cleaning of crud from crucial areas such as the wheel tread, backs of the wheels, and brass pickups. I did so and this really helped. I also added just a smidgeon of goopy lubricant into the worm gear areas.

Another thing that would help is switching from two-rail pickup to live overhead. The pantograph that comes on the car has plastic shoes and limited range, but I discovered that an old Sommerfeldt pantograph that I've had on hand for about 20 years (I ordered a pair of them through this place) fit exactly. The car roof evan has two little pegs that fit into two little holes into the base of the pan. It's as though Kato planned to use Sommerfeldt pans and changed their mind.

I trimmed off the outside edges of the original Kato pantograph, and glued them to the roof alongside the Sommerfeldt one, to give the effect springs and electrical stuff and general "detail".

I haven't yet wired up the pantograph, but when I have a layout with working overhead, I will.

Inspired by our trip to Zürich last fall, I decided to repaint the tram's body in a snappy blue and white livery (my first attempt at masking), with a metallic roof.

Rather than leave the windows clear so that you can see the motor inside, I blackened them, by scribbling on the inside edges with a Sharpie pen.

The model does not exactly reproduce any class of tram that ever ran in Zürich, but is vaguely like a lot some of the single-truck cars that once ran there. The Tram association Aktion Pro Sächsitram (fans of the 6-line) has a picture gallery of vintage Zürich tramcars.

I just wish Kato would make these cars again, because if I could get ahold of a couple, it'd be fun to kitbash a modern articulated car.

Overhead for Street Curves--Prototype Photos

2008-07-13T17:02:00.000-07:00

These are from San Jose's light rail system:

TGV Speed Record Video

2008-06-11T21:34:00.000-07:00

Watch it here.

574.8 KPH = 367.16 MPH!

Another Kind of Micro Layout

2008-06-07T21:31:00.000-07:00

This one's not for trolleys of even trains--it's for cheetahs!

My daughter made this diorama for a school project.

The whole class, in fact, made dioramas for different animals, all in matching bakery boxes. Cool!

Two of my Early Influences

2008-05-18T14:38:00.001-07:00

Peter Ehrlich, noted motorman/scholar/transit-photographer/sfmunihistory-listowner, recently posted this picture

to the NYCSubway.Org transit site.

In this 1971 scene you can see two of the early influences that got me into this hobby: Muni's Car #1 (way before there was the F line, I rode it during Muni's occasonal "Trolley Festivals"--though not quite in 1971, since I was just 2 then!), and over on the right, "Bill's Terminal Hobby Shop" (the building with the arrow-shaped sign). I bought a lot of material that went into my first attempt at an N scale trolley layout there. The proprietors (I presume it was Bill and his wife?) were very nice. They special-ordered some Sommerfeldt pantographs for me from Germany. I still have them, and someday I will build some traction models to go under them!

Deutsch lernen durch Straßenbahnen

2008-05-16T11:45:00.000-07:00

Having studied German for a bit, and having wrestled with the classics in College (ok with Goethe, but always found Thomas Mann a bit daunting!), but reverted pretty much to the level I achieved in high school, I'm always on the lookout for material to practice with that's simple enough that I can understand it, but interesting enough that I'll actually want to read it. (And that's a sentence which would be very interesting to translate into German).

A Zürich tram driver named Thomas Schenk has an online column that fits the bill for me pretty well. He also has a website and has published some of his columns in a book, Im Tram, which I think I'll eventually try to get a copy of (shipping books from Europe seems to be a lot more expensive than shipping N scale models from Japan!).

A recent column described the travails of mothers getting strollers onto (traditional, pre-low-floor) trams, and was forwarded to me by a friend who has frequently dealt with this predicament!

If you don't know German (or if you do, but you want to cheat), you can read it via Google Translation. It seems to work pretty well (and I say this as someone who works in the field of speech engineering, at a company that considers Google our cross-town rival), but still poorly enough to be somewhat amusing.

Ft Collins Birney Comes Home

2008-05-13T09:35:00.001-07:00

The Ft Collins Municipal Railway runs a vintage streetcar operation using a restored Ft Collins Birney car. They have just (re)acquired a second Ft Collins Birney, brought it home, and plan to get it up and running.

From the Ft Collins Coloradoan

Read the full story in the Ft Collins Coloradoan.

Perhaps This is a Detail Too Small to Model

2008-05-10T22:35:00.000-07:00

Seen growing by the VTA light rail tracks in Mountain View:

That's no weed, that's our state flower (California Poppy)!

End-Door Boxcar

2008-05-09T13:22:00.000-07:00

I've built a couple of MDC boxcar and refer kits over the years. Here's the results of a standard, following-the-directions effort.

I decided to try a little variety. Years ago, I bought a B&O boxcar kit, and stripped it (mostly using 99% rubbing alcohol). I added an end-door; it's made with an extra ice hatch (you get these even in the boxcar kits) and some styrene. I also added coupler lift bars, a detail we don't model much in N (not hard though, just bend up some wire and glue it on).

I wanted to model an early-period SP car, with the large tracks-into-the-sunset logo. Republic Locomotive Works, manufacturer of N and Nn3 products, has appropriate decals (I suppose intended for SP's narrow gauge subsidiaries).

I arranged the logo and lettering following a few pictures from books and some of the 3' gauge cars restored by the Society for the Preservation of Carter Railroad Resources, at Ardenwood Historic Farm, in Fremont, CA.

I weathered the car. It ended up being a fairly light weathering job, but even if the car still looks perhaps unrealistically clean, light weathering job still helps make models look a lot less like models.

There were several passes of weathering. First I sprayed on Dullcote. Then I applied artists charcoal and brown pastels, dry-brushed it in, and sprayed on more Dullcote. Then I brush painted on a wash of thinned flat black (water-based) paint.

In the past when I've tried washes like this, I've had trouble with surface tension making paint ball up into drops, which leave lines at their edges when they dry up. I tried a technique I've seen described for scenery painting: mix in a few drops of laundry detergent to help break down surface tension, and get the paint to flow more evenly. It seemed to help, and I was able to spread a thin wash of paint over entire sides of the model.

Someday this car will look nice bouncing along behind a steeplecab.

Happy National Train Day!

2008-05-07T11:20:00.000-07:00

AmTrak has declared May 10th National Train Day.

Events and open houses will be held at stations around the country. Here's schedules and information.

Nothing really big is going on in my neck of the woods, but maybe I'll try and get some freebies.

I Missed the Party

2008-05-04T19:37:00.001-07:00

20 Minutes/20 Minuten, a Swiss newspaper (I think the name means it's supposed to take 20 minutes to read, but with my German, it's more like an afternoon project) reports that Zürich teenagers are taking over late night trams for wild parties.

Click here for the article, with video.

They put up color filters on the lights, play boom boxes, smoke, drink, graffiti, and generally get unruly.

The Swiss police don't put up with this, and according to the article, break things up with rubber bullets and tear gas.

A spokesperson for the VBZ (Zürich transit) says "We are not very enthusiastic about such parties, although we find the idea creative in principle"; though 20 Minuten notes, the youths have taken the agency's slogan "Where we are, Zürich lives" very literally.

Thinking About Overhead

2008-04-16T15:08:00.000-07:00

Actually I've been thinking about it for a long time. But now I'm thinking about actually doing it (running out of excuses--I mean things I have to do first)!

I've been reading up on the subject in the Kalmbach Traction Handbook and the NCat Book, and getting some good advice from the NScaleTraction group.

One thing that's going to make this layout interesting to hang cat for is the sharp turns it has over street trackage. There's going to be no getting around the need for span wires, pull-offs, backbones, hangers, etc.

Here's a design I came up with for one corner (on my work laptop, sitting in the back of a dull meeting--is there another kind?).

One compromise I'm willing to make is that the first installation of overhead will be for pantographs only. Or perhaps I can make the basic track loop a continuous wire, so that pole-equipped cars can run around it, but I'm going to put off trying to take on trolley frogs for later.

Or I could cheat and equip my "pole" cars with bows, like the Portland Streetcar has done with their vintage cars.

Online Pictures from Public Libraries

2008-04-09T20:15:00.000-07:00

A lot of big city and university libraries have impressive photo collections online, that are a gold mine for streetcar researches.

A few notable ones I'm aware of:

The San Francisco Library
The Online Archive of California (includes Bancroft Library)
The Denver Libray Western History Collection

And smaller libraries are getting into the act; check out:

The Santa Cruz, CA's photography collection; it's well organized and you can skip to streetcar pictures here

I particularly like this picture of a quintessential country trolley (somewhere on the way to Capitola):

Another Traction Page in the Scrapbook

2008-03-02T09:40:00.000-08:00

Take a look at Carl's latest update to his site.

Fill'er Up!

2008-02-24T21:13:00.000-08:00

Years ago I made this Micro Engineering gas station kit.

I had a different layout in mind originally, but I trimmed down the base to my standard 20x30' lot size, and it fits in to the town OK (if I'd though ahead I would have made curb cuts).

Also note, I painted the streets. I used "pewter gray" craft paint, and it was a reasonable match to asphalt in both color and texture.

Speaking of Wikis

2008-02-15T23:19:00.000-08:00

I learned from Wikipedia, where I seeded the article on the Petaluma and Santa Rosa a ways back, that the P&SR's powerhouse building in Sebastopol survives today, as a restaurant, where my family and I ate lunch on a trip to the area last summer, unaware of its history.

Back then it was the Sebastopol Brewing Co; now it's Hopmonk Tavern.

It's right by the P&SR depot building, now the West Somona County Historical Museum.

Micro Layout Wiki

2008-02-15T23:03:00.000-08:00

Carl Arendt has added a useful new feature to his Small Layout site: a wiki where modelers can collaboratively create a repository of knowledge on the subject of small layout building.

The official front page is
http://carendt.us/wiki/index.php, but a more useful place to jump in is the search page, at http://carendt.us/wiki/index.php?FindPage.

The Oldest Streetcar Tracks in San Francisco, and an Even Older Train Station

2008-02-12T09:19:00.000-08:00

The Muni's L Taraval line originally ran straight down Taraval all the way to the beach. Later on, the route was changed, so that it turns south a few blocks short of the beach, to a turnaround loop by the zoo. This left a two block stub of non-revenue track, which is occasionally used for car storage, but little enough usage that it's never merited rebuilding.

So the original, cobblestone-lined rails from the early 20's remain, a curiously preserved relic of the Muni's original construction.

I snapped a few pictures on a trip to the beach last weekend (weather's warming up--yes!).

Every stub track in San Francisco has flange grooves past end of the rails, ground in by the occasional car that wasn't stopped in time.

We also visited Golden Gate Park, where there's an even older bit of transportation history.

This was once the terminal of a steam dummy line, a subsidiary of a cable car company. The railway has been gone for a century now, leaving this station as an obscure victorian gateway to the park.