Pages

Saturday, October 3, 2020

TRAIN TIME: Pt 18 of The Edge of Town Makeover and Running Marx Oldtimers

As would be expected, work on the layout slowed some during the summer months but there was in fact progress - just not as much. I would go out in The Cave, piddle around with the trains and structures, take out sets and video them for Y'allTube and generally had some fun without getting too serious about progress. Enjoy! Opa Fritz


Nicely repainted Marx Prewar stamped steel Milk delivery truck


I know what you're saying, "Hey, the light pole is crooked." Yup. After installing it and seeing it this way I thought to myself, "Oh man I screwed up" BUT THEN I had to think a little. Light poles, telephone poles, trees, etc are all things that get crooked in real life (for example, when we take our little jaunts to IKEA we drive down Rainbow Blvd and there is one house in particular with an electrical pole - in their backyard - that is leaning so bad Bettina always asks when it's going to fall on the house!!). 

Okay, add to that the fact that my pole in this location is right next to the loading dock then a plausible scenario is that at some point in time it got hit by a truck and now has a distinct lean to it. It adds character LOL


Fun on the lake


My favorite railroad is the Milwaukee Road and I was able to latch on to a New Marx Milwaukee Road Chippewa Set 10501-8










My 'night' photography leaves a lot to be desired. Even with the camera on the 'night' setting this is what I got. In person of course it's far better

The lights on Ed's Pub


The freight dock light


The cabin and signal tower


It's the middle of June 2020 and the corner hill now has a coat of paint - no more looking at a snow white mass in the corner


Marx Rocky Mountain Express Set No. 15640

Marx offered the Wm Crooks engine in a variety of configurations: electric, clockwork, with gold filligree, plain, tall smokestack, short smokestack, with plastic tender, with tin-litho tender. This Rocky Mountain Express has the electric, short stack, no gold detailing version







The Plasticville Roadside Stand project is about as done as it's gonna get. By mid-June the roof has been painted and the structure has been given a name: Deer Crest Fruit Ranch

The name "Fruit Ranch" is an homage to the real Fruit Ranch which once operated in Milwaukee. There were two locations both of which were quite large. They were a grocery store specializing in fresh fruit and vegetables from what I recall and even as a kid I actually enjoyed going there. I mean, kids don't normally enjoy going grocery shopping, but this place had a certain ambience that I liked. The center support beam which comes with the kit has been omitted and I like this look. There's a good chance I'll add more details to this but for now it's good-to-go


Running sets is fun but sometimes you just want to put a train together with stuff from the bins. I mated the Rocky Mountain Express Wm Crooks to the tin-litho tender. The two don't match up exactly because the tin-litho tender went with the clockwork Wm Crooks which sat lower (BTW I don't yet have a clockwork version of the Crooks yet, just the tender that went with it). Sooo, I quickly made an adapter, taking a strip of metal off of an old track lock-on and cutting and bending it to shape. It actually worked really well!



Oldtimer cars made by the New Marx people. 
Original Marx made a huge mistake by not offering a wider range of Oldtimer cars other than the combine and passenger cars that came with the Tales of Wells Fargo set









Well, now that I've got the Oldtimers out, time to have a bit of sillyness


A Tale of Two Crooks
(L) Rocky Mountain Express Wm Crooks (R) Tales of Wells Fargo Wm Crooks


The Tales of Wells Fargo set was simple: an engine, tender, tin-litho combine, tin-litho coach




















No comments:

Post a Comment