In the South

[P5se Camelback]

Some other shapes than "boxes" attached to a box building.
The main tank is made of a plastic pipe from the home improvement market. The smaller tops are 1/3 of a lipstick cap.

Ah ... the ubiquitous (on model railroads, at least) AMC Pacer, potentially the ugliest automobile ever conceived in Detroit (and I'm including the Edsel!) There is a recent Chevy four-door sedan that is such a close second I always have a mental block trying to remember it's name -- it looks like it over-inhaled and is holding it! That, or it's constipated to the extreme verge of explosion! The body over-hang outside the wheels is beyond atrocious! It almost looks like you could fit duallies under the rear of it!) Both automobiles offend me visually!!!!

O.K. ... now that I've gotten that out of my system I feel much better!

As per usual Reinhard, your fabrication skills, your inventiveness and dogged attention to detail has carried you once again to new heights! You, Kurt and Gary, between the three of you, you are keeping the bar quite high! Yeah, there are a couple of fellas on here who build awesome rolling stock that is absolutely remarkable, but you three, when it comes to realistic scenic representation, well, the rest of us will now have to scramble once again to even begin to catch up.

In all seriousness, your work never ceases to inspire me! The most bothersome thing to me is I am so far away from being anywhere near in a position that I could even dream of embarquing on a project to do something even remotely similar ... ahhhhh! Frustrating!

[rrinker]

DO you perhapes refer to the Caprice?


Only thing is, these babies were available with the Corvette motor in them. No one would expect such an ugly lump to be capable of high perforamnce - and most weren't. But put the Vette motor under the hood - watch out. Police ones were like that too.

--Randy

[Paulman]

Well, put this under "Very Late, Actually Too Late", but in the interests of adding to the catalog of curved buildings with sidings, here are two from the Silver Star industrial park in Orlando. The second one even has a tracked drawbridge that can be withdrawn when cars are spotted.

[P5se Camelback]

DO you perhapes refer to the Caprice?

--Randy

That's EXACTLY the ugly SLUG I was referring to! The designer/designers who came up with that one should be in some serious therapy! I'd rather have a '58 Edsel with a flat-topped combustion chambered 410 V8 and that goofy "rolling dome" speedometer in it!

YUK!

[P5se Camelback]

OMIGOSH, Reinhard! I just realized I had hijacked your thread with a snide comment about design-run-amuck and then all of a sudden there were two very large examples of absolute design disaster!

Dieter Rams, Chief of Design for Braun, A.G. and a designer friend of many years, once explained to me over dinner in Philadelphia his theories of "Weniger, aber besser" (which translates, "Less, but better".)

here, we were looking at very large photos of "too much, and much worse."

I apologized for the momentary hijacking of your otherwise fine, inspiring thread.

Please forgive me!

[faraway]

Many years ago my wife and I have been on vacation in the south. I got a call if I could do some business upstate NY for 2 or 3 days prior to our home flight. Hotel, car (also for my wife) and new flights would be arranged by the company. At that time I preferred a Lincoln Towncar during vacation to do the long rides day over day. My wife hated that large car and was mostly unwilling to drive it somewhere else than on interstates.
We arrived late at JFK and drove in a Volvo up to mid Hudson valley where we arrived at about 9pm to pickup the second car for my wife. A small A class car has been reserved for her. She got a free upgrade, a Caprice classic.... She is still telling me stories how she managed to ride that car for some days

ps. The Caprice was a model much older than the one on the photo here. The suspension was as soft as air.

[rrinker]

Big cushy American boats. With all of the handling of a supertanker - turn well before the expected curve and eventually the bow will come around. Rest assured those newer ones were every bit as cushy and soft as the previous ones. They didn't sell too well, other than to police departments. Not too many left in service these days, but in the 90's if you saw one it was PROBABLY a police car. Me, I prefer the sharp handling of the German cars

--Randy

[radivil]

The end of our driveway had a pair of bushes planted in 1987. The various cars that came and went never did anything to harm them, nor did the snowplows every winter. Until 2004, when my brother's Jeep died and he picked up a 1984 Parisienne. I think the SR-71 Blackbird could turn tighter than that monster.

Those bushes 1987-2004.

[OBJack]

Reinhard, sorry I'm a bit slow on the uptake but that road crossing a few posts back is certainly an eye catcher, and very cleverly placed between all those points/turnouts.
You certainly pack some very crisp and functional detail to your layout.
Its always a pleasure to read your thread and see how you create the effects you do with such a minimum of fuss..... You get the best bang for your buck that's for sure.

Jack

[faraway]

The heading "In the south" provides some freedom for short trips to the south east

I guess because the Athearn CSX GP15 will arrive shortly Walthers CSX GP15 are pushed in the market with good prices. I could not resist and with some dressing and the luck of at least fair running drives they are nice switchers. I am a fan of the CSX YN2 colors.

The MU hoses are the Atlas spare parts I wrote about some weeks ago.

[SSWUPinSA]

Hi Reinhard,

Been watching your post for months now and it is truely inspiring what you are doing. I am about to embark on the build of my own shelf layout.

I would like to know for interest sake what the dimensions of your office are, seems you have put so much into a small space...

Thanks for all the info and photos...

Callum

[faraway]

...I would like to know for interest sake what the dimensions of your office are, seems you have put so much into a small space..

Callum, thanks for the kindly words. I did post photos and the dimension of the layout in this thread on 17 Jan 2011, 13:13 h.
The room is 4 meters (13' ) long and 2,70 meters (9' ) wide. The north yard is 1' and the south yard 2' wide.

[SSWUPinSA]

Thanks Reinhard,

I did see the dimensions of the shelf but missed the room dimensions...ooops...

Wanted to say that your layout is keeping me confidant that I can reproduce something like MR LANCE... I too am a few thousand miles from the US but my ideal layout is of a industrial switching district in the States. I ran a thread on my design here last year and now need to get started now. All I have a chieved thus far is some weathering also featured in a post here on Big Blue.

Your buildings and layout seem to carry such a good realistic balance and this is where I hope I can achieve a similar result. Seems too easy to cram a lot of "stuff" in a shelf layout and I need to resist the urge to fill it.

Thanks again...

Callum

[faraway]

... I too am a few thousand miles from the US...

I thought so. SSW Cotton Belt UP Union Pacific in SA South Africa

[SSWUPinSA]

Any chance yopu could email me as many photos of your old layout as you can... good for my reference...? :oops: