Freelance 2013-2 (MAW)

[bdw9535]

Reinhard,

There's nothing wrong with your trailers, the elevators take all types of trucks and trailers. This is from the Agway Elevators and Mill in Bordentown , NJ.

Bruce

[shortliner]

Reinhard - not a particularly new post, but this might help with the trailers - BTW the OP is a friend so I can pit you in touch if you PM me your email <!-- m --><a class="postlink" href="http://www.rmweb.co.uk/community/index.php?/topic/21363-american-trucks-trailers/">http://www.rmweb.co.uk/community/index. ... -trailers/</a><!-- m -->
Best
Jack

[faraway]

Jack,
PM has been sent. It was the Herpa grain trailer I was looking for but the Lonestar is outstanding! I would like to have one or two of them.

Bruce,
thanks for the photo to make me feel good I think the trailers I am using are manly used between grain processing and huge gain storage facilities e.g. in NJ. Smaller trucks and bottom unloading trailers are more common at the country side where farmers deliver their harvest to the local grain elevator/silo.
Looks like the size of the farm is an important fact. I found a lot of photos where the grain is loaded into smaller trucks like the F850 directly at the field but there are also photos where huge trailers get their load directly at the field. I saw a lot of medium size modern steel grain silos at the farm property in the Texas panhandle. Looks like the Ohio farmers have no private storage but use the next shared storage in the next town.

The new ground cover and a simple swap of trucks on the road permits to run Conrail on my layout too

[faraway]

The area of the commercial district got cleaned up, a former asphalt area got a base sand ground, a track got new ballast and 2" wide sidewalks to support the front walls of the buildings have been constructed from styrene today.
The long building at the left is temporary shifted to permit a commercial building on both sides of the crossing street (white sedan). Sooner or later I plan to replace it with "something" that supports boxcars and fits better close to the center of a small town in north Ohio/Indiana etc. than a cold storage.
I have not decided yet what to do on both sides of the street in the foreground. The old KFC is temporary back on it's old place on the gray lot in the foreground.

[jwb]

Some ideas -- most shots are from upstate New York, but Ohio is little different. Once I told a guy in Ohio that Ohio had a lot more white barns than the rest of the country. He thought about this, and I think it had never occurred to him before, but he never let me forget I'd said it. But otherwise, Ohio, upstate New York, etc, aren't much different.
   
   
   
   
   
You should definitely check out the numerous Blair Line sign sets for highway signs, small town businesses, etc.

[jwb]

The one modeler anywhere who seems to do best at bringing out the atmosphere of US small towns is a UK modeler named Peter North. I download every photo of his work I can find -- they come and go. He builds small layouts for UK exhibitions and then sells them or gets rid of them, so there isn't all that much of a permanent record. Here's one photo that I've saved. Notice the use he makes of Blair Line highway number signs, much like one of the photos above:
   

[jwb]

I went googling for more of his stuff, and found some photos of one of his layouts (typically, sold to another guy) at <!-- m --><a class="postlink" href="http://godinezho.wordpress.com/tag/godinez/">http://godinezho.wordpress.com/tag/godinez/</a><!-- m -->

[faraway]

Peter North's layouts are amazing. I love to look at the all the small details and the way how he played with colors and ended up with wonderful weathering.

Thank for the photos of small town USA. I have luck and Antwerp's main street is covered in Google Maps with street view! I think Antwerp is in pretty good shape. I have passed through many small towns in much worse condition. Looks like economy is still stable in that area. I looked at the web page of Antwerp but there is no large dominating employer listed http://www.antwerpohio.com/businesses.php?p=indu. I guess farming is still strong in that area supporting jobs in the small towns.

There is an old small depot at the main street grade crossing. http://farm4.staticflickr.com/3654/34486...dcf5_b.jpg. It became an ice cream shop in 2009. I am looking for a kit that matches the former depot to model this little shop. It would fit perfect between the tracks on my layout.

I noticed a lot of yellow markings at the curbstones around the grade crossing. I assume they are "no parking" signs like the red lines in Vernon. I wonder basic traffic rules like no parking marks differ from state (OH) to state (CA).

[nkp_174]

In general, the economy in western Ohio is pretty good outside of some of the medium sized cities: Marion, Lima, Hamilton...and the cores of the Dayton and Toledo. One of the spiffiest is New Bremen, OH...and it is worth googling for images as pretty much all of its downtown is magnificent. But the local branchline was the Nickel Plate and not the MAW...

[jwb]

There is an old small depot at the main street grade crossing. http://farm4.staticflickr.com/3654/34486...dcf5_b.jpg. It became an ice cream shop in 2009. I am looking for a kit that matches the former depot to model this little shop. It would fit perfect between the tracks on my layout.

I noticed a lot of yellow markings at the curbstones around the grade crossing. I assume they are "no parking" signs like the red lines in Vernon. I wonder basic traffic rules like no parking marks differ from state (OH) to state (CA).

The Atlas Maywood station looks close to what you have in mind <!-- m --><a class="postlink" href="http://www.walthers.com/exec/productinfo/150-6203">http://www.walthers.com/exec/productinfo/150-6203</a><!-- m --> I think things like curb colors vary by municipality.

[faraway]

John, I had the Maywood building some years ago. It is far to large. However, I may shrink it by kit bashing if there is no better match.
The NS GP38-2 5289 got the NS black suit between summer 2010 and spring 2011. That is fine to do the NS exchange job in Woodburn.

[railohio]

You'll also need Norfolk Southern caboose No. 555555, which has carried (at least) three paint schemes in the Maumee & Western era.

[faraway]

The preparation of the ground for the merchant buildings proceeds. The walkways have been changed into a more flexible system that helps better to overcome the design flaw of no walkways at the grade crossings. Dedicated concrete walkways will be on top of the gray base immediate in front of the stores only and compacted gravel will be in between filling the gaps around the crossing. The paving between the rails will be extended accordingly. I had to do some diluted white glue at delicate locations. The removable section might be glued in place if the glue runs down to the wood base. Three temporary placed well oiled pieces of styrene shall prevent the worse. I will see tomorrow noon what happened....

The sand triangle area is where the ice cream shop / old depot as found in Antwerp might be located.

[faraway]

The buildings are in the mail. The space is prepared.

[faraway]

The long warehouse in the center background has been shortened from 8 to 5 loading docks (spaced for 50' boxcars) to provide more space for the commercial area / down town area. An new total length of 44" is still a remarkable structure on my small layout. The layout looks more balanced now with about 1/3 for grain, warehouse and town and the yard in the foreground..