A few days ago I got my new Athearn RTR SW1500. It is a very nice little engine with an incredible level of detail, almost as good as an Athearn Genesis.



Especially the grill on top of the radiator is absolutely amazing.



Being the first Athearn RTR with a can motor, it even runs smoothly and quietly ... well, too quietly for my liking. So I decided to put a LokSound decoder in this little beauty. I thought it would be quite difficult, but it proved to be very easy instead. The engine is DCC ready with a 9-pin and and an 8-pin plug on board. I don’t use 9-pin decoders, so I cut off the 9-pin plug to give way for the LokSound decoder.



I wanted to put a small .640" x 1" mm speaker above the front truck, but found out that it was just .040" too long to fit in between the front of the frame and the pc board. After some contemplation (I am not that quick ... ) I had the idea to remove the little black clips that are used to attach the wires to the board. I soldered the wires to the board instead and now the speaker would fit in perfectly.



At the front I placed the speaker on the frame (after cutting off .040" of the frame to make the speaker fit under the shell), for the rear end of the speaker I made a little support from .060" styrene.



I fixed it by tucking it between the pc board and the frame. Now I only had to glue the speaker with a tiny drop of super glue to the frame.



Well, that really did not hurt, did it?

Hi all. Has anyone got any feed back as to if its a good place to buy from. They have some awesome beer cars and wondering if some one has bought from them before. Thanks in advance Roger

I thought that I had moved this here earlier, but I can't seem to locate it.

Rather than buying cast brass lagged pipe, you can make you own easily and at low cost, too. I made my pipe to represent a steam supply line for a Barber-Green Snow Loader.
First, fabricate the pipe from suitably-sized brass wire: use wire about two scale inches or so smaller in diameter than what you require for a finished size. The one shown below is .052", which is about 4 1/2" in HO. Make all of the necessary bends and determine the method that you'll be using to fasten it in place before starting the actual lagging procedure.
For lagging, stick a length of ordinary masking tape to a sheet of glass, then, using a new blade, trim off the factory edges and discard them. Next, measure and mark for the width of lagging that you want to use: for my large pipe, I made it 1'(HO) wide, and for the 4" (actual) length of the pipe, I used about 16" (actual) of tape.
Start at an end, or, as I did, at one of the mounting fixtures. You can cut 1/4" or so of the end to a taper or start with a square end - it doesn't seem to make much difference in the appearance. Hold the end against the pipe, with tweezers if necessary, until you can get the tape wrapped at least partway around, and keep some tension on the tape as you wind. I overlapped each preceding wrap by about 1/3 or 1/2. When you come to the end, cut it off with your X-Acto blade.

   

I ended the first wrap at a point where the pipe goes through a mounting clamp on the smokebox front. The lower end will get lagging after the pipe is installed on the loco.
All of the other mounting clamps are installed on the pipe, along with stand-offs to keep the pipe in the proper position. The small wires protruding through the stand-offs will be inserted into holes in the boiler, then bent over to hold things in place.

   

When all of the lagging is in place, apply ca to all of it - all sides and especially the ends. Soak up any excess with tissue. The glue on the masking tape will eventually fail, but the ca will keep it in place. I have pipe that was lagged this way over 30 years ago that is still solid.

   

If you have areas to be lagged after installation, as I did, do so, then apply the ca as before.

   

Here's a look at the installed pipe:

   

The front end has a simple plug, made from a large nbw casting. I drilled out the end of the wire, then ca'd the casting in place.

   

On the prototype, when the snow-loader was to be used, a hose would be attached to the end of this pipe, with the other end connected to the snow loader.
After you've installed the pipe, paint it using your usual paint and techniques. I brush-painted mine, using Floquil paint, as it was installed on an already painted loco.


And, on a different loco, some steam delivery pipes for an Elesco feedwater heater:

   

I hope that you'll find this simple technique useful.

Wayne

Has anyone tried installing the MRC decoder w/sound #1644 in a Kato SD70-MAC loco?
It is supposed to be a drop in decoder much like the Digitrax decoders for the Kato SD-70 but it includes sound.
Any comments on ease of installation, locomotive control quality, and sound quality would be appreciated.
dwight77

Anybody here belong to Train Orders.com? They look a bit interesting-- what little they will show you before you pay them 32 bucks a year to participate. Now i'm not against helping a site to prosper , but most give you some exposure before making you register, not this one. Is it worth what they are asking?

Well...it's almost Nscale. You can find these tanks at Target or will find them soon. This is a newly stocked item and is almost exactly NScale. I measured the tank at 31 scale feet, and the M1A1 is about 32 feet long. Close enough! They also had a Striker vehicle as well, and both are $3.99.

I just discovered what you guys already know most likely...

You can use Code 55 rail joiners on Code 80 track. They seem to grip tightly, and are almost unseen on the rails.

Does anyone have any experience using them? Good or bad reviews?

Hi Guys,

After reading new posts on several threads i could only see the latest page ..... and not start reading from the beginning on them ....... is there a reason for this please :?:

Couple weeks ago, I had the chance to travel sans family to see some of the railway spots in Southern Ontario that I've had on my list for a long time. While it did not prove to be a Canadian version of the Gauge get together from earlier this summer, it was still an excellent trip. Unfortunately, several southern Ontario Gaugers were unavailable, but Spitfire was up for anything, and was an excellent guide and host to boot! Thanks!!

Saturday afternoon was spent poking around at the former Canadian Pacific Railway John Street Roundhouse. Situated in the shadow of the CN Tower and the Rogers Centre (formerly the SkyDome) this relic of Canadian railway history is now home to Steamwhistle Breweries (<!-- m --><a class="postlink" href="http://www.steamwhistle.ca/">http://www.steamwhistle.ca/</a><!-- m -->), Leon's Furniture, and most importantly, the Toronto Railway Historical Society museum (<!-- m --><a class="postlink" href="http://www.trha.ca/">http://www.trha.ca/</a><!-- m -->).

The TRHA is building an impressive collection that will be housed in three stalls of the roundhouse, the machine shop, and outdoors around the restored turntable and coal tower. Nearby sites (and sights ) will be linked with historic walks, including such destinations as Union Station and the former offices of Canadian Northern.

Let's take a look around:

Don Valley Station
You can see where this little station was sawn in half to transport it to the site.

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Interlocking Tower
One wall is currently plywood, as the original was removed to get the interlocking mechanisms (8 tonnes) out for restoration.

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The Roundhouse
Say what you will about the Leon's moving in, but they have reportedly been very supportive, including putting up some significant $$$ in support of the museum.

Inside
The best look at the inside is in the Steamwhistle Brewery, where other than cleaning up and pouring a new floor, the interior remains pretty much the same.

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Outside
Interesting details on the back wall and some big (big!) doors.

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Walthers Tank Set?

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Coal Tower

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Assorted Engines
Since I only have eyes for the steam power, you'll have to fill in the rest for me...

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And a mural showing how things used to be. This is painted on the wall of the access to underground parking for SkyDome/Rogers Centre that faces the Leon's entrance and is built into the side of the coal tower.

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After we had toured the site (and missed the free beer from Steamwhistle ) we headed of in search of a couple of hobby shops. First we found John's Camera & Hobbies *link* - with lots of hobbies (trains, models, doll houses, R/C, planes) but little camera gear in evidence. I picked up a couple of trucks, and this vintage reefer lettered for Sudbury (Ontario) Breweries, shown on Val's layout (Parkdale Yard):

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A trip down through the Don Valley and under the Parkway (via the very interesting Todmorden Mills (cool name too!)) was unfortunately unphotographed. However, it was like stepping out of Toronto into a little turn-of-the-previous-century village - but only briefly! Our destination was George's Trains *link* on Mount Pleasant, but they have unfortunately closed that landmark location in favour of their new, more northerly location.

Saturday night I was treated to a steak dinner, and then we headed down to see what other interesting interchange traffic was at Parkdale Yard:

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I also got a chance to look at some of Spitfire's outstanding large scale modelling. For those of you that don't know, she's also an award-winning 1/6 scale military modeller. Her WW2 scenes are incredible.

Hey all. I've been searching high and low for anything I can find on the old Apache Railway company between McNary and the old logging camp of Maverick. I have found bits and pieces here and there but along the way, I came across this site...
<!-- m --><a class="postlink" href="http://www.azrymuseum.org/collection/Main_Index.html">http://www.azrymuseum.org/collection/Main_Index.html</a><!-- m -->
Really neat stuff for you Arizonans and maybe for those non Arizonans as well!