Where do you guys get the little train icons in your signatures? Are they paintable so I can make a train of my own free lance RR for my sig??

I notice Josh and Tom both have trains in their sigs...

Thanks
dave

I am trying to 'fit' a bridge into an area where two tracks will cross each other. One track will pass under the other at an angle of about 30 dgrees (give ot take). Now, I have been looking for an appropriate bridge to carry the upper track. I have found many nice bridges in the Walthers book but not one of them is designed as an offset structure. Every single one of them is 'square' at the ends. I would like a single track through truss bridge, about 18 - 20" long, which sits on the abuttments at an angle. Does anyone out there know of a bridge like this? I may have to kit bash one if I can't find something already designed this way. The other option would be to pass under through tunnel. This may not sound prototypical but I know of several spots east of Pittsburgh, PA, where the PRR did exactly that. Instead of a bridge and it's maintance problems they just built a stone arch or concrete tunnel for the track and filled in above it for the main line to cross 10 feet above. This will work, but I like bridges. If any one has any ideas I would love to hear 'em!

Thanks, and sdtay warm!

Kevin

While nosing around I found this link to a list of just about every ARR reporting mark there is. It contains links for info for most of the railroads listed.


<!-- m --><a class="postlink" href="http://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=List_of_AAR_reporting_marks:_A&redirect=no">http://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?tit ... edirect=no</a><!-- m -->

As many of you may recall I have a great love for short lines and terminal roads..While checkibg CSX's web site for some possible industries I ran across this little beauty.

<!-- m --><a class="postlink" href="http://www8.cpr.ca/English/Customers/New+Customers/Where+We+Ship/Rail+Partners+Profiles/Albany+Port+Railroad+Corporation+-+APD.htm?PrintMe=1">http://www8.cpr.ca/English/Customers/Ne ... ?PrintMe=1</a><!-- m -->

This road is one mile long and serves 10 industries and still finds the need for 2 EMD SW9 switchers(exCR #9122 & 9133).

<!-- m --><a class="postlink" href="http://naphotos.nerail.org/showpic/?photo=200309101120231148.jpg&order=byrail&page=2&key=Albany%20Port%20Railroad">http://naphotos.nerail.org/showpic/?pho ... 20Railroad</a><!-- m -->

A loop layout,10 industries and 2 P2K SW9s and your good to go..

Oh..Don't like SW9s?

Back date the layout and use these..

<!-- m --><a class="postlink" href="http://naphotos.nerail.org/showpic/?photo=2007122910060531846.jpg&order=byrail&page=1&key=Albany%20Port%20Railroad">http://naphotos.nerail.org/showpic/?pho ... 20Railroad</a><!-- m -->

<!-- m --><a class="postlink" href="http://naphotos.nerail.org/showpic/?photo=2007122910040331817.jpg&order=byrail&page=1&key=Albany%20Port%20Railroad">http://naphotos.nerail.org/showpic/?pho ... 20Railroad</a><!-- m -->

My steel mill idea as follows first its not going to be a huge operation 2nd would this set up be possible in the real world and last would it look right to have tracks run under the bridge in the second pic to the rolling mill? Thanks for all your guys input.        

Wintertime, and roads are getting pretty slippery over here after a few cycles of thaw and freeze recently. Here is a link to a picture (from my local newspaper) of "my" rail line yesteday, a few miles up along the track - almost looks like mail is heading back towards being handled by the railroad again, doesn't it ?

http://www.vg.no/uploaded/image/bilderig...95_878.jpg

No, the mail truck did not get hit by the train, and neither the car driver nor the guy taking the picture was injured - I wouldn't have posted the link if that had happened.

Mail truck ended up about 4 inches short of fouling the track. And the picture is from about 20 minutes after the mail truck slid off the road and landed almost on the track - when the RR dispatcher and engineers had been alerted - that train is creeping past the incident site at very slow speed.

I assume the picture was taken by the conductor's cell phone while he was making sure the train would be able to get past the mail truck without hitting it.

Anyways - time for me to go get started on some modeling railroading again - just wanted to share that picture.

Smile,
Stein

New HO Gensets JUST announced by Atlas.

<!-- m --><a class="postlink" href="http://forum.atlasrr.com/forum/topic.asp?TOPIC_ID=51322">http://forum.atlasrr.com/forum/topic.asp?TOPIC_ID=51322</a><!-- m -->

Apparently these are the NRE Genset, but hopefully, they start making Railpower Gensets too.

.....would it be ok to run intermodals and those really cool auto racks on a layout set from 1955-1970? When did they begin to appear on railroads? I just think those are way cool cars. My planned shelf layout will have large enough radius curves to handle them. They will be set out for interchange. I don't plan to have an area to store a lot of containers or autos, I just really like the looks of those cars.

A while back there was a post here about things that could be used to simulate hose --- a lot of great ideas were posted. At the time I had mentioned "rubber legs" --an item sold by fishing fly tieing shops, but I had none available to show.
I since then got some more, in doing so I discovered that they come in several colors & two styles. The styles are indivdual strands or a "sheet" that has to be pulled apart. The sheet is what I had last time & has a couple other uses, it will make great ribbed belting, ( conveyor belts ) or fine matting or running board covers in 1/24 scale autos for instance. I could not locate a sheet at Cabellos so I got a package of the loose ones .
Here is a picture of the ones I got, I have placed a tooth pick beside it to give an idea of scale. I think this package was about 4.00 $ . each of them is about 6 inches long, thats a LOT of hose . I am going to use some on my 1/64 junkyard cars. Take a look.

   

Here are a few shots of a scratch built tender I built to test photo etching techniques I had read about.
I had Kinkos photo copy on clear acetate the sides of a Riverossi Y6B tender to get the rivet & panel line detail . When I asked them to copy it , The clerk rather curtly told me " This aint star trek, we don't have a replicator" ! Took some convincing to get him to do what I wanted , but I was trying to do it without having to do a lot of art work.

One word of caution, if you are going to try photo etching , be aware that you NEED a good respirator to avoid the Zylene fumes, they are NASTY! I was only exposed to them for abour 3 minutes ( with out protection because I did not know I needed it) & got a violent headache that lasted for hours. Research on Zylene showed that it causes severe brain damage with prolonged exposure. BE Careful!!