What I've been doing that hasn't moved the LA Division forward

Well, it's been quite a while since my last blog update. I had originally planned every 2-4 weeks, but life got in the way. So, I'll start with my end of January update and do my best to post updates monthly at a minimum.

So what have I been doing? Well, quite a bit. I've been working on the house and the garage. Making shelving and trying to get the garage organized. We've combined two households when we got married and have been trying to get organized. So, lots of non-railroad projects.

I did manage to build a spray booth. I has a bathroom fan for exhaust. I used to dimmer switch to control the fan speed. I found a great LED light bar for my lighting. It's great. I had tried using peel and stick floor tiles for the interior, but they only stuck on the bottom. The sides and roof quickly fell away. So, I guess I'll be a fan of the plywood interior.




Next was making a Christmas present for my wife. Prototype police beware! I picked up a Kato Business Car on Ebay. The only one available was a CB&Q car. I removed the lettering with isopropyl alcohol and a Q-tip. That worked great for all the lettering. Next up was to make a new drumhead. I used a hole punch in some clear plastic. My wife likes the Anschutz era Sunset logo, so I applied that onto the rear drumhead (no lit). A Sunset on each side of the front side of the car. The number is her birthday. Next was to apply the red stripe. I tried using Microscale decals with limited success. Most often breaking them. I then applied Microscale liquid decal film. The decals stayed together and were applied with good success. I came back 10 minutes later and they had curled. Needless to say, I wasn't happy. The stripes were removed. Unfortunately, it's been cold in Phoenix in December and much of January, so the stripes are yet to be painted. Next will be  the application of the Southern Pacific lettering, the car will be complete.

Lastly, I decided to gather up my P2K SD7s and SD9s to detail them for the new railroad. So here they are ready for paint stripping. I didn't want to strip the Black Widow units, but I'm modeling the early 80s. Of course, in order to start this project I needed to set up my modeling desk. Something that has been on my agenda for a long time.

Progress on the LA Division - Finally!

Getting around to working on the layout hasn't been a priority lately. But, I'm back to making progress. This month, I finished the framing for the main peninsula. Thus far I'm pretty pleased with how it turned out.

Below are progress pix.

First up was to attach the end to the peninsula. I was working solo, so that was a bit of a challenge as the long horizontals were affixed to the existing peninsula without being connected to each other. Once welded to the existing peninsula, I connected the two with a cross member. Then attached the legs.

The peninsula is completed. Legs
are still to be added between the ends and other part of the peninsula. That will be next and the horizontal cross members. The structure at the end will support the helix. So, I still have a bit more engineering to do to ensure it will be sturdy enough.

The center posts have been added to the main part of the peninsula. The tall posts are required to support the upper level staging yard. In the foreground is the frame for the smaller peninsula.









This is a view of the entire peninsula. It's substantial. After the cross members are added, it will be time to deck it with plywood so I can then start laying the staging tracks.