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Know Your Railroad
John has kindly sent in this follow-up to his earlier article:
We who engage in The World’s Greatest Hobby have a distinct advantage over those who don’t indulge in running model trains – we CAN have our cake and eat it too! Those of us who model trains do not have to go by a specific means of making our railroad. We can follow a prototype, develop our own railroad, have a large or small or in-between layout, or cross eras, as long as it is enjoyable to build and run.
To give an example, my main interest is in the initial locomotive roster of Conrail (Consolidated Rail), which in the spring of 1976 took over Penn Central (New York Central, Pennsylvania Railroad, New Haven), Erie Lackawanna (Delaware Lackawanna & Western, Erie Railroad), the Reading, Lehigh Valley, Central of New Jersey, and several other smaller railroads. Needless to say, Conrail had a lot of equipment to sort through, and some of the locomotives either ran for a few years and then were sold off or scrapped. For example, Conrail inherited a bunch of EMD F7 A-units, but only one was repainted in Conrail blue. The others kept their own road colors (weathered as they were) with a Conrail stencil over them. The successful GG-1 electric was another locomotive to bite the dust, as Conrail de-electrified after a few years. Conrail was eventually merged into CSX and Norfolk Southern in 1999, and some ex-Conrail locos are still running today.
It takes a lot of referencing to choose which locomotives to use on a layout from the initial Conrail roster, and to do this, two free websites online are very helpful, to say the least. One is the Conrail Cyclopedia, a tremendous work where a lot of information is available. The other is The Diesel Shop, which gives the rosters of many railroads, including “Fallen Flags” where one can cross-reference a particular locomotive to see where from where it originated. This site also has the production numbers of various locomotive builders.
As can be seen, a lot of study is necessary to develop an accurate locomotive roster for early Conrail, but it is time well-spent if this is where your interest lies. To give another example, it would be “wrong” for initial Conrail to have an Erie locomotive on the roster, because the Erie and the DLW combined in 1960 to form Erie Lackawanna. By the time of Conrail 16 years later, the Erie locomotive would have been given an EL paint job.
I once saw a layout where a train ran through numerous animal parks, separated by dividers, and went from dinosaurs to wild animals of today. Very unrealistic for sure, but very effective for the owner. So is it “wrong” to run an Erie locomotive on a set-up where the names and types of locomotives are not of any consequence? No way! How a layout is made is of importance for your enjoyment, and any way you want it is right way, as long as the trains keep running. That’s the beauty of this hobby!
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I am making a tunnel for my railroad. It wont look as good as foam but it will still look good. I am about half way through. First you get chicken wire and make the frame of the tunnel. Then you make the first layer with PAPER MACHE. After that first layer dries you put on a second layer as reinforcement. You can put on as many layers as you want as long as you have enough stuff. When that dries you paint it then secure it down where you want. Make sure you can get it back up so you can change that track if you want to.
Thank you I have been trying to decide a layout that at least looks some what real I think you helped me much Thank you.