Originally I wasn’t going to touch the handmade turnouts but after putting the PCB ties on, they stuck out like a sore. So, I decided to do a quick coat of Rust-oleum Camouflage Earth Brown…a comparison photo below.

(more…)

The room being only 12 ft. wide is pretty tight on curves, so to turn around corners I used custom turnouts in designing the staging yard. Seemed like a good idea at the time thought it meant I had to hand make turnouts. A sane person starting on a big layout for the very first time, without any experience hand laying track, would choose to maybe make one custom turnout – a straight one, for shits and giggles. I dived into making 5…curved…turnouts, all having both curved point rails and curved frogs. Let’s go!

(more…)

It feels like it’s Christmas (or whatever holiday you celebrate)…oh wait it is. Well hooray then, let more goodies come pouring (down?). Total of 3 packages came in today and it felt like I worked in Shipping/Receiving dept (it didn’t really). I was looking outside the window every 5 minutes, anxiously waiting for one delivery or another.

(more…)