Filling the Gap (part I)

After finishing (mostly) the AG/GC complex, the last piece of unfinished terrain was the area between Aston station and Aston Growers.

The above picture shows the gap in the early stages.

Closing the gap was a five-part process. Five parts in what was less than a 2 foot square area!

1. Build a road disappearing into the backdrop (see the black strip) to link this area with the outside world and connect (out of sight) with the main road running along the backdrop.

2. Connect that road with the station road (to the left above), the road to the (unseen) truck loading area of AG - the upper right and a short stub to the modelled truck loading dock at AG (the lower right).

3. Build a small bluff (upper centre).

4. Finish "Station Hill" so that it descended down to the road.

5. Construct a small hillock beside the tracks to camouflage the intersection (middle of the photo).

The road to town

Easily the most challenging bit was to build a road those rose from ground level to disappear into the backdrop at an angle. I'm no geometry whiz. The road needed to blend into the big hill behind the station and the later constructed bluff while coming down at a reasonable angle. It also had to meet the backdrop at a angle. Finally, the right side of the road also needed a shoulder. This got complicated because the backdrop and later constructed bluff left little room. It was a puzzle. 

I used styrene as a base with 320 grit sandpaper on top. I left part of the styrene uncovered for rock ballast (shoulder) to be added later. To give the crest of the road some flex, I cut the supporting styrene and narrowed the end of the road going into the backdrop. Again, this creates the illusion of the road disappearing. I weathered the sandpaper and added my shoulder. I also added a wood "lip" at the bottom of the road to match the height of the road that would be added later. This gets tricky because I would be using plaster Smoothit and did not want to sully the sandpaper road with plaster.

But to blend the road in, I needed to finish the hill behind the station. 

Station Hill

I have really come to love pink insulation board as a scenery base. It is firm but easy to cut and counter. Once you add paint, it will absorb ground foam and it is soft but still a good base to plant trees in.

I did not entirely finish Station Hill the first time round. I knew I'd be finishing the hill later so I left room for more trees and roughage.

More SuperTrees, some Woodland Scenics bramble, Heki grass, and some puff balls added greenery:

As I mentioned in an earlier post, the greenery options have come a long way in 25 years and the major challenge these days is not over doing it!

I have particularly fond memories of building the retaining wall on a cold December morning while I listened to a 1978 broadcast of a Kings/Canadiens hockey game. I wasn't able to match the colour of the previous wall but I can't say it is noticeable amidst all the bramble.

The other note about this part of the construction is the dead tree trunk you see in the above photo. I was at a train show a few years ago and spent about $10 on "Woodland Scenics Dead Wood". At first I thought this was the most ridiculous purchase - I was buying stuff I could get for free by crossing the street and going to High Park. But I really like how the trunks are weathered (you'll see more of them shortly), and what I was really spending $10 on was confidence - i.e. that they'd play their role well on the layout (as dead tree trunks).

At some point, construction got to the stage where I could install the road knowing it would blend into the hill once greenery was added. That was a huge moment of relief.

And the same for where Station Hill would eventually meet the flat road behind the station. I roughed in the scenery at the "meeting point" but left enough unfinished that blending could be done at a later date.

In part II, I'll discuss the bluff, the road network and the hillock.

 Aston Growers (Part II)

Prior to "planting" Aston Growers, I had a few additional touches to add.

The first was the sign.

The back of the sign is styrene, painted a faded yellow and trimmed with wood painted black as a frame. The trim was a small touch but I adds some depth to what is otherwise flat styrene.

The letters are from a Blair Line kit. They are wood cutouts. I did my best to evenly space the letters and keep them aligned. The end result isn't perfect (the sign droops slightly to one side) but close enough. I added some support ribs for the sign, but they aren't particularly visible.

Roof touches

A multi-level cold storage building needs at least two things on the roof:

1. A headhouse for a freight elevator.

2. A refrigeration unit.

Using the same techniques used on the outbuilding, I constructed a small brick structure for the roof. I reason that the building contains the elevator mechanism. It breaks up what would otherwise be a flat roof.

As you can see from the photo below, I have something that looks like a refrigeration unit (the grey thing above the "TON" in Aston). I can't say I love how it looks so I haven't glued the unit in place.

For the roof, I wanted a contrast with the Generic Canneries roof which is covered in drainage ballast. Aston Growers has a flat black roof made out of thin styrene. Unlike the foamcore board used for GC, styrene doesn't warp so this roof should remain level.

Additionally, I added an L-shaped styrene rib at the back of the structure to blend the roof into the backdrop (more on the backdrop in a second). I'd like to think that this touch makes it hard for the eye to determine where the roof ends. The other advantage of the L-rib was that it covers any gap between the underlying roof and the backdrop. This is important considering the difficulty in getting a flush fit with the roof and the backdrop.

Blending the roof in.

I also cut some green photo backdrop and added behind the building to prevent the black roof from meeting a pale blue sky.

Finally, I put some pipes on the left hand side of the building from the brick outbuilding up to some roof unit to hide where the grey building side meets the green photo backdrop.

All these small touches took time. And as a chronic box-checker, it is annoying to have all kinds of extra steps get in the way of a big box checked, but, as the photo below shows, mission accomplished. Yes, you can see a bit of a gap between the building and the backdrop but there is enough other visuals going on to make you not care (but oh that yellow door and window on the depot!).

Looks railroad-y!

The walkway

Finally we get to the point of the whole Generic Canneries/Aston Growers exercise. Which was to have a walkway connecting the two buildings.  

The inspiration for the walkway is from a layout by a guy named Paul Dolkos. Of course, I can't find photos of the scene that inspired me, but the point was that he modelled a paper mill complex and put a walkway spanning the tracks between the buildings. The practical point of the walkway was to hide the track disappearing into the backdrop. I had a similar problem - my track comes to an abrupt end between the buildings.

This is where it all ends...

As much as I loved my idea, implementing it was not easy. I had to account for the walkway when putting both buildings together. At least the walkway's meet-up with Generic Canneries wasn't visible, making my task easier (it can be purely functional).

I constructed the walkway out of Evergreen siding, left over window castings and the roof (also out of Evergreen siding). I wanted the sheet metal to look a well aged and rough around the ages. This is an industrial complex, after all. I perhaps got a little carried away the rust affect, but it is hard to see since this isn't a well-lit part of the layout.

Aid from a red cup

I did a test fitting, a few adjustments and then set about to levelling the walkway.

The last piece was that I felt the walkway was long enough that it needed a support. By this point, I had used up my store of luck. The buildings fit. No obvious mistakes or gaps. Yes, a few droops here and there (the Aston Growers sign, the unloading shed). Aston Growers looked good against the backdrop. Enough clearance for boxcars going into Generic Canneries.

All very good, except, as you can see above, the thin support beam is uneven. Sigh. Good luck seeing it though...

Postscript

After writing about "Modeller's block" last time, this weekend (last April weekend) has been productive on the model railroading front. As I write this (Saturday at 3 p.m.) I've begun the first layer of scenery for the foreground yellow blobs I wrote about last time. And as I edit this post (8:45 p.m. on Sunday) I can report that I spent several hours on the first pass of what is now a brambly blob. Very time consuming, but fun.

Modeller's Block 

Before getting back to the saga of Aston Growers, I thought I would write about my current challenge - modeller's block. 

To me, model railroading is storytelling. I think most people who think of model trains think about a train running in a circle (probably with a steam engine on the front and a caboose at the back), perhaps around a Christmas tree.

For me, model railroading is about the industry and the community it lives in. I work for a railroad (not the railroad part though) and I've been in the logistics industry since 2004. The reason I got into the industry is that when I was a baby lawyer in 2003, my firm had a warehousing client in Cornwall, Ontario. The client had a wrongful dismissal court case that needed defending. To you, that may not seem very interesting. But it was fascinating to me because it meant I could take the train to Cornwall. I would get paid to take the train! Anyway, that turned into a job and let to my chosen industry. 

To me, that is an interesting story.

Modelling allows you to tell stories. A great example appears in Sam Posey's book "Playing with Trains". Posey was building a layout based on a long-dead Colorado mining railroad. In real life, Posey was a race car driver and he knew Paul Newman (a big fan of auto racing). At the time, Newman had a charitable endeavour, "Newman's Own" that made high-end food condiments such as salad dressing. The charity part of it was that the company donated its profits to well-deserving causes, like the environment.

Posey (not a big prototype modeller) decided to add "Newman's Own" as an industry on his layout. He wrote that because "Newman's Own" was so virtuous in real life, he would make it a very, very bad company on his layout. He modelled the industry as a rundown, rat-infested building. He placed the industry next to a stream and had a large discharge pipe going from the industry to the stream, spewing out toxic runoff. He added some drunk employees, loafing off away from the eyes of the supervisor. I have no idea if Paul Newman ever saw the layout, but who cares - I'm sure Posey had endless joy translating his idea into HO scale.

I'm at the stage where I've modelled the main stories on my layout. The industries. The track. The winding road along the back. The station. My current block is that there are four areas where I know the story I want to tell, but I just don't know how to translate each story into physical reality. This post is about the stories from smallest to largest.

Story One - A picnic table for Aston Growers

There is a small bare patch of scenery adjacent to AG and beside the tracks:

I hope that is enough room for a picnic table for the AG boys.  This should be an easy project - picnic tables and figures are easy to find.

Story Two - A truck repair scene for Aston station

I have posted about the western end of Aston Station where I've located buildings for the track gang. I've posted about the station itself. I haven't described the scenery between the station and Aston Growers - that is a future post.

What I have right now is empty pavement on the eastern edge of the station. As I'll write about in a future post, I didn't do a good job laying down the road, and it is rather bumpy and uneven. Actually, the bumpy and uneven road will probably blow a lot of truck tires...

...so the idea here is to take a short truck trailer, add some men and junk and tell the story of a small running repair. Nothing overwhelming, but enough to distract from the bumpy road.

This will be a harder scene to put together since I have to find a suitable trailer, build a tire jack and locate a repair vehicle. There has to be enough detail to tell the story, and finding that detail in HO scale is often the source of delay.

Story Three - the back lot of Generic Canneries

I have mentioned this before but there is a decent sized backlot at Generic Canneries (understanding that the model depicts the back of the building, not the public-facing front). 

The detail challenge here is that my ideal scene has a few Generic Canneries truck trailers waiting for their next load. So I'll need to design a paint scheme and find some way to decal the trucks. Not fun but it would be very rewarding if I could pull it off.

I already have a nice shack ready for the trailer boys to hang out in while they await instructions. I'll add a rusted out truck to tell the story of an evolving truck fleet and add assorted other junk. The result will be that Generic Canneries is a busy place with a lot of freight on the go.

The other block on this scene for me is fencing. As noted in an earlier post, Generic Canneries already had a problem with some nosy kids (one of the above photos suggests they may be back). So GC should really fence that yard in.

The drawbacks to a fence are:

1. A fence will block the eye-level view of the main track. I have intentionally put the track going into the GC building at foam level to give some variety to track height. 

2. Fences are finicky to install and break easily. This is especially a concern because they will be near the edge of the layout.

3. Fencing off the yard will require me to build gates for the tracks. And I have tracks at two different elevations which will complicate gate installation.

Two ideas to get around this - 1. Fence off only the track closest to the edge of the layout to suggest that GC owns all the land that the spur tracks run on. 2. Because the spur to the loading shed is new, I could try to model a fence under construction.

Of the four scenes, this is the one I'd really like to make progress on. If I scenic the yard, I'll have a section of the layout fully scenicked from front to back. At present, when I take pictures in this area, I am distracted by the brown paint and unballasted track.

Story Four - the foreground at the western edge

There is a piece of straight track at the bottom left of the layout that serves as a switching lead for the runaround track. Without this track, switching would be impossible because the engine couldn't "run around" its train - hence the term. But the track is straight which makes it boring.

I've built some nice scenery behind the track - the rock face - so I don't want that to disappear.

So I have created a two-part scenery blob that is ready for its story:

So far, the story is that of an overgrown driveway leading up to a small clearing. The driveway begins where the "blog" descends to the base (toward the middle of the layout). I terraformed the foam to create a gradual incline with small slopes on either side of where the driveway will go. Eventually, I'll add a dirt road to the middle forefront of the layout - giving the driveway a connection to the rest of the world.

My "block" is a vision of what is at the top of a small hill. I know it is the suggestion of a small building. I thought about modelling a concrete base and nothing more. The challenge is that the footprint is pretty small - at best 5 inches wide - and I do not want to overwhelm the footprint with a large building. I want something unobtrusive, but still want to hint enough that something was there previously. I'll then add long grass and plenty of scrub to depict and overgrown clearing. 

The hill isn't high enough to block the view of a train behind it, but I'd like to think that it will create the illusion of the track "passing through" the world instead of being the focus.

Postscript

So what is the cure to Modeller's Block? Time - first of all. With mindfulness of what you want, time gives you the opportunities to see things that help fill the gaps in the story.

The second thing is retail therapy. I placed an order today with my pals at Model Tech Studio and an assortment of junk (picnic tables, outhouses, stone walls, etc.) is on its way northward. Do I realize need the junk? I don't know. But it does take away the "I don't have the right stuff" excuse.

Finally, reader's may note that I began this post with a fun story about Newman's Own. The four stories I plan to tell are nowhere near as fun. I've fought the urge to add a moonshine still to overgrown hill scene. People will sit at the picnic table - not skunks (again, very tempted by this idea). The GC yard will be all business. The reason for all this is that for me, I'm more interesting in modelling things as they appear in real life instead of the quirky...

Aston Growers (part I)

Generic Canneries needed a buddy (and a supplier). What do you can? Peaches, potatoes, corn, peas. And it isn't too much of a product stretch to make applesauce and baby food.

Plus, I needed a place to spot those gorgeous 8-hatch reefers I talked about in a post a while back. 

So the answer was a produce storage facility across the tracks. And connected by a walkway to move produce from storage to canning. Conveniently, the walkway would also frame the view of the tracks and distract from the 90 degree corner.

Walthers offers a cold storage model.

While the model looks nice, I had a few concerns:

1. I needed a model to fit in the odd shape between the tracks, the back wall and the side wall.

2. The model didn't have a lot of character.

3. I had just come through the aggravation of cutting and splicing an existing model.

And besides, the Aston spur is designed to teach me new things. Having constructed the unloading shed out of raw plastic/styrene, I was ready for a larger challenge. So I took the "look" of the Walthers model and bought a bunch of white styrene from Credit Valley. Think of it like building a shed from lumber using a mix of 2x4's and plywood. 

I measured and measured. I cut some MDF (described as cardboard with an attitude problem by other modellers) as my base. It also gave me a footprint for the model so I could be sure of fit.

And then I started cutting the styrene and adding layers. I spray painted a tan base for the styrene and coloured with grey, concrete and a little brown.

Bare concrete wall

To decrease my aggravation level, I decided to add doors on top of the styrene instead of cutting holes. I added styrene strip on top of the base wall to give the structure some form and for visual interest. I added the doors (from the Roberts printing kit) and framed them with timber and a small loading dock.

It fits!

I was very happy when the test fitting showed the structure would sit nicely in its spot.

I continued by adding the front wall:

The front wall got two small windows - again for visual interest. Cold storage buildings (and I've been through several in real life) don't have a lot of windows because the aim is to keep the building cold. Pretty obvious eh? But I figured a little light for the workers wouldn't hurt.

I added a truck dock for local pickups/deliveries. I figured the main truck loading docks would be on the other (unseen) side.

As I continued, I noticed that the great thing about styrene is how well it fits together if you are mindful of math. For example, the main wall is slightly thicker than the side walls. I left an overhang on the main wall so the side walls would "slot in" and then added strip to create square corners that were sturdy. (Recall the small pull aparts when the walls met at Generic Canneries).

Details

Although I was really happy with how I was turning styrene into poured concrete, I thought the boys at Aston Growers would want to get out of the cold. One thing I didn't like about the Walthers kit was the all-concrete look. And I was ready to try again to get the brick look.

So I added a small entrance building in brick. Also, to disguise the lack of refrigeration equipment on the roof, I also added a head building on the roof.

And I had a slightly rusty tank that needed a home. 

A final consideration is that the front wall came out at an angle from the backdrop and I thought adding a out building would disguise where the building meets the backdrop.

Outbuilding and tank

I constructed the brick outbuilding using styrene as the core with thin brick sheet as the exterior. The corners were not very neat so I added some l-girder, painted grey, to cover up the corners. To paint the brick, I tried a new product - mortar paste. The paste goes on after you paint the brick. You let it soak in and then wipe it off with a cloth. The effect is much better than my previous method. 

I added a window, a door, a few vents/fans and a roof. I had to notch the structure a little for it to fit between the base and the middle rib of the structure.

I built a faux concrete dam for the storage tank and installed the tank in front of the outbuilding. I hope the shiny tank draws the eye away from where the structure meets the wall.

I then went back and added small eaves to the loading docks.

There will be a part two to this post, but I wanted to share the above photo showing a close-up of the corner of the structure after I added scenery to the side. You can see the small bits of wood strewn beneath the loading dock (broken pallets and boxes) and weeds. And the photo below:

Being a local facility, I figured that Aston Growers would not inbound much  produce (AG being very keen on "eat local") and would generate few outbound loads so only one of the two rail loading docks would see much use. So I added less scrap wood at the far dock. The track also gets weedier as it heads toward the backdrop. (Note the stairs from the door - those took me about an hour to make and paint!).

The project was both fun and time-consuming. The advantage of scratch building (i.e. making a cake without mix) is that you can make things to be exactly what you want. It is also surprisingly easy to make a basic structure that looks as good as an off the shelf model. The trade-off is that building everything from scratch takes more time than building a model kit. You also have to supply your own details. I find the smaller the detail, the more time it takes to create. Those loading dock posts (in black above)? They took hours because I had to find the right wood, cut to size, trim the door, paint the door, paint the wood, add the base, glue everything together, touch up paint, weather, etc. And I still don't think they look great (too big).

Part II will follow shortly.

Building Generic Canneries (II)

Generic Canneries is a mixed concrete brick building. Both concrete and brick are challenging effects to create on a plastic model.

Although I think "grey" when I visualize concrete, the reality is that concrete ages and fades into greyish-cream, almost pale yellow colour. 

Above is a picture of the American Canning Company in Simcoe, Ontario before it was torn down. This is a rather gorgeous example of industrial architecture. You can see more of the building at https://www.uer.ca/locations/show.asp?locid=20330. Another picture is below. 

The concrete is a tan colour, light enough to show noticeable rust stains.

Brick is also difficult to create. Most brick model kits have a reddish-brown colour with the brick being too shiny and no mortar lines. Painting a brick colour obviously gets rid of the shininess but the mortar problem remains. I tried many experiments to get the mix right. Brick colour as a base with a wash of white to capture the mortar. Or the reverse - white mortar first with a wash of brick colour over top. Later on I bought a special mortar paste which I used on Aston Growers.

In the end, I went with white mortar paint first with a reddish powder dusted on top allowing some of the white to show through. I weathered the concrete with grimy grey powder.

Overall, I like the effect although I would have preferred a less grimy concrete and more of a mortar effect. The brick colour pops as opposed to being subdued, but I prefer it that way.

The Roof

The roof was in two pieces. First, there was the plastic roof section where the water tower goes. Second, there was the larger roof area to cover the hexagonish main section. For that I used foam core board, regretting the choice later when it warped. I added roof granules (grey ballast) to both sections and some junk. Junk is helpful for hiding the gaps between the roof and the structure. I also added some vents and a heating unit.

I've mentioned this project was a challenge. The irregular building. The detail parts. Painting concrete and brick. Even the water tower was a pain - the two-piece kit refused to come together evenly but luckily I could hide the imperfections at the back. As the model came together, small parts of the wall came untogether and there are some imperfect joints where the walls come together. Attempting to close those gaps created gaps elsewhere so I left well enough alone.

The Shed

But the second part of the model was just as much of a challenge - the unloading shed.

The concept behind the unloading shed is to provide a reason for the two spur tracks (in the right of the above photo). One spur is for powdered commodities and the second I thought would be for liquids and inbound boxcars.

Nearly done!

I built the shed from scratch using Evergreen plastic siding material. I suppose the shed is supposed to be made from sheet metal. I painted the shed a light grey with some weathering and rust patches. The grey is a little to "blue" and the siding too perfect, but I rationalized that this was a fairly new structure that had not lived for long in the elements.

One side of the shed is supported by the building with the other side resting on L-beams. One of the two spurs has a (simulated) concrete pad to prevent sugar, starch, liquids, etc. from soaking into the ballast and creating a mess. On top of the shed is a blower fan and two pipes to simulate the "suck and blow" process of unloading stuff from covered hoppers. The pad also gave me an excuse to add some additional styrene to level out the aisle side of the shed.

In the above photo, I have closed off the open window (at the back) and added piping into the building. You can also see the weathering.

When I was happy with the fit of the shed, I installed the building - finally adding the main spur track into the building, ballasting it and adding scenery at the back of the building. That scenery was some fencing and bushes and I was pleased with how it matches with the backdrop (although it is largely a sight unseen).

I also added a road between the two foreground spurs and the building using a plastic road I had bought as part of the bridge project. I weathered some tire tracks on the road.

The whole idea here is that the front of the building is unseen - rail spurs go into the back of a building. The front of the building - where the offices are, the main parking lot and a nicely landscaped garden, is unseen. But you need a way to get from the front to the back - hence the road which runs between the building and the shed.

Only then did I install the shed - about 6 months after I started the project!

Conclusion:

The miraculous about Generic Canneries is how I managed to make everything fit together. The shed isn't perfectly level. The track into the building is a little zig-zaggy. The roof sags and the corners aren't perfect. But as things go, I'd rate the final product as Excellent. The building, with its shed, clearly rates rail service.

There is still work to be done. I need to add a sign somewhere. The roof needs some lazy workers drinking out of sight of the shop foreman. The inside of the building needs a loading dock - perhaps. And finally, and most fun of all, there is the unfinished space between the two spurs. I envision some old truck trailers, a small shack and lots of weeds and junk. In my dreams, I can picture a few trailers in the GC fleet resting in anticipation of their next load.

Err, and also I need to figure out the actual name for Generic Canneries (or is it Canning?).

Now that is a building needing rail service!

 

 

 Building Generic Canneries (I)

Returning to our scenery story, once the station area was (mostly) finished, I was left with this:

Empty space (yes, beneath the clutter).

I had an idea of what I wanted to do with the space but turning that into reality would take the better part of 2020. Yes, nearly 7 months to fill in about 3 square feet. This post begins that story.

What comes first?

The basic idea was this: Brick building in the front (Generic Canneries), concrete cold storage building (Aston Growers) in the back, overhead walkway/bridge to join the two. I added an unloading shed to the brick building (Generic canneries).

Generic Canneries came first because there was a kit I could use.

The George Roberts Printing Plant has to be a favourite of model railroaders for kitbashing. The building looks familiar but has enough character (and heft) to sit on a layout looking like it belongs there. As I've mentioned before, for me model railroading is about re-creating the everyday/commonplace of life but making it picturesque. A common problem on layouts is that a building is too small to justify the level of rail service it gets. The building should dwarf the freight cars, not vice versa.

Now this is a building that needs rail service!

The problem with George Roberts is that it is a rectangular building and I needed a sort of trapezoid. The good news for me is that part of the building was going against my backdrop so that side of the building could just be a blank or filler wall with no detail.

June 15, 2020

The above photo shows the early stages. I used foamboard as a base. A not good idea, as it turned out because foam board warps if it gets wet (spray paint not being helpful either).

At this point, there is no backwall and sidewall had yet to be added.

Testing, Testing

Test fitting #723

As I built the structure, I also had to keep in mind various dimensional considerations:

1. Leaving enough space between the building and to aisle facing sidings for the storage shed and a small road.

2. Angling the building so the spur track that goes into the building would not curve unnaturally.

3. Making sure the blank wall was flush to the backdrop.

4. ...and making sure the building did not interfere with the main line.

But the reward would be a building that would be hefty enough to justify the sidings attached to it.

The bespoke footprint of the building meant that I needed to create a roof to fit the structure. Again, I used foamboard because it was easy to cut it to fit. Five months later, having grown used to styrene, I wished otherwise (styrene doesn't warp).

A boring but necessary part of building Generic Canneries was adding interior bracing and view blocks. The interior bracing was needed to keep the roof in place and the walls straight. The view blocks prevent you from looking in one window and seeing through to the other side. In other words, something must be in the building.

Paint

The truth of the matter is that Generic Canneries was slow build. The kit was of medium difficulty to build. It had a lot of bits that needed to be painted before being placed (the exterior staircases being the best example). The structure itself was part concrete/part brick which further complicated painting (I wasn't going to paint it a uniform grey). I had a blank wall and room to custom fit. At the same time, the structure was finished enough that it could sit there - there was nothing time sensitive about it.

But I finally got to painting. I went with a beige base figuring it could pass for concrete when weathered. The brick portions were hand painted. I tried red brick then white (mortar). I tried white (mortar) then red brick. I tried white mortar then red brick (burnt sienna) weathering powder. Brick is tricky to model - a) you have to get the brick colour right and b) you have to hint at white mortar without disturbing the brick colour. Rather tricky.

September 2020.

In Part II, I'll cover more painting, talk about the excitement of roof granules and discuss detailing. Stay tuned!

Rolling Stock 

The Spur being small, the trains are short. Although I don't "operate" the Spur very often (mainly I look at it), I thought I'd put out a post about the rolling stock I use on the Spur.

Collecting rolling stock, like collecting hockey cards, is super fun. Taking pictures of rolling stock on the layout is an extremely rewarding task as it reminds me of why I've gone to all this effort in the first place.

Engines

CPR 7013 - Alco S-2

In real life, CP 7013 was a 1000 hp switch (hence the "S") engine built by Alco in 1943. The Alcos had a long life on the CPR, being retired in 1983-1986. One of them is preserved at the Toronto Railway Museum and looks beautiful.

The model is Atlas and equipped with DCC and sound. It wears the CPR Script scheme (note the maroon name) introduced in the early '60's. While I like the script scheme on larger engines, I would have preferred to buy this engine with a block scheme like the RS-18 below.

CPR 8761 - RS-18

CPR 8761 was a Road Switcher with 1800hp built by the Montreal Locomotive Works in the late 1950's. They were rebuilt in the '80s (losing their high nose) and retired in the late '90s. I have a very fond memory of seeing a rebuilt RS-18 switching the old Kodak plant in west Toronto from a GO Train in the early '90s. One of my favourite CPR engines.

This is a Rapido DCC/Sound model (I bought a bunch of these). In contrast to the S-2, 8761 wears the block scheme. While I love the model, the Rapido model is almost too detailed - there are all sorts of little pieces that can get in the way of smooth operations. 

Freight Cars

In the early 1960's the 40-foot boxcar was ubiquitous on railways. But even in that ubiguity was diversity, as you'll see.

CP 51562

51562 is a 40-foot box built in the 50's by National Steel Car in Hamilton. CP had 6,000 of these boxcars. Note the big door. Made by Trains Canada (I think I bought a six-pack on Ebay), this model has some weathering.

CP 50532 and CP 243300

50532 has the same provenance at 51562. Again, some weathering. I like the tall, solid, "normalness" of this model. 

243300 belongs to the same species but is a different cat altogether. It is a "mini-box" unique to the CPR and built around 1929. Being unique to the CPR but also one of 7,500 in its class makes it a "different but common" model. Although small, I love the "Spans the World" slogan the CPR used in the 1940's - with a plane, ship and train to show that the CPR lived up to its slogan. It needs weathering though - in the early 60's it would have been over 30 years old.

243300 is a True-Line Trains model probably bought at Credit Valley Railway.

CP 240007

Another Minibox. A very, very thoughtful gift from my Stepfather. I believe this is a Yankee Clipper model assembled by Rich Crysler at Credit Valley Railway. This is one of my rare good weathering jobs.

It wears the Block Herald scheme - making it less flashy than 243300.

ONT 90789

ONT 90789 is boring x2. A standard issue Athearn box car, bought at George's Trains. I believe it is custom decaled. You can the detail difference between the chunky details on this model and fine (separately-applied) detail on the Minibox above.

Why is the mundane boxcar on the layout? The ONR is my second favourite railroad, and runs through the town closest to the namesake geological feature that Aston is named after. 

CPR 283331

Moving on from the plain jane 40 foot boxcar, CPR 283331 may look like more of the same, but no - this is an 8-hatch ice-activated reefer. Reefers transported temperature-sensitive cargo like produce and meat. CPR had around 3,000 of this type of reefer.

The model is from True-Line Trains. It is a perfect fit for Aston Produce.

CPR 283344

Another True-Line Trains reefer, this time in the Script scheme. The ice hatches on the roof add some heft and character to the model.

That box underneath the door is a charcoal heater to keep meat/produce from freezing during winter transport.

CPR 234537

CP 234537 is a composite (wood/steel) 40 foot boxcar built in 1920-21. Wood boxcars were in decline in the 1960's, but considering CP had 3,500 of this type originally, it took a while for them to disappear. On the Spur the rationale for their appearance is that the carry non-temperature sensitive produce during peak periods and canned goods.

As I mentioned in a previous post, these boxcars are survivors - they are from my childhood layout. Built by Accurail, they have realistic wood siding and are well-detailed, but not to the point of being fragile. Weathering helps bring out the contract between the wood and steel ribs.

CPR 235363

2nd verse, same as the first. Another Accurail boxcar. I have a third one kicking around somewhere.

Note the droopy coupler. At some point, I'll have to do some maintenance on rolling stock!

CPR 381261

By the 1950's, railroads were starting to understand that the 40 foot boxcar was not the ideal way to transport bulk commodities like grain, salt and sugar. CPR 381261 is a covered hopper and is in its original plain paint. It has roof hatches and hopper doors on the bottom to load/unload (better than shoveling stuff out of a boxcar). The "slab-sided" hopper was unique to Canada, and, much like the RS-18, is a calling card for a CPR layout. You have to have at least several.

381261 is another True-Line Trains model. Although the model may look pretty boring, I've always liked the look of slab-sided hoppers. Prior to True-Line Trains coming along, you would have had to buy this model in brass.

THB 2852

The Toronto, Hamilton & Buffalo was a connecting railway jointly owned the CPR and the New York Central. While it didn't make it to Toronto or Buffalo, it served its purpose of connecting the CPR (ending at Hamilton) with the NYC in Fort Erie. The line is now owned by the CPR.

2852 is the same model as 381261. On the layout, they earn their keep transporting sugar from refineries in Montreal and Hamilton to Generic Canneries. As you will see in a future post, Generic Canneries has an unloading shed designed for them.

CILX 132

CILX is a 36-foot tank car. I'm not sure what the rationale is for it being on the layout, perhaps it brings brine or some other food additive to Generic Canneries.

I'm very unfamiliar with old tank cars and their distinguishing features. They are an interesting contrast in a consist of 40 foot box cars.

 CP 436132

And of course, we have a caboose. The CPR ran with wooden cabooses well into the 1970's - in this case, the caboose has wooden sides with a metal underframe. Also the caboose is simple to look at, again, the design is distinctly CPR (the one cupola window for instance).

The caboose is one of three Tenshodo brass cabooses I bought used at the Credit Valley Railway. It cost me around $200. In contrast, I have a plastic True-Line Trains caboose - similar in look, that cost only $50.

Closing Thoughts

My focus with the Spur has been on scenery. As this post shows, the rolling stock on the Spur are mostly out of the box models that have not been weathered. You can also see how much of a difference weathering makes particularly with the Accurail wooden box cars. In putting together the photos for this post, I also noticed that some of my stock needs repair - wobbly wheels and droopy couplers.

But for now...