April Changes

Well been a busy month but not as much done as I had hoped. I got the backdrop finished and painted, FINALLY.

I've run some trains and ran into a couple of Operating problems with my yard and after looking at some photos that I had taken I decided to move the peninsula that RTP was on. Here is a photo of the prototype:

Here is what I have done so far:

By moving the peninsula this opened up area aisle  so that I could add bench work for Bunge Oil. So here is the beginning bench work addition.

This addition will give me the room to better represent this industry. The tank unloading tracks will move a couple of inches to the right so the area between the siding has some room, trying to compress the area I had made the tracks too close together this new space will be much better. I will also be able to model the storage tanks and the building better as shown:

Tulsa 2012

Been busy but not on the layout. On March 23, I went to Tulsa OK for the Layout Design & Operations Weekend. Thia is the second OPP till you drop event I have ever been to, rewarding and now motivated to get things going on my layout. I'm tired, but had a blast. On Friday night I operated on Jim Senese's Kansas City Railway. Jim's interest is urban railroading in KS. The KCT represents 4-1/2 miles of railroads in the West and East Bottoms of Kansas City. We ran in two man crews for about 3 hrs. Saturday was the Design Workshops all day including 2 presentations by Lance Mindheim. As a bonus Lance used my plan in his Designing a switching Layout presentation, He is one of many who help me with the plan and I thank him. Saturday night Opp session was at Sammy Carlile's Hereford Sub. I meet Sammy couple of years ago at the MCPM Meet in KS and have become friends. Sammy's layout is a double deck layout in his garage. Its Santa Fe mainline from Amarillo, Tx west to Clovis, NM. Also at his house was a few other friends so we all had a great time. Sunday morning operated at Tom Fausser's Central New Jersey & Lehigh Valley. This layout is set in Hoboken / Jersey City New Jersey. His layout uses car floats and is heavy industry. I had a great time and everybody was very warm and friendly. Looking forward to getting things running again at home.

The following weekend the wife and I traveled to Collage Station for Parents Day. My daughter is a junior at A&M and is also in the Aggie Band. The highlight of the trip was when she got here senior boots. At the band banquet she also received an award for most outstanding Junior.  Cant believe it was a little over 3 years ago she was graduating from high school and next year she will be graduating from collage. Time flies when you have kids.