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Reply to "VJandP - Getting Started"

Had some fun running trains this weekend.  I recreated different trains that I would often see intersecting Erie, PA.   The big blue Conrail engines were a common sight pulling mixed freight through the area on the main lines just south of downtown and over 19th St.  To the west of downtown, earthmoving equipment from the Bucyrus plant would cross 12th St towards the mainlines where I’m assuming they were picked up and transported elsewhere.   East of Erie, gondolas were common, more often than not filled with scrap. which in retrospect, I wonder if any of that came from the GE Locomotive plant located right there in Harborcreek.

This run session had me contemplating modeling more Erie specific industries.    I need to do some research, check out maps from the 70s to see where all the rails were (many of the tracks have lone since been removed or rerouted), and considering modeling the industries from that area.   This would be a big shift away from the fictional area I’ve been considering in central PA.  In the end, it will probably be a combination of both. But ultimately, it’ll be fun getting there regardless. :-)

As far as layout updates, there really hasn’t been much other than what I had previously mentioned about defining the new space. I have some tentative track plans that I will post. I do want to try my hand at building a control panel so I‘ve been reading up on that and checking out some YouTube videos.  I’ve been trying to be better about maintaining everything… Keeping the track clean, servicing the engines, going back and double checking some of the electrical work they have done.

The only small hiccup that I’ve run into is with the new Conrail engine that I picked up. The box car that was coupled directly behind the engine kept derailing on curves, even the 072 curves. I thought maybe it was a problem with the kinematic couplers or the pivoting pilot… which it still may be but I swapped it out with another box car that had a metal frame and trucks which was a bit heavier and the issue went away. You would think the weight of the entire train would’ve put enough force on the coupler to get it to pivot but maybe it was that particular box car and the way its coupler was aligned.  

i’m going to Google and read up on feedback about the coupler set up on this engine but if anyone else has any experience they want to share, I’m all ears.

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