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Hello Switcher Saturday fans, and welcome to our weekly tribute to little locomotives that do big things.  If you can appreciate an B-6 over a Big Boy, or Vulcan over an F unit, you found the right thread!

Switcher Saturday has a simple premise, if you have a picture, a video, a story or something else related to switcher locomotives of any size, please share.

Everybody be nice.

All scales and gauges are welcome here!

If its your picture, or one you have permission to use it, please post it!  If you can't get permission but its just something cool you still want to share, please post a link instead.

For this weekends kick off we have my mth 0-6-0 performing duties, pulling a tank car out of the siding to add into the thru freight for the day.

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Have a great day everybody - JHZ563

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Happy SWSAT!

#806 finishing up switching the Paint Factory.

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Please excuse the mess. After this most recent track-plan tweak I still need to lay "ground cover" over the bare benchwork.

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On the PER it is pretty much all switching all the time.

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Regarding this tweak, the Paint Factory is now served by one longer siding which makes drilling more involved and interesting:

       IMG_1128

From right to left: a tank car spot (unloading acrylic resin), a box car spot (hidden by the main structure, loading paint on pallets), a tank car spot (unloading PVA), a covered hopper spot (unloading titanium dioxide pigment) and two storage spots.

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Last edited by geysergazer

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                      Freshly restored NYS&W #206 Alco S2 switcher at Ridgefield Park, NJ Mar.86'.  

A year later while in service on the L&HR the low oil alarm was disconnected by person(s) unknown and the crankshaft was wiped out. Never to run again the #206 is a static display at the Maywood, NJ station. 

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Good Morning everyone. Daybreak greets my MTH 0-6-0 as it exits the one and only layout tunnel. Holsteins moo this early in the day and it’s noisy on the Russian River Rapids Shortline Railroad. Years ago, I saw a photo of an old Ford engine block being used to hold up a barbed wire fence. So, no scale motor but I do have a scale (sort of) freight car wheel. I mugged my local Clo the Cow for her Supreme Quart Dairy slogan. My Union Pacific caboose is an inexpensive MTH offering altered to store alfalfa bales in. Thanks everyone for sharing.

0-6-0_mth_daybreak_exit_tunnel_july2020

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Good morning fellow switcher lovers!   JHZ653 - thanks for getting us rolling today!  .... AND I love the camera angle of your video and the three whistle toots for the reverse move!   Lew - your US Steel switcher looks great!  Love your narrative as well   RSJB - very nice photos ... love that post war steam 0-6-0!  Paul Romano - very colorful RS unit!   Mike CT - wonderful photos!  Some of you may have additionally posted while I was putting my post together .... sorry if I missed mentioning you.  

Lately I've been having a "fling" with postwar/traditional sized trains.  The photos today are of Williams reproductions of Lionel's famous Fairbanks Morse Train Master.   The Lionel version came out in the 1950s.   The Virginian Train Master first caught my 4 year old eye back in 1957 and was burned into my consciousness ever since then.  When I got back into model trains about 17 years ago ( sheeeewwww! Been that long ago?! DANG!!! ) owning a Virginian Train Master was definitely on my radar for eventual purchase.  Since Reading is a small part of my layout modeling scenario,  I purchased a Train Master in Reading livery to be the lone representation of that road on my layout.  With the N&W being a larger part of my layout scenario, I could, in good conscience, able to add the Virginian Train Master to my roster, being that the Virginian was absorbed by N&W in 1959.  My rational is, the N&W paint shop has not yet re - painted this Train Master.... and the FSJR brass is determined that the N&W paint shop will never see the likes of this beautiful Train Master again. The CEO is **** bent on keeping that beautiful locomotive on the FSJR property.      

You may have already guessed that today's theme is something to do with the Train Master road switcher.  Well you are correct and the theme is:  The FM Train Master Road Switcher as they traverses the tracks of the Free State Junction Railway.   Have a wonderful weekend everyone!  BE SAFE & BE WELL!!

RUNNING LITE on The Mountain Division. IMG_4321

This is " Hoghead Harry", the engineer saying "good morning" with a tip of his hat. IMG_0522

Virginian and Reading Train Masters team up in MU fashion. IMG_0079

Reading Train Master in local switching service. IMG_0873

After spotting this military flat car load, the Train Master is back on the main to continue switching duties. IMG_0876

Running lite again, the Reading TM meets a N&W Y6b headed west.   IMG_9674

A "Power - full" meeting of old and new technologies. IMG_9679IMG_9695

Brakeman is on the ground and has this view of today's power. fullsizeoutput_32c

MU'd for a total of 4,800 horse power!   When first produced in 1950 the Train Master had the highest horsepower rating of any diesel locomotive ... 2,400 horses.  They were "all the talk" of the 1950 Chicago Railroad Fair.  FM seemed to have hit a grand slam home run with the Train Master.  Seems the Train Master could walk away with any train the railroads threw it's way.  Due to their fast acceleration/deceleration, Train Masters were great in commuter passenger service as well!  The Fairbanks Morse opposed piston engine, a gem in marine applications,  did not work out well in railway service. ... thus FM had a short lived railroad romance with railroading.  In spite of this many of the locomotive stylings live on in the model train world.   IMG_0655

MUed Train Masters make easy work of a long freight train, as a worker struggles to keep this crate on the forklift's pallet. IMG_0647IMG_0647

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Last edited by trumptrain
@PAUL ROMANO posted:

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                      Freshly restored NYS&W #206 Alco S2 switcher at Ridgefield Park, NJ Mar.86'.  

A year later while in service on the L&HR the low oil alarm was disconnected by person(s) unknown and the crankshaft was wiped out. Never to run again the #206 is a static display at the Maywood, NJ station. 

LOVED that scheme! The Suzy-Q was a fascinating northeastern line. I have literally dog-eared my Carsten's Susquehanna book over the decades. Liked all of the Suzy-Q, like Old Green Pond Jct, etc, but I really liked Hainesburg Jct.

Alas, this photo truly reflects the sad emptiness of Hainesburg Jct after the LNE, and then the NYS&W, called it quits and pulled their rails.

HainesburgJct_Feb1969

Andre

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@laming posted:

LOVED that scheme! The Suzy-Q was a fascinating northeastern line. I have literally dog-eared my Carsten's Susquehanna book over the decades. Liked all of the Suzy-Q, like Old Green Pond Jct, etc, but I really liked Hainesburg Jct.

Alas, this photo truly reflects the sad emptiness of Hainesburg Jct after the LNE, and then the NYS&W, called it quits and pulled their rails.

HainesburgJct_Feb1969

Andre

Great photo; beautiful in its forlornness. Nostalgic. 

Hello fellow SwSat folks...Trumptrain those were great pictures of the FM Trainmasters on your layout.  I acquired an old Virginian from my brother but it will take a lot of work to be running again, one of those "for the future" projects. 

Here is my post for this Saturday (as we wait the arrival of the Hurricane coming up the East Coast from Florida).  Wartime priority freight has caused the US Army to send their Transportation Corps to the port to expedite the movement of some much needed goods.  Rumors are all over the port about lots of stuff going to UK ("at fastest possible speed").  No one saying anything of course but the papers all report that Generals Eisenhower and Patton are most anxious to get what they need.

Lionel USA switcher works the port

Happy Weekend Fellows. 

Don

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Hello fellow SwSat folks...Trumptrain those were great pictures of the FM Trainmasters on your layout.  I acquired an old Virginian from my brother but it will take a lot of work to be running again, one of those "for the future" projects. 

Here is my post for this Saturday (as we wait the arrival of the Hurricane coming up the East Coast from Florida).  Wartime priority freight has caused the US Army to send their Transportation Corps to the port to expedite the movement of some much needed goods.  Rumors are all over the port about lots of stuff going to UK ("at fastest possible speed").  No one saying anything of course but the papers all report that Generals Eisenhower and Patton are most anxious to get what they need.

Lionel USA switcher works the port

Happy Weekend Fellows. 

Don

Don, I love the little stories some of us tell about a particular model train, like yours about the Postwar Lionel #41 US Army switcher. 

Only thing is, I always regarded that #41, which I got as a Christmas present around the age of 4 in 1955, as a slow poke. Maybe you have supercharged yours to expedite the delivery of much needed merchandise in the war effort. LOL, Arnold

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