http://modeltrain.today.com Just another Today.com weblog Sat, 21 Mar 2009 15:17:23 +0000 http://backend.userland.com/rss092 en This week I finally finished my Railyardmodels coil cars.  Work was slow so I had time to decal and weather the cars. I'm happy with the way the cars turned out.  Now on to the next project, building a plastics plant. http://modeltrain.today.com/2009/03/21/coil-car-project-finished/ I have 2 projects to update everyone on.  First is the car project from Rail Yard Models.  I have the cars built and painted, they are just waiting for decals.   For my first time building a craftsman kit like this it went very well.  The second project involved moving a ... http://modeltrain.today.com/2009/03/14/updates-on-projects/ I've wrote about this before, but wanted to reintroduce people to my model train layout.  The CM&W stands for the Central Minnesota and Western.   The layout is based on a old Great Northern line from St. Cloud MN to Fargo ND.  The portion I model is from St. Joe MN ... http://modeltrain.today.com/2009/03/07/welcome-to-the-cmw-railroad/ For my operators who just like to run trains from one end of the layout to the other, I have the perfect job for them.  On any given day in my model world, there can be 3 trains that run the entire length of the railroad.  The first being a ... http://modeltrain.today.com/2009/02/25/the-road-job/ The East local is the larger of the 2 locals because it carries the BNSF interchange traffic.  It starts switching trailing point spurs in Sauk Centre, then Albany, and Avon before coming to St.Joe.  Once in St. Joe they make the interchange with BNSF.  When this is done the crew will take a ... http://modeltrain.today.com/2009/02/24/the-east-local/ The west local is the smaller of the 2 locals leaving the Alexandria yard.  With only 3 towns en-route there is not much switching to do.  The first town is Brandon,  here Barrier products loads 60' boxcars with lumber.  Next on the list is Evansville, where a grain elevator and ... http://modeltrain.today.com/2009/02/23/the-west-local/ The main job on the CM&W is the yard job. The CP rail drops cars in the Alexandria yard at night and it is the yard jobs duty to sort the cars and switch the local industries. Also the East local brought cars from the BNSF the day ... http://modeltrain.today.com/2009/02/22/cmw-yard-job/ The newest addition to the operating plan is the BNSF job.  The lower staging yard was torn out last month and in its place the town of St. Joe MN was created.  BNSF is in St. Cloud proper ( as of 2003-ish it had been the Northern Lines ) and ... http://modeltrain.today.com/2009/02/21/bnsf-job/ The first thing to do when operating is to assign jobs.  They are, West local, East local, and the Road job.  There is also a small BNSF job.  Once assigned, the crew members can start there tasks of moving freight cars across the railroad.  Good communication is very important to ... http://modeltrain.today.com/2009/02/20/first-things-first/ Over the next few days I will describe the new operating plan for the CM&W railroad.  Even though my railroad is made up I still want it to operate like the real thing.  The main purpose for the railroad is to move freight.  After coming up with plans that didn't ... http://modeltrain.today.com/2009/02/19/new-operating-plan-for-the-cmw/