Price: Forever Free STANDARD Edition The model-trains-video.com mediaZine Jul/Aug 2010 Mike Rose Kitbashes a U18B Learn the keys to a successful loco kitbash Modeling decrepit spurs IN DEPTH: Enhancing a layout with sound Modeling Amtrak in N scale And much more ... inside! Page 1 • Issue 8 • Jul/Aug 2010 • Front cover Tell a friend ... Contents Index Need Dallas Model Works Logo Click to learn more Click to learn more Click to learn more Click to learn more Click to learn more Click to learn more about this sponsor about this sponsor about this sponsor about this sponsor about this sponsor about this sponsor Click to learn more Click to learn more Click to learn more Click to learn more Click to learn more Click to learn more about this sponsor about this sponsor about this sponsor about this sponsor about this sponsor about this sponsor Click to learn more Click to learn more Click to learn more Click to learn more Click to learn more Click to learn more Front Cover: Mike Rose needed a U18B about this sponsor about this sponsor about this sponsor about this sponsor about this sponsor about this sponsor but at the time, there were no commer- cial models to be found. So he decided to kit-bash his own! Read along and see what he did to create this beautiful Click to learn more Click to learn more Click to learn more Click to learn more Click to learn more Click to learn more model. about this sponsor about this sponsor about this sponsor about this sponsor about this sponsor about this sponsor ISSN 2152-7423 Editorial Staff Click to learn more Click to learn more Click to learn more Joe D. Fugate, Publisher about this sponsor about this sponsor about this sponsor Charlie Comstock, Layouts and media editor Columnists Sponsoring Advertisers - Visit them and say: “Thanks for bringing me MRH completely free.” Ryan Andersen, New media Richard Bale, News and events John Drye, N scale Lew Matt, Narrow gauge and shortlines Your logo could be on this page, putting your web site just Marty McGuirk, Prototype modeling Les Halmos, Modular railroading one click away from tens of thousands* of readers! Tim Warris, Trackwork Special Correspondents Our click tracking indicates sponsoring advertisers get up todouble the clicks ... Jim Duncan, Layouts and operations Byron Henderson, Layouts and track planning Production Patty Fugate, pasteup and layout Joe Brugger, copy editing Mike Dodd, copy editing Click here to learn how to become a sponsoring advertiser. Technical Assistant Jeff Shultz * Our oldest issue, released in January 2009, has now had nearly 50,000 downloads – and continues to get hundreds of new downloads per month even now. Sponsoring advertisers who’ve been with us since issue 1 are still getting clicks from all our back issues, from their Advertising Account Manager Les Halmos logo on our web site, as well from as our current issue. A sponsoring ad with MRH is truly an investment in growing your business. Page 2 • Issue 8 • Jul/Aug 2010 Tell a friend ... Contents Index Page 3 • Issue 8 • Jul/Aug 2010 Visit the BLMA web site Tell a friend ... Contents Index Page 4 • Issue 8 • Jul/Aug 2010 Visit Dallas Model Works web site Tell a friend ... Contents Index Page 5 • Issue 8 • Jul/Aug 2010 Visit Fast Tracks web site Tell a friend ... Contents Index Page 6 • Issue 8 • Jul/Aug 2010 Visit Model Trains Video web site Tell a friend ... Contents Index Page 7 • Issue 8 • Jul/Aug 2010 Visit CMT web site Tell a friend ... Contents Index Table of Main Features contents Columns 40 Return of the Pennsy 102 Modeling Decrepit Spur Tracks 22 July Model The Pennsylvania Middle Divison, Making track look poorly maintained Railroading News restored and expanded MRH News and Events HO All scales by Charle Comstock by Charlie Comstock and Joe Fugate by Richard Bale 50 Ties and Tie Plates 109 Custom Spiking Pliers Scenery Scene: one evening project Tool Shed: one evening project 120 The Roundhouse My Modular Adventure by Charlie Comstock by Steve Pirosko HO All scales by Les Halmos 54 Kit Bashing a U18B 111 Rolling Stock Numbering When the loco you want doesn’t Setting up a prototype based number 135 Modeling a Creek Up the Creek exist, kit bash it! scheme for a protolanced railroad HO by Mike Rose All scales by Lew Matt by Charlie Comstock 91 Layout Sound 116 Product FIRST LOOK 143 Eating an Elephant Using sound to enhance your layout New cars from ExactRail Getting Real All scales by Matt Snell HO by Jeff Shultz by Marty McGuirk 148 Today’s Amtrak Other Features Comme-N-tary by John Drye 12 A history of 43 years doing the 34 MRH Q - A - T hobby, part 2 Questions, Answsers and Tips Publisher’s Editorial by Joe Fugate 154 Get off the computer Reverse Running 15 MRH Staff Notes 115 Derailments by Joe Fugate Building issues on a bimonthly schedule, Humor (perhaps) and more ... 16 Bonus downloads this issue! Page 8 • Issue 8 • Jul/Aug 2010 • Table of contents - Features Tell a friend ... Contents Index Page 9 • Issue 8 • Jul/Aug 2010 Visit Rapido Trains web site Tell a friend ... Contents Index Page 10 • Issue 8 • Jul/Aug 2010 Visit Digitrax web site Tell a friend ... Contents Index Page 11 • Issue 8 • Jul/Aug 2010 Visit BPL web site Tell a friend ... Contents Index PUBLISHER’S EDITORIAL: A history of 43 years doing the hobby, part 2 Musings from the MRH founder n 1987 I attended my very first many new insights on how to think NMRA National Convention, which about layout design. For instance, the About the Reader happened to be in Eugene, Oregon, LDSIG published a discussion they had Feedback my “home stomping grounds” since among the members on layout height. Publisher (click here) II grew up in southern Oregon. At this As part of the discussion, the SIG convention, I discovered the Layout interviewed existing layout owners about the heights of their layouts. Wow, I’ve spent 43 Design Special Interest Group (LDSIG) and elected to become a member. years in the model rail- Many of the layout owners had built their layouts between 40” - 48” from roading hobby as of I didn’t know it then, but joining the LDSIG has turned out to be one of the floor – but when asked what they this year ... the smartest things I’ve ever done. would do if starting over, most said The LDSIG’s publications gave me they would build higher the next time! Joe Fugate is the featured expert in many Model-Trains- Video.com videos, and he’s also the founder and publisher of Model Railroad Hobbyist Magazine. To learn more about Joe, click here. Thanks to the LDSIG discussion in the late 1980s about what makes the most satisfying layout, I went back to my railroading roots and elected to model the Southern Pacific’s Siskiyou Line in southern Oregon where I grew up. In hindsight, that was excellent advice because modeling this SP line has made for a deeply satisfying layout. Page 12 • Issue 8 • Jul/Aug 2010 • Publisher’s Editorial, page 1 Tell a friend ... Contents Index It’s insights like this that lead to the interested in trains, then try to make design recommendations I make that your basis for modeling. By doing today – build high and narrow. Aim this, you’ll probably have the most for benchwork in the elbow to armpit passion for the hobby, and you will range, to express it ergonomically. get the most satisfying and fulfilling layout as a result. If you drop much below elbow level, you start to get too much of a heli- The Southern Pacific’s Siskiyou Line copter view of the trains, and if you ran right by my house when I was go above armpit height, it becomes growing up in sourthern Oregon. It difficult to reach into the scene to captured my attention as a young uncouple cars or to do maintenance boy and instilled in me a passion for on the track. railroading, mountain style. By going back to these roots and modeling the While designing one of my freelanced SP Siskiyou Line, I could rekindle my Northern Railway layout plans, I kept original passion for railroading every thinking about how time I entered the to add interchanges Growing up in south- basement! to the Tacoma, Washington yard ern Oregon next to That turned out to on my plan. I got the Southern Pacific be great wisdom the idea to add an Siskiyou Line, cap- indeed! I am thor- interchange with the oughly satisfied Southern Pacific – tured my attention with my choice of even though the SP as a young boy and prototype, and if never made it that instilled a passion in starting over would far north. I was free- build essentially the lancing, so why not? me for railroading, same layout model- mountain style ... ing the SP in south- The idea of having ern Oregon. the SP on my lay- out got me really excited. And that’s I also knew there is a part of me when it hit me – if the SP got me that loves freelancing – in my that excited by just having it make an research of the prototype SP “appearance” on my layout, why not Siskiyou Line, I learned about the just model the SP? Coos Bay, Roseburg, and Eastern that built east out of Coos Bay in the The Layout Design SIG recommends late 1800s.