Shoutout Sunday

Today I want to write a special thank you. That’s what Shoutout Sunday is all about; recognizing someone (or something) that has had an impact on my journey in the hobby.

The first person to help me along in the hobby was Luc Sabourin. I first met Luc in October 2013 at a local trainshow and he directed me to his excellent online image posts of QGRY locomotives at http://www.rrpicturearchives.net. I was planning a railfanning trip to scope out the QGRY route from Montreal to Quebec City and Luc had done this trip back in 2009.

I really appreciated his encouragement and Luc was the first person in the hobby to share his enthusiasm and knowledge with me. He suggested that I visit Van Horne Hobbies in Montreal (111 Blvd St Martin East (450) 669-4175). Somewhere I probably would never have found without his tip.

In the last two years, Luc has introduced me to some great model railroaders and I look forward to seeing him at the shows each year.  So a special Shoutout Sunday to you Luc! Thanks for starting me off in this great hobby!

Scenery Saturday

Not sure if the layout qualifies for Scenery Saturday yet as I am barely at the 'Plywood Pacific' stage but it's important to celebrate progress. Less than a year ago, the layout looked like this...

And now, after a door has been (re)moved and some demolition of some storage closets (which was wayyy too much fun) I have the layout footprint that I wanted!

Now that the backdrop is painted and the valence is up I feel like the layout is slowly becoming real. It is still VERY much a work in progress, as I find it's easier to build than plan. This has the definite disadvantage of taking longer as not everything I build works out and I find that there are a lot of 'doovers', however I just prefer seeing it in 1:1 real size before I know if it's going to work for me.

Freight Car Friday

Many thanks to Chris van der Heide's excellent Algoma Central in HO Scale blog for the idea of Freight Car Friday. I am happy to 'borrow' this idea and I owe a debt of gratitude to all of the bloggers who have inspired and taught me in the past two years. It's because of the knowledge that the online modeling community has shared with me on the web and the debt to them that I started QGRY in HO Scale.

So without further ado, this inaugural Freight Car Friday's car is...

The 50' Newsprint Boxcar 

I took this shot of QGRY 75017 at the Port of Quebec City in October 2013. According to http://freight.railfan.ca this car was built by National Steel Car in Hamilton, ON in 1979. This looks to be a repainted CP Action Green car with the 1970's black-and-white multimark painted out.

According to the article on Newsprint Boxcars by John Riddell in the June 2002 Model Railroader (pg 70) These CP cars started out as being originally built for the Minnesota, Dakota and Western and had the reporting marks "MDW" before they were acquired by CP in 1988. I have not been able to confirm the history of this but I am sure that this car has seen years of service and as the consumption of paper decreases and more and more Paper Mills close, these cars will be seen less and less.

Happily, HO models similar to these cars exist and the first ever weathering project I attempted was to take a shiny new CP car and turn it into a QGRY rustbucket. Modeling a Paper Mill ensures that these cars will live on on my layout. 

Video Thursday

Name kinda says it all .... enjoy!

Workbench Wednesday

What's on the workbench? Today is the day to find out... it's Workbench Wednesday, the day that I share what I'm working on. Could be a structure kitbash or a scratchbuild project or a locomotive detailing job. Or perhaps some prototypical rolling stock weathering. Tune in each Wednesday and I'll share a neat project in progress and complete with how tos and step-by-steps pics.

Today, I'd like to share a story about imagination. 
One of the aspects of model railroading that I like the most is the creativity. Especially the fun of building something from unexpected items. Being a model railroader means looking at items in new and strange ways. I find myself wandering through dollar stores wondering how I can turn everyday objects into prototypical 1/87 scale items.

Recently I was opening my son's apple sauce at breakfast when I noticed what a wonderfully odd lid it had. Why anyone would design an apple sauce container lid like this I have no idea, however it sure looked like a candidate for an interesting flatcar load.

So that's what's on the workbench this week. A really neat load. I sprayed the lids primer grey. Built supporting cradle structures out of wood and am pretty happy with the results thus far. So what is it.... who knows... could be a load of industrial equipment for the Quebec Poutine Works? Or part of a wind turbine built at Marmen in Trois Rivieres? Or perhaps something for the Paper Mill? All that matters is that it will be a cool and unique load that I built. Oh yeah, and it was fun!

Next up will be experimenting with various metal beading wire, silver thread and elastic thread to tie the loads down and then weathering the car to look like its seen better days. But that is a post for another day.

Trainshow Tuesday

Happy September. And happy Tuesday... today we honor the official start of the model railroading season with the second in our regular weekly featured blog posts Trainshow Tuesday.

Expect updates every Tuesday on exciting events and shows that I will be attending as well as posts of some exciting treasure finds from the shows.

I can't believe the increase in prices for rolling stock in the two years that I've been in the hobby. I've seen prices more than double with many new cars exceeding $50 Canadian dollars. Crazy. I knew that this was an expensive hobby...but there are limits.

I've alway had great luck finding really great cars at the many shows that we have in southern Ontario. One of my absolute favourites is coming up in a couple of weeks. The LMRA Flea Market is September 19th, 2015 from 10 AM to 3 PM at Apostles Continuation Church, 10 Belfield Road, Toronto (Kipling & Hwy 401).

Details at http://www.lmra.ca/flea_market.html

For a great list of upcoming shows, I like to consult http://www.railwaypages.com/ontario-show-and-event-calendar

Please feel free to comment if you plan on attending the LMRA Flea Market or any of these show. I'd love to connect with other model railroaders in the Toronto area. 

Prototype Monday

Every Monday on the blog is Prototype Monday. That means I will post a picture of the real QGRY for inspiration. First up is a pic that I took last October 2014. QGRY 2007 was switching cars in the QGRY Trois-Rivieres yard on a beautiful fall day.

QGRY 2007 is a GP 38 (ex-PC 7676) built in 1969. The EMD GP38 is a 4-axle diesel-electric locomotive built by General Motors Electro-Motive Division between January 1966 and December 1971. The locomotive's power was provided by an EMD 645 16-cylinder engine which generated 2,000 horsepower (1.49 MW). The company built 706 GP38s for North American railroads. In 1972, it was replaced by an updated model, the GP38-2.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/EMD_GP38

For more pictures of QGRY 2007 please visit http://www.rrpicturearchives.net/Locopicture.aspx?id=126986

Please feel free to comment or subscribe for more updates. I'd love to connect with other QGRY modelers or other model railroaders.