Modelingthesp

I continue to be, on the one hand, fascinated with the variety of route card appearances, and, at the same time, intrigued with all the prototype information about car movement. That’s why I’m writing this post, continuing to show interesting cards from the Michael Litant collection. You might wish to consult the previous post with some background on these cards (see it at: <...

In response to a recent question I was asked (“Why don’t you write more about PFE cars?”), I will describe recent work on a Red Caboose HO scale kit for a PFE reconditioned reefer, kit RC-4121-3, for a car of PFE Class R-30-12-9. There are a number of things I will choose to do for this kit.

I’ll begin with the kit as it comes from the box. It’s nicely decorated (as the...

At the recent ProRail operating event, there were as usual many fascinating discussions among attendees, not only during sessions, but also in the hotel at breakfast, or even in the bar in the evening. One of these involved several of us comparing our own and others’ waybill processes in connection with operating sessions. (For comments on the ProRail event, see my post at: <...

Oranges are probably the canonical California fruit, and although the area I model, the Central Coast between San Luis Obispo and Santa Maria, was not prime orange country, I do know that navel oranges were indeed grown on the Nipomo Mesa, adjoining my fictitious branch line to Santa Rosalia. So that is a crop I can include.  

Oranges in California come...

Long-time readers of this blog, or those who may have heard a clinic I have given several times, may find that the title of the present post stirs a memory. That’s because those prior blog posts and clinics were entitled “Wine as an industrial commodity,” a topic I developed jointly with my late friend Richard Hendrickson. Here’s a link to that earlier post: