Workday Wednesday May 11th

 Workday Wednesday - May 11th

The regular "Workday Wednesday" crew descended on Fred's property for the second time this season.

Their efforts on this day focused on the placement of all of the structures along the line.

While we don't have pics of the big structure move, Bernie managed to captured these images of big movements with the big structure across the street from Fred's home!

The pre-fab roof structure is lying on the ground out front.

Click on the image to enlarge and outside the image to return to the default appearance of the page.

The lads have attached two hooks to it.

The telescoping crane gets down to work.

Truly impressive.

Another piece goes in.

The workmen up top navigate the roof like a spider in a web.

Some of these roof sections were fabricated earlier in the morning at the side of the street!

Robin, Mike & Pat relax after placing all of the railroad structures around the property along with Bernie, Lawrence and Fred.  Funnily enough, there were a couple of structures we had to think about for quite a while to remember where they would go!

The chimenea gets moved to another location by Robin and Mike.

Fred and Mike look on as Robin handles the vent hood.

Firmly in place.

Lawrence sweeps out a location for the patio stones to reside before they will eventually find a home "as" a patio!

Mike starts with the heavy lifting.

Foreman Fred says, "A little to the left...now to the right...back to the left..." and Mike responds with, "%$^#*&^".  Big grin...just kidding! 

"Nice butt!" Fred announces.  Robin looks on after carrying his share of the load as well and Lawrence will clean up the mess.

Skipper Fred "in story".

Well...that's all we have for you from the Workday Wednesday session.  

Thanks for the photos, Bernie.  (We only started shooting pics after we had all of the structures in place for the season.)

Back to some "unused" material from the AGM party.  We find Steve admiring the streetcar he recently purchased.

Some information Steve found on the car.

The 1003 is painted beautifully in this model version.

Three quarter view.

Even some passengers too!

Check out the rivets.

Here's Johnny Chuff-Chuff's rendition of Ken Brunt again.

We miss you, Ken!

As mentioned in our last posting, Paul was the first operator of the season.

Here we see his RGS steamer.

Number 25.

A video look at Pat's train with the Fred Mills Trestle in plain sight.

Remember, to engage the video, tap on the white arrow one time...and then a second time.

Andrew's CN #7427 is a thing of beauty.

Cool looking angled number boards!

The mechanism that work from remote control!

Fred, Pat and Paul eye the Timbits boxes.

Barry conducts a study of the various Timbit choices.

Grant and Marcel trying to predict the number of ops sessions we will have this season.

Bill is busy holding up the dispatch booth, his home away from home!

Doug, Bill and Moe in person!

Pat's train which you just saw on video a moment ago.

There's that special caboose.  "Let It B&M" sang The Beatles!!!

Be sure to bring her out on the standard gauge mornings Pat!

Grant works his way up The Ledges.

Followed by Marcel.

Grant arrives Firgrove.

She's one sweet looking locomotive, Grant!

Love this bigger brute brought in by Bob!

Video of Grant's progress through Bell.

Here's Henky Penky!

Mr. Grant once again.

Cheers as offered up by Robin.

Pat and Paul listen in as Chris winds a tale.

Henk, Andrew and Moe discussing the merits of those sugar coated sweeties hanging out on the table.

Indeed, Chris has an attentive audience.

The ascent at "The Ledges" on video.

Pat adds to the conversation.

Paul and Chris.

George offering some good advice to Father Fred.

Here's Bob!

Aha!  Bernie looks on as Bob climbs Clarke Grade.

Rounding the bend into Spruce.

The lads have enjoyed the harvest.

Henk and Doug await their fill.

Chris offers to conduct the build for Barry.

Still more video of locomotives making the grade!  This time...Marcel's locomotive.

Henk and Bernie hold court in back while Marcel, Lawrence and Pat concentrate on Fred's words.

Neil and Steve in the shade.  

Again, we thank Neil for investigating our OVGRS shirt program.  He tells us they will be brought to Fred's for distribution at the first session on the 21st of May.  

Neil also reports that the ball caps with the OVGRS insignia will cost only $15.00 and not twenty.  Lovely that!

Moe and Bob around the table.  Thanks, Moe, for the great feast!

Doug, Pat and Chris in the filtered sunlight.

Firgrove video footage of the turntable in action.

Bill, Moe and Henk enjoy each other's friendship.

How could you not have fun with this trio!

Fred and Steve listen in on the other Mike's explanation of the streetcar project.

A lovely orange model.

And...a green one!

Some interesting thoughts about streetcars which offer a valuable lesson.

More interesting notation.

Some further thoughts about the future run of a streetcar in Ottawa.

Nice model, Mike!

Yet another video from our AGM party!

Pat has arrived Peter's Pond.

Love it, love it, love it!!!

Marcel brings his Colorado & Southern through the wye and over to the entrance/exit track.

Time to pack up for the day.

Note the canopy covering all of the structures in Craig Leigh.  Everything is now cleared.

Time for one more video!

Marcel passes the streetcar.

The engineman is up front.

In the dappled shade.

Mike and Steve.

Lovely!

Beautiful modelling.

Thanks for bringing the car out on this fine day, Steve!

I was thrilled to be the presenter at the OVAR meeting Tuesday night.  I brought out some of the models I had been working on of recent including this waterfront scene.

The "Tidewater Wharf" kit is offered up by Builders In Scale.  It's a thing of beauty.  The structures took me a month of evenings to construct and they are for Professor David Gardner.  Before I would bring the buildings to his layout, I spent a day creating the diorama simply for the fact of bringing the structures out to our OVAR meeting.  Yes...a month to build the structures and a day to construct the diorama!  Too much fun!

I also brought along the machine shop I have built from scratch for our very own OVGRS member, Doug Matheson.  The machines come from Sierra West Scale Models and are O-scale.

Here is an overall shot of the four modules that make up the town of Tyrone, a fictitious town in Eastern Ontario circa 1912.

Along with the machine shop we find a depot, a general store and a freight house with coal dealer.

Bernie came up to me and offered to snap a photo which was nice of him to do.  I didn't break the camera with my 63 year-old mug, Bernie!  Hehehe.  I'll be 64 at the end of the month and then I'll be able to sing that Beatles song, "When I'm 64" and really mean it.  I used to think it was called "When I'm Six Feet Four".  As I've said before...wishful thinking!  Big grin!

I wrote out modelling descriptions to correspond with the dioramas and Doug wrote a fictitious history of the town that represented accurately what life was like in the town of Tyrone.

A final aerial shot.

The four modules fit nicely on the piece of foam Lisa and I placed in the back of the Rav4.

The seaside diorama held front seat privileges.

Skipper Bernie pulling a stunt at OVAR.   I recognized ya right away, Bern!

Father Fred with chauffeur, David Moat...another talented modeler.  David recently sold his 88 acre farm and will be moving to a nice home in Stittsville where he will build his dream layout.

In other news...Part Two of our article on Train Operations Along the IPP&W will be appearing in the May/June on-line issue of Garden Railroading News about to hit the stands on the 15th of May.  Doug Matheson and I co-authored this segment.

Carla Brand Breitner has already sent the draft to Fred and me and it looks great.  Once again, Carla, Bill Derville and others at GRN have done an incredible job with all the information we sent them...including a fun "Crew Call" list where I did not send in your actual names out of privacy concerns.  Rest assured, many of you are listed...under pseudonyms using your first name only and a fun surname that reflects your personality.  While I couldn't include every OVGRS member as the crew list offers a specific number of crew positions each week, I'm sure you'll enjoy reading the names that are listed.

As we always say,  "Thanks Father Fred for hosting us to the AGM party and our Workday Wednesday Workouts!  Looking forward to seeing many of you at the first operating session on Saturday, May 21st...it will feature the narrow gauge fleet.

Enjoy this gorgeous summer weather in the spring time and we'll see you soon!

All the best, Mike Hamer, Ottawa, Ontario, Canada