Garden Railroading: Thundering Thursday

Thundering Thursday - May 11th

No, today was not considered "Workday Wednesday". Rather...we'll refer to it as "Thundering Thursday" seeing as Thursday is named for Thor, the Germanic God of Thunder.

And...why the reference, you may ask?

Well, trains which "thundered" through the pedestrian crossing nearby the dispatcher's hut often met with near catastrophic accidents as the subroadbed there began to rot and wear away.

I arrived just after 9:30 to find Bernie and Pat hard at work.

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Yesterday Marcel was a big help along with Bernie and Pat working in this area.

Love the shades, skipper Pat!

The new subroadbed is finally in place.

Gravel stones ensure the timber will remain in place.

I let the two lads continue with their efforts at the crossing while I dealt with the signage for the railroad.

I placed the domino factory along the fence wall in Bell. The detail items will have to be glued in place at some point with special outdoor glues. We thank Lawrence for creating this lovely structure!

Now I know where Spruce is!

Back to the track-laying. The rail joiners are slid into place on the grade up to Blockhouse.

Eventually ties will be located in the bare areas after Fred strips a few.

I must've teased Pat too much as he wants to drill me! Big grin!

Father Fred oversees the action.

There's a big smile from the Bernie Man!

Hammering the ties in place. Note how we do not hammer the nails in all the way as we may have to lift them "down the road".

Mike gets into the action a little bit.

The level allows the crew to check for any inconsistencies along the linear route.

It also allows us to align two opposing track areas for a "meet".

Fred cuts the length of rail for us.

He's a dedicated work crew mate!

The vice comes in handy here.

A friend from the States gave Fred these lengths of railroad ties.

Bernie displays the box.

Makes for a nice neck"tie" Bernie!

Bernie slides the rails Fred has cut onto the new section of ties.

Before shot.

After shot. More ties will go in eventually.

The additional ties are now in and the curve at Blockhouse looks beautiful!

You've done good, Bernie & Pat - Marcel too!

More ties will fill the gaps and they will be nailed down.

A look from the other direction.

Awesome job fellas!

What an improvement.

Close your eyes - Fred is stripping - rail ties that is!

One more look.

Video footage of Bernie running a train through the newly-laid track.

To engage the video click on the white arrow in the centre once and then a second time.

This video shows the Ironwood Road RS3 handling the rails beautifully!

One more video of the action!

Bernie sent along some more pics taken during the recent work session with little old me getting in on the action. Here we are drilling holes for the nails to go into the ties.

I am now able to hammer in some of the nails near the former Blockhouse turnout area.

With supervisors like Bernie, Pat and Fred...I had better get it right!

No one is shouting orders at me so I must be doing something right!

Wow...what a difference the new trackwork makes judging by what we witnessed the day before.

Indeed, many kinks were found in the track leading up the way to Blockhouse.

I feel it important to promote our large scale endeavours when I attend our OVAR meetings by bringing out a model to showcase the scale.

With this month's theme for the display at OVAR being "Foreign Roads" I decided to bring out my Delaware & Hudson GP38-2 for the display to share room with some O scale items and some HO scale items.

I also brought along Pete Conroy's recent acquisition, the UP 0-4-0 steam locomotive - once again a foreign road. Note the Canadian National items below. Folks do not have to necessarily follow the theme closely and it's nice to see many models adorn the display area.