Bernhards Random Ramblings BACKUP

On my prototype (Deutsche Bundesbahn in 1972) the train schedule exists in multiple forms. There's the line diagram used in offices and towers at stations, as well as for planning the schedule. The timetable in tabular format collected in thick books and also the familiar yellow and white posters hanging in train stations. And there is the "Buchfahrplan" which is used on the locomotive. The Buchfahrplan contains detailed time points and speed indications for each train. Here's a scan of a prototype Buchfahrplan from 1966: Column 1 has the waypoints in kilometer along the track. Column 2 shows how fast the train may go in the given section unless signaled otherwise. Column 3 shows stations, some interlockings, and other way points. Column 4 and 5 are arrival and departure times at the respective locations. If the train is not scheduled to stop, the time is only given in the departure column. This scan shows 3 train movements: two local freights on different days respec...

Just right. Light and a bit fluffy. I'm getting practice .

Today I practiced weathering with Airbrush and Pan Pastels on a few cars for Silicon Valley Lines. Each car came out nicer than the previous one and even the first one turned out not to shabby. I paid extra attention to only do light weathering. Some fading, some dirt, introduce subtle color variations, paint the wheels and trucks, ... and move on. Next I grabbed one of the box cars from the Welztalbahn. This is a Roco model which, like most cars on the layout, ran straight out of the box. Shiny plastic, flat walls. An hour later, the car looked dramatically different: The camera ruthlessly exposes the small imperfections like the slightly splattery overspray, the missing grab irons, or the crude ladders. Nevertheless, I'm quite pleased with the result.

I had the opportunity to operate on David Park's fantastic Cumberland West layout, which packs scenes from the Baltimore & Ohio (B&O) and the Western Maryland (WM) railroads around Cumberland, Maryland into a busy rendition of railroading in the year 1953. Both railroads have plenty of bridge traffic, online industries, coal mines, and passenger runs. Operations is busy and the crew is having fun (from left Sam R., Bryn E., Charlie B., Steve W. and Dick Z.) Manifest freights use car cards for car forwarding, while coal is routed with multi-car orders (Dick Z., and Michael M.) I very much enjoyed myself, chatting with others while waiting for a train, or clearance. David is a gracious host and a wealth of information about the prototypes he is modeling, as well as many aspects of model railroad design, operations, and layout electronics.

UCSC Rachel Carson College at night Southbound Highway 17 closed at Lexington dam due to rockfall. It's the weirdest thing to drive northbound from Santa Cruz on this winding mountain road in the fog and rain, and there is no-one driving behind you, before you, or in the opposing traffic lanes. You're driving on this winding mountain road alone, but you know this as one really busy road. ... and then some Mini Cooper passes you on the right at high speed, and you know all is good and normal...

[ Emsingen posts ] The railroad crossing at the north end of Emsingen station has been in an unfinished state for a couple years . Now that the Open House is behind me I started to work on finishing the last major unfinished corner of the Emsingen station area. I had cut paper templates for the road by laying a sheet of paper over the tracks, transfer the shape of the rails with a pencil, and cut out the road for a nice fit. I wanted to try another way to build a road, and transferred the templates to thin styrene sheets to become the road surface. Next I traced the continuation of the road past the freight area and paid special attention to avoid kinks, which is why there's a wider arc than the original markings. I glued down cork pieces and dressed up the sides to elevate the road surface a bit over the surrounding area. The gaps in the tracks were filled with styrene strips and putty to work around the center point contacts. Bad idea. It's very difficult to make a smooth s...

Playing with the airbrush on a retired freight car. Slowly getting the hang of it. First results soon followed .

My apple cake today turned out to be particularly popular. The last piece disappeared shortly after dinner. (Photo Credit: Tatjana)

The whole family went to watch Cirque du Soleil's production of "Luzia" tonight.  Once again a great show with amazing artistic feats, good music, and a story that pulls it all together. We had seats right at the stage and at first were a bit disappointed by how the huge conveyor blocks the view. However, once the show started, the stage turned out to be a very impressive construction with multiple rotating rings and very cool water features. Intermission. I even got to take part in the show, playing a dumb member of the audience during one of the set changes. Luzia is an excellent show, in particular the water features of the stage were used very effectively for fun, drama, or visuals, just as the act needed it. The execution was flawless with top-notch choreography. As usual for these traveling shows, the artists didn't just perform their own acts, but participated in supporting roles throughout the show. After the finale

Dessert at work. Ridiculously good.

When I read in a recent issue of Eisenbahn Journal (Thank You for that, Tatjana) that Liliput had released a model of BR614 in the Pop color scheme of the early 70's, and it was available in an AC version I couldn't resist.  Modellbahnshop Lippe had it in stock, the shipment arrived in California in less than 7 days, and was still cheaper than buying in Germany due to no VAT on export shipments. The train comes in a sturdy box, well-protected by plastic sleeves, and is ... oh, very beautiful. Good detailing, no compromises in scale. This train type was introduced in 1973. The first deployment was for fast passenger service on the non-electrified lines from Nuremberg, including the Murrbahn to Stuttgart. It's a very attractive train set and a nicely done model with a LokPilot v4 M4. This is the first train with full-length cars on the Welztalbahn, instead of the 1:93.5 length-compressed cars. I need to work on clearances in a couple areas...

I somewhat hit an impasse while I was preparing the new paperwork for the Welztalbahn: I did not have a table of Richteinheiten. Think of a Richteinheit like a postal codes for freight destinations, identifying the closest major yard or origination of the last local freight train handling a given freight car. On the one hand I wanted to make progress on the paperwork. On the other hand, it didn't feel right to go through the trouble making paperwork and then having to update it later with the "correct" codes when I got my hands on the respective table. While browsing through forums in early February, I read about the Verkehrsarchiv in Nuremberg which is now part of the library at the DB Museum in Nuremberg . On a whim I sent an email to the named contact hoping for a redirect to a location that might have Gueterzugbildungsvorschriften (GZV) from the early 1970's. These rulebooks describe blocking for each scheduled freight train, as well as any special considerations ...

The Andreaskreuz is quite big and bulky. I have to store it somewhere. Since there is no available wall space in the garage, I eventually settled on the most obvious solution: The folding doors to the train room. I mounted the sign so that it folds out of the way with the door.

We're following German tradition with our Christmas trees. Setup on December 23rd . Decoration on the morning of December 24th , ... and delayed take down in late January. This year, we're extra late and so I took down the tree only on the first weekend of February.

On this weekend's return trip from Santa Cruz I stopped at the summit in the middle of the fog. The parking lot at the summit coffee shop has a peculiar sign posted ... Contrary to other parts of the country we rarely get interesting clouds. It's either blue skies, or overcast, so this was a welcome change of scenery.

Today I got to play with the latest addition to the Welztalbahn locomotive fleet: ESU's beautiful model of class 215. As a relatively new entry on the locomotive market ESU is taking the high road the same way BRAWA does: Very well done models with lots of fine details, excellent sound effects, and tricked out with electronics. The locomotive is marketed as a DC / AC model, so of course I had to take it to Silicon Valley Lines and try out how well that works. Maerklin's pickup shoe is removable and the locomotive just worked on the DCC layout. The photo above was taken at Silicon Valley Lines. The wheel flanges are a tad too high for the Code 83 turnouts used at SVL and the engine lolloped through the turnouts. Otherwise it ran just fine. As usual the overall sound settings are too loud, but the engine and brake sounds are very realistic. In addition, the squeal effect when the locomotive navigates tight curves is very well done. In combination with the ESU Powerpack it's a...