My Bet Is That Modeltrainstuff.com Is Heading The Way Of Caboose Hobbies

For a while in the early 2000s, I was a regular online customer of Caboose Hobbies in Denver. Memories are probably short, but for a time, it was one of the major online dealers, on a par with Trainworld and MB Klein/Modeltrainstuff now. But even before Caboose Hobbies lost its building and closed in 2016, it had been going downhill.

I quit dealing with them following a succession of screwups -- they'd habitually send only part of my order, claiming the other items weren't in stock. Then a day or so later, they'd discover they had the items after all and send them in a separate shipment, charging me the extra postage for a shipment that should have gone all in one box.

Each time it happened, I'd call, they'd say they were sorry and credit my card for the extra postage -- but it kept happening, and I got tired of calling. Finally they charged my card for someone else's $700 order, which was a big surprise when I got that month's statment. They said they were sorry and credited my card, but I realized I couldn't deal with them any longer. This was nine years before they lost their building and closed, but I suspect there was a lot more wrong behind the scenes at that point.

The new store apparently never took off.

I quit dealing with Caboose Hobbies about 2007, especially when I noticed that MB Klein was shifting its focus to on line discount. I noticed that Ted Klein, who'd run the business since the 1950s, passed away less than a year ago. Since then, it's had serious problems with longer and longer shipment delays. As of this past week, an order I placed on February 6 had gone unfilled by Thursday, Febrary 11, and the shipping status on their site said they were shipping only orders placed up to February 3 or so.

It looked like it would take them a week or more to fill my order. The problem is that, as their shipping delays grew, I was placing more orders with Trainworld, which has continued to ship pretty consistently the next day since last summer, when the first COVID lockdowns were lifted.

I opened a support request with Klein pointing out that they were taking longer and longer to fill orders, when Trainworld consistently ships the next day. Klein took two days to answer, and when they did, they said they tell customers it takes 5 o 7 days to ship on the site, it's because of COVID or maybe the holidays, and I should be patient, they're trying.

I told them Trainworld ships next day.

Hobby stores come and hobby stores go. I get the sense that when Ted Klein passed away, his store began circling the drain. For now, it's mostly Trainworld for me, and what I can't get there, I can probably get on eBay.

Improvements To My N Scale Architect HARRIS Tower

I've published a photo of my N Scale Architect PRR HARRIS Tower here before. This is how it looked after I'd assembled and painted it, with Roberts Products mortar applied, and instaalled a Just Plug LED:

I was never completely happy with it. The embossed brickwork didn't work all that well with the Roberts Products mortar, and I didn't like the uneven look of the lighting from the single LED. Eventually I installed Woodland Scenics Light Diffusing Film behind the windows, but I still didn't feel like I was finished.

Not long ago I saw a video with a shot of the prototype HARRIS tower in the 1970s. It was much darker than it is now since its resoration. Here's a photo I found on the web of it in that earlier condition:

The video also showed it had ivy growing on its west side, but that's also gone. I decided if I darkened the brick areas and added some ivy, I'd be happier with how the mortar came out. Between the carker brick, the Light Diffusing Film, and the ivy, here's how it wound up:

The ivy is barely visible on the rear corner in the photo above. I made it by smearing full-strength Elmer's glue with a fingertip over the area I wanted to apply the ivy. Then I sifted Woodland Scenics light green turf over the area and let it dry.

I darkened the brick first by brushing brick-colored chalk over the brick areas. I fixed the chalk in place by airbrushing a mixture of a little Tru Color grimy black paint, a little clear flat, and a lot of acetone over the whole tower, including the roof. I didn't bother masking the windows off. This toned down the brick color but left smaller mortar lines visible. I'm much happier with the result.

The Light Diffusing Film also makes the light from the single LED much more even. The NCE Illuminator that I'm using to run the LED also allows me to adjust brightness, and I'll probably dim it.

Walthers Ore Car Trucks

Walthes offers part 920-2013, a set of 12 rigid sideframes for HO ore car trucks, without wheels. These are five foot wheelbase, rather than the normal five foot-six inch used for 70 ton trucks on standard freight cars. HO models prior to the recnt Walthers releases used the standard wheelbase trucks, but the difference is visible. This applies to both the smooth side and ribbed style Lake Superior 24 foot ore cars, as well as the longer Bessemer & Lake Erie cars.

The Walthers part makes it possible to replace trucks on older Roundhouse and Roco-AHM cars inexpensively. I got two sets, which should be enough to re-do most of my older ore cars. Here is a pair of AHM type cars that I relettered for C&NW cars they acquired from the B&LE. I used Circus City decals for the lettering. Some of the C&NW cars were completely repainted, while others were patched and retained the Bessemer herald.

CNW 121175 on the left still has the older style five foot-six inch wheelbase AAR standard trucks. CNW 121193 on the right has the new Walthers truck sideframes and Kadee 33 inch wheels. If you redo AHM ore cars to improve the trucks and couplers, the new Walthers trucks are useful, since you have to toss the original trucks anyhow.

I think the difference is visible and an improvement.

Atlas Illinois Terminal RS-1

I've said here that I seek out models of interurban lines that had diesels and standard freight operations. Here's a fairly recent Atlas RS-1 that I recently converted to DCC with a Digitrax DH165A0 decoder. This had LED headlights, so it was an easy-to-intermediate level install. I don't know if Atlas has ever updated the Classic RS-1 to have 8-pin sockets; this one didn't.

It's shown with an Accurail Fowler boxcar also lettered for IT. This site has prototype data on the IT Fowler cars.

[I]n late 1928 the Illinois Terminal ordered 100 unique cars that were taller than a Fowler, but shorter (less long) than a standard ARA boxcar design of the time. The road needed “modern” boxcars to replace their ageing fleet of all-wood double sheathed boxcars, and their mechanical engineers came up with an odd compromise boxcar design that was both familiar (short, and comparable to the rest of their boxcars) and modern (single sheathed). The cars were remarkably long-lived, with a few stragglers running into the early 1970s. That makes this little group of cars the last American-owned short single sheathed cars in operation.

The Illinois Terminal's history with diesel operations is complicated. According to George Hilton and John Due's The Interurban Electric Railroads in America, Illinois Terminal was a short steam line in the East St Louis, IL area that was acquired by the company that controlled the Illinois Traction System in the mid 1920s. The company adopted the illinois Terminal name for the entire system in 1928.

Two other steam lines between East St Louis and Alton were acquired at the same time. All were operated by steam under the IT name amd were never electrified.

IT RS-1 755 was built in 1950. The Atlas model is in the as-delivered paint scheme. RS-1s and some Alco S-2s were used by the IT in the legacy steam service; I've seen DVD videos of them operating on non-electrified IT track in the East St Louis area in the 1950s.

Several IT electric interurban lines were upgraded in the 1930s with belt lines around cities to avoid street running and allow longer freights to be operated. These were originally operated with electric freight locomotives, Between 1952 and 1956, the IT abandoned all passenger service and removed the overhead wire. However, diesels like the 755 were used for freight service on the upgraded electric lines before the wire was removed.

After that time, of course, the Illinois Terminal was freight only and all diesel.

Walthers New Haven PA-1 -- A Pleasant Surprise

I got a Walthers Mainline New Haven PA-1 and am quite impressed. Given Walthers Mainline, I'd been expecting something "generic" with pretty basic detail, but one or two items stood out:

New Haven units had the pilot cut away below the coupler. Not all PAs had this. Looking at photos of other Walthers units, it appears that all their versions have this cutout, but at least New Haven modelers got lucky.

Here's the overall view. The paint and lettering are very good.

The model has factory-installed wire grab irons at the doors.

The fan has see through screen and fan blades.

There's a sprung diaphragm on the rear. I got to ride and railfan the New Haven a lot in my teens, but by then the PAs were gone from passenger service.

Apogee Locomotive Works Porter Fireless Loco

Over the past few months, a new model railroad supplier has emerged, Apogee Locomotive Works. At least for now, he specializes in 3-D printed bodies for unique prototpyes that fit on commercial chassis, primarily Bachmann.

He makes several fireless locomotive shells that fit on the Bachmann HO Porter 0-6-0T chassis. This model is out of production, but it's possible to find them as old stock in hobby shops or on eBay. Here is a stock Bachmann Porter 0-6-0T:

I was always intrigued by the idea that other types of locos like fireless locos, steam dummy locos, and so forth could potentially be made using the Bachmann chassis. Apogee finally ran with the idea. Here is the Bachmann chassis with the factory shell removed next to a stock loco:

The Apogee body is a careful slip fit on the Bachmann chassis. It's necessary to move the Bachmann decoder from its location in the side tank area to the top of the motor to get the Apogee fireless body to fit.

Here is the Apogee body test fitted onto the Bachmann chassis:

The prototype for the Apogee loco is a fireless loco built by Porter in 1923 for the Public Service Electric & Gas Company in New Jersey. It's currently preserved at Steamtown. The Steamtown site has a copy of the entry for the loco from a Locomotive Cyclopedia:

These locos were often used at power plants that had a steam supply from their boilers. A charge of steam would last a few hours. The locos typically switched hopper cars of coal to fire the power plant's boilers.

I painted my loco Scalecoat Southern Railway Green.

Both this loco and the stock Bachmann verson can switch about three HO cars.

Accurail 36 Foot Boxcars

My interests are eclectic, and I've never been the sort to see my hobby as something I do to satisfy someone else's tastes. So I run what I like, and that includes hauling turn-of-the-20th-century prototypes behind diesels. I really like the Accurail variations on the 36-foot steel underframe boxcars they've brought out over the past several years.

I substitute the plastic wheels in the kits with Kadee 33 inch ribbed back wheels and the couplers with Kadee 158. I also substitute the flexible plastic steps in the kit with A Line Type A stirrups. I tend to create batches of brass brake wheels soldered to brass wire to install on Accurail cars that use them, so I haven't finished such a batch for these cars.

On the Boston & Maine car below, I substituted a pair of old Roundhouse Fox trucks for the arch bars in the kit. The Boston & Maine had a number of these cars in storage at Walpole, NH when I found them there in 1967, and they had kept their Fox trucks.

I seek out models of standard freight cars lettered for interurban lines like the Fort Dodge, the South Shore, the Sacramento Northern, and the Pacific Electric. This Accurail Fowler car is lettered for the South Shore. I'm working on another Accurail Fowler lettered for the Illinois Terminal.

I have a 1928 Official Railway Equipment Register, and the South Shore did in fact have ten of these cars.