By Jeff Moorman

Next Clinic:

The first clinic of the calendar year is this Thursday, January 7. The general topic will be demonstrating what can be done with DCC sound decoders. This will include sound equipment you can install in steam locomotives and some freight cars.

Prior Clinic:

We started by continuing the series of mini-talks on fallen flags. This time it was the Erie Railroad. Here are a couple of interesting facts:

  • Before the country settled on “standard gauge” there were all sorts of gauges in use. For example, the Erie was originally constructed as 6-foot gauge.
  • An Erie financier was once swindled out of $1,000,000 of Erie stock by a British con man who fled to Canada. At one point this led to a state governor wanting to call up his militia to invade our northern neighbor.

Next up was a discussion of modelling railroad-related snow scenes. We experienced some equipment issues that prevented showing the planned videos of winter railroading. We’ll try to fit one of those in this coming clinic.

There seem to be two basic approaches to modelling snow scenes; a temporary scene and a permanent scene. The former usually involves dry plaster, sugar, and/or flour. The later relies on a snow-colored paste (or “goop”) that resembles show when it dries. There are several good examples of modelling permanent snow scenes on the internet, including YouTube videos. To find some search on “model railroad snow scenery”.

Regardless of the approach, you need to pay particular attention to keeping the “snow” out of delicate model railroad mechanisms, particularly locomotives and couplers. For temporary scenes there are two additional issues. You need to control dampness and air movement as either one can mess things up. And the emphasis here is on the work “mess.” And you need to get things really clean when you are done. Generally, the longer your temporary scene exists, the harder it will be to clean up.

For permanent scenes there are three more considerations:

  1. Keeping the snow scene pristine and “white”?
  2. Transitioning from non-snow scenes to snow areas?
  3. It is difficult to convert non-snow scenery to snow scenery. Therefore, it is best to plan and build the scene with the final snow environment in mind from the very beginning.

Directions: We meet at the Ronald United Methodist Church, 17839 Aurora Avenue North, Shoreline, WA. That is on the west side of Aurora (State Route 99) between 175th and 185th Streets and more specifically, between the Cadillac dealer on the south and Deseret Industries to the north. Going southbound on Aurora, make a right-hand turn into the church driveway immediately after passing the Deseret location. The parking lot is at the rear of the church. From the lot go up the steps to the main entrance. Once inside, the Fireside room where we meet is on your left.

Meetings are the first Thursday of each month, usually September to May. In June we often do something different, so there is no “regular” meeting. Doors open at 7:00 PM and the program will start at 7:30.

Remember the next regular evening meeting is January 7, 2016. The meeting after that will be February 4. Hope to see you there or at least sometime on down the line.