Blog
This blog is limited to articles; random photos or quick updates are posted to the FaceBook page.
Blog entries from August 2017 and earlier have been migrated from a former site and many of the images are incorrectly linked. These may be repaired over time.
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- Category: Public Relations Blog
The Pennsylvania Midland Railroad, as described in the following series of articles, is a freelance railroad created by Jerry Britton. The railroad is inspired by actual events and histories of related railroads in Mifflin and Centre counties of Pennsylvania. History itself is not changed, but leveraged to create future outcomes that never came to fruition.
Since the dawn of the railroad age, citizens of Mifflin and Centre counties had yearned for the iron horse to connect their communities. The Commonwealth of Pennsylvania surveyed three routes for possible railroads to connect Philadelphia and Pittsburgh via Harrisburg. They were known as the southern, middle, and northern routes. The middle route would have such a railroad approach from the east, hit Lewistown, then go north through Mann's Gap (Reedsville) and head west down the "Big Valley" through Belleville, and on towards Huntingdon.
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- Category: Engineering Blog
The Secretary of the Interior paid a visit to the Middle Division this past weekend. That's my wife, Michele, by the way. Appointments with fancy titles win points in this world of supervisors, dispatchers, yardmasters, and the like!
Anyway, it was several years ago when she indicated that I could make use of the entire basement if "that's what made me happy". Yes, yes! The basement is three rooms... the train room, a rec room, and a home office shared between myself and Michele.
The "plan" was to put in windows between rooms to extend the model railroad (eventually). Our use of the office is almost nil, now that she has a laptop for work and I had closed my side business. The children never use the rec room and the space lays wasted.
This past weekend, out of the blue, she said "Why don't you just take the walls down?" Are you kidding me?
I think she just got appointed for another four years!
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- Category: Engineering Blog
Today was a landmark... the first train under power on the new model railroad!
Today was a landmark... the first train under power on the new model railroad! PRR NW2 9249 led the first revenue into State College over the Bellefonte Central Railroad.
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- Category: Engineering Blog
First look at Phase I benchwork. The lower level will be Lewistown Junction. The main will be on the left, looking west, and the yard on the right. The upper level will be Yeagertown, again looking west.
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- Category: Public Relations Blog
I am looking forward to a full weekend of benchwork construction this weekend. My suburban is already loaded with the wood. The cool basement will be welcome given the heatwave the east coast is currently experiencing.
One of my favorite photos from the N scale layout... staged traffic on the Sherman's Creek bridge at Duncannon. The new HO layout will have a similar bridge just west of Lewistown.
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- Category: Engineering Blog
I "broke ground" last evening. Let's call this "Phase I".
Phase I entails construction of the model railroad in the former N scale trainroom. It is 10' x 24' plus an 8' x 8' forming an "L" shape.
The main level will feature the main line from just east of the Lewistown Junction station to just east of LEWIS interlocking. It will also feature the Lewistown Junction yard, which includes a turntable and locomotive facility.
The upper level will feature the Milroy Secondary from the very east end of Burnham, through Yeagertown and Lower Mann, through the first part of Mann's Narrows. There are numerous industries along this stretch, most notably Standard Steel.
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- Category: Operations Blog
This past weekend I purchased MiTrains & Waybills from Shenandoah Software.
MiTrains maintains a complete inventory of your locomotives and rolling stock. Tracks list price, actual cost, enhancements, condition (unbuilt kit, on layout, etc.), etc. Produces reports and prints your car cards.
Waybills is exactly that, it prints way bills. You enter your online industries and it supports color coding by switching area, which can aid the yardmaster in classifying work. For offline shippers, there is a sizeable database of real industries included. You can search these by car type, commodity, railroad, etc. You can then ship to or receive from these entities.
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- Category: Public Relations Blog
Had a very interesting discussion on several mailing lists as of late. Was asking for clarification on the use of telephone booths and clearance rules on the Milroy "Branch" for planning my operations, I made some very interesting discoveries...
The Employee Timetable for the Middle Division for 1954 breaks out the territories under ABS and MBS operation, and spells out clearance cards and train order protocols for same. But the Milroy "Branch" wasn't listed among them. So what authority was required for operations?
Turns out the Milroy "Branch" wasn't a "Branch", but a "Secondary". It's an important distinction, as the Definitions section of the Book
