ETMRC  RAILNEWS

November 2012 www.coslar.us/etmrc

The roof is not fixed – This is Rob D’s account of trying to limit the damage from water pouring into the clubhouse after midnight during the heavy rain of mid-October. We are indeed fortunate that he was there and took action to make things far less worse. For more information, see the new business discussion below.

MEETINGS

The official weekly club meeting time is 9:00 to noon on Saturdays. Club members are usually present for work sessions work sessions Wednesday and Friday mornings at the same time as the Saturday schedule. If evenings are a better fit into your schedule than the mornings, consider 7:00 pm each Tuesday evening until about 9:00 pm. For those who care to have Saturday breakfast, club members meet at 8:00 am at the Mi Ranchita restaurant, diagonally across from Braum’s in the Commerce mall.

CLUB ACTIVITY

Lots happening this month. Stalwarts Paul and Rob got the windows on half the northeast side side of the layout room sheeted and caulked, and Paul cleaned up the bits of caulk and applied two coats of paint that mostly matches the existing wall paint.

Included in Paul’s facility rework activities are more concrete paving blocks in the sidewalk. The small 1 ft2 slabs he put into the hole left by the missing slab of concrete to replace the bowed and weathered sheet of plywood were themselves replaced with four 2 ft-sized blocks that better fill the hole with fewer joints. The finishing touch was the replacement of the lightweight concrete-covered Styrofoam blocks that were placed temporarily as steps into the building right after we moved in – more than 8 years ago. Nobody would recognize our facility from the outside – it really looks good.

Probably best of all, at least for safety, Paul and Rob replaced the spotlights illuminating the sidewalk leading into the clubhouse entrance. These have been in a declining stage for some time now, and quit entirely in early September. Not good, said our two facilities specialists, especially since night falls so soon in the winter. Not only were some lights gone, but one of the motion-actuated light sockets had gone bad and the circuit to the lights nearest the door was open. No longer. Now, all three lights work – and there is plenty of light.Thanks, guys.

Our track work is really pretty good. Rob’s mighty 100 car train has made numerous tours of the entire layout without complications – except that it is so long it can’t be stored anywhere without blocking a main line. Just to see what might happen, Rob and Paul added a couple more cars – 22 in all. Everything worked. The train could even be backed up around most of the layout without derailing. That says something, not only about the track, but also the club weight, coupler, and wheel requirements. The whole train was pulled by just two Bachmann FM Trainmaster locomotives. Rob and president Paul used this enormous train with as many track cleaning cars as they could find to clean the main yard tracks and succeeded – the whole yard now runs pretty reliably.

How long is a 122-car train? — About 70 actual feet. The locomotives are hiding just behind the city buildings at the left, while the caboose is just in front of Rob Dove along the back wall.

November BUSINESS MEETING

The next scheduled business meeting is 9:00 am, Saturday, November 3, 2012. Our business meeting is usually on the first Saturday of each month, unless it isn’t. Last month it wasn'

October BUSINESS MEETING SUMMARY

Submitted by Rob D and Tom B in the absence of secretary Bob E

MEETING CALLED TO ORDER: 10:10 by president Paul F

PRESENT: Bob T, Ron M, LeRoy H, Paul F, Rob D, Tom B

PROXIES: Three: Bob E, Bill L, Ed M

MINUTES OF PREVIOUS MEETING: Approved. Leroy H expressed appreciation to Rob D for getting the September Railnews out in the absence of the usual editor, Tom B.

TREASURER'S REPORT: Submitted by Treasurer Ron M
This section is redacted

COUNCIL MEETING REPORT (Sept 18 and October 14): Submitted by Council Rep Paul F

Train show dates are Ft. Worth, November 10, 11, 2012; Plano, January 19, 20, 2013.

The Council had $deleted after all expenses for Ft. Worth show were paid.

Table sales for Ft. Worth are 179; for Plano 260, almost a sellout.

Our work assignments are the same as last year at both shows: Ft. Worth overnight security; Plano: Set up Sat. am, two people, two hours; Video, 3 hours; Tickets, West Door: 2 hours; Assistant Show Manager: 2 hours.

The set up plans for both shows were displayed. So far, the table reservations match or exceed those of 2011 at both shows, and are continuing to trickle in.

Advertisement fliers for the Ft. Worth show have been prepared and are being distributed. Fliers for the Public Service announcements are in distribution. Flyers for Plano are in preparation. The World's Greatest Hobby Show at the Will Rogers arena, Ft Worth is January 5 and 6, two weeks before the Plano Show. The Council will advertise Plano at the WGH show, and all arrangements for this are complete.

Parking at the Will Rogers arena is getting expensive: $8.00 per calendar day: For the security folks who will be staying overnight, the tab will be $16, payable when you leave, regardless of when you get there.

The November meeting will be on voting day: November 6.

OLD BUSINESS: The air conditioner has been bought and delivered. Paul paid for it with plastic. He will be reimbursed for $deleted, which substantially reduces Ron’s optimistic financial report above. It is to be delivered on Tuesday, October 22.

Bob E came across an internet listing of model railroad clubs, and asked Ron to bring it up at the meeting. The consensus was very positive, and Bob will be requested to sign us up.

The outside lights remain a problem. Rob and Paul removed the inoperative motion-activated fixture nearest the door, and discovered that the circuit was dead. While it was nice to discover that the unit probably wasn’t faulty, tracing the circuit to discover the break and the necessary repairs took more time. As the days get shorter, and with the impending switch from daylight deception time to standard time in mid-November, getting this fixed will be most visible, and of course, valuable. The good news was that the task was complete before the end of October.

NEW BUSINESS: Leroy mentioned that Ed M visited the club on Friday, October 19, to pay his dues and to remind everyone that all club members were invited to his upcoming wedding. Particulars are: Location: Episcopal Church of the Good Shepard, 200 West College Street Terrell. Date and time: Saturday, November 3; 2:17 pm (the strange time is because Ed thinks both the priest and his wife may be late, so he is telling them that it is 2:00).

Ed also mentioned that his future wife is interested in model railroading and has been encouraging him to come to the clubhouse more often, and to bring her along. He also reports that she does a great job of assembling his craftsman type structure kits. Hmmm. Maybe something good here for both the M's and the club.

Since the roof of the club area is not at all weatherproof, Tom B suggested that we might plan to check the condition of the debris around the drains on the roof weekly, at least during periods when rain is expected. He also suggested that we try to get a roofing specialist to inspect the roof to identify any possible leaks we might have overlooked during our inspections, and maybe to suggest methods of fixing them. After considerable discussion, the following conclusions emerged:

• Paul agreed to contact Ricky Harris of the city to express our concern that massive leakage could be a fire hazard, and that the club would support any city efforts to try to control the leaks
• That we will do whatever we can to ensure the tightness of the roof, regardless of city participation
• That getting the roof fixed is the top club priority and must be addressed first, even before installation of the just-purchased air conditioning unit.
• Tom B will try to come up with a collapsible sheet plastic cover arrangement for the Roy King trolley layout that can be quickly positioned to minimize water damage without resting on top of the buildings or trolley wires, and quickly and easily retracted after the rains by one person.

Without resting his seemingly nonstop mouth, Tom also suggested that individual members take charge of a region of the layout still in work to assign priorities and an overview of what the finished area should include. This might enable others to support the tasks without wondering if they are doing the right thing. If these area “managers” were to summarize in writing what they want to achieve and how they plan to get there, club members would still have an opportunity to add their views and ask questions to help, without endlessly redoing someone else's work. If these plans are posted, then others can help and no one will be surprised. In the discussions that followed the concept was generally approved and several members volunteered to manage various sections of the layout.

Rob Dove suggested an ingenious plan to possibly improve the utility and function to the staging yard at the extreme south end of the layout room during operation sessions. To implement this concept, a siding from the mainline curve to the east, where Bob E is repainting the backdrop, would be installed to go through the skyboard to a switch ladder to the west end of the existing staging tracks. This would entail removing the existing computer hardware, which Bob T described as being so old that it is not likely to be of much use anyway, so this is not really a problem. A very lively discussion ensued. At the end, there was a general understanding of potential benefits, and approval of the concept. More discussion is necessary to gauge the impact to the existing control and signaling system, and other possible alternatives before hammers and saws start flying.

MEETING ADJOURNED: 11:15 am.

WHAT THE %*##% --?

A section to list strange happenings that really should be tracked down and fixed:
Anyone? Anything? This section is a repeat of last months due to it’s importance! And because I am lazy.

The layout problems are small compared to the leaky roof. We urgently need to find out where it is leaking and why. Paul and Rob are working on this.

INFORMATION:

The following web sites are excellent sources of supplies (1) and technical data (2). Two of our members also have personal web sites (3) and (4). Ed McCamey’s site (3) hosts the club website. Site (5) has some interesting photos of Commerce area railroading over the years.

1. Cyberspace World Railroad for supplies
2. http://www.geocities.com/budb3/index.html for technical data
3. http://www.coslar.us for Ed M's personal web site
4. http://geusnet.com/~rteeter/ for Bob T's personal web site
5. www.tamu-commerce.edu/library/collections/digital for Commerce Texas photos

COMING ATTRACTIONS:

Nov. 10–11 — Ft. Worth Show

Jan. 5–6 — Worlds' Greatest Hobby Show — Will Rogers Center, Fort Worth

Jan. 19–20 — Plano Show

REGIONAL RAILROAD PROTOTYPE NEWS

This is just a sampling of that’s going on in our area, which is defined to be whatever I think interesting, so the area can be fairly large. Or not.

Most are aware of the Norfolk Southern’s Heritage program, when contemporary locomotives are being painted in the historical colors of the Class 1 railroads that have been swallowed up by the NS. They are colorful.

NS Heritage units – 12 of the 22 new NS locomotives in heritage colors were photographed in September at Linwood, North Carolina, by a photographer whose name I neglected to save.

NKP Heritage – Berkshire 765 headed special NS employee appreciation train 957 shown here at Leetsdale, Pennsylvania, by an unknown photographer.