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Post by Milwaukee Road 513 on Feb 11, 2015 11:19:15 GMT -5
That Santa Fe 'Beep' is really tempting, would it be a difficult kitbash, have any of you tried it? Looks great with the B-unit!
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Post by Milwaukee Road 513 on Feb 16, 2015 6:22:37 GMT -5
With the time period that I'm aiming for, or periods (in case that I'd invest in some steamers), was tunnel mining still in use in the 50's, 60's and early 70's? I'm kinda leaning towards that, rather than the open pit mine...on the paper anyway.
Also, those of you with freelance systems, what's the size of your company, in mileage? Mine, after some number tossing and fiddling, I played with the mileages of my favourite companies added the mileages together and divided it with the number of companies, I ended up with about 7,900 miles, including the Michigan Interstate, would you think that's about manageable, I don't want to go too big....
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Post by m a y o r 79 on Feb 16, 2015 22:42:47 GMT -5
Would it matter what kind of mine for modeling purposes? You would only really need to model the loading facility.
Not sure how big my freelance really is miles wise. I envisioned it being around the size of the Chicago & Northwestern. At one point it rivaled the size of the UP bit it got unmanagable for me.
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Post by Canadian Atlantic Railway on Feb 17, 2015 8:28:28 GMT -5
I agree with Mike on the mine. Work on the loading area or simply have the cars staged out of sight for loads/unloading. I assume you are going to focus on one or two main areas to model. I would suggest one on each end of the system so you can have a starting and stopping point for your traffic. Loading ore cars one one end and making there way to a mill or ship on the far end of the system. How much space do you have for your planned layout?
I have four connected "family" shortlines with approximately 1300-1500 miles or track and with one class one RR and two shortline connections to the outside world. I only have a 12x6x8 setup for now and run it as an industrial park to keep me amused until I get more space for a larger layout.
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Post by Milwaukee Road 513 on Feb 17, 2015 11:02:56 GMT -5
Thanks mate! Aye, being as much of a Milwaukee Road Fan that I am, I'll be having a lot of business with them. True, being in that area, ore traffic was one of my first ideas for traffic, love ore trains, spent many summers in Northern Sweden around the ore trains and traffic there, second was coal, being that N&W was the first railroad that got me into this with US railroads, with their big and massive A's, Y's and beautiful J's, but then it hit me, that wouldn't really make much of a difference, would it? So, then I thought in the lines of the NKP, bridgeline (is that the right word?) traffic, either way....point to point it is anyway! At the moment, frustratingly, I don't have any space, which is why I do this with the background etc., etc.. Right now, I'm trying to work out the trackage for the Milwaukee & Western, sticking to the Midwest and the great lakes area, worked out a connection with D&H (Bighamton) and LV (Buffalo and/or Sayre) so far...don't want to go too far east.. Difficult this with mileage and trackage, it can so easily get out of hand...
As always, ideas, suggestions etc., etc., are always welcome and tremendously appreciated!
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mkl194
Trainmaster
accelerating rust on purpose
Posts: 131
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Post by mkl194 on Feb 20, 2015 17:17:30 GMT -5
I grew up in MILW territory and Grain was the commodity on the road where I lived. My ancestors settled Iron Ridge Wisconsin. Something that might be able to be incorporated is if Iron Ridge was more developed into mining territory. Mining ceased by the 1930's, but what if it had continued? Iron Ridge is in Dodge County.
For a name the first thing that comes to mind for me is Milwaukee, Tacoma & Pacific. Tacoma is one of the endpoints of the original MILW mainline, the other being Seattle.
Another interesting fact is that there was a car ferry in Seattle to Olympic Island which had MILW tracks on it. That might result in Milwaukee, Seattle & Olympic.
There is more if you have access to a really good library like a university library, you might get to look at the route choices from 1905 that MILW considered and pick one that they didn't take....
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Post by Milwaukee Road 513 on Feb 20, 2015 23:59:50 GMT -5
Thanks MK! That would have been cool to look into, Milwaukee's considered but picked routes...
Cheers!
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Post by T on Feb 21, 2015 9:06:59 GMT -5
How bout this MILWish road? Pacific Southwestern? Picked up this frankenstein gem off ebay today...super stoked to see what it looks like in person... Alas, she's destined for the paint shop.... What paint scheme and road name are you thinking of for this loco? Tom
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Post by Milwaukee Road 513 on Feb 21, 2015 10:33:29 GMT -5
Cool!
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Post by T on Feb 21, 2015 17:14:37 GMT -5
Cool! I'll second that motion ! after having seen the orignal run through BUFFALO, NY many times behind other cn Units. Tom
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Post by Milwaukee Road 513 on Feb 23, 2015 7:18:18 GMT -5
Looking at what my favourite companies had in Alco's and so on, I came up with this. I saw that N&W had 99 RS-11's (plus another 35 when merging the NKP) and D&H had 101 RS-3's!! Forgot that, but then again, Alco was on D&H's playground, weren't they?
15 Alco S-2 20 Alco S-4 9 Alco RS-1 12 Alco RS-2 39 Alco RS-3 33 Alco RS-11 9 Alco RS-32 15 Alco RSD-7 9 Alco RSD-12 15 Alco RSD-15 17 Alco RSC-2 25 Alco RSD-5 10 Alco C-420 14 Alco C-424 19 Alco C-425 23 Alco C-628 15 Alco C-630 15 Alco C-636
This leave me 314 Alco's on the roster. Mind you though, I'm not too sure about the RSD-7/12/15's yet, might change to just one of the three, same with the C-424/425 and just either one there as well.. Being inspired by Milwaukee Road as much that I am I'm having quite a few miles of branches, also have a soft spot for N&W's Abingdon branch, I'll be using the RSC-2 and RSD-5's for that, or.....should I just go for the RSD-5's? Another thing, would the RS-11's, RS-32's and the C-420's be suitable for high speed service, which would mean 52 locomotives? As you may have noticed, I haven't added any PA/PB's or FA/FB's...thinking of sticking with EMD E's and F's, good or bad?
As always, ideas, suggestions, etc., etc., are very much welcome and appreciated!
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Post by poweredby251 on Feb 27, 2015 15:17:23 GMT -5
The Wabash units were re-powered in 1964, just before the N&W take over. Many lasted into the mid 70's, and were again rebuilt, this time into slugs mated with C-630's in heavy yard service. After the Centuries were retired, the remaining slugs were mated with SD's in the same service.
John
Much obliged John! Sounds interesting, any idea how it panned out for Wabash?
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Post by poweredby251 on Feb 27, 2015 15:22:56 GMT -5
Iron mines by that time frame would be pretty much open pit.
John
With the time period that I'm aiming for, or periods (in case that I'd invest in some steamers), was tunnel mining still in use in the 50's, 60's and early 70's? I'm kinda leaning towards that, rather than the open pit mine...on the paper anyway. Also, those of you with freelance systems, what's the size of your company, in mileage? Mine, after some number tossing and fiddling, I played with the mileages of my favourite companies added the mileages together and divided it with the number of companies, I ended up with about 7,900 miles, including the Michigan Interstate, would you think that's about manageable, I don't want to go too big....
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Post by Milwaukee Road 513 on Feb 28, 2015 5:21:12 GMT -5
Cheers John, appreciated as always! Just trying to work some more the roster for M&W. Even though I'm concentrating on an all EMD covered wagon roster, I can't help but thinking that I should add some from Baldwin and FM, would that be an idea or? Another thing, is there some locomotives that should be swapped, as maybe two could do the same work and then maybe, for the ease of parts and repairs, swap around and stick to one type of engine instead...
Baldwin:
12 VO-1000 9 AS-16 6 AS-616 10 RS-12 8 S-12 20 DS4-4-1000 7 VO-660
Fairbanks Morse
15 H10-44 25 H12-44 20 H16-44 15 H16-66
As I'm operating in the same area as Milwaukee Road and in doing so, I've got FM in my backyard, should I add more units, to support their business etc., etc...?
....and as always, ideas, suggestions etc., etc., are welcome as always!
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milw199
Superintendent
Beaded crossbucks FTW
Posts: 180
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Post by milw199 on Feb 28, 2015 11:55:51 GMT -5
MILW also had some FM CF16A-4 (C-Liners), like these: A pain to work on, but they pulled better than EMDs of the time. The same general machinery in a different body was a H16-44.
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Post by Milwaukee Road 513 on Feb 28, 2015 14:17:06 GMT -5
Cheers Mike! Added a few sets of them as well to the roster...
Fairbanks Morse
15 H10-44 25 H12-44 20 H16-44 15 H16-66 5 Erie-Builts A-B-A sets 7 C-Liners A-B-A sets
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Post by Milwaukee Road 513 on Mar 8, 2015 3:26:24 GMT -5
Did some more...
General Electric
11 GE U23B 18 GE U25B 23 GE U28B 56 GE U30B 28 GE U30C 25 GE U33C 15 GE U36C
Now as I'm looking at the list, I can't help but thinking that something needs to be changed...how many bought U30B's and C's? Would I be better off with just the U33C's and skip the U36C'c? ......and those U23B, U25B and U28B's, maybe just go with the U28B, U30B and C's plus the U33C's......or?
As always, ideas and suggestions are most welcome!
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Post by Milwaukee Road 513 on Mar 14, 2015 8:43:24 GMT -5
Michigan Interstate Railroad
30 Alco C628's... 2800-2829. 25 Alco C630's... 3000-3024. 50 Alco EMD SD9's... 1700-1749. 10 FM H24-66's... 4800-4805 and S1-S4. 6 road units and 4 slugs/B-units, re-powered with Alco 251-16’s. 20 EMD SD24's... 2400-2419. 8 EMD TR4A-B... 2000-2007 A/B
Milwaukee & Western Railroad With subsidiaries, North Shore & Hudson River Railroad, NS&HR, Pittsburgh, Cleveland & West Virginia Railway, PC&WV, Minneapolis & North Western Railroad, M&NW, Montana & Wyoming Railway, M&W..
Alco:
10 Alco FA-1 A-B-B-A sets 4 Alco PA-1 A-B-A sets 15 Alco S-2 20 Alco S-4 9 Alco RS-1 12 Alco RS-2 39 Alco RS-3 33 Alco RS-11 9 Alco RS-32 15 Alco RSD-7* 9 Alco RSD-12* 15 Alco RSD-15* 17 Alco RSC-2 25 Alco RSD-5 10 Alco C-420 14 Alco C-424 19 Alco C-425 23 Alco C-628 15 Alco C-630 15 Alco C-636
Baldwin: 12 Blw VO-1000 9 Blw AS-16 6 Blw AS-616 10 Blw RS-12 8 Blw S-12 20 Blw DS4-4-1000 7 Blw VO-660
Fairbanks Morse
15 H10-44 25 H12-44 20 H16-44 15 H16-66 5 Erie-Builts A-B-A sets 7 C-Liners A-B-A sets
General Electric
11 GE U23B* 18 GE U25B 23 GE U28B 56 GE U30B* 28 GE U30C 25 GE U33C 15 GE U36C*
EMD
8 EMD NW2 10 EMD SW1 18 EMD SW7 (6 TR4 sets) 14 EMD SW9 30 EMD SW 1200 15 EMD SW 1500 8 EMD E7 A-B-A sets 10 EMD E8 A-B-A sets 18 EMD E9 A-B-A sets* 15 EMD F3 A-B-B-A sets 25 EMD F7 A-B-B-A sets 8 EMD F9 A-B-B-A sets 24 EMD GP7 121 EMD GP9 26 EMD GP18 25 EMD GP30 42 EMD GP35 18 EMD GP38-2* 25 EMD GP40-2* 24 EMD SD7 30 EMD SD9 27 EMD SD24 15 EMD SD35* 126 EMD SD40-2* 35 EMD SD45*
Well, that's my all time diesel roster for the Michigan Interstate and Milwaukee & Western for now anyway, as those marked with a * might disappear from the list, because with a lot rebuilds and upgrades, those might not be needed, plus....I'll most likely will concentrate on time period between '65-'75, which means that are quite a few recently outshopped and those still in the shops being rebuilt wheels up, so I don't know if those -2 are necessary as the rebuilds will get new electronics, shopped noses, new engines where needed, etc., etc...
As always, ideas, suggestions and so on, are very much welcome!
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Post by Milwaukee Road 513 on Mar 15, 2015 9:04:40 GMT -5
Milwaukee & Western Railroad....
Unfortunately, me and Gimp2, which I was using, do not get along it seems, I had to leave an grab a coffee before I tossed the PC... At least it gives an idea what I'm thinking here, just a few things to sort, like those wee 'hooks' on top of the 'M' and at the bottom of the 'W'... Then I was thinking about using those five stripes that PRR once used, as for colour, not sure yet, black, dark green, red, grey....
Sometimes, I wish that I was more computer....well, you know!
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Post by Milwaukee Road 513 on Mar 15, 2015 13:12:51 GMT -5
Think that I'll have to change my Michigan Interstate to something else, as there already was one....
The Michigan Interstate Railway Company (reporting mark AA) was formed on October 1, 1977, to operate the Ann Arbor Railroad from Toledo to Frankfort. The AA had declared bankruptcy and was included in the assets of Conrail, formed on April 1, 1976. Just 18 months later, the operations of the AA under Conrail were transferred to the MIRC. The MIRC operated until October 7, 1988, when the Ann Arbor Railroad (1988) assumed operations.
Operations The MIRC began operations on October 1, 1977, and operated until October 7, 1988. The MIRC was operated by the State of Michigan. With its experienced directors, the MIRC was able to regain lost traffic. In 1982, the MIRC ceased car ferry operations across Lake Michigan. On September 30, 1982, the MIRC ceased operations north of Ann Arbor. The remaining portions from Ann Arbor to Frankfort were split between the Tuscola and Saginaw Bay Railway, running from Ann Arbor to Alma, and the Michigan Northern Railway, running from Alma to Frankfort. The southern portion of the MIRC from Toledo to Ann Arbor continued to operate until October 7, 1988, when the Ann Arbor Acquisition Corporation assumed operations.
Roster Upon the formation of the MIRC, the State of Michigan purchased all rolling stock, supplies, and equipment from the Ann Arbor Railroad, which included GP35s, S-3s, and RS-1s. Several of the GP35s were in a state of disrepair by late 1982 and upon the formation of the TSBY, were sold to the TSBY along with several other pieces of equipment. On March 11, 1985, the MIRC acquired three former Conrail GP38s numbered 7771, 7791, and 7802. The MIRC also contracted a long term lease with the Ludington and Northern Railroad to operate SW8 16.
I think that my Michigan Interstate Railroad, will now become Michigan Midland Railroad....
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