SavaTheAggie

I don't wish to derail your thread, so I will simply say no, a certain planned mega build and local history would make a "boring" Santa Fe Warbonnet or the Texas Limited my two choices for an F7. At 50 feet, it'd only be 40 studs long in 8-wide (at the scale I build, anyway), which by my count would only be 8-10 studs longer than yours. I'm pretty sure that piece you used for the headlight surround comes in red (Warbonnet), but I'm not sure it ever came in yellow (Texas Limited). I like the look of it so much my decision may have already been made for me. It looks like I'm going to hope that headlight part came in yellow, cause that's the color on either livery. Oops. --Tony

Very impressive for a first steam engine, if only mine had been this nice. Well done. --Tony

It does look much better in real bricks, which is saying something. Well done. --Tony

I agree, it's got a character all its own. My son would thoroughly enjoy playing with it. Well done. --Tony

Remarkable job. I'm not a huge fan of UP stuff (too much yellow), but you've really put a lot of thought and detail into every one of these. Of course the locomotive is the centerpiece and is just fantastic. Well done. --Tony

I like this. You've managed to capture all the character of the prototype. Well done. --Tony

That's not a bad train, for a 6-wide. For an 8-wide it's terrible... you know, cause it's 6-wide. :) Excellent work, my friend. I love the part usage on the headlight - I'm going to have to try to remember that one. I want to build a particular F Unit and I suspect I'll be borrowing a few ideas from this. --Tony

I've participated in 3-6 public shows a year for about the last 10 years. I've done little shows and big shows, and you can tailor to each. Little shows require less security, since the crowds will be smaller. Most little shows we do completely without stanchions or plexiglass. I can say in all the shows I've ever done I've never had anything walk off (though I have had a minifig stolen from the LEGO Brand Store monthly display). But I also don't put rare figs out. Big shows (total weekend crowds of 500+), you really need stanchions. There's just too many people, and kids go right under them. But at least parents know what stanchions are and most are good enough to correct the behavior without any intervention on your part. I've done one show with Plexiglass. Frankly, I'm not much of a fan. My trains stick out too far to use plexiglass if any curve is on the edge of the layout, but beyond that the plexiglass also prevents you from fixing anything that might break. If the plexi is easy to remove, that's at least something. If I'm not the only participant, I spend most all of my shows outside of the layout. Since all my trains are Power Functions, it works out great. I can walk around as if part of the public and monitor the trains. it also lets me answer questions without having to yell over the layout to be heard. When my wife is there with me, she will spend time inside watching the crowds for grabby hands. Kids will grab your trains. It happens almost every show. Most parents are very apologetic, some frankly don't care. It is life. You rebuild, you move on. If the damage is severe, rebuild later, especially if manpower is light. Definitely do the seek-and-find, we do that every show and it's a big hit. It also gets the parents involved, and in some cases they start appreciating what they're seeing, rather than just looking at a pile of plastic ("oh wow, I didn't notice how nice this was", etc. etc.). Don't do big giveaways. If you really must do some sort of giveaway, tie it to the seek-and-find. Either give away candy or something else small for completing the seek-and-find (if it's written down on paper), or hide something REALLY hard to find and challenge all the kids to find it. If you have raw brick available and the manpower to watch it, set up a free-build area (NO RARE PARTS). An inflatable or hard-sided kiddie-pool works great to contain the parts. Be sure to remind the kids they can't take the bricks home but they can play all they want. This works well as a antidote to grabby hands - "If you'd like to play with LEGO I've got some set up over there." Keep Lysol spray to hose the bricks down between show days. It takes us about 8-12 hours to unload and set up for a typical show, depending. It takes 2-4 to tear down and load up. We're ALWAYS the last ones out the door, and we try to make sure the venue knows this ahead of time. --Tony

I don't pay enough attention to the smaller steam engines, and I really should. This is a great MOC, and I'm impressed with how you got everything in that boxcar. Well done. --Tony

You've done a fine job on this very challenging locomotive. The sculpting on the nose is impressive. Well done. --Tony

The IR receiver is in the same place a sand dome would be. It's normal to have a break in the top of a boiler like that. --Tony

Thank you both. Aside from the new cooling shroud, in that second photo my locomotive had new pistons (all four), the mounting brackets to the front pair were rebuilt, and the whole front of the forward driver set has be redesigned to allow articulation. Since taking the picture I've also moved the cow catcher forward a half stud (required moving the whole truck forward and moving the wheels back). I have a few other things that must be adjusted still as well. --Tony

On very rare occassions I accept commissions, so for this rare occassion I accepted one to redesign my Pennsy T1: Shark of the Pennsylvania Railroad by SavaTheAggie, on Flickr The client wanted instructions for my new version of the locomotive (I have instructions made for the older, less SNOTty version), but they wanted the as-delivered from the factory "Buick" style cooling shroud on the front. The PRR T1 was delivered with this highly stylized front-end, but it and other bits of streamlining were eventually removed or redesigned to make maintenance easier. The redesigned front end was what I originally modeled. Reference photo: http://www.billspenn...hotoid=60320355 I think I've captured the Buick style shroud pretty well; it still needs a few tweaks, but I think she's looking pretty good: Factory Fresh by SavaTheAggie, on Flickr Note: this is my original model wearing the Buick shroud - so the shield on the nose would be relocated in place of the dark red 2x2 tile. Right now I'm in the middle of testing to make sure the pony truck will still clear the front end. So far so good, but I want to do a lot more testing before I sign off on it. As-Delivered PRR T1 v4 by SavaTheAggie, on Flickr Before you ask - my client has asked for a sole license to the instructions for the new T1 with the Buick front end. I won't be selling it in my shop. --Tony

Very well done. Can it pass the milk jug test? --Tony

I only ordered plastic track, so I really don't have any skin in the game. But if you must deal with an automated kickstarter supplied shipping system, and it does not support split orders, then I can understand you wanting to wait. That said, could you export who ordered what to an Excel document? Have two columns - "plastic shipped" and "metal shipped", and keep track of them internally? Then you could ship off the plastic orders, marking through Kickstarter those who only ordered plastic as "shipped" but marking everyone down on your spreadsheet. Then, when the metal track was ready to ship, mark those on both Kickstarter and your Excel spreadsheet. --Tony

I found in curves, the metal axles slowed down considerably more than Technic axles. Over time the metal axles started squeaking as well, and would gain friction in straights. I do lubricate my axles, using Labelle 108 oil. I know others use a lithium grease. --Tony

I didn't suggest that design because 1) it only works with the old style 9v train wheels and 2) in my experience BBB wheels on Technic axles provided less friction. But YMMV. --Tony

For a MOC by a non-train builder, its very good. There's some nice attention to detail. However, given the original subject and the train fans that love it, I'm not surprised by the reactions. A good MOC, if a bit unconventional. --Tony

The small BBB wheels are thinner and the flange is slightly smaller, meaning you can pack more details around them in smaller spaces. I have a flatcar that wont roll with LEGO wheels but will with BBB because the larger flange on the LEGO wheels rubs against the anchor for the truck facade. If space isn't an issue, then go with what you can get. --Tony

Just use a 2x3 plate with hole. Centers it right up. --Tony

Thanks all. Yes, we run batteries - I run PF Battery Boxes filled with Eneloop brand rechargeable batteries - they are awesome. The rest of my club-mates use the LEGO rechargeable PF battery. Since we have many different sets of batteries to choose from, and even more locomotives, a single train running low on power is simply an excellent excuse to swap out trains and keeping it interesting for the club members and public alike (alone I have over 7 PF capable locomotives). And since Eneloop batteries and the rechargeable PF battery both provide constant output of power until the last few minutes of run-time, the trains never start slowing down or stalling through tight curves. They just kind of... suddenly die. We don't usually run our trains at full speed (they tend to derail on standard LEGO curves at full speed), we can typically get about 2-3 hours of run time out of them running the AAA batteries. An average show will last about 8 hours a day, so that's only 3-4 trains worth of batteries, and we usually ask for an electrical drop to charge batteries as needed. At the last show, I ran my Allegheny at half-speed. It doesn't run on AAA batteries, but AAs, so with a higher capacity, and my not running it at full speed, it meant I got over 6 hours of run time in one day - it just kept chugging along. Regarding rail distance - we use the standard track placement - 4 studs from the edge of the baseplate, 8 studs between tracks. Nothing too fancy. The height of the rail is dictated by the type of track ballast we use, which is the PennLUG standard. It lifts the track two plates off the baseplate. Our club standard height for elevated rail (monorail or otherwise) is 20 bricks baseplate to baseplate (track bed to track bed). I hope that makes sense. --Tony

Thanks all. I don't know when our next show in Austin will be, though there's talk of putting together something for Brick Fiesta in Austin summer 2015. Our next displays will be Galveston, Texas City, and Orange, with the possibility of a display in New Braunfels mixed in there somewhere. We try to keep our website updated. Http://www.texasbrickrr.com --Tony

Here are some photos from last weekend, where Texas Brick Railroad (TBRR) displayed at the Big Texas Train Show in Houston, Texas. I think this was one of our best solo displays yet. Full Gallery: https://www.flickr.c...57647344446181/ BTTS2014_12 by SavaTheAggie, on Flickr BTTS2014_18 by SavaTheAggie, on Flickr BTTS2014_23 by SavaTheAggie, on Flickr BTTS2014_30 by SavaTheAggie, on Flickr BTTS2014_39 by SavaTheAggie, on Flickr --Tony

It's a known issue with LEGO's plastic switch mold that our club, and I'm sure many others, reported to LEGO a few years ago. The problem exists with the 9v switch as well, but not nearly as bad. The only work around is modification - I.e. cutting the track a little bit. But if you're going to be cutting track anyway... --Tony

Handles on shipping containers. Sections of street lamp poles. --Tony