Hints, tips, backshop tricks - Post 'em here.

Use gun blueing solution to blacken diecast car frames or other diecast parts. Clean the frames with soap/water and alcohol first, just as you would for painting. Makes a nice black finish, very good as a base for paint. Same as but cheaper than the stuff packaged for hobby use.

Here's another:

-Storage trailers are common near modern industries or stores that need more space. Weather a model trailer, adding some lettering and a phone number, and place it on your layout, perhaps adding a wood platform.

Cordially yours: Gerard P. President, a box of track, a wet basement, and some plans.

snipped-for-privacy@gannon.edu spake thus:

Here's one: next time you're looking for vehicles for your layout, forget the expensive hobby-shop ones for a change and instead look at the toy aisle at your local big-box retailer. I've found lots of HO-scale (close enough, anyhow) cars, trucks and buses there, not to mention equipment like front-end loaders. A little touchup with a file, a little paint, and you've got a pretty good looking vehicle for less than $2.

Goo Gone (available in the household cleansers section of supermarkets and drugstores) makes an excellent wheel and track cleaner. The stuff is sold to remove the price tag stickum from newly bought items. It is fallout from the "save-the-ozone-layer" rules that outlawed freon as a flux remover in the electronics business. When freon was outlawed the industry did a lot of R&D to fine a water washable flux. An experimental flux made from orange peels wasn't quite strong enough for soldering but someone noticed its powers as a cleaner and marketed it as such. For track, just use a rag. It cuts grease and scum, brightens tarnished rail, and dries clean. For wheels, wet a paper towel in goo gone, lay the towel on a spare piece of track, and just roll the car back and forth over the paper towel. Watch the black crud come off the wheels and onto the towel. There is no need to remove the trucks with this method.

David Starr

The Hot Wheels are closer to S than HO scale. They work for foreground models, but they were too big to serve as loads for an Accurail tri level auto rack car. They just would not fit. I usually check the toy aisle when I shop WallyMart, but it's been a long time since I saw anything that was really HO in size.

David Starr

DS:

Hot Wheels and other die-cast cars are made to 'box scale'...whatever scale fits. Generally this makes the autos and light trucks very close indeed to 1:64, S scale, but highway trucks and much construction equipment is generally quite near HO scale. Trailers tend to be undersized, but are sometimes close to smaller, older prototypes. A few HW vehicles like the mining dump truck are very small scales indeed...perhaps close enough to work with N.

Another tip: Give your layout shrubbery. Slice Scotchbrite pads into strips, coat three sides in glue, and cover in fine ground foam. If your landscapers have not been doing their job, roughly reshape and cut away bits of the pad-strips for less neat hedges. If they're really off, spray the pad smoky gray, splay out the top, and cover only that with foam, for a 'badly hacked pruning job' look. Add some knights who say, "Ni!"

Cordially yours: Gerard P. President, a box of track and some plans.

Why would we put toys instead of models on our layouts?

No thank you I gave this up when I was young and had no money.

After the GooGone step I use Isopropyl on a towel to clean off that slightly slimy residue from the GooGone.

Paul

-- Excuse me, I'll be right back. I have to log onto a server in Romania and verify all of my EBay, PayPal, bank and Social Security information before they suspend my accounts.

Working the rockie road of the G&PX

Because I can buy them at Wally world for $1.97 to $5.99:-)

Donald

snipped-for-privacy@hotmail.com wrote in news: snipped-for-privacy@s48g2000cws.googlegroups.com:

To each their own... I used hot wheels on my layout for years after I changed from "playing with a train set" to being a model railroader. The cars are close enough to scale that it's not too far of a stretch to think a HO scale person would drive the car.

Now that I've found a small supply of 1:87 scale cars at Walmart (for about $3 a piece) I've got almost all the hot wheels off the layout because that does ruin the suspension of disbelief. (The trucks, OTOH, stay.)

Puckdropper

innews: snipped-for-privacy@s48g2000cws.googlegroups.com:

Have you found older prototype autos? My visits to Walmart have led to nothing before the '90s in approximate HO scale. Thank you.

Jerry

" snipped-for-privacy@hotmail.com" wrote in news: snipped-for-privacy@64g2000cwx.googlegroups.com:

They're mostly pre-90's. I believe they're "Model Master" cars, they state 1:87 on the package and are in clear plastic cases with a cardboard wrapping. The package for the HO ones is usually black. They'll be on the shelf, so look down when you look next.

There's also John Deere tractors in 1:87 scale. I found some on clearance and chained them to some flat cars.

Good Luck!

Puckdropper

J:

They're out there. Lately there has been a 5-auto set, and I've also seen them individually packed. Big Lots stores, by the way, have plastic military trucks packed in 99-cent three-packs that are quite close to scale, and can be used.

Another tip- for cheap bulbs to light your buildings with, cut apart a malfunctioning Christmas tree miniature light set. (you know, the one with the burned out bulb you can't track down). The 25-light type's bulbs seem to work best on 12 v, but you can adjust the lighting voltage to suit other sizes. Not only are these bulbs a huge bargain, their sockets make them easily replaceable. Just drill a hole in the tabletop and glue the socket in, with the wires sticking below the layout. I used to have a city lit with nothing but these. White lights are of course best, but you can scrape or sand the dye from the colored lights.

Cordially yours: Gerard P. President, a box of track and some plans.

Goo Gone will end up making your track filled with Goo. Better to use denatured alcohol it works much better.

PN:

Probably best to make sure the rubbing alcohol used doesn't contain glycerin (which could conceivably leave its own residue). I'm not sure if denatured alcohol (ethanol with added methanol) could be used for this; ethanol is a pretty mild solvent, and I've cleaned a lot of contacts and such with denatured alcohol (methylated spirits to the heathen British) but I wonder if the methanol might attack some plastic ties, making them brittle, if denatured alcohol was used on them for a long time.

Bonus tip for the heck of it: the end grain of a block of soft wood, such as balsa, can be a good scrubber for removing stubborn track gunk.

Cordially yours: Gerard P. President, a box of track and some plans

I have never noticed much difference between the various sorts of alcohol when used as cleaner/degreaser. Alcohol is the mildest organic solvent and the least likely to attack paint and plastic. Yes, I know that soaking in high strength Isopropyl is a paint removal technique, but when just wiped on with a moist rag it evaporates too quickly to dig into the paint. Usually I have denatured alcohol (shellac thinner from the hardware store) in the shop and its never given any trouble. One major benefit of alcohol for cleaning is that it evaporates cleanly and leaves not residue. I used to clean track with it before I learned about Goo Gone. It is not a bad track cleaner. When unsure of the nature of the scum to be fought, I always start with alcohol. If alcohol gets the scum off then I don't need to try the more active solvents like paint thinner and MEK. MEK is very aggressive and a spill can dissolve asphalt tile floors. Needless to say, I seldom get desperate enough to use MEK lest it eat the item being cleaned.

David Starr

I haven't noticed the +90% variations leaving any residue.

Paul

-- Excuse me, I'll be right back. I have to log onto a server in Romania and verify all of my EBay, PayPal, bank and Social Security information before they suspend my accounts.

Working the rockie road of the G&PX

snipped-for-privacy@gannon.edu spake thus:

I've never seen *any* alcohol of any type that contains gylcerin. Conceivably it could be available, but certainly isn't common. No need to worry about it.