microlayout – Robert Raymond’s Blogtorium

November 8, 2020

OpsLog – TBL – 11/7/2020

vents and obligations resulted in us not having much of a crew, just Greg Wells and myself. Still, we broke out our Pennsy switchers, he took the local, I took the coal and dispatching and we ran the session. This one was a lot of fun. We ran it slow, being very careful with our train handling. The bamboo skewers are still, in my opinion, the best uncoupling tool known to man. So we switched our industries and bargained for track rights, in easygoing operation fashion. It was a great deal of fun to work through the schedule – the […]

September 17, 2023

OpsLog – TBL – 9/16/2023

ll sessions have problems. My new SW-7 (after running a shakedown flawlessly around the layout) started to sputter and cough. And that turnout I dug out? Its replacement is repeating the same failures (the original now languishes in pieces in my new scrap yard). But still, goddam, but it was fun. Rather than trying to pack our attendance, we kept it at four and ran the session. Since we had two newbies (Chris in the tower, and Mike down in the coal lumps) I gave a points-to-stress speech before the clock went flip. Then, carefully and deliberately, we ran the […]

March 19, 2024

OpsLog – TBL – 3/18/2024

hat? Didn’t I just have a session the other night? Yes I did, with friends, as reported HERE. But I had an urge to run (I was managing the tower all last session) and I wanted to run my SW-7 in a little more – it’s so sweet now with a Paragon 4 chip. So I set up the layout and ran after the work session was complete. Hey, I was out there anyway. Rather than the blow-by-blow I usually do, let me mention a new “scenario” for operations on my Pennsy line. Now, boomers on my line no the […]