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     Out to TheShops to work on the 40 series cars this morning.  Gonna do up the trucks for both and get all the castings cleaned up.  Get the hopper boxes applied to the frames as well.   Thinking about doing a new bolster casting for leaf springs to be used on tenders and passenger type cars.

1500

     Trucks for the new hoppers are painted complete with steel wheels and all associated castings.  Got castings laid out for them as well.  The hoppers have had their basic water proofing applied and are sitting outside drying.  I shuld be able to get the styrene parts done today and get them applied.  The really tedious part of these cars are the latches and levers.

    I have 6 cars worth of Bachmann trucks left I think mebbe I'll use them to round out the boxcar fleet perhaps 4-5 more of them, depending on traffic needs.  If nothing else could always use a few more flatcars.

    Monsoons last night hit the layout, some wasahouts and slides to deal with, and I have to clean out the turnouts again.

Monday July 12, 2004 0900

    Hopper progress stalled at the strene stage, but the trucks did get mounted last night.  Got a rare day off, so I'm planningto do some outside work .  Have to clean up the mess that the storm made on Saturday.  Grass needs mowing too, but thats a minor detail.  Perhaps during the heat of the day I can get the styrene bits of the hoppers done and the castings applied.

    I aquired some scrap paneling yesterday that I'm gonna attempt to use as boxcar sheathing.  I beleive I will pull the cast steel trucks off Boxcar 306  and replace them with Bmann arch bars.  307 will ride on the same.  This will bring the couplers of bot down to the level of the other cars with LNPs.  Contemplating a few "quick and dirty" boxcars, composite cars with simulated steel frames riding on Bmann trucks with inside hung brakes as opposed to the outside hung stuff up til now.  Perhaps even allowances for airbrake gear and knuckle couplers on the new construction.

Tuesday, July 13, 2004, 0800

    Welp, didn;t get a thing accomplished yesterday unless ya wanna cout mowing the grass and spraying a little Roundup around.  Guess everyone needs a little R&R  even from the RR.

    I did get the construction article on No8 done and got it posted.  Will start to work onthe article for No9 shortly.  I guess I'll remove some of the older non applicable articles from The Bench make room for soem new stuff.  Think prehaps I'll change the name of the "Slingin' Dirt" section to "Under Construction" so that it will cover all the current projects.

Thursday, June 15, 2004, 1730

    I beleieve the next tail car I will build will be a combine/cabin Drovers style for the Miners Accomodation. Basically a combine with a pasneger roofline equipped with a cupola.  That leaves the 03  for freights and 02 for the mixed.  A dedicated combine and coach  for proper passenger service to come later.

    For what its worth,  I found a tank car design that I rather like.  Its a Pacific Coast Railroad prototype.  Yeah its a three footer, but it has a rather interestign blocking arrangement holding up the walkways and tank.  Might take this oppurtunity to explain what happened to flatcars 100, 101, and 102.  Have them rebuilt to tanks 200, 201, and 202

Friday, June 16, 2004, 0830

    What needs to be done today?  Prolly fit the hopper doors and work on the latches and levers for the wooden  hoppers, Time permitting, then the slope sheets, castings, and paint if at all possible.