ToyTrains1's Blog

I've always loved to run long trains.  They can be a pain however, if you want to turn them around to run in the other direction.  For that reason, when I built the current layout, I incorporated a pair of reverse loops so that I could turn a train while it was running, no matter which direction it was going in.   The reverse loops run through the yard in the center of the layout.  Though they're normally plugged up with stored trains (too many trains, too few display cases), I recently freed them up and have been able to use them.  I thought that I'd share their operation with you and so I've shot another video.  It shows both reverse loops in operation with the longest possible train (reefers, of course).  This video is 5 minutes 16 seconds long so if you're on dialup, click on the YouTube version below.  The video, in your choice of Real Media, Windows Media, or MPEG-4 formats, is posted on the Multimedia page of my web site. Note that the files are about 40 MB in size.

Now that I've incorporated a brief intro that identifies whose video it is, I've enabled embedding for the Big Boy video from YouTube.  Here it is.

Videos can come about in some unusual ways.  The videos I have on my web site of the UP Big Boys show them double-headed.  I got an email asking about the pulling power of a single locomotive.  I don't have a gauge to measure the pull in pounds but I do have lots and lots of freight cars.  So, why not shoot a video showing the Big Boy hauling all the freight cars it can?  Good idea!  Load up track 1 with reefers, put on the Big Boy, its tender, and auxiliary tender, fire it up and shoot a video.  Capture the video and eek!  Breaking up video, scratchy noise, what in the world is going on?  Haul out the trusty manual and lo! and behold! it shows this exact problem.  The solution — go get a head cleaning cartridge!  D'oh!  With that out of the way, I shot the video of the single Big Boy, #4012, pretty much chasing its own caboose.  If the layout were bigger and I had the room to do it, I'm pretty confident that it could easily haul a hundred cars.  Toward the end of the video, you can hear the oh so appropriate freight yard sound set that I installed in this locomotive.  The video is posted on the Multimedia page of the web site and will be on YouTube once it finishes its processing.

I think I've now shot videos of all of the PS2 trains and locomotives (both those that came that way and those that I converted from PS1) that I have.  The last three — UP DC-3 track inspection car, PRR B6 0-6-0 switcher, and "tinplate" NYC J1E Hudson (4-6-4) — were shot and posted today.  How I missed doing doing them long before this I'll never know but at least they're now accounted for.  There are now 76 toy train videos on the Multimedia page.  And, I've got 67 of them on Youtube.

With the reshoot of the Standard Gauge #10 Christmas set, I've completed the reshooting of all of the old toy train videos.  All 73(!) on the web site have either been reshot or reencoded and all are now at 720×480 resolution with high quality settings when encoded — and each is now available in all three popular formats.  I've removed a few videos that were (a) pretty bad and (b) I don't have the original to try to reencode them.  The real steam train videos I'm leaving alone.  Other than a few new videos I have planned and a few videos to show off trains that somehow got skipped in the past, that should be it for a while … until the next new locomotive arrives! Oh, I almost forgot — you can now find over 50 of my videos on Youtube!

I don't quite know how it came to pass, but none of my four subway sets ever made it into a video.  I've fixed that omission and have posted four videos — Lo-V IRT, R-1 IND, R-32 BMT, R-36 IRT — on the Multimedia page of my web site.  Given how excited I was at the time to get the R-32 set — it's the N train, better known as the Sea Beach, which ran through my backyard when I was growing up — I don't know how I missed doing a video for it.  In any case, the subways are now covered (photos of the various subway sets appear on my Subways page).

Some old streamlined locomotive designs seemed to come right out of the Art Deco school.  Yesterday's contribution was a video of the MTH Premier model of the PRR S1.  Today's is the MTH Premier model of the New York Central Dreyfuss Hudson (4-6-4) steam locomotive.  Again, a marked resemblance to the nose of a spaceship from the science fiction of the thirties and forties.  The Dreyfuss Hudson is only one of seven (!) videos that I reshot today, the others being (all MTH Premier): Nickel Plate Berkshire (2-8-4) #779 steamer, New York Central Niagara (4-8-4) steamer,  Pennsylvania RR Baldwin Sharknose diesels, Pennsy DD1 electrics, Pennsy E6 Atlantic (4-4-2) steamer, and Pennsy H10 Consolidation (2-8-0) steamer.  In redoing all of these old videos, I've noticed that occasionally I've missed doing a video for a locomotive though I don't have a clue as to why that might be.  I'm correcting that now and have posted a video of the MTH Premier Pennsy 2500 HP Lima-Hamilton transfer diesel locomotive which I got in 2002.  Oh well, I suppose it's better late than never.  All eight of these videos have been posted on the Multimedia page of my web site as well as on Youtube.

… another four videos reshot.  At this rate, I hope that I'll have all of the old videos reshot by the end of the month.  Today's videos are the MTH Premier PRR K4s Pacific (4-6-2), both alone and double-headed, the MTH Premier PRR S1 Duplex (6-4-4-6), whose nose reminds me of nothing so much as Flash Gordon's spaceship, and the MTH Railroaders Club Rugged Rails Consolidation (2-8-0).  If anyone ever tells you that O-gauge model railroading has to be expensive, smile and show them the video of this little $179 gem.  It has the same electronics package as all of the very expensive steamers.  All of the videos have been posted on the Multimedia page of my web site as well as on Youtube.  Enjoy!

Having been unable to sleep last night (sigh), I went to the Railroadiana show today with my friend Bob.  It's a nice show that I haven't been able to attend the last few years due to a scheduling conflict with the Greenberg show, where we did DCS demonstrations.  I picked up a few DVDs of the 4449 Daylight, a book, and other odds and ends.  Later on, I reshot three more videos — the MTH Premier PRR Q2 (4-4-6-4), the MTH Premier SP GS-2 Daylight (4-8-4), and the UP F-E-F (4-8-4) — and got them edited, encoded, and posted on the Multimedia page of my web site.  I picked those three locomotives since they were all sitting in the ready yard raring to go.  It's nice to be able to fire up a locomotive after a few years sitting idle and have it immediately respond to your commands with no fuss and bother.  All in all, a productive day!

Today was productive!  I reshot four of the old videos — AT&SF Texas (2-10-4), GN R-2 (2-8-8-2), PRR FF2 Electric, N&W Y6b (2-8-8-2) — and got them edited, encoded, and posted on the Multimedia page of my web site.  In the course of shooting the FF2 video, a rather funny thing happened and, instead of just reshooting it, I've turned it into a blooper video which is on both my web site and on Youtube.  You can find all of my videos there on my "channel": http://www.youtube.com/toytrains1.  I hope the blooper makes you laugh as much as I did!