A Couple of Small improvements

A new month, a new photo posted up at the top of the blog.

I managed to get around to working on and finishing up to a couple of small and simple jobs on the layout this week.

First off, I had grown tired of accidentally pushing a boxcar off of the end of the spur at the MidWest Plastics plant.  The loading dock door is a bit closer to the end of the spur than it probably should be, and sometimes when coupling onto a 60 foot boxcar there, well, the car would bump right of the end of the track.

Then one day, JSSX management (me) finally clued in that there were a pair of wheel stops sitting beside the maintenance shop, and wondered why they hadn't been installed at that spot.

There's the wheel stops sitting to the left of the two barrels.  Brian must be working, that's his bike parked there.  Maybe I should put up a no parking sign in front of it.

The wheel stops installed at the end of the spur. Sure, it was easy, and it only took 2 minutes...unless we want to count the 6 or so months since I last worked on the MidWest Plastics industry.

Then, building on the relative success of that little improvement, I also made up a short piece of chain link fence to put at the end of the MidWest property, just behind the wheel stops.

At the same time, I made and added a swinging entrance gate that the train crew (me) will have to open for access and close when they leave. That will be in addition to operating the derail on the track leading into the plant.

The gate and fence are made from .025 steel wire and bridal veil tulle, then painted with Vallejo's Rust Texture.  The gate measures a little over 16 feet wide, which may be just a little bit oversize.

This view shows the derail at the left and the new entrance gate to the MidWest Plastics plant.  Both are details that will have to be operated by the train crew.

So, to switch out cars at the MWP plant (a busy place), I'll now have to line the switch, flip the derail, and then open the entrance gate.  As it should be.  I've also just received 2 more derails from GLX, so those will need to soon be installed elsewhere on the layout.