Since getting back into modeling a few years ago, I’ve done most of my hands-on work from approximately December through April each year, when I have a lot of free time to myself, as my husband spends most of those weekends snowboarding, and takes multiple week-long, or long weekend snowboarding trips outside of the area. Just as snowboarding season comes to an end, other priorities begin to take up our time. Gardening, projects around the house, hosting an annual Pride party, smaller rooftop gatherings, croquet at the park, and all the other fun things we do in the summer have to be crammed into the three months of gorgeous weather we get in Seattle before the clouds and drizzle return in October. As it’s now the end of April, I thought I’d put an official end to the Winter 2018-2019 modeling season by reviewing the accomplishments and noting what’s up next, when the 19-20 season begins later this year.
The season officially began in late August when I began purchasing my first model paint in decades (via eBay). I slowly built up some basic supplies, including paint, brushes, pipettes, thinner and decal solutions. At this point I realized I’d need to replace my airbrush compressor before doing any airbrush painting, which was a disappointment, as I was very excited to try out the new paint when it arrived.
Not much more happened until December, when I happened across a video about Arduino microcontrollers on Model Railroader Video Plus, which sparked interest in a whole new aspect of model railroading. I purchased a couple of Arduino clones and got to work writing code and learning new coding techniques that would come into play in some of my early programs for model railroads, including automation of lights in buildings and crossing signals. I continued writing Arduino code through December and part of January.
Once the rush of the holiday season was behind us in January, I was ready to dive into modeling again, as I had recently obtained my new airbrush compressor and portable spray booth. January began more research into paint schemes of the B&O passenger trains, trying to determine a plausible time frame for my dad’s B&O passenger train, and to identify any changes that I’d need to make to them if I were to ever repaint them. I experimented by painting a roof black on a new model I picked up from eBay, but later found evidence of historic inaccuracy in how I painted the ends black like the roof.
An important part of the 18-19 modeling season began on Saturday, January 13, when I came across a playlist on Apple Music titled Beneath the Stars. According to my listening history, I listened to part of the playlist that afternoon, but went back to it late that night as I sat at my computer writing Arduino code. It had some interesting, mostly low-key music, some of which I found a little odd but still good. It became the soundtrack for the 18-19 modeling season, as I listened to it almost exclusively while working on my models, and even while at the office, wishing I were at home working on my models. At one point I realized that playlists on Apple Music sometimes change, so I eventually purchased all of the tracks so that I could keep using my own version of the playlist.
A week after Beneath the Stars became the soundtrack of the season, I made the long bus trip to the annual train show in Puyallup, where I purchased my first building kits in decades, as well as some unpainted Preiser figures, micro brushes and pipettes. I wasted no time getting started assembling and painting one of the buildings and painting some figures. Seeing early results of the painted building and figures around January 20-22 was inspirational and stands out as one of my favorite memories of the 18-19 season. By that weekend, Beneath the Stars was about the only music I was listening to, and it was quite exciting that Sunday night to take a break from modeling, go up to the roof for a bong break, playing the music on the rooftop speaker, looking up and seeing the beginning of a lunar eclipse that I didn’t know was coming. Definitely a high moment of the season.
January also saw repainting of the Model Power Shifter, an exercise in steam locomotive painting and weathering. This project came to a stopping point late in the season with my failed attempts at applying decals to the tender and engine cab. The painted surfaces will have to be repainted before I attempt applying the decals again, perhaps next season. I had a similar experience painting a Mantua 4-6-2 Pacific, which awaits further work next season. Both of those failures were big disappointments to me, mostly because of the amount of work that would have to be re-done in order to clean up after the failure. The disappointment is why I put both of those projects to the side for the remainder of the season. Update from 3/24/23: Now that I’ve had success applying decals to other models, I’m pretty sure the reason I had a problem with these decals was that I was not using enough Micro-Set. The problem was that the decals adhered to the model too quickly, before I had them in the correct place. I didn’t realize then that you can brush on a little more Micro-Set to release the decal and float it into place.
February saw a small buying spree when my income tax refund came. I purchased a Digitrax Evolution Duplex starter set, my first DCC system. I also purchased my first wood car kit, a Chapel Car from LaBelle Woodworking. I didn’t start on it this season, but I’m excited to try it out next season. I also purchased my first DCC decoders, one of which I installed in an old Life-Like steam engine, and the other is still not yet used. I also purchased my first DCC-equipped model, a PCC streetcar modeled after the later units purchased by Pittsburgh Railways Company in the 1940’s. The purchase of this model kind of sealed the deal on which location and era I’ll model. That approximate time frame and location was always high on my list, and once I purchased this model, I felt like this was the era and region I’ve always wanted to model the most.
By March, I was adding interior detail to the structure kit, changed plans on what type of store I’d put in there. Miners Cafe was my first idea, but it’s too small for a restaurant, so now I’m thinking it’ll be a radio store. I began adding floor and wall separations, wired in the LED lights, applied some window dressing, and wrote code Arduino to change the lights throughout the day.
By April, I was thinking a lot about the end of the season coming, and was hesitant to start anything new, such as the other building kit that I purchased at the February 23 UNW train show in Monroe. I was still avoiding the failed decal projects. I found some nice gooseneck lamps from Woodland Scenics and installed them on the building that I had started, and eventually decided to prep, assemble and paint the two other structure kits. I’m not very happy with the color of one of them. I wanted it to look more red than the others, but I think it ended up a little too red. I might have to change that when I get back to the project next season.
I just wonder if I’ll still be listening to Beneath the Stars when the next modeling season starts next November or December. I won’t be surprised if I am.