Broadway Limited EMD SD40-2

4005 Big Boy

This film was taken at our clubs local exhibition. My son and I were in charge of running the American layout. Near the end of the exhibit we had her pulling about 60 carriages. How many is she pulling in this shot?

Diamond point update

Not a lot has been going on the Railroad of late except for the completion of the railway station and some repairs to some dodgy track work. Josh had decided to take it upon himself to relay a portion of track that was causing some railroad staff to forever call in the cranes and heavy equipment due to derailments in the station tracks. So out went the curved Peco turnout and in came the Peco y turnout. It ended up giving us more straight track to fit the Heavy weight Union Pacific passenger express as well as the Sante Fe express as seen in the photo.

A friend from club came by on Monday night with a friend who needed some questions answered. It was good to get the railroad running and to remember that this is a work in progress and the most fun comes from careful, slow steps. The joy is not in the completion but in the creation and creating. He also took some photos, which I thought are well worth putting in the blog.

I think the next stage will be some more work on the river valley and bridge work as depicted in these photos.

The waterfall in the background was part of some careful thinking and looking on the internet to establish how to do it. In the end we went for a cut up piece of a plastic bottle for the behind the water scene and used som silicon to form the water cascading effect with bits of cotton wool thrown in. Josh did the placement and creating the water effect. He is quite handy to have around sometimes. The other thing that we have begun to delve into is using the computer for programming and running trains. we have been using with some success Decoder pro. We also discovered an application on the Ipod that uses the wireless network in conjunction with the computer so we can use out Ipod touches as hand held wireless controllers. Quite nifty.

Placing figures

My son came over and helped me paint them as I was sitting down in the lounge. He then went and placed them in the village after they had dried and he took some photos of the village. I actually think he has done a good job with the pictures taken so I thought I would show them off in a photoslide. The music is by Dave Dobyn and called Welcome Home.

Painting figures

Currently I am unable to do too much scenery or heavy work on the layout due to just having a knee operation from Football, so have decided today to put off the inevitable. Yes painting figures. I have always struggled with the part of the work until the treasurer of our model railway club put me onto a good thing.

It has always been hard to avoid touching the figures when one colour is trying to dry and spoiling the look. By glueing them to a balsa stick (in this case I have used kebab sticks from your local supermarket -$2 a pack) you avoid too much man handling of the little person. I used a latex glue and let them set for about 10 minutes. Latex glue is better because it doesn't eat into the plastic and it is flexible.

I find that the odd figure comes loose, but the reglueing is worth it.


I tend to do one colour at a time therefore I might be working on a number of figures at once. The beauty of using the skewer sticks is that they are pointed at one end and can easily be poked into a peice of polystyrene as you wait to paint other figures and it is good for allowing them to dry.


The finished product is definately better than if I had tried to hold onto them with my hands.

Thanks Trevor.

The Union Pacific Big Boy # 4005

I have always enjoyed this locomotive and ever since I was a kid have always thought that it would be cool to own one. About 4 years ago I purchased a brand new Athearn Genesis 4-8-8-4 Big Boy from United States # 4005. Big Boy was the name given to the Union Pacific Railroad's twenty-five 4000 class 4-8-8-4 articulated steam locomotives built between 1941 and 1944 by Alco.

In total, 25 Big Boys were built, in two groups of ten and one of five locomotives. All were coal burning, with large grates to burn low quality Wyoming coal from mines owned by the railroad. One locomotive, #4005, was experimentally converted to oil burning. Unlike experience with the Challenger types, this change was not successful, and the locomotive soon reverted to coal. The cited reason for this failure was the use of a single burner, which, with the Big Boy's larger firebox, created unsatisfactory and uneven heating. It is unknown why multiple burners were not employed, though with dieselization in full swing after 1945 the company probably lost interest in further development of steam.

The Big Boy is one of the best represented and preserved model of steam locomotive in the United States, due to its legendary reputation and late survival in service to 1959. Eight of the 25 still exist:

The backhead (controls) of 4017 at the National Railroad Museum in Green Bay, WI

• 4004: Holliday Park, Cheyenne, Wyoming 41°08′12.30″N 104°47′59.4″W / 41.13675°N 104.799833°W / 41.13675; -104.799833 (Big Boy 4004)
• 4005: Forney Transportation Museum, Denver, Colorado 39°46′37.38″N 104°58′13.8″W / 39.77705°N 104.9705°W / 39.77705; -104.9705 (Big Boy 4005)
• 4006: Museum of Transportation, St. Louis, Missouri 38°34′19.73″N 090°27′40.0″W / 38.5721472°N 90.46111°W / 38.5721472; -90.46111 (Big Boy 4006)
• 4012: Steamtown National Historic Site, Scranton, Pennsylvania 41°24′26.96″N 075°40′10.8″W / 41.4074889°N 75.669667°W / 41.4074889; -75.669667 (Big Boy 4012)
• 4014: Railway and Locomotive Historical Society, Southern California Chapter, Fairplex, Pomona, California 34°05′01.44″N 117°46′14.44″W / 34.0837333°N 117.7706778°W / 34.0837333; -117.7706778 (Big Boy 4014)
• 4017: National Railroad Museum, Green Bay, Wisconsin 44°29′02.70″N 088°02′55.1″W / 44.484083°N 88.048639°W / 44.484083; -88.048639 (Big Boy 4017)
• 4018: Museum of the American Railroad, Dallas, Texas 32°46′58.32″N 096°45′49.4″W / 32.7828667°N 96.763722°W / 32.7828667; -96.763722 (Big Boy 4018)
• 4023: Kenefick Park, Omaha, Nebraska 41°13′49.03″N 095°54′54.3″W / 41.2302861°N 95.915083°W / 41.2302861; -95.915083 (Big Boy 4023)

All except numbers 4005 and 4017 are currently stored in the open without protection from the elements. The dry air of Southern California has helped #4014 to remain the best preserved of the survivors, assisted by care of the local chapter of the Railway and Locomotive Historical Society. The Steamtown example is also said to be in good condition, though the harsher weather of the northeast has taken its toll. The Forney Museum of Transportation in Denver moved the 4005 to a renovated building in January 2001. Thanks to considerable fundraising and volunteer efforts, number 4017 now resides with other pieces of railroad equipment in a climate-controlled shed at the museum in Green Bay. Number 4023 is the only known Big Boy to move by highway since preservation, to the new Kenefick Park in Omaha, NE.

This information was collated from Wikipedia.com

Original track plan

Although we have had another layout at our old place which was not as extensive as what we have now, we have not included it in this diary of events as this Blog relates to our Diamond Point Railroad.

My brother, who now lives in London came up with the initial plans, which you see here. This plan was made in 2006 and the initial construction was made from this draft.

The layout was composed of three main lines which were all connected via turnouts. So with some careful driving you could move your train from one main to another. It did not have any reversing loops, which we thought made it quite immpressive. The entire layout (L shape)
was 23 feet by 23 feet. The reason we had to change was that we underestimated the gradients and the fact that we wanted to run long trains we found that our long trains could not make it up the gradients. We have learnt lots since this intial construction and we decided to refine our thinking and skills to do a better job next time.

I have included in this post some other photos of the original construction.

The layout as it is now takes up the same area but instead of having crossovers and a number of duck unders, it only has one duck under and is a walk around layout. This has the advantage for guests to observe the operation and see it from a number of different vantage points. It makes it a lot easier for operation too. We have found that there is far less derailments. The disadvantage is that it has taken away a bit of the mystery of knowing where trains are coming from or going. This should be overcome when we have finished constructing our mountain ranges and tunnells.

The blue wall you can see in this photo contains the layout to make its own separate room. This keeps the garage where the cars are away from the layout. The layout is now fully connected as per the video in a previous post. We will continue to update as we go.