Visiting Jim LaBaugh's N Scale Narrow Gauge

Silver Springs on Jim LaBaugh's modular Nn3 layout. That foreground street scene is as full of character and as well executed as anything produced by George Sellios, Malcolm Furlow, or John Allen--despite the very small size.

NMRA Mid-Eastern Region Potomac Division sponsored an open house in August featuring Jim LaBaugh's Nn3 layout, which comprises modules built by Jim, John Drye, and Marc Sisk of the Nn3 division of the Northern Virginia NTRAK (NVNTRAK) club.

The layout uses N scale to full advantage to depict the lonely, sparse character of classic Colorado narrow gauge in the Rockies. Many narrow gauge layouts miss the low-density, ramshackle aspects of backwoods railroading, but to my eye, Jim and company got the ratio of track to scenery right, particularly in the rural parts of the layout I neglectfully didn't photograph. And where there is urban development on the layout, the craftsmanship is impressive. The structure and vehicle modeling is among the best I have seen in N scale, and accurately captures the look and feel of rural mountain Colorado in the 40s and 50s. The vehicles in particular have set a new standard for the Old Line Corridor.

A Rio Grande K-27 Mikado did laps around the layout while I visited with Jim and we swapped stories about the joys and travails of niche modeling in N scale. I learned a lot about how N scale narrow gauge has evolved and its relationship to Z scale. Nn3 modelers are an inventive and persistent bunch, and I look forward to seeing more of the NVNTRAK gang, including the Nn3ers, around in the near future.

Thompson Valley is located on a river. The number and quality of era-appropriate vehicles is remarkable--often a shortcoming on N scale layouts regardless of era or modeling subject. 

The Dunes and Chicagoland, After All These Years

A westbound South Shore train at Mineral Springs Road in early July 2018. This location--which formerly was the location of the Dune Acres flag stop--is the inspiration for my Dunes Junction HO shelf layout. 

I tagged along on a Chicago business trip with my wife, Rachel, in early July and visited the South

Shore railroad in the Indiana Dunes, as well as Chesterton, a well-documented hot spot with plenty of CSX, NS, CN and Amtrak action. During my visit to the Dunes area, I was able to complete a long-overdue task for my Dunes Junction layout: I finally got some photographs of Mineral Springs Road to use on the Dunes Junction backdrop.

Looking north toward Lake Michigan
on Mineral Spring Road. This photo will be used to fill that pesky gap in the existing Dunes Junction backdrop.
Look for a post on filling the gap
 in the near future.

Mineral Springs Road on the Dunes
Junction layout. Currently looks like
it ends at a cliff overlooking Lake
Michigan, which has bothered me for
years. 

My wife's business trip venue was up near O'Hare in the Northwest Suburbs, so I also explored some new railfanning territory on the BNSF/Metra 'Racetrack'. I got to the Belmont Station well past rush hour and prime lighting, but managed to squeeze off a few photos of Metra commuter trains and a freight. In all the years I lived near Chicago, I had never actually rail fanned this area, and my hour or
so trackside at Belmont was exciting and rewarding.

A mid-afternoon eastbound South Shore train outside of Ogden Dunes. The lattice catenary bridges featured on Dunes Junction have been replaced with new I-beam bridges. Also, Island Model Works is offering a 3D-printed N scale shell for these cars, should fit right on a Kato RDC...

Where steeple cabs, 700s, and 800s once roamed: an eastbound South Shore Freight engine move at Mineral Springs Road. A wood flag stop shelter stood where those instrument sheds are now when this was Dune Acres 

Freights like these come fast and furious through Chesterton. Railfan photography was actually banned here for a time due to several near misses. I took care to give the trains and the police a wide berth.

Chesterton station, now home to a museum, as a NS coil train rumbles past.

Westbound Metra train at Belmont. Even during non-rush hours, an hour or so will yield four or five trains.

Eastbound freight at Belmont. The sun was already too high for my taste by 11 AM or so, but that blue sky made up the difference.

Distractions and Diversions

What's happening on the Old Line Corridor: Designdyne/
Shapeways Pennsy Catenary Towers with black primer
 and mounted with magnets on roofing nails.

It's been over a year since a new Up Dunes Junction post, with distractions and diversions aplenty keeping me from both my Dunes Junction and Old Line Corridor layout projects. In addition to the usual array of grown-up cramps to my style, such as work, family, real estate, and the rest, old and new hobby activities have been vying my very scarce spare time.

First, new activities: A work friend and my younger son introduced me to the new generation of board and miniature gaming, which has become a surprise new interest. X-Wing, Catan, and Eclipse are my favorites, and I find the social scene and camaraderie to be an unexpected delight.

I've also been participating in Washington DC's storytelling scene. You've read here before about my interest, nay even love of the the spoken word, and the kind of storytelling I've been involved in so far has been akin to The Moth or This American Life on NPR (available as podcasts or broadcasts). It has been surprisingly fun and rewarding. Here's a link to a recent performance I gave at Washington DC's Story District.

Just not railroad modeling:
 workbench with armored
vehicle kit construction
in progress

Modeling has been going on, just not railroad modeling. It all started with the miniature gaming, particularly the beautifully finished miniatures for Fantasy Flight Miniatures's X-Wing and Armada games, set in the Star Wars universe. I acquired a miniature of Tantive IV, the first spaceship visible in any of the Star Wars movies (Princess Leia's cruiser, boarded by Darth Vader and his stormtroopers in the first few minutes of the original Star Wars movies). produced by Fantasy Flight for X-Wing. I vaguely knew it was a gaming miniature--but I wanted it because it was a beautiful model. In my quest for more Star Wars models, I stumbled upon Zvezda's state-of-the-art kit for the Imperial Star Destroyer from Star Wars. It's close to 30" in length when finished, and required nary a sliver of filler putty to assemble.

Zvezda Star Destroyer dominating my
workbench

With my appetite for plastic model assembly thoroughly stimulated, other kits caught my eye and I went on a bender of armor modeling, mostly in 1/72 scale. The small-ish military models are appealing to me in much the same way as N scale train models. Along the way, have caught up on a variety of new finishing techniques that will be put to good use in my model railroading projects.

Model railroading continues, albeit at a slower pace. Have put my hands on a couple of new locos, notably a second Fleischmann Rc4 to be converted into an AEM-7. Catenary towers are now primed and installed all around the layout. And looking forward to sharing it here on the blog.

1/72 Revell GTK Boxer APC, Federal German Army

O, Canada! 1/35 Trumpeter Grizzly APC

The best tank ever fielded, but I'm prejudiced:
Tamiya 1/48 M1A2. An excellent, fun kit

S-Model 1/72 Sheridan Tank, the most fun of all to build and finish.