Tortoise Switch Machine topside installation

In the all-new series playing exclusively on Trains.com Video, you’ll discover scores of expert techniques and useful tools for making your model railroading efforts easy, more efficient, and even fun! To get the series started, Model Railroader magazine Editor Eric White shares his process for installing a Tortoise by Circuitron Slow Motion Switch Machine to […]

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SP’s Lucin Cutoff

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The Southern Pacific’s original transcontinental line north of Ogden, Utah, and around the top of the Great Salt Lake via Promontory was operationally difficult. In 1904, SP opened the 102-mile Lucin Cutoff, a shorter, flatter, straighter route that included a 12-mile trestle across the lake. Classic Train coll. […]

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Model an enginehouse scene

Photo of metal single-track enginehouse with supplies stored along right side

Model an enginehouse scene. Last year, I wrote about an old 40-foot insulated boxcar being used as a storage shed on the Sisseton Milbank RR (SMRR) in Milbank, S.D. I thought it would be fun to take another look at the 38-mile line, a subsidiary of the Twin Cities & Western RR, this time focusing […]

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Rehab My Railroad: Scenery projects, Episode 15

This episode is all about scenery on the HO scale Jones Island layout section, but first, David Popp and Ben Lake share progress updates on the freight house and Hoan bridge projects. David works on roads and grade crossings. Meanwhile, Cody demonstrates a three-step process for ballasting a freight yard. Then David switches gears to […]

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Make signs from swizzle sticks

Red, yellow, and green swizzle sticks on a white background

Signs from swizzle sticks: When my wife, kids, and I visited the General Store Antique Mall in Kewaskum, Wis., I wasn’t really thinking about model railroading (although I did run into a fellow modeler at the store). Instead, I planned on enjoying an hour or two browsing the dozens of booths in the two-story building […]

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Building Bay Junction 17

Cody Grivno next to layout

Lots of work is taking place on the Model Railroader staff’s Bay Junction model train layout. Associate editor Cody Grivno has installed his United Cooperative grain elevator, while senior editor Dana Kawala describes building the fertilizer plant that will be located in front of the scene. Managing editor David Popp will also show how the […]

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