Your Model and Railroad blog by the folk at SMARTT
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Das U Boat, The GE Version – ConclusionMay 13, 2014 The U Boat: Models and AnecdotesOver the years, numerous models of U Boats have been produced in all scales. Athearn was probably the first to mass-produce a GE locomotive in plastic; they did an HO version of the U-28b and U-28c. However, these models… |
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Das U Boat, The GE Version – Part 2May 5, 2014 The U Boat lineThe advent of GE’s joining the US locomotive market and the success of their 2500 HP U series locomotives fueled a race among the three builders to produce even higher horsepower models. EMD would counter with its GP30, GP35 and SD35. AL… |
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Das U Boat, The GE VersionApril 29, 2014 Part I: Genesis of the U-BoatIn the early post World War II era, the US railroads needed new locomotives fast. The war had taken a toll on their aging locomotive fleets. The War Production Board limited the number of new locomotives that locomotive bui… |
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Modeling Trains Part III – A Few More Freight TrainsApril 11, 2014 In an earlier blog entry (December 2012) we looked at manifest or general merchandise trains, unit trains, and way freight-peddler-turn-switcher. Today we’ll follow up this article with a look at transfer, maintenance of way or MOW, and mix trains tha… |
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Step Aside Live Steam, now there’s Live Diesel!April 1, 2014 New From the Nuremburg Toy Fair . . . O scale Diesel Powered DieselsYou’ve heard of live steam in HO by Hornby in 2004. Well, we now have Live Diesel in O scale! Yes, Glockenspiel Modells, located in Rothenburg ob der Tauber, Germany, has announced two… |
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1972, Rod Stewart, Model Railroading, and High School – Part IIJanuary 21, 2014 All I needed was a friend to lend a guiding handBut you turned into a lover andMother, what a lover, you wore me outAll you did was wreck my bedAnd in the morning kick me in the headOh Maggie, I couldnt have tried anymoreYou lured me away from home, ca… |
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1972, Rod Stewart, Model Railroading, and High School – Part IJanuary 10, 2014 Model Railroading has long been a popular form of relaxation, enjoyment and creativity. Around the world it is safe to say that the number of people that have indulged themselves into the hobby at one time or another is over a million. Some are collect… |
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A SMARTT SPECIAL REPORT – John Allen’s Influence on Model Railroading and SMARTTNovember 8, 2013 With this year being the 100th birthday of John Allen, we want to go beyond just our recent paragraph in the “In the News” segment of our newsletter and focus on this master craftsman whose name is almost synonymous with Model Railroading. John has ha… |
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Unit Trains, Part 1: PrototypeOctober 24, 2013 Back in the 1960’s, railroads perfected the concept of trains carrying a single commodity from point A to point B. This allowed railroads to speed up delivery time by eliminating switching, the assembling and disassembling trains at railroad yards. The… |
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Unit Trains, Part 2: ModelingOctober 23, 2013 Modeling unit trains is very easy; most cars used in unit trains are available as ready to run models. Many manufactures offer these cars with multiple numbers, or include a small decal sheet so you can number the cars yourself. The only restrictions t… |