April 25-26 Work Sessions

This will most likely be our last official work session for a while as we're getting ready to host an open house for Imagine RIT on May 2, followed by hosting the NFR NMRA regional convention on May 16.

 After constructing some supplemental support structure, Otto and Dave installed fascia at CP 373. The mainline and yard tracks in Niagara Falls were masked and painted. Nick D. and Dave polished the railheads so trains could once again operate through Niagara Falls (ballast will have to wait for another time).

Nick, Dave, and Alex swept and cleaned throughout the club room. Trains were packed away. The workbench was cleared and its surface saw the light of day, if only briefly.

 

 On Sunday, the fascia was primered and Otto cut and painted a stand-in for Route 104 to make the scene look a little more finished for the upcoming Open House.

Imagine RIT: Innovation and Creativity Festival is a campus-wide event that showcases the innovative and creative spirit of RIT students, faculty and staff. We will be hosting a special Open House on Saturday, May 2, from 10:00am to 4:00pm so that visitors can tour our expanded HO scale model railroad, the Rochester & Irondequoit Terminal! Trains will be running and club members will be available to tell you more about our club and our model railroad. See our progress and learn more about the hobby of model railroading. This event is FREE and open to the public! ALL ABOARD!!

April 18 Work Session

Work is starting to wind down as we prepare for Imagine RIT, the NMRA convention, and finals. Joe and Otto hung 8 more feet of fascia on the Rochester peninsula, Jimmy painted rails in Niagara Food Terminal, Alex helped clean up, Matt sprinkled foam and fixed Joe's engine, Charles installed another throttle jack and did some other useful stuff. Otto later worked on his kitbash of the Walthers Grocery Terminal to make up one of the buildings in Niagara Food Terminal. Over the next couple of weeks, we will begin to wrap up whatever projects are left and start cleaning the room and staging trains for our upcoming open houses.

April 11 Work Session

We're only a couple weeks away from ImagineRIT! More fascia was installed around the Rochester peninsula and painted green. Plans are to extend the fascia as far as CP 373 to the west, and up to High Falls to the east before work in that area will stop. The engine terminal in Irondequoit was ballasted by Matt, and Jimmy and Joe ballasted the mains leading into Irondequoit Yard. Charles continued his project to install cab jacks around the layout as needed.

We are also hosting the Niagara Frontier Region NMRA "Mortimer Junction 2015" regional convention with the Lakeshores Division during the weekend of May 16. We are looking forward to that event as well.

April 4 Work Session and Operating Session

Returning from Spring Break, we continued to prep the layout for our May events. The school year is quickly drawing to a close, with finals just a few weeks away.

Otto, Joe and Dave worked in the fascia surrounding the peninsula. Another 16 feet were hung from High Falls, working towards CP 373. The plan is to have fascia installed all the way around the peninsula by the end of the month.

Matt continued the work started by Elliot to relocate the switch for the Niagara Food Terminal lead. Alum and former club president Chris Stilson was in town and paid us a visit. He was quickly put to work soldering power leads.

There was an accepted students Open House on campus, so we had a fair number of visitors trickle in throughout the day to see what we were all about.

Otto helped prep the layout for the evening operating session. Our club advisor SuperDave came down to help. Trains were staged and a schedule was worked out.

The train schedules worked out pretty much as they have in the past with east and west mainline trains  dropping cars off at Irondequoit Yard. The BO-1 local (operated as a Rochester & Southern train with a real R&S crew) ran from Main Street over to Irondequoit to swap cars for interchange. The ABN-1 Albion local ran late in the day after all of its cars arrived. The NFL-1 Niagara Falls turn ran from Buffalo staging to swap cars. Meanwhile, the NFL and IRQ yardmasters were kept busy throughout the day. The commuter train made its scheduled runs to and from Rochester. A good time was had by all.

We are trying to get as much done on the layout before our May 2 Imagine RIT Open House. A couple weeks after that we will be hosting the Niagara Frontier Region NMRA regional convention the weekend of May 16, right around the time final exams hit. No pressure!