Friends

Morgan Turney & Jason Shron visit the M & M Sub.

One of the things I enjoyed best about the M & M Sub. was having visitors over.

While watching trains make their way around the layout, we had many enjoyable conversations.

One thing that was especially gratifying was welcoming friends who didn’t have layouts. Having a chance to run trains with them was always fun.

Some of them brought locomotives to see them run. This provided the M & M Sub. with some interesting visiting power. (See photos in this post.)

One frequent visitor was Morgan Turney, editor and publisher of Canadian Railway Modeller.

He was also the last visitor before the layout became a pile of lumber on the floor.

Which was only appropriate; he was the first person to visit my previous layout, the CP Rail Grimm Valley Sub., back in the early 1990s.

He also made one of the first visits before the M & M Sub. was built.

And now the layout is gone. But the friends I made through it have remained—along with the photos and memories of their visits.

Empty Room, or The End of the Line (Until the Next Layout)

Well, it’s gone.

All that’s left is an empty room, some piles of lumber in the garage (awaiting a friend who will pick it up for his new layout), and memories—lots of memories.

All told, it took about a week and a bit, not full-time, to take it down. The last pieces were disassembled yesterday.

While unscrewing the layout, I had a few thoughts. Starting with, why did my younger self use so many %&$#@*&#! screws!

One thing for sure: That old layout was solid. It was never going to fall down. If two screws were good, my younger self thought three were better. Four was pure bliss.

Second, I’m glad I (mostly) followed the time-proven advice to screw up from the bottom, not down from the top.

Except for one or two places where I clearly lost my mind, all the screws were easy to find (although not always easy to get at with this getting-older body).

Third, the wisdom of DCC occurred to me more than once while undoing all the DC block wiring. There were a lot of wires under the benchwork! That was an afternoon of unscrewing and pulling all in itself.

Fourth, I thought about modellers who are looking for the best glue to glue down cork and track. If I have any sage advice for them, it’s this: Whatever you glue down you are going to have to pull up someday. Don’t make it too hard on yourself.

In my case, I didn’t use any glue, except for diluted white glue to hold down the cork, track and ballast. When it dried, I removed the track nails. It never moved for 25 years—I consider that a win.

Best of all, taking it up was (mostly) a breeze. Spray with water and then pull the track out of the ballast. Except for a few pieces of cork that clearly didn’t want to leave, it came up easily.

Fifth, the shop vac is your friend! There was a lot of ballast on the floor and on the layout after the track was removed. But the shop vac was up to the task.

Sixth, it’s great to have a friend who can use the lumber. I’d hate to see it go into the dump. Since much of the wood was in my first layout, that means it will be part of three layouts, at least—maybe more.

Now I’m in the dreaming stage for my next effort, a 17 by 21 foot L-shaped shelf switching layout. The old layout is barely down and I’m already dreaming . . . .

Obituary for a Model Railroad

If an obituary was written for a model railroad, like it is for a person, what might it look like? Maybe like this.

CP Rail Manitoba & Minnesota Subdivision, 1994-2015

After a long and healthy life, the CP Rail Manitoba & Minnesota Subdivision passed away on July 19, 2019. It was 25 years-old.

Born in 1994, the double-deck layout filled a 17 by 21-foot room in a Winnipeg, Manitoba basement.

Basically complete by 2010, it was then significantly altered when the central peninsula—which featured three-levels of tracks—was dismantled and reduced to a single level.

It remained in that state until this year, when plans to move in a year or two resulted in it being taken apart. 

During its lifetime, the M & M Sub. was honoured by being featured in Canadian Railway Modeller (several times), Railroad Model Craftsman (twice) and once in Model Railroader (about its unique use of tree bark for rocks).

Information and photos about it was also included in two Kalmbach how-to books by Tony Koester: Model Railroading from Prototype to Layout and Designing and Building Multi-Deck Layouts.

In addition to being part of many open houses sponsored by the Winnipeg Model Railroad Club (WMRC), the layout was also on the tour schedule for the 2000 NMRA Thousand Lakes Region Millennium Express, the 2005 Golden Rails national convention (marking the fiftieth anniversary of the WMRC), and the 2010 NMRA Thousand Lakes Region Steam on the Prairies convention.

It was also featured on a blog of the same name, and is featured on a YouTube channel with dozens of videos about the layout.

The layout was not without its eccentricities. At a time when most everyone else is using DCC, it remained committed—some might say stuck in the past—to DC (Dinosaur Control).

It also wasn’t embarrassed to use Athearn “blue box” locomotives, even if it was more likely in recent times to find units from Kato, Rapido, Atlas and more modern Athearn pulling trains.

It was similar for rolling stock. Although higher quality items from Atlas, InterMountain, Accurail and others were found in consists, so too were offerings from Athearn “Blue Box,” Roundhouse/MDC, Lionel, Tyco and Bachmann—with new wheels (if required) and weathering. 

One thing the M & M Sub. really enjoyed was having people over, especially children. Nothing beat seeing a kid’s eyes light up when he or she was handed a controller and told to run the train.

Over its lifetime, the layout provided much enjoyment and satisfaction for its owner, and hopefully for many of his friends. It will be missed.

Predeceased by the CP Rail Grimm Valley Sub. (1988-1994), the M & M Sub. is survived by a few hundred of pieces of rolling stock and locomotives, several hundred feet of track, a couple dozen structure, and over 700 trees—and lots of memories.

A private service to commemorate its passing was held July 19, 2019.

Tributes in its memory can be made by running a train, patronizing a local hobby shop, reading a model railroad magazine or inviting a child over to your layout to run some trains. 

That, plus raising a glass of your favorite cold beverage. 

Tibetan Sand Mandalas, Model Railroading and the Transitory Nature of Life (and Layouts)

First load in the garbage bin.

Back in 2009, when I was still building the M & M Sub., I got to thinking about the impermanence of all things—like layouts.

Specifically, I wrote about Tibetan sand mandalas and model railroads, and what they have in common.

Sand mandalas come from the Tibetan Buddhist tradition. Monks and devotees spend weeks or months creating them, making amazingly intricate images out of millions of grains of coloured sand.

When done, the mandala is admired and then ceremonially destroyed—swept away to symbolize the transitory and impermanent nature of material life.

Just like a model railroad.

A sand mandala.

In my case, the ceremony, such as it was, was a quiet final run on the layout (after having some friends over for a final time).

And then the dismantling began.

As I wrote back then, and am living now, a model railroad will not last forever. That includes the M & M Sub., which looks so permanent.

But with time, and taking out a lot of screws, it will be gone.

And that, not to sound all eastern and mystical, is the way of all life, and of all model railroads.

And even though I knew the M & M Sub. would one day end up as a pile of lumber on the floor, I wasn’t deterred.

Like monks making a sand mandala, I happily and carefully laid track, ballasted, planted trees, erected buildings and so many other things that gave me joy and a sense of accomplishment.

And now, the layout will soon be completely gone. I will mourn its loss. But I will also remember the times spent building it, and running trains.

And learning anew a lesson or two about the transitory nature of life.

End of the Line for the CP Rail Manitoba & Minnesota Sub.

It’s the end of the line for the CP Rail Manitoba & Minnesota Sub.

Not this blog; I hope to keep it going for awhile yet! I’m talking about the layout which the blog is based on.

In a year or two, we expect to move to a smaller place. The kids are grown up and moved out, and we don’t need such a large house. (As nice as it is.)

So rather than rush to tear down the layout, I’m taking my time this summer to take it apart.

I hope to leave up a section of the upper level along two walls to build a small industrial shelf layout; got to have something to work on!

This isn’t the first time I’ve dismantled a layout; I did it in 1994 in our previous house, when I tool down my 12 x 18 CP Rail Grimm Valley Sub.

(Interestingly, as the photo above shows, it was almost 25 years ago to the week that my first layout had its last run.)

And in 2010 I tore down the three-level centre peninsula of my current layout, a several-year process to create a single level portion in the middle of the room.

But now, after 25 years, the whole layout is disappearing. It’s sad, but it’s also time.

Before . . . 

During . .  . 

Truth is, I’ve been spending less and less time in the layout room of late. I always enjoyed running trains from time to time. But those times had become less frequent.

So I’ve been preparing myself psychologically for this day for a number of months. Doesn’t make it any easier, but it helps with the resolve.

In preparation for the tear-down, I had some friends over for a last time. Then, on July 19, I did a final run—just me and my memories as I watched a train traverse the layout for the last time.

Then, a day later, the dismantling began.

Over the next few posts, I’ll talk a bit about what it’s like to dismantle a layout, and what the layout has meant to me.

In the meantime, enjoy the photos of the last run.