Engines (Second from the First)

I was in need of additional pulling power on the 2-rail portion of my layout and decided this old Kemtron Geep would do perfectly.  It required a bit of TLC work as well as being repainted in Milwaukee Road colors and adding those details specific to the Milwaukee Road's Geeps.  Details such as chains and walkways were added along with numberboards found on Milwaukee's Geeps after the 1959 renumberings.  I also rebuilt and rewired the motor as well as oiling around on the drive.  The engine had not been used for some time and it took a little effort to clean wheels, and repair the brushes before it would run.  Once done it ran beautifully.  My goal was to make it look like it had just returned to service after renumbering and getting a new coat of paint.  All of the MU hoses were added as well as new Cal-Scale air hoses. This Unit I picked up while I was at the Indianapolis, Indiana O Scale train Show in August.

Milwaukee Road GP9 (First of Two)

Finally the Engines have arrived. The First of Many articles to come.

Milwaukee Road GP9 #275 is a Red Caboose engine I picked up several years ago.  I finally had some time to build this kit and detail it for an early Milwaukee Road unit.  The Red Caboose kits are adequate for detailing, but ere very much underpowered and this unit will go in a lashup of Atlas F9's and AHM C-liners.  The details added were the correct air hoses, single chime horn, numberboards, and correct windshield wipers from Cal-scale.  This engine will run on my 2-rail layout once it is completed.

Scratch build Sunday

This model of the Milwaukee Road #2119 Railway Post Office started as a badly damaged Walthers 60-foot RPO that had been previously built many years earlier by another modeler.  We dismantled the car completely and stripped, straightened, repainted the sides.  The remainder of the car was rebuilt and detail was added to the underframe and new trucks were added to the car to more closely represent the #2119 which had been rebuilt in 1959 for expanded RPO service on many of the Milwaukee Road's secondary passenger trains such as the Copper Country Limited and the Chippewa trains to the Upper Peninsula of Michigan.  The interior is based on photographs I found of a working Milwaukee Road RPO from the 1960's.  I chose to duplicate what the RPO might have looked like during the busy Christmas season with many packages as well as letters and Christmas cards to be sorted on the train.  This car will operate on the 2-rail portion of my future O scale layout in my Chippewa train.