It is Getting Close to the Season for Model Railroading

This is the time of year when I usually start to devote more time to model railroading. I model in HO scale and run HO narrow gauge trains. HOn30 gauge runs on N-gauge track.

I don’t have a permanent layout, one in which I keep up all the time, I have what might be considered a mobile layout, one in which can be easily transported and assembled at train shows and other events.

The layout measures six by eight feet and consists of four three by four sections. The sub-assemblies are stored just with their scenery shell and track. All the structures are labeled on the layout and on an accompanied diagram. Everything is removed, wrapped to protect and keep dust from accumulating and packed away. The trees, all one hundred of them are pinned to the layout and must be removed one by one. These usually need to be spruced up before they are painstakingly replanted on the layout.

I have had the layout for five years and it has been assembled seven times, either at home or at some event. Usually when the layout is taken to an event I usually take two sections and assembly a three by eight layout. The layout is pretty versatile and can be assembled in a few different configurations (with a few minor modifications to the layout). I will be setting the whole layout very soon and plan on keeping it up over the holidays.

A model train layout is never really ever finished and I am always thinking about ways to improve the scenery, adding detail parts, or about adding new structures to fill in some of the gaps. I will be digging through my un-or-partially-built kits, picking a few of these out, and assembling them. I will be posting several articles on different aspects of this endeavor over the next couple of months.

Another go at Abandoned

This time it is set of abandoned “mysterious ghost” ships. Two dozen images of ships in all sorts of points of disrepair. Abandoned!

The Work of William Joseph Cosens Lancaster AKA Harry Collingwood

Harry Collingwood is best known for his adventure stories many of them at sea. I have finished reading Jules Vern’s Master of the World and wanted to get back to Collingwood. Currently I am in the middle of Collingwood’s Under the Ensign of the Rising Sun, A Story of the Russo-Japanese War. Many from the following list of his works seem like titles I would like to read.

• Across the Spanish Main
• A Tale of the Sea in the Days of Queen Bess
• The Adventures of Dick Maitland
• A Tale of Unknown Africa
• The Castaways
• A Chinese Command
• A Story of Adventure in Eastern Seas
• The Congo Rovers: A Story of the Slave Squadron
• The Cruise of the "Esmeralda"
• The Cruise of the Nonsuch Buccaneer
• The Cruise of the Thetis
• A Tale of the Cuban Insurrection
• Dick Leslie's Luck
• A Story of Shipwreck and Adventure
• The First Mate
• The Story of a Strange Cruise
• For Treasure Bound
• Harry Escombe
• A Tale of Adventure in Peru
• In Search of El Dorado
• The Log of a Privateersman
• The Log of the Flying Fish: A Story of Aerial and Submarine Peril and Adventure
• A Middy in Command
• A Tale of the Slave Squadron
• A Middy of the King: A Romance of the Old British Navy
• A Middy of the Slave Squadron
• A West African Story
• The Missing Merchantman
• Overdue
• The Story of a Missing Ship
• The Pirate Island
• A Story of the South Pacific
• A Pirate of the Caribbees
• The Pirate Slaver
• A Story of the West African Coast
• The Rover's Secret
• A Tale of the Pirate Cays and Lagoons of Cuba
• The Secret of the Sands
• The "Water Lily" and her Crew
• The Strange Adventures of Eric Blackburn
• Through Veld and Forest
• An African Story
• Turned Adrift
• Two Gallant Sons of Devon
• A Tale of the Days of Queen Bess
• Under the Chilian Flag
• A Tale of War between Chili and Peru
• Under the Ensign of the Rising Sun A Story of the Russo-Japanese War
• Under the Meteor Flag
• Log of a Midshipman during the French Revolutionary War
• The Voyage of the Aurora
• With Airship and Submarine
• A Tale of Adventure

Although I am looking forward to reading more of this author, if I ever hope to get through Verne’s Voyages Extraordinaires, I will be going back and picking another novel by Verne.

3 Game Rule Booklets I have added to my Reading List

Two of the three resources are rules created to use with your 1/285 scale miniatures, while the other are rules to Wizards of the Coast’s Axis and Allies Guadalcanal, a game I am completing on purchasing.

Battalion-Commander-Rules (20 pages)

Battalion Commander offers optional rules for battalion-sized battles using Axis & Allies rules and 1/285 micro armor.

Axis and Allies Guadalcanal Rules (14 pages)

Axis and Allies Guadalcanal is one of the many variants of Axis and Allies produced by Wizards of the Coast. Axis and Allies Guadalcanal is a game for two players and depicts the very decisive land and sea battle for Guadalcanal between the Japanese and the United States.

Wehrmacht ’47-Supplement to Micro Armour: The Game (29 pages)

The Wehrmacht '47-Supplement to Micro Armour adds various experimental projects, such as German E series vehicles. The supplement offers weapons tables, and 10 additional scenarios to be used with your 1/285 miniatures.

Pirates of the Spanish Main Post Script, & ETC

In my last POSM post I mentioned that this post would probably be my last post of this topic. However, while performing a web search the other day I came up with a few additional links relating to POSM. This is the twelve posting on this topic-it is now an even dozen.

Rules and Scenarios

The Complete Game

Rules for a complete game are included with the basic rules, but are printed on a separate sheet. Up until now I have not been able to locate a copy of these rules. At last here they are, the official Pirates of the Spanish Main complete game rules. The rules bring some other factors into the game, extending and making the game a bit more sophisticated.

Pirates Scenarios

Instead of playing POSM strictly by the rules try playing out one of these scenarios, or add the scenario to the basic or complete rules for a more challenging game. Some of the scenarios look like they might be a lot of fun to play:

• The Isles of El Dorado
• Thar She Blows!
• The Midas Touch
• The Pirates' Race
• The Golden Goose
• The Other World
• The Live Volcano
• Paradise Island
• Rain Squalls
• Convoy Command
• Ted the T-Rex
• Treasure Island II 

ETC

The Scary Biscuit Studio’s-The Spanish Main

The Scary Biscuit Studio featured a beautifully painted Carrack from Valiant Enterprises in a 2011 post. I believe that the author did a very fine job on his Valiant Carrack. The images are inspirational.

Historic Naval Fiction

The Historic Naval Fiction site features reviews and links to some of the texts mentioned within these pages. All of the stories reviewed here are from the Age of Sail and depict characters like Horatio Hornblower to privateers. If you appreciate the Age of Sails era you are sure to find some fodder for future reading on this site.

Abandoned Psychiatric Hospital in New York in Disrepair

The Creedmoor Psychiatric Center in Queens Center, founded in 1912, once housed 7,000 patients. Now through neglect and disrepair Creedmoor has taken on the aspect of creep’s. It looks like it would be a good location for a horror movie.

The site features fourteen slides of various locations on the Creedmoor Psychiatric Centers campus and displays images of peeling paint, mountains of bird dropping and discarded toys once handled by the centers patients, ETC.

GEV Rules for WWII Micro-Armor

In my last post I mentioned having found a set of rules to use with 1/285 scale miniatures. GEV-WWII can be downloaded as a zip file. Once extracted you will find three files, a Gev_wwii.gif-a set of game tokens, Gev_wwii.htm-a page that includes basic rules for the game, and a Gev_wwii.xls, a three work sheet workbook that contain some more introductory notes, and an infantry and vehicle offence, defense points, movement and abilities stats for each type of unit.  For a quick start, the rules look simple enough, but not too simple as to make the game boring and uninteresting.

1/285 Skirmish Miniatures

I ordered several sets of C in C’s 1/285 miniatures the other day. I had, as I had mentioned in a recent post wanted to create a diorama using these miniatures. I originally wanted to order a set of WWII Sherman’s and a set of WWII infantry for the diorama and had planned on ordering a set of 1/4800 British WWII ships, but after giving the purchases some thought I have decided to add a set of German WWII Panzers to the mix.

Recently, I came across a site the offers dozens of freegame rules. On the site, I found GEV-WWII a game intended for 1/285 and 1/300 miniatures. It might work as a basis for a two person skirmish game where I could put my Sherman and Panzers miniatures to use. I will keep you up to date of the latest developments of the game…

5000 Year Old Game Tokens

Archaeologists have found what seem to be the oldest game board tokens that are thought to be at least 5000 years old.

The tokens are fashioned out of stone and are painted in red, green, and blue. The game tokens represent pigs, dogs, and pyramids while others are shaped in what might be considered more generic shapes such as cylinders, dice, and flat, round discs.

What the game board may have looked like and how the game proceeded is any ones guess. No rules for this game have been discovered.

Do any of my readers have any ideas on how a game using these tokens could proceed? How would the game board be designed? How many players would be involved?

Add Some Personality to Your HO Model Train Layout

There are number interesting characters you can add to the crowds and scenes on your layout. These notorious characters will definitely add some personality to your scenes.

Santa Clause

I don’t know how you feel about Santa, but I believe in him. This figure is equipped with the correct costume and just needs to be painted in the proper colors.

Sherlock Holmes and Dr. Watson

I don’t know how he and his side kick got on my layout, but I am sure the mystery will be solved very soon. Holmes totes his pipe; well it looks a pipe to me, and Watson his top hat.

Baby Face Nelson

He is the most notorious of the bunch, but doesn’t Santa break into houses and steal cookies? I better be careful now. I do want those brass locomotives delivered to my house without being broken. Nelson sports a machine gun. I wouldn’t want to tick this guy off.

The above figures can be purchased from Scale Figures for $1.50 a piece, unpainted and $3.50 painted. These have remarkable detail and character for the scale.

The Bosco and Galileo Lines

Another place for unique HO figures is Sierra Scale Models which feature Bosco and Galileo figures. These figures are not cheap, come painted, and at least the Bosco line, are quite unique. The Bosco line features some pretty hefty characters, not to mention, notorious in their own right.

You have the three bandito brothers: Gordo Sorfeetz, Mitad Sorfeetz, and Pequeno Sorfeetz. To say that these three guys are stuffed shirts would not be an over statement. They look like they have had too many fried tortilla chips and re-fried beans, not to mention a few too many cervezas. "Una cerveza, por favor".

Archibald Peter Van Slurp and Horace P. Vestibule III are couple of heavy weight contenders. You better make sure that your layouts framework is good and sturdy before placing these guys.

We don’t see enough overweight people on our layouts. Most of our figures are thin, look sickly, and are boring to look at. It really does take all kinds, you know.

Collingwood verses Verne

After reading Harry Collingwood’s “The Pirate Island, a Story of the South Pacific”, I was tempted to continue reading from Collingwood’s collection of novels. The Project Guntenberg offers a large list of Collingwood’s literature. I was especially interested in the mention of Collingwood’s “A Story of the Russo-Japanese War”, one of the few stories written about this era and his “With Airship and Submarine”, which seems to me like a pre-steampunk genre.

Although Collingwood’s novels are begging to be read they will have to wait until I read another of Jules Verne’s. I have wanted to get through as many of his texts from his Voyages Extraordinaires, so I am now reading Verne’s Master of the World. The text can be found here as an epub, or as a LibriVox recording. Enjoy!

The Pirate Island, a Story of the South Pacific

I just completed my reading of Harry Collingwood’s “The Pirate Island, a Story of the South Pacific”. It is a story of high adventure in the South Pacific, a story of ship wrecks, mutiny, a fabulously rich gold mine, earthquakes and erupting volcanoes, notorious and desperate pirates, and brave and resolute seamen.

The novel is twenty chapters long and at the climax of the story, I had a hard time knowing when to quite reading and turn off the light. Harry Collingwood is pseudonym for William Joseph Cosens Lancaster, a son of a sea captain turned engineer and prolific writer of stories of the sea. Project Guntenberg offers a large set of the author’s works and in many different electronic formats.
There are several plates that depict some of the scenes presented within the text:

• image1
• image2
• image3
• image4

Historical Board Game Tokens

The supplement tokens I had ordered from Historical Board Games arrived by post the other day. The tokens are very similar in appearance, color, and quality as those that were supplied with the Axis and Allies 1941 board game. I ordered five infantry pieces for each player and a set of piece markers. The piece markers are larger than those supplied with the game and will need to be colored with a marker to represent one, three, and five unit markers.

The tokens arrived a few days later than I had hoped. We played Axis and Allies the other day without these tokens. We made do and used pennies for the one unit markers. I wonder if it was really worthwhile to have sent for these tokens when we evidently were able to get by with out them.