Page 20 - B2B 13 to 18

At the opposite end of the spectrum is the New England narrow gauge which ran fast passenger services behind Forney tank locomotives and a Southern Pacific line in California that ran narrow gauge 4-4-0s in front of a train of clerestory balcony ended coaches through the desert sand. The middle ground is the typical American short line; slower shorter trains, mixed trains, daily ‘cept Sunday services supplemented by maybe a weekly freight serving all the communities and industries along the line. Lots of gentle switching and maybe a few specials like a railtruck bringing the post or a box cab MoW loco with a little gondola or a diminutive tank car on the back. Even piggyback operations, in North Carolina one line had narrow gauge track laid on standard gauge flat car to take away narrow gauge mineral and logging cars to the mills down the valley.
There are a number of narrow gauge heritage railroads in the USA, many of which relied in the earlier days on freight traffic for revenue – passenger trains were often infrequent and ill-used. The East Broad Top shipped coal; the Rio Grande Southern and the Denver & Rio Grande Western shipped ore, coal, oil, livestock. The EBT, Cumbres & Toltec and the Durango & Silverton all have freight cars in their roster and often run freight trains as a special event.
A search on YouTube will reveal many videos of freight operations, both from the past and the present day.
Dead Rail
There is some interest these days in operating smaller scale model locomotives using on board batteries and radio control. Although the NMRA would prefer it to be called “Power On Board”, the popular name appears to remain as “Dead Rail”. There are several ambitious schemes that will integrate with DCC systems or offer alternative DCC decoders fitted with wireless. Our garden railway brethren have used radio control for years as an analogue control option and UK companies like Protocab now market systems that will fit in many On30 locos (see https://www.protocab.com/welcome). No more track wiring, or wiring buses, live frogs, keep alive units or track cleaning.
References and Sources
White River Productions for the On30 Annual, Narrow Gauge and Short Line Gazette, and scratch building books and freight car plan books. Some of these publications are available from UK dealers. The 2019 On30 Annual should have been published in May.
Early Wood Frame Structures by Pat Harriman MMR should provide much research resource for suitable structures. It is generally available from various sources on the internet.
Membership of the 7mm Narrow Gauge Society gets you 10% off their On30 Depot sales and their Modelling
Goods supplies. The On30 Depot also goes to shows throughout the year. At the time of writing the Depot has 30 locomotives and 80 rolling stock items available. The association publishes several books including an excellent On30 handbook for UK newcomers to the scale/gauge.
The Slim Gauge Circle is a historical and US Narrow Gauge modelling group here in the UK. It is very active in On30 modular building through promoting the old track and trestle modular standard and at meetings.
US narrow gauge is well represented in books and videos including plenty on YouTube. Camden Miniature Steam Services tends to carry US narrow gauge books and media on their online site in the UK – see https://www.camdenmin.co.uk/.
On30 browsing sites should also include EDM Models at
www.ngtrains.com.
18 ROUNDHOUSE - August 2019