North Bank Road

North Bank Road An N scale model railroad featuring the Spokane Portland & Seattle railway.

Here is a side project I have been working on. It is a replica of the old Spokane Portland & Seattle office sign. I fou...
08/09/2026

Here is a side project I have been working on. It is a replica of the old Spokane Portland & Seattle office sign. I found a vintage postcard on EBay of the SP&S office in Albany, OR. After purchasing and scanning I was able to blow it up to life size and tape together a workable version. I initially traced it full size and then traced it again onto a painted wooden board using carbon paper. Yeah I’m old and still using old tech.

My wife then took over and hand painted the lettering. The original sign appears hand lettered as I don’t recognize the font. Each letter was a bit different. I am quite pleased with the result and it will hang just above the entrance to my layout room.

The decal process has always been tedious and time consuming for me. The wood siding makes it especially difficult to ge...
08/01/2026

The decal process has always been tedious and time consuming for me. The wood siding makes it especially difficult to get good adhesion. Here is my N scale version of the Mathieson Dry Ice car finally finished and earning revenue on the layout. This car is based on the Pennsy R7, a re**er variation of the X-23.

I had hoped a printed 3D model would be available by now, but as they say “build it and it will come”. I like the wood construction though the finishing process is a challenge. I would probably do a lot of things differently in this build if I were to do it again. The model is weathered to show it in its last stages of life.

Onto another project!

Second posting for the dry ice car. The Re*****on kit is for a X-23 boxcar. The Pennsy built a re**er version and called...
07/26/2026

Second posting for the dry ice car. The Re*****on kit is for a X-23 boxcar. The Pennsy built a re**er version and called it an R7 of which 3500 cars were built. These all eventually were sold by 1935 to secondary companies.

To convert this I pipped off the MT roofwalk and trimmed the side extensions. Then the Hatches were removed from the Atlas donor car and glued in place. Atlas did a great job creating working hinges from wire. It was an effort to pull those out!

The last thing required was to attach the Atlas brake wheel and rod, creating new attachments from styrene. I think these really add some detail to the model.

Now I can positively say it’s ready for primer and paint!

The dry ice plant at Wrights on my layout needed additional ice cars and to fill that need I located a couple very old R...
07/22/2026

The dry ice plant at Wrights on my layout needed additional ice cars and to fill that need I located a couple very old Re*****on Pennsylvania X-23 outside braced car kits. The cars that were converted to ice transport outlived many of the original Pennsy cars.

This is a challenging kit that I felt needed updating. Many of the paper parts I have scratch built with styrene and wire. Brass additions to the ladders and side steps were also needed.

This kit has been stalled for quite some time as I was unable to create hinges for the doors. To move ahead I finally broke down and scavenged a door from an Atlas re**er that had excellent hinge detailing.

Follow along as I get this painted, decals applied and weathered.

So remember that construction article in N scale magazine where Pete Thomas cut down a Micro Trains caboose to model a 2...
07/20/2026

So remember that construction article in N scale magazine where Pete Thomas cut down a Micro Trains caboose to model a 25 footer? It always bothered me that one could still still the cut marks from the razor saw and mending.

Well I took a different approach where I cut the whole side out before reducing the roof and chassis. The MT windows were then cut out and sanded and installed into fresh Evergreen siding. The cupola hides the roof mends and now no side joints to see. Brass end no ladders replaced the plastic on the correct left sides and new metal hand rails applied.

Of course this was all before American Laser came out with their wood kit version which is now out of production. If you don’t have this kit, give my approach a try?

Well layouts are built to be run! I have not posted in a bit because it does take some time and effort to set up a sessi...
07/20/2026

Well layouts are built to be run! I have not posted in a bit because it does take some time and effort to set up a session. We ran for five hours and still left trains to be run. Every session is a learning opportunity with TT&TO and this was no different, but we still all had fun. I will continue to make some changes to the schedule and get back to working on the layout.

07/15/2026

So with the new Atlas FA 1 release I thought I would show a bit of of old school. Here is an ABA set of Life Like FA2s that I retrofitted. The power units have Atlas RS2 mechanisms with added weight. The B unit has the guts pulled and replaced with an old sound decoder and speaker. It’s so old it filled the whole shell. I hard wired all three together for better pick up since I did not like the sound resetting with every dirty spot on the track. New grabs, hand railing, horns and painted top round out the exterior.

So here is the follow up on my Atlas engine house kitbash. I cut it down to 1 1/2 stalls for a close to the fascia edge...
07/11/2026

So here is the follow up on my Atlas engine house kitbash. I cut it down to 1 1/2 stalls for a close to the fascia edge installation. This took a lot of the support away and will probably need a clear acrylic barrier for stray elbows as protection.

I am putting this out showing how I install my lighting. I just wish someone would have put this out there before I fumbled my way through my learning curve.

It’s not hard when someone shows you the process beforehand.

I attended a three day work session at a good friends home layout and he asked me to build him a simple box styrene kit....
07/10/2026

I attended a three day work session at a good friends home layout and he asked me to build him a simple box styrene kit. I said no problem, but then he added he wanted it cut down to mount at the edge of his fascia. Hmmm? “OK, I can do that.” He also added he wanted a different angled turntable to use with it. Not impossible, but suddenly a very easy kitbash got complicated.

After a few days of enjoyable train therapy I decided I would need to take it home to my workshop to finish. As is in many of my builds things just get added to it!

Here’s some progress pics. Follow to see it finished.

Here are two more additions to my Cole Circus train in N scale. The flat cars are Warren flats by N Scale Kits out of En...
07/02/2026

Here are two more additions to my Cole Circus train in N scale. The flat cars are Warren flats by N Scale Kits out of England. They are cast metal with etched metal steps and wooden decks.

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Tigard, OR
97224

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