Canute

No rush. The holiday season is when many builds go in vacation. And congrats on the chair; I just got an an early present of one for the workshop, too.

As OC said. Looking forward to seeing more of your build.

Gary, this quite the performance. Bravissimo! 👍👍👍👍👍

No doubt in my mind, Denis. High sugar content does that to some of us. 😁 I just figured you had been captured by the Christmas elves and were incommunicado until after the Day. Nice work on Leopold, sir.👍

I, too, like to see the historical tie-ins. While considered "obscure" by the model making community, there were many of these little gems manufactured for various purposes. I like these one off- models. Vive la differnce.

It will be a deep and convoluted rabbit hole. Been at it a long while and still feel like a noob in many areas. And it is fun. 👍

Roger, the Rivarossi brand is an old one; their motive power is all pre-DCC, meaning it's a DC engine. Like Egilman said, a simple loop of track will work. You could get some Bachmann HO track, which just snaps together, keeping the rail joiners attached to the rails between the segments of track.There should be one straight segment with attachment points for your power pack. Be aware of the radius of the rails. Get the biggest you can handle in you space. These bigger, articulated engines can balk at 18" radius curves. 18" is the usual size included with a basic track setup. If all you can fit is a shelf in your space, you're limited to a long piece of track, pushing and pulling your consist of ore jennies and a caboose. Adding sound can be costly and you'd need to use a DCC system for using sound in HO. The board and speaker setup will be over $100. Have a local hobby shop (LHS) do the install, if they are capable. Or else have them point you to a good installer. DCC is a very deep and convoluted rabbit hole. A minimal set up for running your train can cost several hundred dollars. A bare bones setup in DCC would be a power controller (included in a throttle), a wall wart power source and a connector to tie your controller to the track. This could run to about $200. A DC power pack may be about 1/4 of that. The tender could be stripped with isopropyl alcohol. But that's no guarantee it will come completely off. You'll have to experiment. Ask your LHS if they can help there. And if I remember correctly, Pennsy locos were finished in a very dark green/black paint, sometimes called Brunswick green. I think you have a greenish tinge to your loco, so Rivarossi may have painted it with that color. Just be careful with stripping the name off the tender. You may have to do a complete repaint. Yeah, it's a fire hose treatment, but as OC said, it is a rabbit hole.

Nice work, OC. It does capture the intensity of the battle.

Kevin, nice work fixing and shoe-horning those details. Our building materials are way too thick for the scales we work, so you get your situation. The trolley was used in a similar setup in the B-29 to get from the cockpit area to the aft crew compartment, behind the bomb bay. Those were pressurized, but the bay wasn't.

Wonderful work, Chris. Hard to tell it's a card model. 👍

Mark me in, too.

Um, I think your supposition is correct...😉

Nicely done. 👍

I agree "best in show". Outstanding work. 👍

Turned out well, OC. Nice and easy does it. 😁

Oh yeah. Cut, bend,fit, rebend, refit. Reset the tweezers to get some glue and.... ? Happens too often for me, but luckily, I can still get down and back up off the floor. Just a few snap, crackle. pop moments.

Nice looking parts; very crisp. Flyhawk has really figured out how to get the most accurate scale parts yet.

Good save on the tubes, Kevin. Very nice details on the loading ends of those tubes, too. All coming along nicely.👍

Wow, your post person seems to have it in for you. "The Mangler." Good repairs. 😃

Generic masts and the builder adds the yards. Good idea and your inner craftsman gets some needed work.

I use a setup similar to Tim's with white LED lighting and a magnifier on the swing arm. The magnifier has a lid, too. That plus the cataract surgeries earlier this year allow me to work with just a pair of reading glasses. My far vision is back to what I was seeing when I was flying. The near is OK, but I use the readers for the fine print and my modeling work. You can't have too much light for your modeling work. Just go with the LEDs, since most everything else generates heat.

Kev, I'm in, too. 😉

Nice. I can tell you that was one system that gave the Western air forces sleepless nights. Pretty detailed TEL (transporter-erector-launcher).

Interesting design, Mike. I'm in.

Alan, that's a quantum leap in the appearance of your parts. Well done.