The Gandy Dancer The Official Publication of the Alameda County Central Railroad Society

Next Public Operation Session:

(Note that we will be 'closing' when traffic dies down-- which may be after 4:00.)

Upcoming Events:

March

The Monthly Business meeting will occur on March 4th, 2005.

Orchard Supply Hardware How-To Show
March 5th and 6th, 2005

GoodGuys All American Get-Together
March 19th and 20th, 2005

April

The monthly Business meeting will occur on April 1st, 2005.

Fair warning:

2005 Alameda County Fair
June 24th to July 10th, 2005

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Trivia quiz

Think you know railroading? Railroads often used slogans for their trains or the railroad itself.
Here are a few examples. Which railroad used each slogan?

1. "McKinley National Park Route"
2. "For the America you can't see anywhere else"
3. "Serves All Canada"
4. "Employee Owned"
5. "The Flagler System"
6. "The All Weather Route with Center to Center Convenience"

HO Scale News:

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From the HO Trainmaster:
Hi,
Well we survived our first show. The layout worked great and I think everyone had a good time. I would like to thank everyone that helped out Friday to prepare the layout. What can I say about the hidden yard. It's fantastic. It worked with out a hitch. Wayne even routed trains through it during the show. This week the hidden yard crew will finish the remaining three tracks. They are looking into adding a stub track off of track one.

Up-coming projects:

1. Upper hidden yard
Well the hidden yard crew is going to start the planning for upper hidden yard. I hear it is going to be like lower hidden yard but with seven tracks. It will have the same track selection method and with the new video switcher it will have video cameras as well. We should see track plans for us to vote on soon.

2. Hidden yard door
I hope to get started on the hidden yard door project this week. I could use some help so if you would like to help please contact me.

3. The city
I have collected the comments/proposals for the city. I would like to get a few volunteers to look over the proposals and come up with a final list for the members to vote on. Any takers????

Contest:
A new paint scheme for the club locos. Do you remember playing with crayons? Well, how about coloring books? The contest is to create a new paint scheme using crayons/markers/paint/etc. to color in outlines of three locos from different time periods. The members will choose from the drawings and the winning paint scheme will become the new HO paint scheme.

Have fun,
Seth
HO Trainmaster

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O Scale News:

From the O Scale Trainmaster:

Hey gang-

Here we are in March, and the Fair is looming ever closer. I'd like to get a couple of work days together to tackle some trouble spots in the electrical, and do a pre-fair clean up. I'm thinking that one workday in mid April and another in early June is best approach.

During the April workday, I'd like to fix all the environmental sound modules (and adjust the volume on a few...) and attend to any spots in the track that need power drops or switches repaired. There are quite a few trouble spots currently, (I found another on Sunday) and they're only going to get worse if we don't get on them. As a bonus, I'd like to make progress on getting the Trolley section ready to operate in some form- a suggestion has been made to have a boxcab pulling a couple of boxcars during the fair.

I'd also like to get some under-layout lighting installed in the areas we tend to use for temporary storage during shows.

During the June workday, I'd like to clean and dust the layout from top to bottom (including the rugs!) and toss out stuff that's broken or no longer useful to us. I'd also like to install some basic storage shelving so we don't have quite the amorphous blob of boxes and equipment that we do now.

So, think about what dates would fit your schedule and come ready to discuss plans.

Thanks in advance,
-Dan
O Scale Trainmaster

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Trivia Answers:

1. "McKinley National Park Route" - Alaska RR
2. "For the America you can't see anywhere else" - Amtrak
3. "Serves All Canada" - Canadian National
4. "Employee Owned" - Chicago Northwestern
5. "The Flagler System" - Florida East Coast Railway
6. "The All Weather Route with Center to Center Convenience" - New York, New Haven and Hartford

Thanks to Bob Johnson for contributing this month's trivia.

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The Gandy Dancer, a monthly publication of the Alameda County Central Railroad Society.
Last updated March 31, 2005.
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