Tolga's Railroad Repository

Christmas is over, so it's time to watch stores for After-Christmas clearances. Historically, I scored the Sphinx set, which is a great parts pack, for half off at Walmart. This year, I hope to miraculously score Laval's Royal Fighter from Chima. Wait, why am I mentioning clearances? Because of what they can do to what I am really going to talk about... my 2014 LEGO plans. 2012 and 2013 have been marked by a boom in LEGO's color palette... not so much for earth tones, even though, yes, Olive Green sprouted and more Dark Tan than ever was being put out in sets. Dark orange made a 8 year comeback as well. But case in point, the big growth has been within the Friends and Chima lines. And it only took me until this summer to capitalize on it. Laval's Royal Fighter has a healthy chunk of Flame Yellowish parts that will help greatly when building FEC or CSX locomotives. This tone of yellow will look better than standard Bright Yellow on locomotives and even TTX boxcars....

If there's one tree NOT to put your gifts and stocking stuffers beneath, it's MY tree. History Since 2001, and with minimal fail (2003, 2008), I have managed to get some Laygoe trains running around the tree. The 2001 effort started with a botched copy of 4561, botched I say since we bought some half-assed version from Toys R Us with loads of missing pieces and got filled and reimbursed by the company. It was complemented with the 4553 Train Wash. 2002 had what I remember to be fragments of the 4565 Freight and Crane Railway as I managed to get it (and gazillions of other classic system and train sets) from St. Vincent de Paul (became Hearts United of Florida and now Maxyne's Thrift Shop). For 2003, I went back to HO Scale but it only lasted one year as the Life Like HO tracks were producing sparks, and not to mention I had no knowledge of what a 22" radius meant (my Opera centerbeam didn't like the layout) much less was able to differentiate the Wal...

Better Late Than Never I am pleased to announce, with only one week before Christmas, the 2013 holiday layout. This layout will be installed beneath my Christmas tree for about one month and will be removed Martin Luther King weekend. The reason I was late to do this was because of academia and finals. Also, the way the house was being cleaned up prevented earlier setup. Features include the Footbridge from 2012, McDonalds, Starbucks as seen before, and new models including the Modular Building that was finished a couple of weeks ago. The Gas Station is tentatively going to appear for the last time before a heavily needed rebuild is performed on it... it's the oldest existing building on the layout at 5 and half years of age. There should be an industrial section with appropriate models and buildings. I am not sure if I will be doing any sort of yards or team tracks. Just like the 2012, there will be one elongated pigtail loop, a trick that I kind of learned from the ol...

While Fort Lauderdale-Hollywood International Airport is gracing Norwegian's 787-8 , more promising news have come from the airport, hot of the press today. http://www.sun-sentinel.com/news/broward/fl-southwest-terminal-makeover-20131210,0,5567298.story Southwest and the Airport have joined forces to make (long-overdue) enhancements to Terminal A. The plan is to modernize the terminal as well as provide enhanced security and concessions. Five additional gates will add capacity. This is great especially considering that this capacity is now more possible thanks to the mammoth Runway Expansion project. Meanwhile in Miami, sources are saying LAN is expected to begin flying the 787-8 into Miami starting in late August. The flight will come in when it's dark and take off after 7AM, once a week. Air Europa and Royal Jordanian have, since my last praising post about 2014 at KMIA, announced intentions to fly here as well. 2014 is looking great for South Florida aviation. 20...

Sifting through some inventories on Bricklink, I found the parts list for the less than desirable Sunshine Ranch Friends Set and found two oddballs: 14719 Tile 2x2 Corner - A fairly essential piece, it resolves the need for improvising this configuration with a 1x2 and 1x1. Personally, I find this as juniorization for this configuration but it can certainly come in handy. This set has four in white. 15397 Plate 3x3 Cross - AKA "Railroad Crossing" piece, this part is the combination of a 1x3 with 1x1s off the center, making a perfect X. Robin and I used a similar but thicker configuration to rig crossbucks as I remember it, but this piece will, when released in white, eliminate the need for it. 1 of this is in Dark Orange in the ranch, presumably for the tree. Trees and certain connections will render this part quite useful.