March 2006 Railhead

PIKES PEAK "N" GINEERS MODEL RAILROAD CLUB

THE RAILHEAD

March 2006

SEEKING SERIOUS N-SCALE MODEL
RAILROADING SINCE OCTOBER 13, 1989

Calendar of events for the Pikes Peak "N"Gineers 2006

March

March 3^rd - 6^th: Garden City, KS show. Load and leave Friday Morning return Monday afternoon.
March 13: Board Meeting – Howard's Pit Barbeque – dinner at 6:30 p.m. – meeting at 7:30 p.m.
March 17: Business Meeting – 7:30 p.m. in the dining room on the fifth floor of St Francis Hospital
March 18: Run Trains at Chris & Connie’s house from 1 to 4 pm.

April

April 10: Board Meeting – Howard's Pit Barbeque – dinner at 6:30 p.m. – meeting at 7:30 p.m.
April 21: Business Meeting – 7:30 p.m. in the dining room on the fifth floor of St Francis Hospital
April 22: Run trains at Charley’s from 1 to 4 pm.

May

May 8: Board Meeting – Howard’s Pit Barbeque – dinner at 6:30 p.m. – meeting at 7:30 p.m.
May 19: Business Meeting – 7:30 p.m. in the dining room on the fifth floor of St Francis Hospital

Other events waiting for dates or conformation

June 5^th – 11^th: Cheyenne, WY show – We will not be attending this show.
July 22^nd or 29^th: Club rides Pikes Peak Cog
August 9^th – 13^th: National “N” scale convention in Denver
August 19^th & 20^th: Rock Island Festival
Home operations: Will be reported when scheduled

CLUB TRAIN TRIPS

This year the club is entertaining two train trips. The first trip will be the Pikes Peak Cog Railroad. It was discovered that it is in our own back yard and hardly anyone in the club has ridden it. Two possible dates have been picked. The first is July 22 and the other is July 29. These are both Saturdays. If we have over twenty-five people the round trip ride will cost $ 25 each. The club would like to get a head count as soon as possible so we can make reservations and start collecting the money. I have been on this ride and it is one you need to take a camera on. If we are lucky we could end up with Mel McFarland as our conductor, as he works for the road.
The other trip will be the Royal Gorge Route. I’m still working on this and will get the info out later.

13 February 2006 board meeting minutes

Board members present where: Lester Coburn, Chris Dueker, Joe Morgan, Rick Shumpert, and Paul Schemm.
Guests: Mike and Mary Peck.

7:30pm Meeting called to order by Lester.
7:31pm Board meeting minutes: The minutes where accepted on a motion from Rick and seconded by Chris.
7:32pm Pay Masters Report: Chris reported that the Club had $***** in income and $***** in expenses for the month of January. The paymasters report was approved on a motion from Paul and seconded by Rick. Chris reported that we have one member behind form 2005.
7:37pm Insurance Policy: Chris will bring the copies of the insurance policy to the Business Meeting.
7:38pm Cog Railway: Lester reported for Charley that we can ride the Cog either the 22nd or 29th of July and the group discount will be $29 per head if we have more than 25 people.
7:40pm Club Account: Chris reported that all the required signatures are on the Club account.
7:41pm Mike’s Open House: Mike reported that he added a new siding to his layout, only Rick showed up and ran.
7:42pm G.T.E: We will meet at 12:00pm on Friday the 24th of February at storage to load the MTL
7:44pm Cheyenne Show: Lester Checked the online calendar for the Cheyenne Depot Museum and they had no events listed, Mike reported that he checked the DANS web site and they have Cheyenne Depot Days listed on the 3rd and 4th of June.
7:45pm U.P Round House: Rick reported that he is checking to see if we could visit on a weekend in July.
7:47pm N scale convention: Mike reported that he contacted Bill Harrison and confirmed on nscale.org that the convention is scheduled from August 8th trough 13th at the Radisson in Denver. DANS will also attend the picnic and will bring the meat; Mike will try to have more information for the Business Meeting.
7:49pm Rock Island Festival: Lester will try to get more information.
7:50pm PPNG Swap Meet: No report
7:51pm Garden City: We will attend the Boot Hill Model Railroad Club show in Garden City Kansas on March 4th and 5th there are 5 members definitely going and 2 more might possibly attend.

New Business:
7:55pm Web Site: Chris reported that he has volunteered to be the web master for his walking club and would also like to try to be webmaster our club also. He will try to contact Glenn Hobbs and Don Heath.
8:00pm Royal Gorge Route: Mike reported that the dinner train is 50% off for this month February 4th through 21st only. The train departs at 12:30pm from the Santa Fe Depot.
8:02pm Friends of PPLD: Mike reported that he was contacted by Jack Maier, Jack stated that the Friends of the Library will be having a train book sale and might want us to display the MTL. Jack said he would contact us back with more information.
8:04pm Meeting adjourned on a Motion from Chris and seconded by Rick.

17 February 2006 Business meeting
In attendance: Lester Coburn, Rick Shumpert, Chris Dueker, Mike and Mary Peck, and Paul Schemm

7:31pm Meeting called to order by Lester.
7:31pm Business meeting minutes: A correction was made to the January minutes, the Rock Island show is on August 19th not the 9th as stated in the minutes. The corrected minutes where accepted on a motion from Mike and seconded by Rick.
7:33pm pay masters report: Chris reported that the Club brought in $***** and had $***** in expenses in the month of January. The Paymasters report was accepted on a motion from Mike and seconded by Rick.
Chris reported that there is one member behind from 2005.
7:37pm Insurance: Chris made copies of the insurance coverage’s for the members to take to there insurance companies. Chris reported our address on the insurance policy as still out at the hanger, it was decided that we would use Mike’s address until further notice.
7:42pm Open House: Mike reported that his layout was ready but Rick was the only member to show. It was discovered that Rick’s Kato Mikado had a broken motor armature wire. Rick stayed till about 4:00pm and ran trains while Mike worked on his Mikado.
7:44pm Great Train Expo: We will meet at storage at 12:30pm instead of 12:00pm to load the MTL and head to Denver to setup.
7:46pm Cheyenne Show: Chris reported that there is no information. He talked to Steve Bentz who suggested that we decline the invitation due to an apparent lack of organization. It was decided to make a decision to go or not by the April Business meeting.
7:51pm N Scale Convention: There is no new information; Dave Porter will contact us about show when information becomes available.
7:52pm Rock Island Festival: No information.
7:53pm PPNG swap meet: No information.
7:54pm Garden City Show: We have six people going and one more that might go. Lester will contact Charley and confirm we will attend.
7:57pm Open House: Chris confirmed that the Club is invited over to his house to operate on his layout on the 18th of March. He has only one line so we will be able to operate only one train at a time or use DCC.
7:59pm Royal Gorge Trip: Mike said he will put the prices and dated in the Railhead. We will get a group discount if we have over twenty people.
New Business:
8:01pm Cog Railway: We can ride the Cog July 22nd or 29th if we have over twenty-five people tickets will cost $29 per head.
8:02pm Open House: The April 22nd run will be at Charley’s.
8:03pm Business cards: Glenn Hobbs has the templates; Lester will try to contact him.
8:04pm MTL: The MTL is ready for the GTE, the oil wells are repaired but we need a power pack for the wind turbines.
8:07pm the meeting was adjourned on a motion from Mike and seconded by Rick.

While we were at the Great Train Expo Steve informed us that we had been uninvited to the June Cheyenne show. I’m going to schedule a camping trip/field trip for one of the weekends in June to go and check out the Colorado Midland route over the Continental Divide near Leadville. A good portion of the old roadbed is considered 4-wheel drive; we will need to know how many people would like to go so we can figure how many 4-wheel drive vehicles are needed. There will be some hiking involved as well.

We need a volunteer to have everyone over to run trains on a Saturday in May. All we’re asking for is track to run on. It doesn’t have to be finished. Finished? Er! A work in progress is what we are looking for. Let a club officer know so we can get it on the schedule.

The Great Train Expo started out a little slow then picked up. We received many nice comments on our layout. I believe for the first time each module received a compliment. There were times we needed to up to the layout for minor repair work, but had to wait till the crowd moved away from the area. The show seemed smaller than before as we were able to store our trailer inside with everyone else’s. Didn’t seem to be as many venders either. There was however a lot of “N” scale around.
We have several modules that need some minor repair work performed on them. The jobs are as follows so far.

	1)	Replace the Velcro under the modules with plastic clips to hold up wiring. I have the clips.
	2)	Module #10 – replace part of the red line track. Looks like something fell on the track and pulled the rail from the ties. We have a temporary fix on this. Need to move one of the intermogal tracks and move crane so we can perform operations on sidings. Need to repair wiring on out going switch as we have a dead spot.
	3)	Module #12 – Wire DPDT switches for sidings.
	4)	Module #3 – replace motors for wind turbines
	5)	Replace track on the throat of the yard module and rewire. If we do this we can get another 12” of setup space.
	6)	Modules 8 & 9 – wire DPDT switches for sidings.
	7)	Module #6 – repair golf green that is pulling up.

These were all subjects that came up at the Great Train Expo. If we find other things at the Garden City show I will add them to the list.