First, get out the leaf blower..... HUH? Yup. I weathered a few of my
steamers last week and thought you might get a laugh at me about this. My
train room is in a 24X26 building out behind my house, and though there's a
work room in the house, I do a lot of my stuff out there. My painting and
weathering airbrush activities are confined to the garage, or outside since
I don't have a paint booth. So last weekend it was beautiful here and I had
the airbrush fired up, with the air hose strung outside the outbuilding and
decided it was time for some sand residue on the sides of some of the newly
painted steamers. I set up the picnic table next to the door, brought out a
power pack and a few engines to shoot (I run the engines when spray
weathering so the side rods won't shadow the drivers). You see this coming,
right? Yup again.

All went well until the last Decapod was getting shot, laying on it's side
on the edge of the table, drivers flailing away. All of a sudden, it took a
little "hop", slowed down and suddenly stopped dead. Laying there still on
the table I saw the side rods had gone "V" shaped on the up-side. DARN! The
down-side main crankpin decided to come loose, and sprayed parts all over.
You guessed it, out into the unraked leaves! Now that is a needle in a
hay-stack for sure. Down on my hands and knees for an hour, looking for
brown, black and light tan itty-bitties lost in a jungle of brown, black and
tan! Well, as luck and perseverance would have it, I did find all the pieces
and got it all back together after straightening the eccentric rod and
removing all the rods to put it back square. So there you have it, a word to
the wise.....

Just another day at the funny farm.

Tom Knowles
website: http://members.tripod.com/tomknowles/index.htm