In reply to Appleseed :
Ask and you shall receive. Today, I choked down my mild OCD and made . . . junk. I made a ro-ro dumper (and assorted trash contents), a couple pallets with barrels and a fluid storage container. I also made a pile of ties. Then I scavenged the wire rolls, trucks and wheel set off from an old Bachmann flat car that we'll never run again. First, I built a tan gravel "pad" for the junk collection. Then, I threw in a little bit of grass just to get the "finished look". I'll probably add a few more wheel sets eventually and maybe some more pallets/barrels/etc.
Soon you be joining the Weathering gang. I'm a lifer. 
I did weather the dumpster a bit . . . but it's a dumpster, so . . . .
I'm trying to decide whether I like this or not. I made up a couple of "piles" of ballast and gravel. If I decide to keep them, I'll probably find either an backhoe or end loader to be "working" the area. To me, it looks a bit empty with nothing there and a bit congested with the ballast/gravel piles. I would integrate them better into the layout if I decided to keep them.
I couldn't convince Kazookid2 it was OK to run the CN caboose, and it was way to nice too not make use of it, so I made it into a small "rail park" by the maintenance area. It gets used, and Kazookid2 heartily approves.
Earth moving equipment working the gravel or a dump truck dropping another load...or both would look just right.
In reply to Appleseed :
I've got a cheap backhoe coming from ebay. I'd like to eventually get some hi-rail MOW trucks, so I might well include a dump truck eventually. Unfortunately, the ones I've found so far are $$$$$$$$.
I wonder how hard it would be to get some silicone, make molds of all the cars, and pour resin? Make a fleet of cars for cheap. Clear resin would take care of the windows.
In reply to Appleseed :
I bought a "bulk pack" off from ebay (or Amazon, can't recall which). They were under $20 for at least 30 cars. There are a mix of various generic looking sedans and a few oddballs that look like Porsche Caymans. I've also bought a 10 pack of similar cars with lighted headlights/tail lights. Those were around $20.00. I've been slowly buying up other cars and trucks to add more variety. There's a "hobby recycler" store in the town north of us. When my son and I go, I'll usually pick up an oddball car or truck in addition to whatever we're after. The more specialty stuff (like the MOW trucks) is harder to get ahold of at reasonable prices.
My "still looking for it" list includes:
-MOW stuff
-A modern city bus (preferably lighted)
-A mail truck
-A few motorcycles
-Another delivery truck and/or semi
Did a little work on the backhoe I got the other day. Added "hi rail" wheels and repositioned the stabilizers, which came molded down. Did some detail painting, added a driver, lights, and CN markings on the fender. I'm pretty happy with it. My only concern is that I think it might be a bit over-scale. It looks OK by itself, but I'm not sure how it will look next to my planned dump truck.
Plugging away at finishing up the "yard" area.
Sunday, we did a bit of an "operating session". Nothing formal/organized. I don't see us ever getting into waybills, train orders and stuff like that. Basically, we needed to do some track cleaning, so we pulled out our new Tomix cleaning car and made a short "cleaning train". In order to cover all of our track, we needed to do various moves and switching operations to clear the mains and all of the sidings for the cleaning car. We were able to do the entire layout without picking anything up off from the table except to wheel clean the various engines, which was sort of a switching/operating puzzle. The "cleaning train" is now safely stashed/hidden in the "car shop", which was sort of why I built it.
Kazookid2 seemed to enjoy himself.
Today, I finished "Joy Blooms", a fictional family flower shop, A number of the ladies in the family have the middle name "Joy", so this is for them. BTW - took the easy route on this one a bought a prefabbed building. It was REALLY high quality for the price (about $15 IIRC).
Picked up this little guy today:
Need to find a garbage HO freight loco shell and slice and dice it into an HOn30 locomotive body to fit the Kato 107. Should be fun.
Made a "team track" platform, a forklift and some random "less than carload" freight. 
Today's trivia: Apparently, the phrase "team track" comes from the days when spurs and platforms used to be set up to unload boxcars into horse drawn wagons (hence the "team" part) without tying up the "main".
Appleseed said:
Picked up this little guy today:
Need to find a garbage HO freight loco shell and slice and dice it into an HOn30 locomotive body to fit the Kato 107. Should be fun.
So, what do you do with a junk HO caboose? Slice and dice, and file, and glue until you get a box cab locomotive.
Needs a radiator. Cut a square out of an old mesh pencil holder.
Hog out a square hole in what used to be the roof of the cupola.
Drop it in after the roof is glued on. Add blocks of scrap caboose to keep your fat fingers from shoving the mesh back in.
In reply to Appleseed :
You're trying to shame me into hacking up my extra RDC shell to make the rail inspection car, aren't you? 
This weekend I made a small shelter. Today, I did the gravel for the "side yard" area of the flower shop and made a bunch of potted plants.
kazoospec said:
In reply to Appleseed :
You're trying to shame me into hacking up my extra RDC shell to make the rail inspection car, aren't you?
Maaaaybeeee?
Let's add some details to the box cab.
Thin down the leftover caboose door and add it to the engineer's side.
Flatten a 1/4" copper coupler into an oval for the smoke stack.
I used a brass tube form an broken clock for the air tank. I thought about using 2, but I like the offset look. Added a horn stolen from a junk Bachmann F7. Don't forget to drill out the horn.
I cut apart the caboose's ladder. I added it to the foreman's side to balance out the doodads.
I drilled very small holes for a grab handle at the rear door. I was going to put the ladder on the other side, changed my mind, and forgot to add it to the other side. 
Lastly, primer. Lots of rough spots to smooth out, but that what primer helps you see.
Just bunch of random stuff this weekend:
Found some vintage non-functional crossing signals at the train store. After paint, we put a pair of them out at the "rail park" and added rest to the growing "junk pile" by the car shop.
Also fenced in the "side lot" of the flower shop and added a plant display and a pallet of our "house brand" fertilizer which, since we're accustomed to government work, comes with 10 lbs crammed into a 5 lb bag.
Yes, I'm a 12 year old. Our "house brand" of fertilizer is "Poo" brand.
Today's project. I got some adhesive scale reflective markers for our rolling stock. The bad news is I can't find N Scale, so I had to buy HO and cut each strip into four parts to scale it down to approximate N scale. They end up REALLY small. I got one car done before my eyes crossed permanently, but it looks kind of cool and KazooKid2 likes it. The stripes are actually straighter than they look in the photo. I think it's the "fish eye" effect from my cell phone lens.
Small project today, but here's the most important part. They were a bit on the expensive side, but I found a set for four figures called "Crew Change". I ended up painting two as Amtrak crew and adding them at the train station since Amtrak actually does crew changes at the Battle Creek transportation station in the morning. We also did second crew painted as a CN crew, and they ended up by the yard office. Couldn't get a great pic of the CN one since they are near the back of the layout.
Made a vignette for in front of the flower shop. It's entitled "I told you we should bring the van!"
Kazookid2 and I went to a train show today. We didn't find a whole lot, but did manage to grab an old OOP Wiking bus, which, unlike most currently available non-Shapeway stuff, has the doors on the right side and is reasonably modern. This hitch is, it is a German marked airport bus. Since "Nachtbusse" didn't seem to belong on our layout, I repainted it.
Most recent addition was a dead pine tree. This ended up being a LOT of work for a single tree, but I'm pretty happy how it came out. Made it out of twisted wire and a BBQ skewer.
Another fictional "family business" on the bench. This one is "Dub Z Arcade and Vintage Gaming" for my brother and his wife. They are both gamers, and usually bring the latest and greatest gaming system/games over when they come to visit, so they get an arcade.
