DAR Beta 1.0

[Paul Charland]

Hi All,

I've uploaded a beta for the first part of the route I'm working on. This includes track only from Coldbrook to east of Wolfville (about 13 miles) and from the Kentville yard to Aldershot (about a mile or so), the Kentville yard trackage is complete to the best of my knowledge.

If you would like a copy of the beta please feel free to e-mail me at

p.charlie@sympatico.ca

and I will send you the link to the file posted on Gigasize. I will also add you to the list for future betas, at any time you can ask to have your name removed if you just don't have time for this sort of thing. Also I'd like feedback, if you see something I've done wrong and can provide information how to make it right, please do. I'm shooting for the early '70s so thing have changed since then, like my memory!

Next I'll start adding roads and rivers.

Paul

[stem]

This is too cool Paul. My mind is racing with the possibilities! I already made up an old-time consist using available MSTS assets. That locomotive is a dead ringer for DAR No. 6 and 7. I feel a repaint coming on especially since Dan uploaded those photos of the No. 32 model. Now I can finally get a colour sample of the locomotive and car colour for that period.

[Paul Charland]

Must have taken a wrong turn at Truro and ended up in Fonda, NY!

Paul

[fergusontea]

My wife tells me that my copy of MSTS arrived in the mail this morning.

I'll be installing it tonight and I have files and instructions from Paul, so I'll also try to get the DAR Beta going.

I'm stoked, dudes! LOL

-mike

[stem]

I've gone and bought the Train Sim Modeller program now to create some DAR assets for this project. I'm miles behind Paul but as a pretty good CAD draughtsman I think I can get up to some kiind of speed soon enought to be of some asistance.

However, I love doing repaints to and so I will finish the repaints I have planned of DAR assets in order to help out immediately.

If you liked that Dayliner in front of the Kentville station, that is available at Train-Sim.com as a two file download. If you aren't a registered user there you'll have to do that first, then got to the file section, search for and DL the following two files: dar9059.zip, dar9059f.zip. Install dar9059.zip first followed by the fix dar9059f.zip. Follow the instructions in both zip files for more information.

You can see the Dayliner in the screenshot of the Kentville station that paul put in a message recently: http://www.dardpi.ca/forum/viewtopic.php?f=15&t=116

I will also finish my planned repaints of 9058 & 9059 in everything from the war paint scheme to CP action red. I also have repaints planned for:
the 4-4-0 Baldwin that is in this screen shot: http://www.dardpi.ca/forum/download/fil ... &mode=view
along with all the rolling stock attached which can be used to decorate even a 1970 scene in Kentville.

After that I'm hoping I can create a D10 10 wheeler using my new TS Modeller although I may try something more practical to start. Paul is going to create the S3 and the RS1200RS so maybe I'll do a bunch of repaints for those items and perhaps try something simply to start off with on TS Modeller like the gysum gondolas or something else unique to the DAR.

[Paul Charland]

Hi Steve,

If you're looking for something to do there is a lack of good CP 40 foot boxcars in the Train-sim library. I'm talking about the 50000-59000 series 40 footers with 8 foot doors in all the appropriate paint schemes, block lettering, script, Action red and green. Forty foot yellow insulated boxcars were pretty common but there hasn't been a model made of one for MSTS. Oddly enough with all the CN 40 footers out there there is only one model available with a CN noodle, it has a yellow door. CN 40 footers with 6 foot doors were pretty common on the DAR in the '70 and earlier I'd imagine.

Just a though.

Working on Calkin's across Aberdeen St from the station... that reminds me...

There was a large industry north of Cornwallis Street near the Cornwallis River, I think Mill Creek went under it. The building was big, about 300' x 100', in one of the mid '70s photos of the station you can see it in the background, two storey red with white trim... anyone know what this was, it's gone now.

Paul

Paul

[stem]

You are so right about that. I'll do a few up. I can crack off one or 2 an evening. I like the Larry Goss later 40' box cars and stock cars and so shall put those on my to do list to perhaps even sneak in a few before all the Dayliners are done.

By the way Paul, go ahead and upload the screen shots right into thsi forum instead of linking to photobucket. That way, they'll always be here and I don't have any problem with supplying as much disk space as needed.

[stem]

I forgot I had already done a few. This is a Larry Goss boxcar converted to a stock car. Sorry about the open bottom. I'll try to use his stock car that I found later to fix this problem. The bottom is not open on that one.

So consider this BETA REPAINT car a world exclusive to the DAR DPI. Download and have fun.

[Paul Charland]

Hi Steve,

An interesting note about cattle movements on the DAR. Most appear to be Newfoundland cattle being shipped over to Nova Scotia in the summer months, then shipped back in the fall and early winter. Shipments in the fall used cattle cars, usually sent to Kentville for inspection before being loaded around Brooklyn (probably Windsor in earlier years as well), but in the early winter cattle were shipped in boxcars. Might have been to protect them from the cold water spray crossing on the ferry I'd suspect.

On a similar note, in the '70s Hostess Foods shipped boxcar loads of potato chips across to Newf, but in the winter the shipments changed to insulated boxcars, guess they didn't want the grease to congeal and gross the customers out!

The 50000 series boxcars were the backbone of the CP fleet back then, they actually went into the early 60000s (but from what I've seen didn't make it to the 61000s). Might be nice to have a couple of car numbers for the different paint schemes if that isn't too much work.

I'll have to take a few shots of what I have and try then as attachments. Photobucket appears to be better then most but I'm sure there is a time limit somewhere before they will disappear.

Paul

[stem]

I went back and looked at the Goss stock car but it was based on his earlier boxcar that it NOT a great model at all. This stock car is based on his later model which is much improved. I'll try writing to him and see if he will fix up this box car so the interior is dark and the floor is solid.

They definitely loaded stock cars at Windsor at one time. The pens appeared to be across the tracks from the station perhaps right next to the freight house in 1949 and 1954:
http://www.dardpi.ca/wiki/index.php?tit ... r1041b.jpg
http://www.dardpi.ca/wiki/index.php?tit ... No._98.jpg

[Paul Charland]

Hi Steve,

Windsor for sure, although there were no shipments to or from Windsor of cattle in the 1973 consists, only to and from Brooklyn north of Windsor and if I'm remembering correctly, a couple of cars of sheep north of Yarmouth that year.

Boxcars and cattle cars were sent to the Agent in Kentville to be cleaned and inspected before being sent to a consignee.

Paul

[stem]

They must have been then forwarded through Truro right? Maybe Andrew knows something about what went on in Truro and perhaps something about the stock pens at each end.

[Paul Charland]

Hi Steve,

Yes, Truro - Sydney - ferry - Port aux Basques and on from there. Until the bridge at South Maitland failed most of the traffic on the DAR was interchanged at Truro.

Paul

[stem]

OK. More I didn't know. The bridge failed when?

[Paul Charland]

Hi Steve and All,

If I get this screwed up please correct me...

We moved here in the summer of 1977, kept getting the Middleton Mirror for two years.

In December of 1978, a local railfan and I called Kentville station one evening to ask about the Mixed that was still running at the time, we were actually going to hit the road and drive from Ontario to Truro to take the mixed as it was the last mixed running in Canada and we didn't have anything else to do that weekend! Only thing that stopped us was a freezing rain warning in New Brunswick, so the plan was put on hold until spring.

Spring came along including the usual spring flooding and ice jams. The Mirror arrived and had an article about the DAR bridge being damaged in South Maitland and rail service being cut off, that would have been the spring of '79. From what I remember there wasn't a lot of switching to be done between Truro and Windsor until you got pretty close to Windsor. Interchange traffic shifted from Truro to Windsor Junction which was handled but the crew of 25/50, customers north of Windsor became part of yard limits, customers in Truro were turned over to CN.

There were studies to look into repairing the bridge, but the expense wasn't justified by the little extra costs for interchanging at Windsor Junction. Full abandonment of the Truro Sub finally occurred in the spring of 1986.... if I remember the events correctly.

Paul