Saturday we visited the 'modelspoorbeurs' in Arnhem. A toy train heaven for h0 and N scale enthusiasts. One stand had quiet a few Athearn American trains in h0. For 0 scalers there were two stands interesting selling pre-war Märklin and JEP for enormous prices: one passenger car from Märklin for 220 Euro or a lantern for 70 Euro. This is quiet in contrast to the low prices for conventional h0 wagons of 5-10 Euro per car. It has been suggested before and it is probably true, due to the global Ebay trade common toy train cars are becoming cheaper and less common cars are becoming extremely expensive. We enjoyed the three layouts on the side. The real steam powered engines in scale G (LGB) were running and those are the most impressive to watch and smell.
Sunday was a good day for redoing a part of the layout. Because the new engine house requires a track distance (center rail to center rail) of 13 cm (5 1/5 inch) instead of the common 16 cm (6 1/4 inch) on Lionel 027 layouts, a special Z-bend had to be made. I took two half curves in 027 topped them off at 10 cm curve length and soldered them back together with brass pins. This brings both tracks just the 1 inch and a bit more to each other and indeed the engine house is now ready for use. While being busy soldering I decided to connect one switch more and to make a circular power line for accesories. I only managed to connect two red bumper lights, but this simplifies the connection of other fun things in the coming months. For instance, the rotary beacon that still does not turn.
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