If you’re a registered attendee of Brickworld Chicago this year, we would like to extend an exclusive opportunity.
Similar to our NMRA 2018 National Train Show exclusive, we are happy to announce that an exclusive Premium Instructions Kit is now available for registered attendees of Brickworld Chicago 2019 to pre-order.
The Model
To celebrate the Sesquicentennial of the completion of the first Transcontinental Railroad in the United States, I chose to model a B-50-25 “Challenger” Express Boxcar.
Rendering of the final model.
I’ve always had a taste for shorter (in height) boxcars, as well as clean but attractive paint schemes. This car checks all of those boxes. This particular car has been an interest for me since I first saw Nate Brill’s rendition of one a few years ago. It was a striking grey and red scheme with a stylized “The Challenger” to the right of the doors.
It’s been a while since we’ve posted any update on our work behind the scenes. Allow us to offer some insight today, as well as a surprise announcement at the end.
Premium Instructions Kits
The cover for our 164 page book.
We’ve been hard at work in getting our next Premium Instruction Kit ready to go. I’ve modeled the International Car Company Extended Vision Caboose in fine detail, and Cale has been working non-stop to bring the book to completion. We would have had this model available by now, but we have drastically expanded our vision and approach to the kit, and thus have taken more time to ensure we are checking all of our boxes. We’ll have more details in the announcement article at the time of release, but I can definitely say that this will be the most comprehensive kit we have ever done. We are now in the process of editing the 164-page book and building test models.
Driving south along Route 1 in Van Buren, Maine today, a visitor glancing to the right probably wouldn’t know that they were looking at the remains of the northern yard of the former Bangor and Aroostook Railroad. The tracks are gone, and buildings, at least those still standing, peek out from the trees.
Keeping the past alive, William Dumond
has been modeling that rail yard.
William Dumond’s Van Buren Yark – from his Flickr account
We’ve featured his work before, but in addition to building incredible locomotives and rolling stock, Bill is a proficient scenery modeler, as can be seen in his comparison shot of the real Van Buren yard, next to his brick-built version on the left.
Van Buren Yard in 2014 – image from Google Maps, notice the white warehouse to the left, and the yellow building through the trees.
Looking at a Google Maps image of the area, it’s easy to find the buildings featured on the layout, and to get a sense of the tracks that used to run between them. The layout has a nice organic look, matching the prototype, and staying away from the rigid blockiness of some LEGO layouts.
Custom Turnout Switch – from William Dumond’s Flickr gallery
One of the most interesting things about the model Van Buren yard is the use of a custom switch, documented on Bill’s Flickr account. This switch flows nicely, and really adds to the realism of the scene.
For more of William Dumond’s Van Buren yard, as well as more of his Bangor and Aroostoock work, check out his stream on Flickr. We’ll be looking forward to watching the progress on this one!
As some of you might know by now, I’m one of the few Contributors (the only?) of BMR that lives on the other side of the pond, ie. in Europe and more specifically in The Netherlands. Compared to the US, some things in Europe are a bit different structured when it comes to running a Lego Train Club. For one, there are no such things as LTC’s in Europe. Second, instead of organizing in regions, we tend to organize ourselves per country. This means that most of our LUGs are bigger and more diverse than in the US, with builders doing Space, Castle, City and all others in one club. Third, since train builders are a minority in most of these clubs to begin with, we tend to not do big layouts like the US-based LTC’s. Fourth, most of our exhebitions are part of bigger Lego festivals, but almost never part of a Model Railroaders event. This means that one a whole, most of the European train layouts are or one-off builds by 1 or maximum 2 builders, or are static displays on a kid-centered event that don’t really give the love that our scale-craziness “deserves”. Deserves obviously in quotation marks because indeed, we do get credits for our trains, but on a different level than US LTC’s that might show off at the NMRA for example.
Trains at Legoworld
The standard pre-show day at Legoworld in Utrecht, NL. Tables with shrouding, supplied by TLC.
However, that all doesn’t mean we don’t build elaborate layouts. It just means we do it a little bit less often, and when we do it, it’s mostly because of some huge show that wants to show off the best there is when it comes to AFOL building. For us in The Netherlands this typically means Legoworld, a yearly one week event that is held by TLC in Utrecht, the so-called center of our little country. Legoworld actually used to be organized by one of the local LUGs, De Bouwsteen, in Zwolle, but at one point after some intense co-operation with TLC, it was decided to hand over the organization to our favorite commercial plastic bricks producing company.
Anyway, in the last several years there always have been some kind of group train layouts, most of them organized on an ad-hoc basis (which is partly also due to the way my own LUG, Lowlug, is organized) but with some standard rules, the major being the use of MILS and the Lowlug Lego Train Standard for connecting track between modules. In the previous years this was a six-wide style layout, but for 2018 we as members of Lowlug decided there should be a layout specifically for eight-widers as well, and the rest is history.
I can now ofcourse keep on telling how this all came to fruition, but to be honest, one of your fellow members is currently writing something like that, so I’m just going to leave you with one fact: Before setting up the layout at the show, we had never tested if everything fit together. It actually did really well, proving once and for all that the internet has some great promises for us in the future.
We know you’ve been waiting for our next Premium Instruction kit. Well, the wait is over, and to make up for the delay, we have not one, but two new Premium Instructions for you: the Thrall 61′-1″ Bulkhead Flatcar, and the Pacific Car & Foundry 50′ Insulated Boxcar. These cars are available for purchase now, and will begin shipping next week. Let’s take a closer look at our new models.
After a year and a half of trial, failure, and redesigning, and exactly one year after we originally planned to, Cale and I are pleased to announce the first ever Brick Model Railroader steam locomotive kit.
BMR Prototype Model, Engineer Side 3/4 VeiwBMR Prototype Model, Side VeiwsBMR Prototype Model,Fireman’s Side Rear 3/4 VeiwBMR Prototype Model,Nose Profile
This is a locomotive we are very excited about. The Reading Railroad was located in the eastern part of the state of Pennsylvania, and the BMR Model Team (Cale and Glenn) are Pennsylvania residents, making the Reading a home road for us. The Reading T-1 felt like a natural choice for a prototype for both Cale and myself. It has been on both of our “to do” lists for a while, but other projects have taken priority since. The T-1 will fit well with all of our current transition-era Premium Instructions models, as all of them were used on the Reading and could very well have been seen behind a T-1 at any point during their service life.
I’m sure many of our readers are wondering why it’s taken so long to get to this point. Allow me to answer a few questions you may be having.
Good news! It took a bit longer than expected from our side (and we again apologize for this), but we can finally reveal the winners of this years OcTRAINber!
First, let us again say that we really enjoyed all the builds, the WIP stories and all those beautiful pieces of foreign rolling stock. I’d say it’s no strange thing to say that the community really added the TRAIN in this years OcTRAINber again! And yes, just like last year it was a challenge to judge them, but just like last year, in the end we managed.
Prizes & Judgement
Due to a difference in prizes compared to last year, we have come up with some new winning categories for this year: Grand Prize for Real Life Entries, Grand Prize for Digital Entries, Prize for best Foreign Factor and Prize for best WIP Story. The winners of the Grand Prize are allowed to choose between the new Powered-Up Cargo Train and the PFx Brick Holiday Train Conversion Kit, with the winner of the Grand Prize Real Life having first pick. The winners of the categories get two prizes: First a choice between PFx Brick 4MB + XL Speaker and Bricktracks R56 curved tracks, and second a choice between Lego Rails and PF pack, with the winner of the Foreign Factor category having first pick in both. Oh, and ofcourse you can only win once. So if you win in one category, you are obviously out for any other prizes in this years’ OcTRAINber.
Just to shortly tell something about the judging itselve: All four of us (being Cale Leiphart, Glenn Holland, Holger Matthes and me) gave all entries points between 0-10 in three categories: Credibility, Foreign Factor and WIP Story. These points were added up (meaning you could get a max of 120 points for the Grand Prize, and 30 for a “Best of” Prize) and then compared between all the entries, with the one with the highest number of points wining. Yes, it’s that simple 😉
So now that we have established the prizes and the judging, let’s go on to the awards!
GRAND PRIZE REAL LIFE
It’s Hod Carrier with his amazing Ferrobus!
Everything just worked in this entry. The WIP story, the credibility, the scale, the little pieces of rust and chrome, but definately also the absolute amazing foreign prototype. Who would have ever thought that a bus would win in a train contest? Well played Hod Carrier!
GRAND PRIZE DIGITAL
Congratulations Bricknerd with his FM H15-44!
A great WIP story from day one, including microscale and Halloween versions of his build, but also one of the stranger diesels that have been running around in the US (if you are familiar with those boxes on wheels, that is) that was captured really well with some great sideways work. A true digital winner.
BEST FOREIGN FACTOR
That’s ofcourse no other than Alexander with his Lartigue Monorail!
Most probably the most wonky Foreign build of this year. Yes, some of us had once read about this thing. And yes, even back in the days when it was build it was weird. But seeing it build in Lego, with a functioning drive unit? Thats a whole other trainyard!
BEST WIP STORY
Lastly, it’s Donát Raáb with his Wiener Linien ULF tram!
Even though he came pretty late to the party, Donát Raáb gave us a really good insight in how he build that thing. Including puns like “Flag Day” and how he managed to keep it just also Ultra Low Floor like the prototype, it was awesome seeing his updates coming in day by day.
HONORARY MENTIONS
Just like last year, some builds came really close, but just not close enough. These are our honorary mentions. No prizes, but just a proper reminder to keep up the good work!
A Hudswell Clarke “Ganges” class with skips (part of his full narrow gauge consist) by Mike Pianta
KП4 by Erik
Korail V-Train (aka Baekdudaegan Canyon Train) by kellelely5
Lencse-005 by Nicholas Bond
DRG Class 99.22 HSB 99 222 by Robert D.
Lastly, we would like to again thank our sponsors; FX Bricks, Bricktracks and The Lego Company. Without them these awesome prizes would have never been possible. We are really gratefull for their effort in supporting the community!
And, ofcourse, we hope to see all of you again for OcTRAINber 2019!
I certainly can’t recall the last time I’ve seen an Atchison, Topeka, & Santa Fe (ATSF) steam locomotive modeled in LEGO, though I’m sure I may be missing one.
Chris Stone, known as Narmot on Flickr, has updated his model of ATSF 4-8-4 #2926 into what he is calling his third version. Chris is one of the OcTRAINber 2017 winners with his flexible-boilered mallet steam locomotive and has built several other noteworthy models including a wonderful passenger train to put behind his new 4-8-4.
One look at this locomotive will keep your eyes darting to new locations to pick out all the details. Chris certainly packed it in on this locomotive.
Now that OcTRAINber 2018: The Foreign Challenge is officially over, we first would like to thank all the participants who made this such a great month again. It was amazing to see all the WIP stories showing up on the Flickr feeds, FB timelines, but also on the well-beloved Train Tech forums over at Eurobricks for example. So thank you all for that!
Now, let’s go over the timeline. In the next coming weeks our judges will go over all the entries and score them according to three criteria: WIP Story, Credibility and The Foreign Factor. This might take a while because BMR is a labour of love, meaning we all do this stuff next to our real life lives.
However, for now we would like to make a short round-up of all entries and also to show you some of the key statistics of this years OcTRAINber.
Our premium instructions include instructions to model a Bethlehem Steel Car version of this gondola and a Pennsylvania Railroad G31 / American Car & Foundry version. Both designs were largely the same with the main differences being the construction of the body (riveted versus welded) and the location of the brake wheel. The details may be slight, but enough to warrant a few call-outs and sub-models to allow the builder the choice.
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