En Garde
Lest anyone think that my modeling always progresses flawlessly, rest assured that I make plenty of mistakes—I simply don't document them all. As but one of many examples, I fabricated the control panel three times before I got it right (and indeed I may do it again to address some minor cosmetic issues). My latest goof: I forgot to install the guard rails before painting the track.
Turns out it was a lot less work than I'd anticipated. This was due to the fact that John Allen never added guard rails to the wooden trestle! I hadn't noticed this until I started reviewing photos more carefully. He'd only installed them on the truss bridge and the through plate girder bridge, and not until he was midway through construction of Version II.
When I'd found that the original G&D—that is, Version I, which I'm building—had no guard rails at all anywhere, I was tempted to use this as justification to save myself the trouble. However, I didn't like the look of these bridges without them. Besides, it wasn't much work—they were made from scraps of Code 40 rail bonded in place with CA.
To save time masking, I wrapped the whole layout in a trash bag and slit openings for the bridges to spray them. As for the trestle, I elected to remain true to history and leave them off. Just as well: they'd have been considerably more work to install than the others. So ended one more goof in a long line of goofs.
Original Gorre & Daphetid images courtesy of Peter T. Prunka.