The Pasadena Model Railroad Club began in 1940, housed inside its members’ homes. From there, they were set up inside a retail space and an old bowling alley before the club eventually ended up purchasing a former rubber stamp building in Los Angeles in 1979. Today, it's known as the Pasadena Model Railroad Museum, having become an official California museum in 2018, and it's the home to The Sierra Pacific Lines - a model railroad display featuring a main line of over 1700-feet that takes a model train over an hour to traverse. Throughout the years, the PMRRM has modernized and upgraded their systems – including a lighting upgrade in 2019 that converted the industrial fluorescent lighting overhead to RoscoLED Tape.
The museum had a few distinct visions in mind for their lighting upgrade:
Knowing these desires, the team reached out to Kinetic Lighting who, upon seeing their list of wants and needs, knew that RoscoLED Tape was an ideal solution!
The final upgrade included twelve, 60’ runs of RoscoLED Tape – a mixture of our RoscoLED Tape VariColor: RGB+CW to create extra warmth and nighttime blues, and our RoscoLED Tape VariWhite that allowed them to modify the color temperature of the “sunlight” during their daytime scenes. The installation team appreciated how easy it was to solder the 5m reels together to achieve the long runs, before they installed the LED tape inside RoscoLED Tape Profiles that were mounted above the Sierra Pacific Lines display.
The Kinetic team worked with ETC to configure a control system that would provide the museum with preset looks, including a 23-minute sequence that replicates a 24-hour sun cycle – just as they imagined!
If you’d like to see the final results, the museum is open to the public and hosts open houses monthly. It’s great fun for the whole family, and the level of detail throughout the model is incredible! You can learn more about the Pasadena Model Rail Road Museum on their website: www.pmrrm.org. If you’d like to learn more about the LED lighting solution they used to upgrade from fluorescent lighting to LED, visit the RoscoLED Tape product page on the Rosco website.
Megan Duncan December 05, 2019 Questions?
Megan works out of Rosco's Los Angeles office. She studied technical theatre and stage management at Western Washington University while also working at a local TV studio, producing, directing, and filming content. Her varied skills and background in theatre and broadcasting make her a perfect fit at Rosco.