In Rockport Massachusetts, the stub ended station used to have a reverted loop to turn the trains heading back to Boston. Has someone tryed this in their model railroad? Paul
John Armstrong in his Track Planning For Realistic Operations talked about the use of the reverted loop. I haven't met or talked to anyone who has used one, but I'm sure there are a few out there.
Thanks Rick, In the booklet "Classic Railroads You Can Model" the trackplan of the "B&M Gloucester Branch" has this Rockport reverted loop included. Looks impressive to me. Paul
Paul, I have seen this done on a lot of small layouts and even had one on one of my earlier layouts. The only thing with a reversing loop on a layout is that you have to wire it to reverse the polarity at one point in the loop. This is commonly done by isolating the section right before the switch and wiring up a toggle switch to control electrical flow. Real railroads still use reversing loops as well. Below is an aerial picture of the Metro North reversing loop in Danbury Connecticut. Happy railroading! Russ
Grand Central station in NYC has reversing loops on both levels. The outer tracks on both levels form the loop. They were used to reverse the long distance passenger trains in the past.
Thanks Russ and Gil. Modelling a reversion loop can be done and can look prototypical that's the conclusion of the topic I think. Paul
I believe the SP had what they called a balloon track at their coach yard in Oakland. They could turn the passenger consist without breaking apart the train or performan backing manuevers. If you model this you have to isolate the loop for both DC and DCC. But it is no biggie.
