Hello all! Wanted to introduce myself--my name is Devon and I'm a college senior who actually services real locomotives with General Electric for a real job (I'm on the engineering team which supports Union Pacific at the moment, so I'm in Denver's historic Burnham shops) and am looking to get back into the hobby. I am a HO modeler (not a convert yet as I have no N equipment) and my previous layout you can get a feel for here: [Oops, can't post links but will when I'm able--google ATSF Black River Subdivision in HO]. My only qualm about transitioning to N is the difficulty/expense of sound with steam (and even diesel). I looked at places like Top Hobby Trains that can do the installs... nearly over $300 and I was hoping N would be cheaper! (Where else can you get a Super Chief passenger set for ~$150?) Therefore, I guess this is my jumping off point and would love to hear from the community. I live in a small apartment and want to build something that I can start and move with (not an Ntrak or module or anything...) and KATO Unitrack (Which I can then ballast over) looks like it will do the trick since I can save the track in worst case. Being in an apartment, a transportable HCD layout seems very appealing. Continuous running for sure. I've looked over the KATO site, Carolina Central, Salt Lake Rt, etc and would love some other inspiration. Clearly I am a fan of the ATSF and love the fact I can get equipment RTR since I have no painting/detailing experience. I have become very interested in Rocky Mountain railroading (can't find it in me to switch to the Grande!) and plan to focus my next fictional ATSF branchline somewhere in the Rockies or some condensed Raton Pass. I like fictional because in doing so it allows you to freelance yet use equipment off the shelf... and I really want to be able to run a Super Chief since I can actually afford it in N scale. Does anyone know of any N scale examples of Rocky Mtn railroading that might be of some help in small layout form? Track plans? Or general layout advice if starting from scratch that applies to N scale or advice of installing DCC/sound in steam, what are the best runners? I would love to hear from you and hopefully this thread will be filled with photos in the near future as I acquire and build an Npire. Cheers, Devon
First off welcome to trainboard. For steam locomotives Athearn is coming out with challengers and bigboys again with dcc & sound. Bachman sells a few steam locomotives with dcc but no sound. Kato & Atlas make some great early diesel locomotives that are dcc ready and easy to install decoders. Digitrax, mrc, soundtraxx and Lok are some companies that make sound decoders. A warning with n-scale steam they don't like sharp curves. Best of luck with your new adventure.
Welcome to Trainboard! Regarding Sound in N: 1. Google PowerSteamGuy1790 . He has done many tutorials on installing sound in steam and if you decide to go the route of onboard sound you will like what you find. 2. One alternative to onboard sound in N is SoundTraxx's SurroundTraxx system, although (a) the jury is still out on how good it is and (b) it requires a significant LocoNet infrastructure and transponder-equipped decoders. (read: Digitrax) 3. A third good option IMHO is having a "bank" of sound decoders under the layout feeding a mixer/sound system, and consisting the respective locomotives to their own sound decoder underneath. Sort of a "po-man's SurroundTraxx" that doesn't follow you around the layout. (probably not a requirement to follow for a small/medium layout) Regarding Inspiration 1. A few layouts come to mind immediately for small layouts depicting Rocky Mountain railroading: (a) Danneman's old Rio Grande layout, (b) Trainboard's own HemmiAtta2d Rio Grande layout, (c) John Leaders' UP Rocky Mountain sub and also the Marias Pass layout currently featured in NSR, (d) a few more that I cannot recall the owners of at the moment... ;-) 2. Don't discount medium size HO layouts, that can become small layouts in N. (or any size, any scale layouts. For inspiration, a good idea or beautiful scene from any layout is still a good idea or beautiful scene....even if it doesn't work on your layout, it might spawn some similar idea that will) The late David Haines' Raton layout (a large N layout) comes to mind, and the list of Rocky Mountain railroads in HO goes on forever. I think a layout done in the manner of John Leaders' small layouts that loosely depicted Raton would be cool. Great scenery, double-track, tunnels...perfect!
Hi Devon, First let me add my welcome to TrainBoard. You will find a few tons of info here. Just ask a question and many will help. The following links (all on TrainBoard) are just a few that may be of help for you. They don't address the sound issue, but do address size, apartment modeling and scenery. Mark Watson's Thunder Ridge: A Freelanced Focus on Scenery Tragedy on Thunder Ridge! Kewatin's THUNDER RIDGE LIVES THUNDER RIDGE LIVES MAR21 BUILD UPDATE THUNDER RIDGE LIVES UPDATE MAR27 BACKDROP Caleb Austin's The central VA door layout progress GregK's layout A reply in the thread "Show me your 2X4 layouts" Regards, Gary
All, thank you for the help. Always good to find a place to call home and seek counsel when needed. Unfortunately I lost an auction on a Con-Cor 2-10-2 with Soundtraxx which would have been my first N scale endeavour. I think I will swing by the LHS tomorrow and pick up the KATO Super Chief set to provide inspiration and grab some Atlas C55 track as well to experiment with. As far as plans... my career is going to require me to be mobile and Dave Vollmer's layout is the closest thing to my ideal layout--ironically I love the track plan too. Thanks to David Smith for drawing this up, I like the double track run and will probably move the sidings around a bit but leave it mostly intact. I'm looking at a 36"x80" HCD. I know all the 4x8 is really 6x10 arguments, but the table is great because of ease of construction and I can take it with me. It was terrible tearing down my previous HO layout, I'd like to not have to throw out an investment every 4 years. Voila the Juaniata division idea. There really is a gold mine of small layouts in N--I'm having a much easier time with research than I ever did in HO. Therefore a few follow up questions: 1) Thoughts on the plan? Adding a crossover in the front where the sidings are? (In my experience makes a junction look bigger). My timeline is to spend the next month developing a small fleet and gathering track (And an NCE PowerCab DCC set) and start construction late August in my new apartment. 2) I've heard KATO Unitrack is bulletproof but C55 allows for a much more realistic appearance. Does it come in sectional? Or will I have to use flextrack? Will I have to solder the joints? That is something that I have no knowledge of but am always willing to learn. I'm guessing the C55 is cheaper as well even with the cork, since the ballast is a wash since I'd have to reballast the Unitrack a la John Sing and his awesome Peavine layout. Thanks all!
When building the layout, condiser using PVC piping and blue/pinkboard for construction materials. PVC is a great material for a small layout as it weighs very little and is very strong. I made a shelf layout by building a frame of PVC pipes and then gluing 2" foam board as a base. PVC is easy to cut with a miter saw and you can build the benchwork in minutes with no tools other than the saw.
Well it is a pretty elegant plan as it stands, I think adding the crossover may make the junction look bigger, but it will reduce your siding storage capacity a bit.
Some plans to consider: http://whiteriverandnorthern.net/plans.htm I'm also willing to help with custom planning--just PM me.
Atlas does offer C55 as sectional track. That actually might be a good compromise between Unitrack and C55 flex, but I would say go with Unitrack for now. I have built layouts with both, and the real advantage of Unitrack in your situation is that you can get things up and running quickly, and the performance will be good as well. I am using Unitrack now for similar reasons as you....apartment dweller, needed semi-portable layout, etc. I have thoughts at some point of going through and slowly replacing the Unitrack with C55 (I own a lot of it already) but I'm in no hurry. No, I won't be on any magazine covers anytime soon but Unitrack can be made to look OK, and it performs very well. The other thing with using Atlas C55 is there is no sure-fire method of controlling the turnout while powering the frog. Choices are switch machines, the Caboose Industries 15ft tall ground throw, or a number of "home brew" options....many of which work great but they aren't necessarily easy to duplicate sometimes. Most use micro slide switches and it's hard to find the exact right throw, etc. Anyway, when you factor in that cost/complexity, Unitrack seems to be a faster/more trustworthy option. Regarding the plan, DKS has done a great job assisting others so I would see what he can come up with. The plan you posted seems fine though, it certainly would be a great starting point. You could order Unitrack for that and literally be up and running trains in two days.
I'll speak to the concept.... let others go to the hardware. The "woulda-coulda-shoulda" for the Santa Fe in the Rockies is more than you'd think. They had every intent of having a significant map in that state. The war with the Rio Grande was on several fronts. Remember that the deal that was struck was on several fronts. Everybody knows that Santa Fe "won" Raton Pass from Rio Grande, but they also "lost" the war in the Royal Gorge. Remember, THEY BUILT IT: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Royal_Gorge_Route_Railroad http://media.museumofnewmexico.org/press_releases.php?action=detail&releaseID=63 AND They owned the Colorado Midland: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Colorado_Midland_Railway So if you want to have some freelance fun, imagine what Colorado would be like if Santa Fe had hung onto Royal Gorge, got into the Leadville District, and leveraged the Colorado Midland. If ever a railroad concept sure made it look 'good on paper' (wow, it's such a straight line!) this is it: http://www.google.com/imgres?hl=en&...SwQUIiZMYSz0QH7vICgCg&zoom=1&biw=1024&bih=571 I think some of the most effective freelanced railroads are built on these little twists of history, the 'what ifs' that very well could have happened. A "Super Chief" in the rockies? Oh, if you realized how close it almost was... Imagine a 'northern section' of the Super Chief headed for San Francisco via Ogden on the "Colorado Midland Division". Santa Fe also bailed on the Eel River Canyon line up to Humboldt County, CA (smartest move ever) and also bailed on the line project across Mexico to the Gulf of California. I have a copy of an internal study performed pre-Conrail of a concept to merge with Erie Lackawanna. Any time you want to freelance Santa Fe going where it never went, think again!
Devon, Welcome! I'll echo Gary's suggestion to check out Mark Watson's Thunder Ridge designs. Made for an excellent apartment sized layout, although not quite so portable, what with the gorge. Unitrack is great, and you can see some of my ballasting in the JACALAR link in my signature. It isn't truly "bullet proof" (one can do all sorts of things to screw it up - but you have to either get creative, be very incompetent, or mount it on a target stand and actually shoot at it). For ability to get up and running quickly, and for ease in adjusting the layout to your needs before actually gluing it down, you can't beat it.
Mark's Thunder Ridge concept had a couple major things that made it different: 1) the 'two railroads side by side' concept, better done on a small track plan than any other I've ever seen. 2) EXTREME SCENERY without extreme grades, not an easy thing to accomplish, by dropping the canyon down below track level. And some first-class photography results from a very small layout, actually. Getting scenery below track level is one of the great tips to creating the mountain-climbing image. I did it on just one little spot on my layout and it sure did the job well. That 'may' conflict with the HCD concept, and if it does, then I don't think an HCD should be the basis - think more along conventional grid-and-cookie-cutter approaches, even if they take more carpentry. Here's the CM both historically and as of 2005: http://goh.godevco.com/Trips2005/Hagerman/HagerPass.html You're going to want floor-to-ceiling scenery for the Colorado Midland. Oh, and here, TAKE THIS, RIO GRANDE! http://www.flickr.com/photos/davidwatson/5883834849/in/pool-952441@N20 Just a reminder, the big mainline-style depot there was built by ATSF, not Rio Grande. And, ATSF kept a branch in there for customers even after they got booted out by the Supreme Court. Santa Fe, over the rockies, not through them!
THANK YOU all for the excellent information--really I appreciate it. It makes the jump to N scale this much easier finding a home on the web filled with energetic people willing to share advice... the welcome is most welcome. randgust: I agree wholeheartedly! I love the 'what-ifs' because it allows you some historical flexibility. And as I've learned I model for myself and for no one else. I am a modeler who goes for a realistic appearance but not necessarily complete historical accuracy in order to have some fun and leeway. I'll certainly look into ATSF foraying into Royal George albeit on a more reduced scale with the space I have available. Once I learn decaling, etc I hope to phase into a fictional road alongside the Santa Fe. Hopefully I can do some prototypical research as well--I actually work on the Georgetown Loop and have some connections to get a ride and check out the Gorge. Stay tuned but I'll definately work this into the railroad backstory. DKS: Thank you so much, your plans are fantastic. Honestly I think some of the best on the web in conjunction with Mike's which everyone so handily references. If you have some free time (I'm a college student on a tight budget) I'd love to work the angle a little further tweaking the plan and work towards a part list. I'll shoot ya a PM. Doug: Yes, this is a condundrum I've been facing. I love the bulletproof aspect but am torn toward the realism of C55. However, I have never worked in a scale smaller than HO so it seems like it is a decent compromise for a first layout especially seeing how well some people are able to disguise it. I would be using manual switches all the way... haven't figured out enough Electrical Engineering for another route! (Why I love DCC... two wires! But what is this about powering the frogs?)
If you go Unitrack then there is no reason to worry about wiring frogs. And, with either the DS51 or NCE SwitchKat, you can wire the Kato switches up directly to them and track power for very simple DCC switch control. The SwitchKats also allow for optional push button control.
Here's a "Unitrack-ized" version of Dave Vollmer's Juniata Division, "version 2" with improved passing tracks. Bear in mind the limitations of Unitrack create a very rigid framework in which to design, so I've suggested hiding both end loops in tunnels to disguise the awkwardness of the returns. Also, the interchange track, lower right, does not break off the main smoothly as it does on the original, but it serves the same purpose. It's a starting point, if nothing else.
Rbrod: Your track looks fantastic after going through your thread. Certainly an inspiration. DKS: Thank you! Wow, you are certainly right about the rigidity of the plan. Are those 15" radius on the outside? Part of me thinks I need to learn to solder and go with the flex track because the plan seems so much "smoother". I was at the LHS for hours yesterday just comparing and I'm still stuck. Part of me loves the realism of the 55... and I've laid track and ballasted in HO, but just used rail joiners which apparently isn't sufficient in N. Lost all my bidding wars on some Soundtraxx equipped steamers. Keeping an eye out for a Mikado and see if the LHS can install the decoder.
