Greeting All: I have been enamored by this this hobby for nearly 40 years (and I have boxes of HO & N scale stuff in the attic to attest to this) but now for the first time I actually have a dedicated space, the support of my wife (kids are gone now) and a little free time to actually DO something. I intend to model in N scale only because I have more and better "stuff" and because you can fit more into the space. Yes, the eyesight is starting to go, but they make good magnifiers now. I'm not sure exactly what I'm hoping to get out of this. I know that I like building the models (I'm in construction, so that kind of follows) and I'm sure that I'll like seeing the trains go 'round but I'm not so sure about the operational stuff. I think I'll like the puzzle/problem of moving/switching cars around but in the put it up / take it down railroads of my youth, this was never the focus. I am not trying to follow any prototype and like most, I'll probably set my layout in the mid-50's so that I can have a mix of steam and diesel power. As an alternative, I may just have the citizens of Carterville pass a levy to support a "local steam historical district". Any and all thoughts, tips, advice and critiques will be greatly appreciated. A couple of tech notes: Mostly double track mainline with one single track section Mainline is 11" min. radius main except one section of the double track under the mountain Not planning on big articulateds or long passenger cars (I know, I say that now but just you wait, lol) Big industry is the mine on / in the mountain Wharf will serve as a port to ship stuff overseas Open section will be the town I would dearly love to find someplace to build a trestle but I don't really know where Thanks again, Mark
I wouldn't keep the layout stuck against the wall if possible, I have a place of track plans for inspiration, since track plans seem to always change. The White River and Northern Model Railroad: Track Plans
Welcome to TrainBoard! You have some good ideas about using a large minimum radius and a double track mainline. Have you decided on what type of track and turnouts to use?
I really like the location of your yard and passenger terminal in terms of space utilization and access to both main lines. The only suggestion I have is to make a shift to the left of the double track that crosses over the single track section, probably about a foot. I think that wouldn't crowd the town area too much but would give you more space for the mine scene and the mountain topography.
The main thing that troubles me is the double track wye and the bottle neck on the overall loop. The Wye and yard access are built for a major operation, but that bottle neck will only allow about 1.5 trains to operate at once, since you'll be constantly stopping one to allow the other through the bottle neck. I would condense that wye to a single track to save on the cost of the multiple unnecessary switches. A single track wye can serve multiple mainlines very easily. I would then decide whether you want to run two trains (opposite directions) with out any worry, or if your content with just one train, or maybe two but both traveling the same direction. Depending on that decision, you'll either need to make the loop double track the full way around, or I would recommend making it just single track to open up more space for scenery. Other than that, I like it!
Thanks very much for your input. This is basically a variation on "The Central Midland" which is railroad #6 from the book "Six HO Railroads You Can Build", 2nd Addition by J. Armstrong & T. Stepek. My only contributions are the curved yard at wharf and adding the mountain. The layout must go into the corner of my new 12 x 14 "barn" that I built in the back of my house. I moved all of the camping stuff in there along with my tools. All I have left is one corner. I am concerned about access to the back corner, but I figure worst case, I can make part of the town removable so I can get back there to work. Once completed, there's not much need for access unless I derail a train. The only other option is some sort of slide out, roller mechanism and I really don't want to get that involved. For trackage, I was planning on using Atlas code 55 flex. Don't know about turnouts yet. I did buy a bunch of Peco turnouts from a train show years ago but until I get them out of the attic in the house and into the "new train room" I won't know what I have. I can't even remember if they are insulfrog or electrofrog. Comments on either would be appreciated. I am planning on DCC, probably Digitrax Empire Builder. I know it's more money but I looks to me like it has some extra features that might be nice to have. I like the idea of shifting the "cross" mainline over to make more room. Great idea. The Big Wye concerned me a bit. It looks cool but I have no clue how it will work in real operation. I never thought about having to stop trains everytime a train pulled out of the yard. I did think that it would be expensive to build, ha ha. How would it work to have the wye only serve the inner main and just let the outside mainline run right on by? As for the single main section, I do like the idea of double track main all the way through. I end up with another section of 9 3/4" radius in the back corner to make that work though. I guess I can put in a cross over and make sure that the passenger cars stay to the outside? As for the curved yard at the wharf, again I never thought about the uncoupling. I don't quite know what else to do here, Thoughts? Thanks again everyone for your help. I think this is a great forum and I really enjoy and gain inspiration from looking at your layouts and pictures. mark
Mark, Welcome to TrainBoard! You have a really interesting and well designed track plan.:thumbs_up::thumbs_up: One thing that stands out is you have a double track mainline running over 90 percent of the layout and then you reduce to a single track mainline around your town. Why not continue the double track mainline loop around your town? Just add a crossover / double crossover for industry access to both mainlines. You're going to have a lot of fun building this layout. Enjoy!:tb-biggrin: Jerry
The only potential problem I see is reaching the back corner where the 5' wall and 6' wall meet. It looks like your benchwork is about 3' wide on each leg of the L, so that would be a long reach to lay track, build scenery or to get to a derailment. Operationally, it looks like it offers a lot. I would also suggest making the mainline double track all the way around. Then you could have two trains running unattended while working the yards or the branch line. That section of single track means that you can't just let two trains run. You'll have to constantly pay attention when running 2 or more trains. That's not necessarily a bad thing, but I know I would get distracted and have an accident sooner or later.
Thanks for the input! Thanks to all for your great input. I will keep you updated as this progresses. Probably not much until the fall sets in though. Thanks again, Mark.:tb-biggrin:
You asked for a critique so here goes. I recognized the plan immediately as a close to mirror image of the one at the end of the Atlas book I read maybed 40 years ago. I think someone questioned putting the wye up against the wall. I think I would question it too, because that wye junction looks like the most complicated track on the whole layout. I wonder how it would work in your situation to unmirror and/or remirror the layout back to its original orientation to put the wye junction on the right side of that plan, even though that makes the layout jut out into the room instead of hugging back into the corner. I suspect you are not going to find ready made crossings with a curve crossing the straight for the wye junction. Are you going to hand build those curved crossings? Using standard crossings will make the plan took more space than your drawing suggests. I am concerned with the proportion of length taken up by the yard throat- the wye junction and then the scissors double crossover before it gets to actual yard tracks. I consider the junction and crossover to be the preliminary to getting into the yard, and the yard classification tracks, passenger platform tracks, etc the main thing. It seems you have a lot of preliminary in proportion to the main thing. For instance, it looks like it would limit passenger trains to about three feet long-- 2 F-units and four cars- a weak impression compared to that major production of the entrance. No escape tracks on the passenger platform tracks (and hardly any room for any anyway). Perhaps all passenger trains will back into the terminal-- but then why is there the expensive (in space and trackbuilding costs) trackage of the double track wye to allow trains to either enter or leave to or from any track. I can see the double track mainline as an advantage for train running action. Here is a way to use both mainlnes and access them with a single track wye that eliminates the need for the double crossover throat. This is a way the prototype did it at Houston Union Station before use stopped in the middle 1970s. And a small portion of the 1911 station building survives as part ofn the structure of the Minute Maid Stadium used by the Astros. Houston Union had a stretch of double track running perpendicular to its station tracks, operated right handed, one track as normally northbound and the other as normal southbound. The leg of the wye coming out of the station to the right connected directly to the nearer track. But the leg of the wye turned to the left CROSSED the closer track and connected to the opposite main. Any train coming out of the station could take either leg of the wye and it would be routed to its right-hand track. The east track of the pair would be right-handed northbound, and the west track of the pair would be right-handed southbound. Okay, what about arriving trains. Arriving trains would run on their right-hand track PAST the wye, then BACK into the terminal. This arrangement would allow more length on the yard tracks. One problem on THIS layout would be for a train running counterclockwise on the inner main backing in to the station. It would have to back uphill on a fairly steep hill. By the way, notice that the Houston station had a freight station parallel to the passenger platform tracks, accessed by crossing one leg of the passenger wye. No wye for the freight station...just a plain spur. By the way, the Houston Union Station DID have a double track wye in the busier 1940s... Since I am shooting my mouth off-- reducing the number of tracks at the wharf from three to two or one would allow some room for a minimal suggestion of a cargo shed between the tracks and the mainline. I would have double track all the way around, and several spots for industrial spurs. It looks as if the mine "branch" has NO runaround so it will require pushing cars uphill instead of pulling them, to avoid the loco being trapped. My personal druthers-- and just mine- Since you using so many resources that tend to create the look of a big city terminal, I would skip the mine and make the entire layout urban. The double track mainline inside one leg of the wye would only suggest a crowded downtown area of many parallel tracks... As I said, just MY druthers. That may not be what floats your boat...
I posted my "Houston solution" late last night, then continued to work on it in my dreams. I recognized the problem of taking a passenger train normally running counterclockwise on the outer mainline (right hand) to enter the terminal by backing up a steep grade into the station. Problems galore! One obvious solution- with much large space- a crossover just beyond the right leg of the wye from right hand to left hand. That would allow that train running counterclockwise on the outer main (right handed) to cross over to the wrong side to take the right leg of the wye heading into the station. Okay, how do we get that train out? For it to continue its journey courterclockwise, it can just make the reverse movement-- back out the right leg onto the inner main, crossover to the outer main, then proceed forward. To run clockwise, the train would back out the left leg onto the inner main, easing downhill around the grade. (Backing a train downhill is little problem comnpared to pushing it uphill backwards.) Once clear of the terminal entry, the train could proceed clockwise. The problem here is one of the space. The end curves both need to begin immediately on both sides of the turnouts that access the wye. No room. One solution would be to locate the right-hand to left-hand crossover around the corner from the wye entrance. The uphill grade on the top of the layout plan seems to have more length (be more gradual) than the one that drops on the bottom of the plan. In this case, the cross-over would serve two functions: allowing access to the terminal and also crossing over trains for mainline running. But there is another solution-- I think of it as neither single-track wye or double-track wye but "one-and-a-half." A turnout off the top of the outer main crosses the inner main and joins the right leg of the wye. This would add only about half a turnout's length of length and width to the space requirements of a single-track wye-- much "space cheaper" than double track wye and scissors crossover. In this case though, this trackwork would NOT serve as a crossover for the mainline. One other consideration might be what I will call a "non-reversing reverse loop," for use when each line of a double-track mainline pair has a normal one-way direction. Imagine a reverse loop cutoff that runs across an end lobe of double track, but instead of running from one side of the inner track to the other side of the inner track, it connects to the inner track on one side and crosses that inner track to connect to the outer track on the other. A train that is going counterclockwise on the outer track will change to clockwise on the inner track, thus seeming to change direction relative to the double track as-a-unit. But it is always going the correct direction on one-way track. And there would be no need to reverse polarity, as long as the two mains are set up for normal one-way running either right-handed or left-handed. One other suggestion not related to any of this. The access to the turntable on your plan seems to require locos to run into a stub ended switchback than can be used for nothing else. Too short. If the access to the turntable comes off right between the yard throat and the yard ladder, it is more easily accessible by both freight and passenger locos. (It looked like the ONLY runaround track in your yard area was in the track around the turntble access, which required a switchback move at either end-- hard for a loco to run around more nthan one or two cars at a time.)
Mark, May I add one more item, I apologize if this has already been approached but elevations are a consideration, everywhere the track crosses at elevation you will need clearance. The grade will effect train lengths and traction. It will require "approximately" 2 inches of clearance to cross under or over another track. A 2% grade, is 2 inches rise in 100 inches of length, that is 1 1/2 the length of your longest wall. If you would post the track elevations I am sure there are plenty of experienced people to help you with grade. Good luck, I really like the track plan. Richard Cook Sand Springs Railway NScale Layout
