The foam board approach had crossed my mind --- may come to that. I assume that mounting Tortoise switches under foam board is not an issue.
I am well aware of JMRI. Have already been browsing some of the manuals and checking out some videos that people have made. Being quite familiar with Java, I may even find myself snooping through the code at some point --- after all it is open source.
Ron,
You should look into JMRI (Java Model Railroad Interface) free software. Among its many model railroading applications, it has operations software than can do what you want. And I'd never be caught programming DCC decoders without it!
If you can't find a reasonable solution to your railroad grades, I would suggest you look at the problem a little differently. If your layout was built on 2" thick foam insulation board, on top of your benchwork, you coud have your road pass down under the railroad by digging out the foam there, rather than the elevate the railroad to pass up and over the road. Of course you can still have trestles and stuff if you want, by just cutting away the foam board in an area wider than just the road. You could also use a combination of railroad grades and digging out the terrain underneath it to give the illusion of more/steeper grades.
-- Andy - Arlington TX
Saw this post of yours after I had sent my previous reply. Yes, I agree --- I think yard switching can be made interesting.
Aside from the various different types of real world scenarios you describe, as I said in my original post, I was a software engineer for some forty years and I can see myself trying to come up with computer controlled optimized yard switching to build a train construct --- create a card for each of my freight cars, shuffle the deck and then build a train from the cars represented by the first eight or nine cards, in order, that get dealt (the card per car, shuffle and deal concept is not an idea that I came up with but rather is from a YouTube video of someone's yard operations).
Thanks again for your continued feedback and encouragement.
-- Ron - Thousand Oaks, CA
Thanks for all the incredibly helpful input and in particular pointing out some of the problems that were present. The layout has evolved.
First, separate and apart from your comments but based on another person's input (relative to all of the parallel tracks) I realized that since my interest was in switching, I really didn't need a two track mainline. That of course I had more internal space to address some of the problems that you had raised. Also relative to that other person's input, the mainline now rides up a tressle on the north and northwest portions and down a hill in the southwest corner. At the point where the road crosses under the tressle there is N-scaled clearance for a standard 13'6" high semi trailer. The mainline will primarily run counterclockwise. Currently, the grade going up the tressle is 2% and coming down the hill it is 3.2% (yuck, but I will play with that some more, sacrificing some of the nice 2% to get the 3.2% number down).
The problems you pointed out had the most profound impact on the layout redesign. While I didn't adopt the same solutions you came up with, I think I have addressed all of the issues. I flipped the while layout from right to left only because I felt more comfortable with the yard extending to the right. I wanted to do was keep the "dirty" industries (oil and rail builders) apart from the "clean" industries (furniture, beverage, freight) so that clearly influenced the direction in which I went.
I did get rid of the pump jacks and instead incorporated oil tanks. As you suggested, I made the northern most yard track an engine service track and now have the machine shop instead of the diesel engine house. With the added space I was also able to bring in the Medusa Cement Company.
WSFT and Central Beverage now have truck areas capable of handling 53' semi trailers and a cab. Have drawn in the trucks to make sure they fit.
The roads now avoid switch tracks so that problem is gone.
For Allied Rail Builders I had been basing what I did on the picture on the Walthers web site. Haven't decided with way to go yet so have two versions of the layout; one with the spur and one with the track entering the structure.
Have included some 3D views of the layout.
Again, thanks for all your help.
https://imgur.com/nqcPK3c
Yes, sometimes yard switching can get repetitive, but sometimes the challenges of small yards and/or drill tracks can make for challenging puzzles to figure out, if not execute (e.g. 'Towers of Hanoi' type problems) The same things that can make switching difficult (there's seldom enough room for maximum efficiency) also make the mental planning of moves in advance more interesting. But then again, once the solution is figured out, repeating it over and over again can become tedious.
The key is in coming up with new scenarios, and variation in specialized loads (maybe delivering new (or salvaging old) equipment to an industry, rather than just more raw materials or picking up more product).
For example, maybe your railroad is hustling to keep its good customers, and occasionally uses its MOW/wreck crane to off/load heavy customer equipment (that the customer's already paid to have shipped by rail anyway.) Even if this was never prototypical in the industry, remember, this is your railroad, and you get to decide what's "prototypical." Maybe more railroads would still be in business if they had thought about additional/better services they could offer.
ron@329What is meant by "drilling the yard"?
Thanks for the input. Couple of things ---
What is meant by "drilling the yard"?
Actually the runaround track is dual purpose and this is one of the kluges I was referring to. It is runaround for both the industrial area (those arriving trains I talked about and for the yard lead (there was no way to put a runaround on the curve).
I hear what you are saying about the long parallels and agree with you and have played around with putting some twists and turns in the mainline. But, alas, not enough width. I like the idea of going to a second level and will play around with that see what I can come up with.
And I understand what you are saying about the operational characteristics in your last point.
ron@329My interest is in lots of intriguing switching situations rather than, say, elaborate scenery. Would love some feedback on what I came up with --- and if an experienced model railroader comes back and says it is totally nuts,
Would love some feedback on what I came up with --- and if an experienced model railroader comes back and says it is totally nuts,
I think you also have another problem, similar to the WSFT, at the Beverage Distributor: No room for trucks to back up to the loading docks, let alone allowing street traffic between the parked trucks and the mainline.
The solution is likely going to involve putting WSFT and the Beverage distributor next to each other, on the same side of two parallel spurs. The industry nearest the shared switch would back up to a short spur that stops short of the second industry, allowing that 2nd industry to back up to the 2nd spur. Since the Beverage Distributor is the deeper of the two buildings, I would make it the 2nd industry, furthest from the switch.
To have enough room for the trucks and street traffic in front of these 2 industries, both of these spurs are going to have to be either up near the mainline, or down near the yard.
To make room for that, the Furniture Co. could be moved to a new spur/extension off the end of the run-around at upper right. This allows you to remove the third industry spur on the left side.
This all makes for a much more significant change to your industrial trackage, but I don't see another good way to accomdate both the Beverage Distributor and the WSFT and their trucks.
While I was studying all this, I also noticed that the white curve at the left end of the Yard Lead/Industry Arrival track, the following RH switch and Y, could all be be replaced with two successive LH switches, eliminating the S curves, and cleaning up the route into the industries. It would also increase the usable length of the Yard Lead/Industry Arrival track.
Andy pretty much said what I was going to say. In fact he offered several great suggestions that I hadn't thought of.
Have fun with it!
Cheers!!
Dave
I'm just a dude with a bad back having a lot of fun with model trains, and finally building a layout!
Nice plan!
I like the flow of it, and the variety of industries, but I noticed a couple of problems.
1) The Water Street Freight Terminal's truck docks are on the opposite side of the building from the RR dock. So where you have it situated, you do not have room for trucks to back up to their docks. I would look at swapping the WSFT with the Oil Refinery & Pumps since you should have more room for truck access over there at upper right. I would also slide the lower left industrial spur (now for the oil refinery) up closer to the furniture company spur, to give you more room for the oil refinery, and potential future expansion.
2) Allied Rail Rebuilders is set up to run a spur into its middle via the roll-up door, for the loco/railcar to be rebuilt/refurbished. An addional side spur is for delivering replacement equipment/materials, etc., and could be considered optional.
3) Both road crossings interfere with points on switches. That won't work, because you have to leave enough clearance in the road deck for the points, which is too big a gap in the roadway, and also subjects the points to damage from the road vehicles (in real life). The road crossings need to be relocated, and perhaps combined into one crossing. You could put road crossings over switch frogs (though that would be a lot of work), etc., just not the moving points.
The remaining suggestions only reflect my preferences, and are not really problems.
I would add an empty spur on the right end of the industrial tracks, in between the two existing spurs, to use as an extended lead for switching cars at the industries on the right.
I would move the oil well pumps (called pump jacks) to a new spur in either lower corner, outside the mainline loops. Add a storage tank for the oil they pump, to be transferred to a tank car on the spur. Large storage tanks for flammable liquids are usually surrounded by a dike high enough to contain the spill from a ruptured tank. (same thing in modern refineries). It is unusual to have oil wells adjacent to a refinery.
I would move the engine house to the left end of the upper yard track, with the shed to the left of the Furniture Co.
That, in turn, sets up some other improvements:
1) That upper yard track can then become a full service engine track, with fueling and sanding equipment.
2) You can extend the lower 2 yard tracks for more yard capacity
3) you can slide the whole yard down closer to the mainline, extending the usable length of the AD track, by shortening the crossovers between mainline and AD track. I might keep the former engine house extension on the left end of the AD track, if for nothing more than additional capacity on the AD track.
4) Replace the curve at the entrance to the upper yard track with a RH switch, and add an extension to the right, for a Repair In Place (RIP) track. This extension could turn down and extend parallel to the yard ladder to keep that part of the yard more compact. RIP tracks can be their own little scene within a scene, with jacks, blocking timbers, a small "cherry picker" crane, equipment shed, spare & scrapped wheelsets, trucks, etc., to support minor repairs on freight cars, and get them and their cargo back on the road to their destination, or at least to a shop that can complete the repair.
Ron, I looked at your track plan and for what you are wanting to do and the type of locomotives you are wanting to use it looks great. As far as cabooses, they have been gone for a while now so no you don't need them if you don't want them. If you should change your mind, Atlas makes some nice "shoving platforms" which are cabooses with all the windows plated over and the crew must ride on the outside platform. Bluford Shops also make some really nice transfer cabooses that can also fill that roll. They are sometimes used when trains have to back long distances or in congested areas, but again that's up to you.
As far as your track plan, it really seems to have a lot of switching potential and I like that. I really enjoy switching myself and it keeps things interesting. Remember it's YOUR railroad and it's something that has to be most enjoyable to you.
Also welcome back to model railroading and welcome to N scale, that's where I am and I really enjoy it. I also just retired last year and am still in the process of building a small layout with enough switching possibilities to keep me interested.
Ralph