A few months ago, a friend built me a mini table top layout board that is hollow in the middle with a removable bottom to access wiring and such. Originally for Lionel prewar OO gauge, that plan never happend and the layout just sat. But the traction bug has bitten and I have aquired several brass cars and dug out my poles I bought a few years ago when I considered doing traction before.
The idea is a layout that fits in the back of my Jeep Liberty and can be handled by just myself without to much risk to the trolley overhead. Its very lightweight and I will keep it that way, buildings will mostly be removable to keep the weight down, since I am modeling northern Indiana scenery, its mostly flat, also helping keep the weight down.
I removed the toy train style grass carpet from the table top, laid out the Atlas "snap" track with 15" radius curves(no issues for traction, it can go much much tighter than 15"). The poles are mostly set in place on the main loop. Still working out how I want do the carbarn still. Wont be any overhead trolley wire just yet, need to do basic track ballest and building placement before adding the overhead wire to the poles. So the cars run off the 2 rails for power right now. So far I have 4 ex Sacremento Northern cars that will be painted for my proto freelance traction company. Then I have 3 Chicago Aurora & Elgin cars and 2 Chicago North Shore cars. They will be in their respective paint schemes as I like both of those lines as well. Most are Suydam brass imports with 2 from S. Soho and one from MTM imports. I hope to have the layout done enough to run at the fall train shows this year. Here is how the layout looks as of tonight.
Silly NT's, I have Asperger's Syndrome
emdmikelaid out the Atlas "snap" track with 15" radius curves(no issues for traction, it can go much much tighter than 15").
In the 1980s I discovered an unaltered Athearn SW1500/SW7 mechanism could take 9 inch radius just fine. And built several traction bodies on some of them.
emdmikeWont be any overhead trolley wire just yet, need to do basic track ballest and building placement before adding the overhead wire to the poles.
Don't ya love the sound trolley poles and/or pantographs make going along the wire!
And a well tuned spring belt drive sound is not all that different from the gear noise that a typical interurban car has as it moves along the line. They have a "growl" to them from the pinion gear/bull gear on each axle. Combined with metal wheel on rail and flange noise, its just a beautiful sound you cannot hear on diesels. Then hearing the wire sing as the car approaches. There is so much to enjoy with traction modeling, once one gets over the fear of building the overhead wiring.
No new pics, but yesterday I took down the old modified 4x8 table and benchwork that the mini layout was resting on. That freed up lots of space in my tiny train room. I moved my work bench/desk and set up an old card table to set the traction layout on. Its at the same height as my work bench, which will aid in building the overhead and doing scenery work as I can sit in my rolling desk chair and go between the work bench and layout as they are next to each other. If anybody is near Kokomo, Indiana, I will donate the old layout parts. The "benchwork" was several professionaly built frame modules that I shelf mounted to the walls. Its free for the taking, need it all out of my garage and with the cost of wood, this should help someone out.