General Discussion (Model Railroader)

I'll be having guests over for op sessions in the near future on my 16ft-by-17ft island-style layout.  For switching, I have a steel mill and plenty of trackside industries.  But the main line right-of-way is only 60ft long  [45ft if you exclude the Arrival/Depature track at the visible end of a run].  And I just don't have the space for long runs between towns.

I'm trying to figure out how to keep an operator occupied for a bit longer than the ~3-4 minutes it takes a train to make a full circuit over the main line.  One idea I've been pondering is doing an extra 'lap' around the main between each town, before 'officially' recognizing that the train has passed that milepost.  I have 5 towns altogether, so this could make a complete main line run last about 20-25 minutes.

Have any of you ever done laps, or seen somebody else do them?  I've never hosted op sessions before, so I don't want to propose doing anything that seems too weird...

T-I-A 

I've done it on my own layout - forever.    I've never seen it done with an operating group.  The issue would be how to schedule the extra meetings of the train with the crews already switching.  It could make it impossible for them to get a simple run-around move completed.  

 Do your crews take the time to brake test the cars?

How about stopping before getting on and off equipment? 

Do you run at prototypical speeds? If you've got a short run, limt crews to 25 MPH.

Are they shoving down industry tracks at reasonable rates?

Are they making hard hitches? Slow them down if they don't!

 My mainline runs from staging to Westport to staging, a short one too.

But I've three industrial districts and the yard at Westport. Usually there're two operators for the Westport yard, one for the switcher at Third Street District, one for the Harbor Turn and one for the Plywood Local. If there're more people these are crews of two, conductor and engineer.

The Harbor Turn runs from Westport via Third Street District and sets out cars there and runs to Harbor District.There he does his work and runs back, picking up cars at Third Street District.

The Plywood Local  runs from Westport via Third Street to Plywood District, does there the work and runs along the Belt Line via Harbor Jct. to Westport.

 

 The time each crew needs is different. Some switch faster than others. There's no crew lounge, who has no work looks at the others.

 operation   

Wolfgang

 I've been wondering that myself. Ever since my friends convinced me to merge my staging yard and classification yard, I've been wondering how I'm going to work with that. I've created a crew change point where the mainline "loops" from one end of the railroad to the other, but I'm worried about the mainline run from the yard to that point (even on the long way) being too short. I'd never considered laps. Let us know of your decision, I'd be interested to find out if it works for you.

I would also take GraniteRailroader's suggestions, just to increase time spent out on the road. If you have a grade (or an area that might have a grade in real life, even if your layout doesn't), you might try implementing helper service on the grade, or a mandatory stop at the summit to pin down handbrakes, and the counterpart at the bottom to release them. That would give your crews more time spent on the road, because they have to stop and let the brakeman walk the train tying down brakes. If you have a yard, a train might stop for a crew change, giving another stop that adds running time.

Good luck, and keep us imformed! There's probably a lot of us out here who have a similer problem!

Texas Zepher:

...  The issue would be how to schedule the extra meetings of the train with the crews already switching.  It could make it impossible for them to get a simple run-around move completed.

 

TZ - I understand what you're saying, assuming that the crew of the Cleveland Local was always switching on the single-track section of the mainline - that could indeed be a problem.  However in my situation, only 2 of the industry spurs hang directly off the shared section.  The other industries hang directly off of passing sidings or a branch line.  The Cleveland Local crew would NOT do laps, they wouldn't need to since the pickup/setout of cars will keep them occupied for awhile.  My concern is for the pass-thru, intercity freight crew: Unless I can schedule ~12 different trains for them to pilot during an evening session, they'll spend maybe a total of 10 minutes per train:  3 running their train over the mainline,  2 leaving the staging yard, 3 getting back into staging, plus another 2 communicating with the Dispatcher.

GraniteRailroader:

Do you run at prototypical speeds? If you've got a short run, limit crews to 25 MPH.

Granite - that's already been factored into my calculations, it's how I came up with the 3-minute time to make one lap (60ft / 20mph = 3).

GraniteRailroader:

Do your crews take the time to brake test the cars?
How about stopping before getting on and off equipment?

Hadn't really thought about those, I'll look into that...

GraniteRailroader:

Are they shoving down industry tracks at reasonable rates?

Since my layout is full of 'quality-challenged' Atlas turnouts, they have no choice but to take 'em s-l-o-w, LOL!

GraniteRailroader:

Are they making hard hitches? Slow them down if they don't!

This certainly applies to locals and point-to-pointers; but an intercity pass-thru freight cleared for the shared section of mainline, once it starts moving there's [supposedly] no reason for it to stop anywhere to do setouts or pickups.

wedudler:

My mainline runs from staging to Westport to staging, a short one too.

But I've three industrial districts and the yard at Westport. Usually there're two operators for the Westport yard, one for the switcher at Third Street District, one for the Harbor Turn and one for the Plywood Local. ...

Wolfgang - I glanced the simplified trackplan of your legendary layout and at first I thought, "Wow - maybe there is a way I could make this work [without laps] after all!"  But when I looked at the detailed track diagram on your web site, I noticed you have way more switchable industries than I do.  Excluding the engine terminal, yards and switchbacks, I counted at least 30 spurs on your layout - that's 4 times the number I have!  Definitely enough to keep 5 crews occupied. This pretty much confirms what I was planning to do all along: Have only two guest crews, one in charge of the local and the other ferrying mainline freights.  Hopefully they'll be kept busy for an hour or two... 

TrainManTy:

... If you have a grade (or an area that might have a grade in real life, even if your layout doesn't), you might try implementing helper service on the grade, or a mandatory stop at the summit to pin down handbrakes, and the counterpart at the bottom to release them. That would give your crews more time spent on the road, ...

Tyler, I like your idea alot - I've seen lots of helper activity here in West Central Maryland and other mountainous areas and would love to replicate it in model form.  Trouble is, the region I'm modeling - northern Ohio near the shore of Lake Erie - doesn't have any steep enough hills or sustained grades that would make helpers look believable [In fact, the area of Cleveland that contains the steel mills is known as The Flats]. 

. . .

Thank you for the responses, gentlemen - I'm getting a lot of new ideas from this, keep 'em coming!

 

Laps are what I'm planning to do. Make up a train and pull it onto the main and let it run for a given amount of time/laps before pulling back into the inner layout to it's destination.