Gave up on keeping us up to date, huh Crandell?
Mark P.
Website: http://www.thecbandqinwyoming.comVideos: https://www.youtube.com/user/mabrunton
Brunton Gave up on keeping us up to date, huh Crandell?
You must know Crandell is busy working on it doesn't have time to take pics and post. No pressure or anything!
Modeling B&O- Chessie Bob K. www.ssmrc.org
Hi, everyone. Sorry for the slow pace, but much has gone on personally over the past couple of weeks. I haven't been slacking off in the loft, but it has been fits and starts such that progress has been slow. The spring is always nuts at our house with all the pent-up pressures from a long grey wet winter spewing forth in one way/place or another. I don't want to sound indelicate or biased/unedujumacated, but I am the lone male who is surrounded by wimmin. Springtime means I have to dig deep and take care of all sorts of anxieties, troubles, emergencies, illnesses, breaks, maintenance, and so forth. We men may not live as long, but it's a lot better quality...wouldn't trade it for a week of the longer life if I had to endure what the womenfolk do. Sheesh.
Back to the fun stuff. What was it again? Oh, yeah, building a layout...my favourite pastime...NOT!! I do it because I can't pay anyone else to do it, and I have to have one in order to enjoy my trains the way I like to enjoy 'em. [...sigh...]
Seriously, it isn't so bad. I am enjoying some aspects of it, but this build seems to offer all sorts of puzzles and challenges the second/last layout didn't. The helix was a bear at times (you were right, RRCanuck), but I think it is mostly my inexperience and inexpert skills. The next one, if I were ever to attempt one, would go differently. Figuring out how to wire the turning wye was also a challenge. It seemed straightforward on paper, but the reality was something else. I was having all sorts of shorts, and it wasn't until I went back and traced my feeders on the tail end of the Peco that splits the two wye routes that I found I had crossed two of them. What the....!!! Once corrected, so did the problems go away.
I am happy to say that the whole side of the loft is now laid, ballasted, and tested. I have some ballast tidying yet, and have to lay a small industrial spur of the long curved turnout at lower left of the first photo. That turnout was salvaged from my old layout and was scratchbuilt. The diverging route descends at about 3% so that I can lay level trackage running through a village and industrial comples. Nope, no idea what either of them will look like or represent. I like to wing it as I go. First I want to get the entire double mains and liftout bridges working flawlessly.
The helix is complete, although once I construct/scenic the mountain covering it, I will remove two already cut sections of the upper deck and insert bridges and portals. You might be able to make them out with zooming. They are both at left, close to the right side of the turning wye tracks.
This is a view from left of the last image looking toward the door and bridge area.
I have proved the power and tracking with an Atlas Train Master and a hand-pushed Walthers CPR passenger car with twin-axle trucks. Next test will be with the J Class 4-8-4 at speed, and finally with the CPR Selkirk. Later, the BLI Niagara 4-8-4 or the BLI Hybrid 2-10-2 Union Pacific TTT-6, which I intend to run before I begin to lay down scenery, because those are the most twitchy engines when it comes to decent track.
It was great to run the FM H24-66 and to hear its engine thrash loudly while it loaded and began to move. My trackwork seems to be paying off. I do have to be reminded of some tips now and then, but that is just a way to recover/recollect the excitement and learning during my first two attempts at making a layout.
Next up is pondering the construction and powering of the two liftout bridges. The upper deck is for the mains, and it will have the double crossover if you recall. The lower is offset a bit laterally and affords the descending ramp access at that point to the other side of the loft benchwork and eventually the staging yard after a 90 deg turn toward the yard bench.
I have yet to recover the old turntable and roundhouse section of the old yard, but I will have to cut it out and set it in place soon as I lay track past it and have to insert a section of new plywood next to it for the top surface of that bench. Meanwhile, I have harvested three Fast Tracks type turnouts from the old layout, and about four Peco #6 Code 83's. Soaked all of them, and then used a paring knife to dislodge the most clingy ballast and glue. A quick brushing and rinse, pat dry, and they are as good as new. They are running about $27 at M. B. Klein's, discounted, so I won't be chucking any of those into the landfill if I can help it. I even took up the Walthers/Shinohara curved #8 because it is/was expensive and does a good job on most steamers. The curved #7.5's with the fibbed claims of inner radius will probably end up in the landfill. I had to butcher them badly to get them to spread into wider radii so that I could use them.
I hope to update soon.
Crandell
Now THAT'S an update!
Thanks!
Terry in NW Wisconsin
Queenbogey715 is my Youtube channel
Good to see an update, Crandell! Until I can get my own new layout started (have to buy the house first), I have to usually model vicariously through others' work on their layouts, and your efforts top that list.
I hope the personal churn is behind you - I know that can not only eat up the time, but sap your energy while doing it.
Your slow pace is my blistering speed. I'm constantly amazed at how easily and fast you seem to progress. I'm looking forward to seeing even more!
Thanks for the update. It looks like you are doing really good work.
Curt Webb
The Late Great Pennsylvania Railroad
http://s1082.photobucket.com/albums/j372/curtwbb/
Thanks for the tour of your "work in progress"... the new layout is looking great. Thanks for taking the time to give us that update.
Bob
See I think that's my problem - I LIKE building layouts, so after I reach a certain point I sort of don;t do a whole lot - which is why my layout has been in progress nearly 3 years and I still have the entire cement plant area to build and I've only ballasted a whopping 6 feet of track. Not to mention I still have a siding, a spur, and the connection from staging to install yet. Instead, I sit here building covered hoppers out of open hoppers. OH well, eventually it will get done.
--Randy
Modeling the Reading Railroad in the 1950's
Visit my web site at www.readingeastpenn.com for construction updates, DCC Info, and more.
Well, then , you must convince yourself that you dislike it intensely, Randy. Start when you awaken on Sunday morning. Before you leave the bed, tell yourself how much you hate building layouts. I'm pretty sure you'll manage to spend about four hours in the train room before you know it. LOL!!
This evening I recovered the wooden trestle I built for my last layout. I managed to free it from the roadbed and its abutments, which I will make anew, and I got the Code 100 track off the curved deck. I would not have bothered if I hadn't taken a pencil swipe image with paper overlaid on the tracks already in place on the new layout, where I envisioned using it, to see if the curvature matched. When I took the rubbing and overlaid in on the trestle the match was close enough for curvature and length of arc segment, so I went at it. It came away nice and clean after a minute to let the glue in the ballast soften when I wet it. Then with the trestle upside down and the tracks on the bench, I gently sawed with a steak knife and forced the blade between the ties and the wooden 'stringers'. I heard some cracking, but the ties were popping away from the wood, so I just kept at it and soon the entire Code 100 length was away. Trestle feels solid, looks great. I will have to cut it down, but I I had to do that when I first installed it. I purposefully made the bents too long so that I had something to cut away during installation to ensure a tight fit with the terrain of the gully still to be made.
I also figured out tonight how to make my topmost liftout bridge. I will make twin parallel L-girders long enough to reach across the loft entrance gap. Sandwiched between the two L-girders will be twin blocks of 2X2 pine to act as both a spacer and backbone, one on top of the other separated by about 1/2". The top flanges of the L-girders will face outward. In total, those two flanges and the 1X2 spacers between them all, level to form the deck for the tracks, add up to a 5" wide deck. The headblocks on the #6 Walthers/Shinohara double crossover reach out to 4" from tip to tip across the appliance. So, that gives me one half inch on each side outboard to the edges, and gives me lots of gauge loading clearance to the side of the bridge itself.
How will I connect it to power? Ah, here's the neat part: I purchased small metal L brackets, the chromed kind with two holes on each 2" shank. I will fashion U-shaped blocks of 1X2 whose lower inside corners are lined with one of those brackets. Also on the outside corners of the bridge, the lower edges, will be the same metal brackets. The supporting blocks will be just wide enough, with the L brackets in their corners, that when the bridge rests on them, the four brackets on each of the four corners will nest precisely. Metal to metal contact established. On one end of the bridge, its U-shaped support will have its inside corner metal bracket liners with a thin feeder wrapped around the top of the retaining screw. More metal to metal. On the bridge-mounted L-brackets, a feeder also wrapped around one of the screws rises up to feed the rails. Should work, no? Simple, robust, effective, and a quick and easy lift-out is all I need. I don't need an spade connectors, which is ideal.
I'll post a diagramme tomorrow.
Thanks for the up date Crandell. Looks like a very interesting layout out so far. Well you have got a lot done with all the other things going on in your life.
Looking forward to the next up date. I have been checking every day I will add.
Ken
I hate Rust
Looking reeeeeeaaaaaally good Crandell. I bet its nice finally being able to run some trains huh!
I like that you're ballasting the track as you go. That's what I should have done. I still have unballasted track. LOL
Michael
CEO- Mile-HI-RailroadPrototype: D&RGW Moffat Line 1989
The new layout is looking AWESOME !!!!!
Bob/IG
Ii appreciate all your enthusiastic support.
Below is a diagramme of the lift-out bridge which will be duplicated below on the descending stage ramp. Probably, maybe. I'll see how this one goes.
I expect to have this constructed and in place tomorrow. I went at the entrance/duck-under module of my old layout two days ago, cutting all the wiring, removing a few screws and some carriage bolts. I also had to bust up all the tens of pounds of J-Cloth, window screen, and ground goop, including that nice hand-carved cliff. I hoisted the module outdoors, much lighter than it had been moments before, and removed all the end-screws of the joists so that I could free the L-girders. Finding the portions with the flattest/least warped tops of them, I marked them for cutting and will bring some of the old to the new when I construct the bridge.
More tomorrow.
Well, another lesson learned. It didn't go as easily as I had hoped. Nothing wrong with the design and idea, just the mechanics. And that problem was warped wood. The L-girders I harvested from the old layout were unsuitable because they had warped a bit, and one of the 1X4's was actually milled improperly. It was 1/4" off at one end. Didn't know that until I had trouble aligning the 2X2 blocking between it and the other one.
So, I had to start from scratch with freshly milled lumber, seasoned already, to make two new L-girder lengths. The bridge, minus steel bracket contacts on the corners, is setting at the moment while I have a coffee and a break. I won't put it into place until I have added the sub-roadbed, roadbed, tracks, and ballast so that they all provide the eventual grade at the rail ends to which I must match/align the truncated rails at each end of the gap that the bridge fills. Once I figure out how to get and keep all eight rail tips perfectly aligned, only then can I situate the support brackets. If I do this right, say by getting the bridge very close, then I can still fudge the loose oncoming rail ends on the permanent modules on each end of the bridge and get those to line, up, thus freeing me from all sorts of aggravation with the bridge placement. Assuming the bridge and supports are fixed and 99% reliably positioned from insertion to insertion, it makes sense to just make the four oncoming rails on each end of the gap do the conformation. All I will need is about 1/16" wiggle room. I will bevel all the rail ends well to ensure flanges get guided across the small gaps, even at speed.
Thanks for sharing Crandell; I always love reading layout build topics like these!!!
Darren (BLHS & CRRM Lifetime Member)
Delaware and Hudson Virtual Museum (DHVM), Railroad Adventures (RRAdventures)
My Blog
Thanks, Stourbridge Lion!
In a departure from construction, I present some sobering (for me) destruction.
The duckunder module at the entrance to my old layout is gone, with evidence of the busted up rock-hard ground goop all over the carpet. I cleaned it up soon enough.
With unfettered access to the operating pit, and the diagonal reversing loop bridge also gone as a result, I began to tear up the yard with a view to recovering any useful turnouts of the Peco Code 83 variety.
I bared the yellow underlay to mark a cut line to excise the turntable and roundhouse surgically, and then cut it out with an electric sabre saw. Worked well, and the desired chunk sits on the new layout in position, not yet fixed.
More later.
Stopped by the local small engine/lawn-mower/generator sales and repair depot to get a generic 6' throttle or choke cable, the one with a plastic armouring and sleeve. I had to nip off the wire square-S at the bared tip, bend up a new tip at right angles, and grind it down to a sharp pin to insert it into the one turnout on the entire layout I won't be able to reach...the one at the back, near the wall, of the helix. I fashioned a plywood retaining sandwich with grooves to hold the sleeve end in place, and glued it in place with the wire end in the throwbar hole and the other end with the actuating plastic lever and housing bolted to the helix's outer frame. It worked!
I have the W/S #6 double crossover glued into place atop the lift-out bridge. I need to cut down the metal L-brackets on one of their shanks because they are too long. Not looking forward to doing that eight times.
Once they are cut and the four corner ones installed on the bridge, I can fashion the support brackets for a snug fit, and then mount the brackets so that the rails align at all four gaps. That will require three hands.
I tell you Crandell, I am said to see the old layout coming apart.
I have many great photos saved that you have posted!
In fact this one is my desktop on the computer.
Yet if one has to go, so the other one can be, I am with you.
That's a terrific pic, Crandell. A Niagara and NYC Mikado out on the line and a Pennsy steamer in the roundhouse. Sweet.
Tom
https://tstage9.wixsite.com/nyc-modeling
Time...It marches on...without ever turning around to see if anyone is even keeping in step.
You can get those cables anywhere they sell bicycle parts. They are used for brake cables.
Dave
Lackawanna Route of the Phoebe Snow
Ken and Tom, yes that is a fairly nice photo. Jarrell worked his magic on it for me....he's the only guy I know who can make a silk purse out of a sow's ear.
Phoebe, yeah, I was going to visit them next if the engine/mower shop wanted too much or had cables too short/long. I have a tandem bike with the right cables, but the armouring was stripped at various places to leave it bare. I need the entire length, except for the last 1" and a bit, armoured.
Thanks for the reminder though.
Crandell,
When Mark started this thread in mid-January, I ignored it and haven't paid any attention to it since then until this morning. However, I just spent 45 minutes reading through the entire thread, and I must say that I am totally impressed with your project.
One observation. At a 29" height, either your turnouts will not be automated or you will add power from above rather than below. What do you plan to do in this regard?
Rich
P.S. I notice that Motley has spent quite a bit of time replying to this thread. Michael, on a personal note, I would remind you that you have an "extension layout room" that remains ignored and unfinished.
Do you ever plan to lay track ?
Alton Junction
Rich, you are right about the turnouts on such a low layout.
Even though I don't qualify as an 'operaor' the way so many modellers like to do it, I do insist upon using a pick to line the points all over the place. It's part of the fun for me, and about as close to operations as I get. I do get that others would rather automate it both for the challenge and to ensure they operate more like the real railroads where things are done remotely.
The one turnout I just connected to the cable is situated well out of both reach and sight, like by nearly 5 feet from my outstretched hand because it is against the wall at the back of the large helix. I made doubly sure to clean and test the turnout, and then to test it once I had it fixed in place. Later, I had to make sure the cable actuation was reliable, and so far it has worked. If I ever have a failure there, it won't be so bad to replace the turnout, but it won't be a cakewalk.
Thanks for your comment.
richhotrain P.S. I notice that Motley has spent quite a bit of time replying to this thread. Michael, on a personal note, I would remind you that you have an "extension layout room" that remains ignored and unfinished. Do you ever plan to lay track ?
Crandell has been making a lot more progress than I have, I will admit I have been slacking. But only because the weather is warm and i've been playing golf in my spare time.
selector Ii appreciate all your enthusiastic support. Below is a diagramme of the lift-out bridge which will be duplicated below on the descending stage ramp. Probably, maybe. I'll see how this one goes. I expect to have this constructed and in place tomorrow. I went at the entrance/duck-under module of my old layout two days ago, cutting all the wiring, removing a few screws and some carriage bolts. I also had to bust up all the tens of pounds of J-Cloth, window screen, and ground goop, including that nice hand-carved cliff. I hoisted the module outdoors, much lighter than it had been moments before, and removed all the end-screws of the joists so that I could free the L-girders. Finding the portions with the flattest/least warped tops of them, I marked them for cutting and will bring some of the old to the new when I construct the bridge. More tomorrow. Crandell
Crandell, having built a few lift-out bridges, I would recommend adding some of that 1/2" ply you have as a top layer to your bridge to insure flatness and stiffness.It should also help prevent twisting over time. Glue and screw everything together so you end up with a mono-block., but you probably know that.
Jay
C-415 Build: https://imageshack.com/a/tShC/1
Other builds: https://imageshack.com/my/albums
Jay, thanks for the tips. In fact, the bridge is constructed pretty much as shown, and of course it has twists in it which forced me to alter the electrical contact design. For one, the horizontal flanges on the L-braces are too long...they would overlap over the bottom surface of the wood block. So, I elected to cut those flanges, invert them and place them on the inside shoulders of the supporting outer blocks on which the bridge rests, and to use wood screws as bearings, thust still getting a means of electrical contact. It has meant that the positioning of the supporting blocks with the inverted modified L-braces has to be carefully determined due to the construction of the bridge, its somewhat twisted wooden elements, and the requirement to have the screws adjust for vertical alignment at the rail tops. It has been a challenge, and I know I'll have to continue to tinker with this, even to the extent of softening the ballast, removing the double crossing, and building a whole new bridge with better quality lumber, maybe even 5/8" quality plywood. No rush...what I have will work until I decide I want a better setup, or until I gain confidence that what I have constructed works reliably.
It looks fine, and so far the alignment at the rails is fine, even with repeated insertions and removals of the bridge. It remains to be seen what a season change will do to the section of the layout.
Crandell, if the bridge has twisted, you will probably continue to have issues with it as time goes on, As I see it from the design, your trouble is most likely the use of the 2x2s. Not sure what you used, but assume they where just ripped from 2x4 stock. Pine, hemlock and even fir can be unstable for this. I know it's tough to pick stock that looks like it may remain, but usually is not the case. Funny how many can just use a 1x4 spanning 3 ft and back it up w/ a simple block and it will remain straight as an arrow for years. Guess you didn't luck out. I generally rely on constucting things like this w/ 1/2 or 3/4" birch ply. A birch/ poplar 1x2 top and bottom w/ gusseted sides of hardwood ply would remain quite stable. The top 1x2 could also extend slightly as to provide the anchoring at both ends. Capping the top w/ ply as mentioned would also help. Tappered doweling could help tremendously for always locating the bridge, this is true in case there is any benchwork movement from humidity/ drying etc. One day it may drop in but removal may need a few good raps to lift. If you continue to have problem w/ the electrical connection of those "L" brackets, you can "mortise" them in for the fit desired. I would even allow for slight angle as they would tighten the further down the bridge is placed. Solid to solid metal contacts may give an unrelyable or intermittant contact, Wave or spring bronze strips would always remain tight and provide contact. Still better than a plug in connector.
You're doing some fantastic work thus far, especially like the helix workmanship.
BUMP!!!
As I had not seen anything new recently, I thought a BUMP was in order to get any recent updates. Keep up the good work, Crandell.
Blue Flamer.
I have been plugging away at the mains and the yard. I have the mains twinned to the far bridge, where it will be just under the block glass large window you see in photos at the far wall of the loft. I have ballasted all but 5'. The bridge is a twin track Atlas through truss being sent to me by a member living in a gulf state.
Meanwhile, I have fashioned a handlaid two-way turnout a-la-Chuck with odd geometry that will comprise the west end yard access to the throat, installed it, fiddled with it endlessly, and finally decided it was time to wind up and shove a Walthers heavyweight passenger car through it at super speed. It stuck!! I had it doing about 90 scale mph, and despite the very shallow S curve necessary for the geometry to get to the yard, it went well and was diverted smoothly down the passenger train track.
I have run out of Atlas Code 83 with wooden ties, but have more coming from Walthers. Because I have a hodge-podge of turnouts for the yard, Peco Code 83, hand laid, and one Atlas, I decided to use Peco Code 83 rails in the yard with Peco joiners because that brand comprised about 70% of the turnouts. Those rails are to be shipped soon...I hope. It has been a week and still no shipment notice from the dealer.
After some yard work today, I will clean out the loft so that it looks presentable in photos and take a couple to show how things are coming along. I'm not wasting time, but I am taking my time. And, as one would antiticipate come spring, there are many calls for pent up needs of all kinds.
I am at the stage where I am trouble-shooting track sections. I manually run a Walthers heavyweight passenger car (six axles) along places at speed, both directions, to see how it tracks. Comoing off a superelevated curve is a Code 100 Fast Tracks #8 from my previous layout. Tuning its join with the oncoming Code 83 Atlas tracks and also the easing out of the superelevation was my chore over the past 24 hours. The heavyweight didn't like it. It would not continue to track through the points end of the turnout properly...at least the lead truck did not. It would derail right at the point, but it also lifted just prior to the point. So, I had to modify the geometry slightly, but mostly I reduced the s/e a bit more and softened the solder to make the joint a bit flatter. I also fiddled with the point itself to get it a bit more flush and to change the angle at the tip a bit for better fit. That seems to have done the trick.
I am about to wire the other half of the main line (only done it one direction, right-ways from the controller, across the lift-out, and on into the helix...about 20'). So, I will work left now for about the 18' it will take to terminate the bus that way. Once I have three or four feeders soldered here and there, I will be able to test all my trackwork, minus the truss bridge section, with some steamers since they will be my most troublesome testers. I'll save the Athearn Genesis SD-75M's for later once I have the tracks tuned for my steam fleet. They will probably not be very happy. They weren't with my last rail system in a couple of places, mostly where superelevation was not very consistent.
More later. I still have to muck out the loft, tear up all the floor maksing tape I used to figure out curves and lengths, including benchwork limits, and vacuum. Then I'll post some photos.