Thanks for the update Corey. Nice to know that I helped somebody, and I hope you get what you want for christmas(Hope that I do to )
"Mess with the best, die like the rest" -U.S. Marine Corp
MINRail (Minessota Rail Transportaion Corp.) - "If they got rid of the weeds what would hold the rails down?"
And yes I am 17.
Before you decide how to operate your layout, you have to define what your layout does. That is: How does the railroad make it's money.
A bridge line that connects two points with some local switching enroute? Maybe more than one railroad has trackage rights and different power may show up.
Cars have to be spotted at your industries and then sent back out on the mane lion. How does your industry make money.
Here in Richardton, Red Trail Energy is the big rail customer. 20 to 30 trains a day pass through town without stopping, for we are on the BNSF mainline (former Northern Pacific Main Line), But the Local train drops and picks up cars. If only one or two cars are to be moved, the regular local serving the brick plant in Hebron and the elevator in Gladstone can handle the traffic. Usually the ethanol plant gets its own trains.
It receives grain (corn) by both rail and truck. It receives a tank car of gasoline (to denature the ethanol so that it cannot be used as a beverage) and strings of coal cars for the power plant. The plant was supposed to receive local coal by truck, but the engineers did not do their sums right and the low quality local coal would not suffice, so it now comes by rail from Wyoming.
Outbound loads are of course ethanol strings of tank cars larger than the gasoline tank above, and covered hoppers transporting brewers yeast used for livestock feed.
If a small train is going out, the conductor must perform the inspection, if it is to be a larger train, a car knocker will drive in from Dickinson to inspect and prepare the train for departure.
The Coal Facility, obviously ad-hoc:
The Plant, with a string of grain cars: There are only three tracks all parallel to the BNSF main line, but these four tracks total more than four miles of privately owned track. The Plant has two locomotives of its own.
A BNSF Coal train passes through town:
ROAR
The Route of the Broadway Lion The Largest Subway Layout in North Dakota.
Here there be cats. LIONS with CAMERAS
Thanks for the info Lion, i know the system i will use but i don't know 100 % what industry will be on the layout.
Corey
Railroading In Council Bluffs
http://www.rrincb.com/
Visit my caricature carving website:
http://iowacarver.tripod.com/
Lion, I also thank you for the information and pictures.
Corey, Thanks for starting this posting as it has been interesting.
Ken G Price My N-Scale Layout
Digitrax Super Empire Builder Radio System. South Valley Texas Railroad. SVTRR
N-Scale out west. 1996-1998 or so! UP, SP, Missouri Pacific, C&NW.
No problem! Not much progress probably this month... got to get my Christmas carving done!
i didnt really know were to put this but im building a intermodal layout containers will be the only rolling stock i have on this but what im wondering is what kind of busisnesses can i use that take containers? Another question i have is were could i take the containers to before they leave out on trucks? Like from the yard to wear? then to trucks then out to businesses. If anybody can help it would be great. Thanks.
Jake
beginner i didnt really know were to put this but im building a intermodal layout containers will be the only rolling stock i have on this but what im wondering is what kind of busisnesses can i use that take containers? Another question i have is were could i take the containers to before they leave out on trucks? Like from the yard to wear? then to trucks then out to businesses. If anybody can help it would be great. Thanks.
Hi Jake --
Basically you decide whether you want to model a port (where containers are transferred from ships to trains (or the other way around), or an inter-modal terminal, where containers are transferred from trains to trucks (or the other way around.
It is not really relevant where the containers will opened to be emptied or loaded - the point of transporting a container by rail is to haul a pile of containers from one terminal, half way across the country and then transfer the containers to another mode of transportation (typically truck or ship).
Container transport is very efficient, but (IMO) fairly boring. You push a string of RR cars with containers into a track and leave em. The people at the terminal will take the containers off the cars and either put them directly onto a truck or ship, or stack em for later pickup by truck or ship.
They will then put new containers on your flatcar, typically bound for another terminal half a continent away. You hook up your road power (locomotive) and leave. End of story.
RR cars loaded with containers aren't usually delivered to individual end customers. If you want to switch individual customers, you would most likely be better advised to put the container cars away and instead modeling e.g. rail deliveries to some industry that is directly rail served.
Smile, Stein