Finalized Track Plan

On Mon, 15 Oct 2007 15:36:00 -0700, I said, "Pick a card, any card" and steve instead replied:

I've heard of a tight radius before but this is the limit!

Do I smell a typo there? Made me smile before the morning coffee. That takes some doing!

-- Ray

I was going to mention a layout in (I think) MRC which had a Pug running around a circle which had a coin as one rail, but Steve says his 3" radius is on the outside mainline - I wonder what radius the inside mainline is???

Greg.P.

Probably somewhere near that of a gnat's arse...

fl@liner

He said the outside radius is 3", and the inside radius is 36".

The layout must be built around a black hole with significant warping of space around it.

s:

Okay, foist of all, let's get this into some discussable form. The plan is at

*Yahoo* groups: groups.yahoo.com/group/MILWmodelers rather than Google Groups, or the Usenet newsgroups that Google is slyly pretending to own. Here is a small jpeg of the track plan:

It's low resolution but will do for some discussion. Let us begin:

As it stands, this plan is a good start, but it can be greatly improved. Consider, first of all, the size. The Koesters and John Allens have operating crews, but most of us don't...at least not at first. Even the big boys, I wager, find that they're operating their own railroads, or with small crews, from time to time. It's important, therefore, to consider just how many people you want to keep busy. Modified or as-is, this is a lot of railroad to keep running...I'd guess that you'd need at least

8, five yard operators, a dispatcher, and two road engineers, to maintain a reasonable level of traffic on your original plan. Design something smaller, say 60 square feet, and you'll have enough to keep yourself, or yourself and a couple of friends, enjoyably busy, without getting into maintenance headaches.

Assuming you do want to keep a dozen people occupied, and can rely on them to help you with maintenance, here are some changes to your plan that might make it even better:

One strong point of your plan is that you haven't crowded it with track. You've taken a common plan for a 12 x 12 or so layout and doubled its size. This will help you very much in creating a realistic landscape. I took this a step further, eliminating your four small yards, and reducing the size of your large one. Yards, you see, are not storage areas, but working areas. Too much yard will just give you headaches and cost a lot in switches. The smaller yard is still very large for a personal layout.

I tried to make your layout less mechanical-looking. You have a lot of room, so some curves here and there are a good plan. You want to take away the viewer's awareness of the table edge.

Not being familiar with the prototype, I tried to include as much of the essence of midwestern railroading as possible - the small grain- elevator towns, the branch line, the interchanges, the electric switching line. You might not want these - they are just suggestions.

I used some of the yard space to add a passenger terminal with coach yard. You'll have to do some research on this, but after that you'll have found your monogrammed RI towels and will be the envy of the gang, making up trains, switching out diners and express cars, that sort of thing. Besides, Rock Island, Ill. had a beautiful small terminal that would be a perfect showpiece.

I also added some engine service facilities. You didn't mention era, but in a more modern one you could just model a rundown roundhouse that is still used to turn wheels and such things, which could provide interesting detail opportunities. I also added suggestions for industrial tracks - a RI operated area by the yard, and an "electric switching line" across the river. I don't know if Rock Island really had one, but to this easterner these ex-interurbans are just so associated with the midwest that I had to include it, and you've just got to have the River.

In general, I tried to add more way-freight opportunities, crossovers for lots of meets, and a branch with some interchange. I didn't fully work out the details, which would take time I don't have just this minute, but I think with some trial and error you should be able to come up with those.

Finally, I gave you a staging area to help generate traffic. This is, of course, only one-directional staging, so you might want to add something going the other way, or perhaps a hidden curving track to the other end of the line.

Happy railroading! Remember, though, that it's better to start small and have fun than to go for the big time right away, and fall short. Most model railroads that actually get built, they say, are about 60 square feet.

Cordially yours: Gerard P. President, a box of track and a gappy table.

"Ray Haddad" wrote

Brings to mind the phrase "See Poland by rail!"

Pete

the plan is at

The era is 1979-1985 from Perry,Iowa- Savanna,Illinois. gerald I like the plan you have drawn,how big is the yard and how many staging tracks?I am including Milwaukee Road and Rock Island and I am not having any passenger trains just freight trains. let me know about the yard and staging. Steve Church Milwuakee Road and Rock Island Iowa Division

in your link there is a dot missing... between models and railroad. Please resend your (corrected) message.. editing a link may lead to strange results.

Groet, salut, Wim.

the track plan fro the layout and it will be a double

Thank You fro pointing that out Gerald,I have dorrected it and added the dot between models and railroad. Steve Church Milwaukee Road and Rock Island Iowa Division.ps.what is the size of the track plan you designed Gerald?

the track plan fro the layout and it will be a double

ps.What is the size of the track plan Gerald?

I assumed he was working in three dimensions rather than two - or do I mean four dimensions?

the track plan fro the layout and it will be a double

the track plan fro the layout and it will be a double

snipped-for-privacy@gannon.edu wrote:

Gerard, Thanks for the track plan. Looks like it's 25' by 25', which is a humungous layout. First thing I'd think about is a staged construction plan. Say build one half the bench work. Add some loop back track so that you can run trains continously on the half you have up. Get that half working, do some scenery, before expanding the layout by building the other half. You want to keep the railroading juices flowing, which means you gotta run trains. If you have a two year building job before the first train runs, you may find layout construction begins to lag behind schedule as you loose interest in the endless benchwork and tracklaying. Is the blue line a view block? The layout will be more fun to operate if you add a bunch of spur tracks serving industries. Then you can operate peddler freights that amble round the layout picking up and dropping off cars at factories. Plus you can then scratch build the factory buildings. Your mainline runs straight down the edge of the table, which calls attention to the fact that the table has an edge, and your trains are in fact just chugging round a table. Better would be to add some gentle curves to the main line so the track looks like it is following the terrain, rather than a table edge. Rolling stock expands to fill track available. You will acquire more rolling stock than you know what to do with. You want as much storage track as you can afford, so you can use all of your rolling stock without having to take 'em out of boxes, place then on the track, and when finished, pack the cars away in boxes again. You want to have trains all made up and on the track, ready to run. This way you can have an express freight, a long coal drag, a streamline passenger train, an old and tired local passenger train, a peddler freight, a milk train, a wreck train, a fruit block, a grain train, a piggyback, and more, standing on the rails ready to run. If the blue lines are view bocks, then you have a lot of room behind the view blocks for staging tracks, holding trains you can run for just flipping a few turnouts. Or, with a lot of visible yard trackage, you can have a goodly number of trains ready-to-run standing by on yard tracks.

David Starr

Makes one wonder what kind of layout Steven Hawking would create.

Dan, U.S. Air Force, retired

That 3" radius is a real space-saver, but where are you going to find an articulated 0-6-0 to run on it?

Wuerttemberg F class.

Regards, Greg.P.

Wouldn't that be an 0-2-2-2-0?

Greg Procter skriver:

The Würt F class, isn't that a BR 53

Klaus