well-i-spent-several-hours-today

well-i-spent-several-hours-today

Well, I spent several hours today working on the layout. After the last work day with Wayne and Drew, I had decided to go with the Woodland Scenics foam for the grades. This turned out to be pretty expensive, but the math and engineering on the alternatives was driving me crazy! It's not that easy to do cookie cutter on a 500 square-foot layout.

It cost $110 for the foam just to do the UP line, BUT the grades are perfect. Since I plan on keeping this layout for ten years or more, perfect grades seem worth the expense.


The InterMountain tunnel motors are starting to hit the shelves and I expect mine in the mail soon. The buzz has been mixed on these. Some comments about thick glue lines, distorted details, and headlight locations. Much of the noise seems to be coming from the usual rivet counters. That is not a concern of mine, unless they are poor runners. I've got a Cotton Belt, a Southern Pacific and a Union Pacific on order. My roster was light for the UP tracks, and with the UP trademark crap going on, I figured I better get some while I can. If I don't like them, I can always sell them on eBay. They're already getting about $20 more than I paid for mine.

Tonight was the annual holiday party for the Corona Model Railroad Society. We had a model contest with a citrus theme. I built an N scale diorama of a fruit stand which won Grand Prize for best use of theme! I donated my prize money back to the club, but kept the blue ribbon. You can click on the thumbnail for a bigger version. On the left of the fruit stand there is an old hound sleeping next to two old guys playing checkers. Inside the stand is a lady with boxes of oranges. Leaning on the side of the stand is a guy watching the traffic stop out front where the local cop has pulled over a hot-rodder. An orange grove is at the back of the diorama.

I was feeling artsie-fartsie tonight so I started working on a diorama for the modeling contest at the train club. I got to a point where I couldn't do anything else on the diorama tonight so I started working on the backdrop for the layout. Before I knew it I had painted the backdrops from Blue Cut to Silverwood.

I'm not sure just who Charlie Burns is, but someone who knows him has posted this web site of Charlie's N Scale Layout.


I don't know too much about his layout except what I can deduce from the photos. It uses spline roadbed; a high rail height; lower-level staging; and lots of track. It says on one of the pages, "To move the 7 trains through the layout once and back into the helixes to where they started took about 90 minutes." Cool!

Long's Trains in Moreno Valley is having a 30% off sale on selected locomotives. I picked up a couple Kato locomotives for $54 each. One is an SD40 in CP Rail paint for eBay. The other is an SD80 in Norfolk Southern paint to run on my layout. NS and BNSF have an agreement to run coast to coast trains, so I frequently see their locomotives in the Cajon subdivision. This new loco will be a great addition to the roster.

Stuart just emailed to ask how many times I stuck my head into the fans while installing the fluorescent lamps. The answer is zero. I had stuck my head into the fan blades and ripped them out soon after. It was pretty dramatic. My head hit the spinning blade, setting the fan into an odd orbit and striking the garage door. The strike caused the blade to skew, creating a mean shimmy, which led to splinters of fan blades flying everywhere. Each strike against the aluminum garage door, clanged out, causing my dogs to flee in horror. Argh! The fans worked great on previous layouts, but the layouts were never this high off the ground.

As expected, today was a great day of working on the layout. This is a photo of Drew and Wayne working on the benchwork at Summit. Actually, Wayne's elbow is resting on Keenbrook. We started at 9:30 and went to 4:30, so that is about 20 man-hours of work if I deduct the few minutes we spent wolfing down Sherry's turkey taquitos!

We have all of the subroadbed installed for Devore, Colton, Lugo and Summit. We have the subroadbed cut and laid out for Keenbrook, Blue Cut, Devore, Cajon Station, Sullivan's Curve, and Silverwood.

Last night I installed new fluorescent lights over the layout. There is now eight, four-foot, plus one eight-foot fixture illuminating the layout.

Things are moving along quickly. I've signed up my layout for the January layout tour with the Corona Model Railroad Society. We might even get to see a train run!

PS: I'm working on the problem with the archives. They should be back soon.

Kato has just about cleared their inventory of decorated Dash 9 shells. At a price of $15, I'm not surprised. I picked up an SP shell for airbrush practice and maybe an occaisonal run on the layout. It came in the mail yesterday, and like everything from Kato, it looks terrific.

The train club meets on Tuesday night and I'm presenting a clinic on railroad grades. This all started when I was looking at a cheap 12" aluminum level I picked up at the dollar store. It has three bubble levels: horizontal, vertical, and forty-five degrees.

Since each of the bubbles is held in place with two screws, I got to thinking that I could adjust them to show one, two and three percent grades.

That began the quest to complete all the computations and find an easy way to do all the calibrations. So here it goes:

- 1% grade is 1" of raise over 100 inches distance.
- One inch divided by 100 inches is 0.01 inches.
- 100 inches is 8.33 feet.
- 0.01 times 8.33 is .083 inches of elevation per foot for a 1% grade.
- A Kennedy Half Dollar is 0.084 inches thick, which is pretty damn close to 0.083".

So, with a foot long level, you set one end on top of one coin and adjust the bubble so it says level. Do it over two coins and adjust one of the other bubbles to level. Lay it on three coins and adjust the last bubble to level. Finally, label the bubbles for one, two and three percent grades.

Now, as I'm doing the subroadbeds, I can refer to the level to make sure I don't exceede my layout standards.

Okay, I got the SD40 shell, and there is no way it is going to fit on an SD40-2 frame. Sounds like a perfect excuse for buying another locomotive! I just ordered the cheapest Kato SD40 I could find, a CP Rail with the right color sideframes for the Conrail shell. When it gets here, I'll swap the shells and eBay the CP Rail shell, hopefully for the price I paid for the Conrail shell. Ah, the best laid plans...

At least once a week I log into RailPictures.net and check out the new Cajon photos. One of the most prolific Cajon photographers on the site is Santiago Homsi Jr. He has a photo taken last week that is Cajon Pass. Check it out!

Yesterday, Wayne and I were talking about foreign power on the BNSF. It got me thinking, and checking my locomotive roster. It turns out that I have two BNSF SD40-2 locos with the same road number. I did a search on eBay and found a Conrail SD40 shell with eight minutes left on the auction. I don't know if it it'll fit on the Dash 2's frame, but it was worth a shot. I also have a GP20 with a banged up ATSF shell. I just bid on a UP shell for the same loco. Curse you Wayne!

 

Been a rough week with the fires here in Southern California. I've been on standby with the County's Emergency Operations Center, so I've stuck close to home. An old friend lost her home in Julian, with the only saving grace being that the fire crews were able to use her water tank to save her neighbor's home. I have a coworker that has(?) a cabin up in Arrowhead, and I haven't found out yet if it's still standing. There is a lot of finger pointing going on, but Southern California ecosystems are based upon fire ecology. Back to trains, I printed out several dozen photos of the prototype backgrounds so I could use them for inspiration for painting the backdrops on the layout. I've taped them to the top of the backdrops and in so doing, stuck my head into the ceiling fan again. I'm really having to rethink that whole ceiling fan thing. With the layout being armpit height, every time I climb onto a stool I'm getting a haircut. I'll probably take the fans out and go with oscillating fans in the corners.

Over on Trainorders.com, I started a thread asking about extras that make a layout more convenient. Things like cup holders so drinks stay off the scenery. There are some interesting ideas that popped up, but you'll need to be a member to follow the link (the site is worth the registration money).

I've been thinking about how I can transfer the trackplan from the computer to the plywood, and I think I have an idea that beats carbon paper and tracing the printouts. Instead, I'll just put staples down the centerline of all the tracks and tear the paper away, leaving a thin metal line where the cork should be glued.

My buddy Wayne came over today to help on the layout. We got quite a bit done, installing all the masonite backdrops. After he left, I sanded and painted the blue on about two-thirds of the backdrops. I would've finished the blue, but the glue was still drying on the portion from Blue Cut to Silverwood. Right before he got there I had a pretty dramatic accident as I climbed a ladder and stuck my head into the spinning ceiling fan! It swung out of control, and into the rolled up garage door, bending one of the blades. My hard head survived the blow.

Tonight, I worked out the elevations and grades for the layout. They are imortalized below. These elevations are from the top of the benchwork base.

Devore: 0"
Cajon: 2.25" BNSF WB/EB (2%); 3.5" UP (3%)
SR 138: 4.75" BNSF WB (3%); 4.75" BNSF EB (<3%); 6.5" UP (2%)
Silverwood: 8" BNSF WB (3%); 8.25" BNSF EB (3%); 9" UP (2%)
Summit: 9.25" BNSF WB (3%); 9.25" BNSF EB (<3%)
Hivolt: 9.25" UP (2%)
Colton: 0" UP (4%)

Over at N Scale Supply, Scott has posted a pretty comprehensive list of the new stuff revealed at the Hobby Visions Show in Vegas. Athearn has an Automax and not that I'm big on steam, but Atlas has a cool two-truck Shay on the way.

Not much work on the layout this week. I was tearing out a cinder block wall to make way for a swimming pool. I did spend some time on the computer though, tweaking the track plan and identifying which tracks are concrete tie and which are wood. As I look down at the counter, I see that it's just about ready to roll over to 9000 visitors. Pretty amazing to me anyway. I guess people like reading diaries? I know it's not just me logging on because I've programed the counter to ignore my computer.

I've posted the latest trackplan here. It was a little scary to inventory and price out these things at over $800 with 38 twin-coil switch machines.
10 Kato Unitrack 20-035 Bumper C 2
20 Peco-55 InsulFrog SL-E388F Large Right
12 Peco-55 InsulFrog SL-E389F Large Left
2 Peco-55 InsulFrog SL-E391F Small Right
2 Peco-55 InsulFrog SL-E392F Small Left
1 Peco-55 InsulFrog SL-E395F Medium Right
1 Peco-55 InsulFrog SL-E396F Medium Left
4229" Peco-55 Flex Track (109 Pieces)

My buddy Jake joked about Monday's post and said I would end up with a cornfield meet when I tried to run that many trains. Spoken like a true ex-railroader with a beer keg in his living room!

Today I got an email from Ted York. We've been talking about which tracks on the Pass have concrete ties. His great Cajon Pass layout is featured at his web site.

I spent a lot of time looking at the Cajon Pass layouts of Bill Pearce and Otto Kroutil as featured in the 1999 Model Railroad Planning. I've learned a lot from these two examples, and was especially inspired by Otto's version of the San Bernardino station and yards. With Otto's version as my guide, I developed a new plan for the San Bernardino end of the layout.

This version allows through-trains at San Bernardino, plus fits in a lot of yard tracks as well. Most importantly, it provides an entry into the station that more closely matches the original. I was also inspired to make the UP tracks south of Keenbrook a loop that connects to the Palmdale Cutoff above Silverwood. This will allow a UP train to run continuously and unattended, while the BNSF tracks are run normally. The Metrolink trains also run automatically, so with only one operator, I can easily have three or even four trains running at once.

In the small world category, the other day at work, I went to a demo on an automation project. After the meeting, my wife and I ran into the presenter at the train station. Turns out Tony is a big railfan and was there to get some shots of the trains before he traveled on to the next stop in his road show. Tony is interested in all kinds of power, not just the rolling variety. He was telling me about the Society for Industrial Archeology. The SIA is made up of over 1,800 members, world-wide, who have a strong interest in preserving, interpreting and documenting our industrial past and heritage. This might be something other railfans would be interested in as well.

Okay, so I haven't posted in a while, but I've been pretty busy at work and at home. Sherry told me today I need to spend some time with my trains, and I just might take her up on that. I've got to stay home on Thursday for the dishwasher repairman, so I should try to get to the layout then.

There is a guy named Robby, who calls himself "Mr. MRL" over on TrainOrders. He just hiked up to the top of a hill above Swarthout and took some great photos. You'll need to be registered at TrainOrders to see the photos, but check these

Today I snuck out with some of the guys from the club for a field trip to Riverside to measure and photograph the old buildings. Many of the buildings are being torn down for the redevelopment of the area. Pictured are left to right, Ray, Kevin, me and Hugo. If anyone but our mothers wants to see a larger version of the photo, just click on it.

I'm heading out to the garage soon to knock out some more on the benchwork. Maybe for my birthday next week I'll get a nail gun? I built two four-foot square rolling stages so I can use the area under the layout for storage but still be able to roll the stuff out of the way to get under the layout. If you decide to do something similar, I recommend going to Ikea for the casters because you can get them for half the cost that Home Depot charges.

one-of-issues-with-trackplan-is

one-of-issues-with-trackplan-is

One of the issues with the trackplan is the reverse loops and DCC. There are circuits available that will automatically handle the reversing, and I'll need three of them. The red, blue and green blocks on the layout schematic below will each need reversing circuits. The way they work is by sensing the short circuit that occurs when the metal wheels of the locomotive arcs a gap cut in the wheels. When this is detected, the polarity of the block is reversed. Because metal wheels are key to this system, the block needs to be longer than the longest train, or you need to keep plastic wheels on all the cars. There is a lot of people who say that plastic wheels build more gunk on the tracks and insist on metal wheels for all their cars. I think this makes the train sound like a Pachinco machine rolling down the track. Even so, the shortest block is 14 feet long, so even with metal wheels, I can handle a 14 foot train.



Counting the black block, I've got four power districts on the layout. There are circuits available that let me take one power supply and divide it into four power districts. This is great for the reversing circuits and also means that a short circuit won't cripple the entire layout, just the effected area.



As this graphic shows, I've adjusted the trackplan to angle the area near Summit and Silverwood. This was necessary to allow access to a cabinet on the back wall and to shorten the Mormon Rocks leg of the layout. As it turns out, this made a more prototypical depiction of Summit.

The power districts caused me to think seriously about signals for the layout. Automatic circuits are available to create a prototypical signal operation based upon the power districts. That would have required many, many power districts and I've decided that based upon my style of operating, I'm going to use a simpler signalling system that relies on sensors between the rails. When the train covers the photocell the signal turns red. When the train clears the photocell, the signal turns yellow after a delay (either 10 or 30 seconds). After another delay the signal turns green. The system I'm looking at is by Logic Rail Tech.

back-in-town-but-its-almost-as-hot

back-in-town-but-its-almost-as-hot

Back in town, but it's almost as hot here -- 91 is the high today. Still, I was able to paint the walls "Cajon Tan" which is a little lighter than the brown sandstone floor. I've got some things on the honey-do list, but I hope to start on the benchwork soon. I was going to do a wrap-around backdrop first, but with the double decks, it'll be too dificult to determine where the horizons should be until after the sub-roadbed is down. Once that is done, I can do the wrap-around backdrop.

I figure the sky blue will look great against the tan walls. This composite photo is from the last layout, but it shows what I'm thinking about doing.

I took a full-size print-out of the layout and put it down on the garage floor. This real-life test showed a couple of tweaks that I need to work out, but overall it looks great. Here is the shopping list: 420 feet of flex track (about $1/foot); 7 large right turnouts ($15 each); 10 large left turnouts ($15 each); 16 medium right turnouts ($13.50); 14 medium left turnouts ($13.50); 2 small left turnouts and two small right turnouts ($12 each). Do the math and that's almost a grand!

I would stress over that (and my wife would to), but I have friends who spend thousands on boats or ATVs, or drinking and raising hell. Sherry will always know where I'm at, and I don't know of anyone who has broken an arm or drowned playing trains!