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Andrew’s garden experiment

“Dear Alastair,

Please find enclosed two pictures of my garden railway experiment.

This project was started when I lost the control of my “Train Room” small as it was.

So I decided to try the garden after watching the wonderfull series of Garden Railway’s by Mark found.

The idea is to construct several modular base boards place them on 40mm dia pvc drain pipe and bury them into the ground.

Hopefully I will be able to source plants which will grow under the base boards to give a nice green background for the trains to run through.

Regards

Andrew”

And now on to the main event. Every now and then a jaw dropping layout comes in. Like Mark’s. Here it is:

“Hi Al. Thanks for the kind words. Here is some more info. Feel free to edit it for size and reader interest.

The layout, physically located in the Las Vegas, NV area is a freelance fictional short line RR “Sweetwater & Thunder Mountain” which shares track rights with the Union Pacific, Southern Pacific and Western Pacific Railroads. The time frame is roughly from the 30’s & 40’s which allows Steam operation through approximately the late 70’s for medium Diesel Power (depending on what I feel like running at different times) The inspiration comes from the Sierra Nevada Mt. Ranges along with the Alaska RR. Lots of tunnels, bridges, granite rock, trees, vegetation, sheer cliffs etc. It has five major towns, Sweetwater, Eagle Mt., Sheridan Yards, Thunder Mt (which is the connecting point to Dunsmuir, CA) Boyd City (hidden) and several whistle stops – Red Rock Station and Camp Carroll. There is an operating turntable and roundhouse in the SW Yards.

The layout is in an area approximately 22’ x 20’ which includes the workshop area. The construction is open grid with risers starting at 4’ and rising to 5’ for track and just over 6.5’ total for scenery. It is basically an around the wall scheme with a free standing 4’ wide peninsula which allows operators to “walk the canyon”. The scenery is all done using plaster cloth over pillows of newspaper and using real rock from my back yard along with some molded and rubber rock. There is one elongated helix and one standard helix both hidden under mountains. Our favorite saying here is “What happens in the Helix, stays in the Helix”.  However, I do have emergency access. I have some guys over and we can actually run timetable operations with a full passenger service in about 6 hours Fast Clock Time or 1 hour real time.

Electrically, there are five control panels located in strategic areas so local switching can be accomplished along with mainline passenger and freight service. Nickel-silver, code 83 rail is used throughout with a minimum 18” radius (this fits the smaller wheel base equipment timeframe) All turnouts are electrically thrown using Tortoise machines and most coupling/uncoupling is done with under track magnets. Control is accomplished using North Coast Engineering, is all radio controlled DCC with hand held throttles. 98% of all motive power is DCC and Sound equipped.

One really cool feature is that the Sweetwater Yards are designed to not only function as an operating yard, but can also be used as a John Allen inspired “timesaver switching puzzle” You’d be amazed at how moving 4 boxcars around into proper locations with a stopwatch running and bring grown men to their knees with exhaustion! Model Railroading is FUN!

Cheers!

Mark”

“Hi Al.

A little update.That wheel of 3mm diode’s.comes in 30 foot wheel I paid oh I think was $3 and free shipping.You see on the strip at the end is two copper tabs. you can solder positive and negative. You can see where to cut the strip.

I cut 3 and attached wires.I used a dead 9 volt battery to power them.The other side of the strip is very sticky if you peel off the paper.I recommend sanding the copper tabs before you solder wires to it.You can cut as many as you like from the strip and also each section has its own 12 volt resistor.You can also desolder each diode off the strip to use for car headlights or other uses.How about lighting for coaches.These wheels come in many colors.

Kim”

That’s all for today folks.

Please do keep ’em coming.

And if today is the day you get started on your layout, the Beginner’s Guide is here.

Best

PS Latest ebay cheat sheet is here.

Thomas’ update

“Alistair – These are pictures of my Mine and the rest so far. You don’t need to publish, just wanted to show you what that river runs through. All the rocks are natural, and the bridges are all hand built using 2 sizes of match sticks.

Thanks again,

Thomas”

“Hi Alastair

A model train tip that will save a lot of frustration: Leave room around your baseboard so you can reach track and rolling stock on top and wiring underneath. In a confined space make an operator hole in the baseboard to achieve the same object. I recently designed a new baseboard and discovered that I would not be able to reach the wiring.

Best wishes

Geoff”

And Thomas has just sent in another update too! Watch this space.

Latest ebay cheat sheet is here.

Best

PS Want three times the content? No ads? And to search through the archives – that’s every post I’ve ever done. You need the Golden Key.

Bob shares more of his DC train layout

“Dear Alastair,

I have written you a few times and submitted some movies of the Leaky Creek railroad. You said that you liked the entrance of one movie where I closed up the loop and started the trains running. I was thinking you might like some photos of how the loop was built as you seem to like instructive material.

I have been in this hobby a long time. You know one way to set up trains is with blocks on DC currant. Two trains can follow each other but the block where one engine is and the block ahead is the one powered at the time. Other blocks can be off. You can set up a block signal wired with a red LED and supply one volt to light this up. When power for the trains is supplied in opposite polarity but forward for that engine, the red led will go off as polarity is reversed and a green aspect can show. Once the train passes, power is shut off the blocks and the red aspect reappears. The low voltage could be left on all the time to illuminate the layout and those nine volt plugs in for telephones and such is a good source of power for non operational layout lighting. Almost everyone has thrown away one of these old transformers at one time or another.

I like building models and painting them. Almost everyone models equipment near where they live and I am no exception. I love the long Alco PA diesels nut we only had two for a demonstration for a year at Montréal. Another interesting engine was a GP 7 diesel I saw one day down by the steel mills, except the end of the engine was missing. One end was like a GM GP7 but the other end had no hood The gP7’s were called geeps in slang but without the hood they were called sweeps, because they were often mated with a GM sw-7 locomotive. These were made from Athearn model kits.

I sent you four more shots of the Hallmark e3/6 diesel I repowered with a Proto 2000 motor. Then there is a photo of a Mallet I modified before and after photo. This was a powerhouse model bought on Ebay. I lost my best friend a few years back but he used to say he would never ride on my railroad because it was all reconditioned junk! The next photos are of the way I built the moveable bridge. I saw someone else make a dutch door idea like this but his was straight and was cut on an angle where it closed where the tracks met.

Picture 003 is of a F3 diesel that came from eBay made by Cox. I carefully cut out the plastic to open the side screens and used wedding veil for screening. I painted ot early CNR colors but the CNR soon found it more economical to use yellow paint instead of the gold leaf they started to use This color scheme did not last very long but I really liked it and so did a lot of other railroad fans. Picture 005-2009, the year was correct when I made these, is of a Bowser 2-10 4 I still nave not completed of an engine used in Toronto, CNR 4100, which was used to push trains up the hill leading north from Toronto. The other engine was my modified mallet, and the cow catcher on the 2-10 4 came from the original mallet engine.

Picture 015ac is painting in progress of an Alco FA engine bought on eBay to match an older train I made of a CNR Via passenger set. The FA models were shorter than the PA models because they did not have a steam generator for passenger trains. However the CNR eventually retired the FA units to light duty passenger service as heavier diesel engines took over the freight business. The SD 30 units are an example in photo picture 20 with the new CNR colors replacing the old green black and yellow.

The rest of the photos I picked try to show how the table is built in sections with the section with the viaduct built on casters and car be opened by using the doorknob and pulling the table out and then pulling the table so that the locating steel rod is free at the end. The wiring for the tracks has a tether with two regular plugs and a wall socket is set up to receive these four wires near the locating pin. The plugs are color coded painted so polarity is respected as my trains only run on DC and no fancy DCC systems are in use. I do not have any models of the CNR turbo trains that ran between Montreal and Toronto but there are models of the turbo trains for sale. Speaking of turbines, about twenty years ago I tried to sell ideas to automobile companies as I always wanted to have turbines in each wheel of my car. When I was a mechanic I found hydraulic power can be used to great advantage and I believe we could use ery small engines to drive pumps and still have cars with lots of power but would be far more economical and efficient.

I hope these photos are of interest to you and you many fans.

Sincerely,

Bob”