Dan’s been in touch with another missive, which includes a HO scale coal fired power plant:

(You can see the first part here: Northern Pacific railway.)

“Here is the second part of the Inland Pacific Railway We used car cards and switch lists to do the work at the businesses and industries. The finished layout was fully and correctly signaled. We had hand held phones at all yards. We had a time table with the rules of operation and signal indication information.

My part was the scenery design and about 75% of the buildings. He did the electrical and DCC work, track work, and construction.

The first set of photos are a review of the general “floor” plan and track plan as well as the dispatcher desk.

The foot print of all three layers.

The track plan.

The dispatch panel frame I made for the panels.

The finished dispatch panel. Terry (owner of the layout) did all of the hard work. The panel worked just like the prototype.

Close up look. The rows of lights on the left and right are the indicators for the lower storage tracks as well as the run through tracks. The lights on the right side are easier to see.

Simplified schematic.

Cover of the book. It was a multi page booklet.

Signal aspects as it pertained to the layout.

Random photos of the top level. There was as interchange with the B&O RR. Mostly coal for the power plant. To the left you see hopper cars going left. There was mirror strategically placed to make it look as if it went beyond the wall.

If you have ever had to attach a second level you know the issues involved. This photo shows the power plant segment. It had a loop around the power plant. It had a 6 foot section to attach to the wall because we had 30 inch radius track. Terry constructed what amounted to as a spooked wheel with a flat side to the wall.

The power plant. Notice the three stacks. The middle one had a length of all thread from under the building running up through it and up thru the I-beam that supported the floor if the house above. This supported the weight of entire wheel assembly. There was a minimum amount of attachments to the wall.

The coal unload facility for the power plant. I made the pile using a thick mailing tube and cut holes for the coal to fall out. The pile is just cone that I covered with white glue and sprinkled on the coal.. In this case real coal.

Photo 15 A box board plant. Basically card board for packaging. Goods go out to plants that make the boxes.

Photo 16 A large grain elevator. The Walther’s kit plus extensions. Unit trains came in and out of here. The yard in front was for all of the top level locals and switching except the for the coal at the power plant . I usually did this job and it took about 3 hours to do.

This is also a VIEW BLOCK. The upper level trains come from the left after passing through the wall and passing behind (actually through) the elevator. In the next photos I will show more.

Here is a better view of the set up. The building on the left is a tomato condiment plant. The grey building to the left of the elevator is the office. Between them is a slight “peek-a-boo” where you can see the view blocked trains pass.

A better view of the mini scene I did as the “Peek-a-boo” to verify that the trains was indeed there. The dispatcher knew. It was just fun to watch.

The plain grey building at the far right is a freezer storage place. Back in the days before folks had home freezers the rented space to store large amounts of frozen food. I needed a building to hide the hidden track that had not entered the “stage” yet.

After leaving the storage building the hidden track passed under the city scene and behind the rock wall.

The upper level passes through the helix. This is to the left of the elevator and some more industries. There were at least 12 industries to be switched on the upper level.

Photo 23 Just a scene along the way on the upper level.

Photo 22 The “connecting” of the previous photo. The train goes past several industries and at the far end it swings left past the Carnation dry milk plant and back past the B&O interchange. What you don’t see behind the interchange is more hidden track. At the very far end where you can just see a signal crossing is the, now viable track, about to pass behind the Carnation plant to the other side of the layout where the grain elevator awaits.

Photo 25 Local approaching another switching job.

Photo 26 A wider view.

Photo 29 Here is where the upper level hidden track reappears. Out of a tunnel and under a bridge helping to hide the sudden appearance of the trains. The track will continue to eventually the large elevators.

Below is a feed processing plant and to it’s right the track goes to the lower level storage and run through track.

This was a great layout to operate. There was the hump job, dispatcher, the locals, and run through trains to keep things interesting during the operations.

SantaFedan”

A big thanks to Dan for sharing his ho scale coal fired power plant pics.

You can see more of Dan in the Hall of Fame.

That’s all for this time 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

Al

PS More HO scale train layouts here if that’s your thing.

Need buildings for your layout? Have a look at the Silly Discount bundle.