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Showing posts from July, 2016

A Few Pictures

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After working on the layout this afternoon, I ran a train to Norway and back. I thought I would share a few pictures showing a train running through the areas that I have recently worked on. This photo shows the train just after crossing Bird Brook and starting to round the curve out of the Norway terminus. The train approaches the camera. Though it is not the best quality photo, I think it gives some realistic heft to the locomotive. The train crosses through what will be a field and prepares to enter the future location of a forest hiding the entrance to staging. I will post about what I did on the layout later .

Hills and Terrain

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I know that I haven't posted much recently, but I did not get to work on the layout much last week. I wasn't particularly busy, it being summer vacation, but I could not get any layout work done for various reasons. However, this morning I was able to make good progress on the layout. I carved and shaped one side of a rise in the land of the third, countryside module and part of the corner module. This rise will eventually cover the entire countryside module except where the track passes through a shallow cut. One of my pet peeves about many layouts is that they are either far to flat or have exaggerated  topographical features, like very steep slopes or deep ravines, when most land areas are dominated by rather gentle topography. I have been guilty of this many times- Most of my previous layout attempts were completely flat. In Maine, however, most of the land is rolling terrain with countless slight rises and depressions in the land, so I have attempted to simulate this on

First Operations

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After test running the layout, I held a brief , informal, operating session with my Dad and Grandfather. The layout took about half an hour to operate informally, and was very enjoyable. It takes about two minutes for a train to operate between two ends of the layout at very slow speeds. We operated a three car train to Norway and spent around twenty to twenty five minutes switching the yard. We left town with a short, two car train. Here are some photos of the operating session. A Grand Trunk Western boxcar is set out at the lumberyard.  The locomotive heads to switch the team track. The locomotive returns from switching the lumberyard. Norway has been switched and the train back to Portland is being made on the passing siding. The train is ready to leave and the crew is taking a break before leaving for the return trip to Portland. The train begins to leave Norway yard. The train has arrived at the end of the layout. Looking

First Run

This morning, I finished laying track with the help of my Dad. An advantage if a smaller layout like mine is that tracklaying can be completed in the span if a few days. I used plain Atlas code 83 flextrack for the track. After tracklaying was completed, I hooked the layout up to a power source and started to test the layout. An alco RS-3, currently primary locomotive, was run back and forth to test to see if the layout would actually work. The video above shows the first test run of the layout. I then put together a train of three cars and ran it from where staging will eventually be located to the town of Norway. The video is broken into three parts for ease of uploading them to the blog. This part of the video shows the train leaving from near the future staging area, running through the countryside module, and entering the corner module. This part of the video shows the train crossing Bird Brook and entering the yard at Norway.  This shows the train coming to a s

Track Plan

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Here is the track plan for my layout. (Click on the image to enlarge it.) Each square represents nine square inches, while a distance of four squares represents a foot. The layout size is approximately nine by eight feet. A staging area will be added later, either in the form of a sector plate or a two track yard. Minimum radius is thirty inches on the mainline, and there are no grades. The two dotted lines that cross the layout represent the joints between the modules. The town module is six feet long, the two outer sides of the corner module are each three feet long, and the third, countryside, module is five feet long.  To anyone reading this who lives in Canada, happy Canada Day!