January 1st, 2013

Well, where do I start?
Six months goes by pretty fast when you are beginning a new relationship with a woman. And during that "getting to know someone" period, most things get pushed aside. The layout was no exception. Now that things have settled down a bit with us, I was able to get back into the train room, with a fresh outlook on the layout.
In fact, I've had so much motivation to work on the layout, that almost all of this update was completed in 4 to 6 weeks. Needless to say, there's gonna be a lot of pictures so I'll keep this short and let the captions do the talking.
I jumped around quite a bit while building, but to make it easier to follow, I'll have the pictures go from the helix, around the upper level, and end in staging. So here we go...

 

Upper loop of track installed on the helix and a test train running the loops

 

Detection wired up for helix

 

June Lake passing siding roadbed installed

 

Track glued down and wired for June Lake siding

 

Painting the track

 

South June Lake turnout completed

 

Working on rock quarry spur turnout

 

Slight up and down grade at Bodie, between June Lake and Bridgeport.

 

Gluing down track. Bodie will be located at the far curve.

 

32 car coal train

 

Super elevated curves

 

roadbed glued in

 

Track glued in, painted and wired.

 

Curve around the end of the peninsula starts at 22" radius at left and jumps to a 24" radius where the autoracks are.

 

Continuing spline along the upper level. Town of Bridgeport will be on the left

 

Spline gluing. Bridgeport will be to the right of the center pennisula backdrop.

 

More spline. Walker canyon will start on the right side where the spline ends

 

North (Bridgeport/Sonora) siding turnout template used for alignment

 

Gluing in the spline

 

More spline. Turnout size is close to a #11

 

Getting the siding spline put in. Bridgeport to the left.

 

spacer blocks to keep the siding even with the main

 

22" radius for main, 23 1/4" for siding

 

Only a few more pieces of masonite to glue in and the siding is done

 

Gluing down the homasote for the partial curved turnout at south end siding (not sure if I'll name the siding Bridgeport or Sonora)

 

Homasote for north end (Bridgeport/Sonora) siding

 

Ties glued down

 

Turnout laid, main line track connected

Ties cut, tortoise installed and turnout wired up.

 

Gluing down roadbed for siding first. Town of Bridgeport located to the left where the level is. Eventually there will be 4 or 5 industries to switch.

 

Using 2 layers of the thinner EasyMat for the siding.

 

Its hard to measure but the siding will be around 10 scale inches lower than the main.

 

Gluing down the siding track. I'll leave the track in place for now, but when I come back to locate industries and model Bridgeport, I'll cut out the track and roadbed and hand lay the turnouts where I need them.

 

Gluing the spline for Walker River Canyon. Looking towards Sonora and Bridgeport

 

Walker River Canyon. Opposite direction of above picture. Looking towards staging.

 

Walker River will cross the tracks in the foreground where the blue painted stick is, then meet back up with the tracks and follow them all the way to the backdrop.

 

Risers installed along W.R.C.
Track will rise 1 1/2" along the canyon to Sonora then drop back down before Bridgeport.

 

More risers. Grade reaches summit above and right of the yellow box, then starts dropping at the homasote (at left)

 

Gluing down the supports.

 

Looking through backdrop to Walker River Canyon.

 

Coming from staging through hole in wall. This whole area will be hidden from view, with the June Lake main/siding hidden in a tunnel.

 

Cut out to clear double stack containers.

 

Another view

 

Just barely makes it!

 

New Year's resolution: To update the website more often. =)
This was a lot of work!

 

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