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Guys,
Now that we've sorted out the gauge/scale thing...
I have an open house coming up. Since it is a once a year type thing, I try and get as much of the rolling stock out to the track as possible. However, I would rather not have trains all over the place, so I need to add some temporary capacity. Last year, the addition of a 'dead' yard was very useful for storing the long trains.
Here's Russ doing some switching of a freight train getting it ready on the 'dead yard'
And here's my dinky little yard that's not good for much other than motor storage:
See? A couple USA streamliners, and we're full. Plus, all I have are 10' dia switches and not enough space to not have a problem with S curves:
SO - I am looking for some advice. I have scanned a drawing I made of my schematic.
http://1stclass.mylargescale.com/markoles/Open08/Layout%208-28.doc
They took away autoCAD from me, so I can't draw it all to scale. The heavy black lines are things I cannot move, like the house and a huge tree. The small, red dashed lines are where I built the big temporary yard last year. However, that presented a lot of problems.
1. That temporary yard blocks access to the back yard. The path shown to the left is not wide enough for my wheel chaired guests. Last year, I had about 3 or 4 in chairs. I'd like to be able to accomodate everyone, and this is something easy to fix.
2. The red dashed lines show the location of the temp yard. Here's a pic of Jim's Mallet traversing a set of S curves necessary to miss the hammock posts:
The S curves prevented the passenger train from being parked down in the big temporary yard.
3. In the drawing, I have some blue dashed lines that run from the yard lead along a row of pines. The lower branches of the pines have been removed to the 8-9' level. However, nothing really grows underneath. I was thinking it would be a natural place for train storage.
Some other notes and pictures about the proposed new temporary yard:
The yard lead is a steep downhill.
Any tracks that go the direction I have proposed will have to cross some sort of temporary scaffolding/trackwork to reach the relatively level section.
Switching maneauvers are expected to be fully manual. I do not plan to actually switch with a locomotive.
That side of the yard is the main point of entrance to the whole backyard. Where the yard lead curves is actually a path across in to the backyard. This will create a bottleneck at the other entry point, at end of the small terminal. Last year, I had some 'accidents' with people getting bunched up at those locations. Perhaps some directional signage is warranted "Entrance" "Exit", etc..
Here are the pictures of the area in question I have saved on MLS:
kind of a tree line shot, notice the mainline is about 12" higher than the ground where the locomotive is located.
This cropped shot shows part of the yard lead with the loop:
Right behind the small weber grill is where I'd have to put a switch leading off to the left. See how steep that is? No way I could get away with just laying the track on the ground. Also, I'll have to put up a people barrier for sure.
An option I haven't drawn yet. The bridge is tall enough, and there is space enough underneath, that I could possibly run a second track down underneath. In fact, I had planned to do this and remove the beverage service branch all together:
Please feel free to copy and mark up the document. You can either email it to me or repost it.
I have some switches, and a single crossover that I can use for the project. The dead sections will all be brass track.
Thanks for your time!
Mark
PS. This is your chance to tell me what your plan would be. You know who you are. Anyone of you that shows at my open house and tells me "what I should have done" will be beaten with a woll sock full of dimes!!
Now that we've sorted out the gauge/scale thing...
I have an open house coming up. Since it is a once a year type thing, I try and get as much of the rolling stock out to the track as possible. However, I would rather not have trains all over the place, so I need to add some temporary capacity. Last year, the addition of a 'dead' yard was very useful for storing the long trains.
Here's Russ doing some switching of a freight train getting it ready on the 'dead yard'

And here's my dinky little yard that's not good for much other than motor storage:

See? A couple USA streamliners, and we're full. Plus, all I have are 10' dia switches and not enough space to not have a problem with S curves:

SO - I am looking for some advice. I have scanned a drawing I made of my schematic.
http://1stclass.mylargescale.com/markoles/Open08/Layout%208-28.doc
They took away autoCAD from me, so I can't draw it all to scale. The heavy black lines are things I cannot move, like the house and a huge tree. The small, red dashed lines are where I built the big temporary yard last year. However, that presented a lot of problems.
1. That temporary yard blocks access to the back yard. The path shown to the left is not wide enough for my wheel chaired guests. Last year, I had about 3 or 4 in chairs. I'd like to be able to accomodate everyone, and this is something easy to fix.
2. The red dashed lines show the location of the temp yard. Here's a pic of Jim's Mallet traversing a set of S curves necessary to miss the hammock posts:

The S curves prevented the passenger train from being parked down in the big temporary yard.

3. In the drawing, I have some blue dashed lines that run from the yard lead along a row of pines. The lower branches of the pines have been removed to the 8-9' level. However, nothing really grows underneath. I was thinking it would be a natural place for train storage.
Some other notes and pictures about the proposed new temporary yard:
The yard lead is a steep downhill.
Any tracks that go the direction I have proposed will have to cross some sort of temporary scaffolding/trackwork to reach the relatively level section.
Switching maneauvers are expected to be fully manual. I do not plan to actually switch with a locomotive.
That side of the yard is the main point of entrance to the whole backyard. Where the yard lead curves is actually a path across in to the backyard. This will create a bottleneck at the other entry point, at end of the small terminal. Last year, I had some 'accidents' with people getting bunched up at those locations. Perhaps some directional signage is warranted "Entrance" "Exit", etc..
Here are the pictures of the area in question I have saved on MLS:
kind of a tree line shot, notice the mainline is about 12" higher than the ground where the locomotive is located.

This cropped shot shows part of the yard lead with the loop:

Right behind the small weber grill is where I'd have to put a switch leading off to the left. See how steep that is? No way I could get away with just laying the track on the ground. Also, I'll have to put up a people barrier for sure.

An option I haven't drawn yet. The bridge is tall enough, and there is space enough underneath, that I could possibly run a second track down underneath. In fact, I had planned to do this and remove the beverage service branch all together:

Please feel free to copy and mark up the document. You can either email it to me or repost it.
I have some switches, and a single crossover that I can use for the project. The dead sections will all be brass track.
Thanks for your time!
Mark
PS. This is your chance to tell me what your plan would be. You know who you are. Anyone of you that shows at my open house and tells me "what I should have done" will be beaten with a woll sock full of dimes!!